Toxic Air Pollution Particles Found In Human Brains (theguardian.com) 93
Damian Carrington, writing for The Guardian: Toxic nanoparticles from air pollution have been discovered in human brains in "abundant" quantities, a newly published study reveals. The detection of the particles, in brain tissue from 37 people, raises concerns because recent research has suggested links between these magnetite particles and Alzheimer's disease, while air pollution has been shown to significantly increase the risk of the disease. However, the new work is still a long way from proving that the air pollution particles cause or exacerbate Alzheimer's. "This is a discovery finding, and now what should start is a whole new examination of this as a potentially very important environmental risk factor for Alzheimer's disease," said Prof Barbara Maher, at Lancaster University, who led the new research. "Now there is a reason to go on and do the epidemiology and the toxicity testing, because these particles are so prolific and people are exposed to them." Air pollution is a global health crisis that kills more people than malaria and HIV/Aids combined and it has long been linked to lung and heart disease and strokes. But research is uncovering new impacts on health, including degenerative brain diseases such as Alzheimer's, mental illness and reduced intelligence.
First bottled water, next bottled air (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1)
Close enough? [google.com]
plastic bottles are toxic (Score:1)
Too bad plastic bottles have been proven toxic. Air or water in toxic bottles would be a poor way to evade toxins.
Re: (Score:2)
I need to switch to bottled air. The natural stuff is getting to dangerous.
Ironically, we label bottled water that we store in BPA-infused containers as some kind of safe alternative...
Re: (Score:1)
Most bottled water and reusable consumer plastic water bottles are BPA free. You are far more likely to eat food that has absorbed BPA by eating anything from a metal can than you are from your bottled water.
Re: (Score:2)
Me too. There's an air bottling factory next to the magnetite factory that bottles some amazing stuff.
Just as safe as bottled water.
Re: (Score:2)
* air purifiers, ionizers, filters, humidifiers, dehumidifiers, picture hangers, paper cutters, waffle irons, [striketag]antibacterial gluten-free canned air[/there is no strike tag]
Re: (Score:2)
I'll quit buying their products when I'm dead, then the invisible hand of the market can correct this.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Not to worry. Someone is making money, so it's fine if pollutants kill our brains and bodies. All that matters is the rich get richer with as few impediments as possible.
Moms basement (Score:2, Troll)
Re: (Score:1)
Take the survey [ukradon.org]
Re: (Score:2)
Agreed, many of the posts coming from you fall into this category.
Makes sense (Score:2)
That actually explains a lot.
Correlation does not imply causation (Score:4, Informative)
Almost certainly a factor, if not the cause (Score:5, Interesting)
Frankly, we haven't done a good job managing pollution. Not enough research - generally because entrenched interests fight attempts to do the research. And too much partisan politics involved. Issue got pegged as liberal vs conservative rather than healthy vs non-healthy
Re: (Score:1)
The dirty little secret is that majority rule causes brain damage...
Re:Almost certainly a factor, if not the cause (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: Almost certainly a factor, if not the cause (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Problem is that those areas have generally poor levels of health and healthcare anyway, and people don't live long enough to see the expected effects. If it brings on problems 10 years earlier but the subject dies of something else first...
It's very difficult to do controlled studies on humans like this, which is why mice are often used. Also, you don't have to wait decades to see the results in mice.
Democracy Always Fails To Avoid Social Problems (Score:2)
Democracy is really good at promising welfare and benefits for individuals, because those vote in groups, but not for avoiding actual problems, which will inconvenience someone.
Think about what must be done to reduce air pollution: someone must give up their cars, or not get one, or have them be too expensive; somebody's imports must cost more because we limit sea shipping; someone will have their dreams dashed because they cannot engage in landfill-producing or energy-intensive practices to launch their in
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1)
Democracy has the same purpose every government structure has, keeping the majority from revolting while the elite remain elite and live off their labors.
Instead of divine right, we must now accept this because it's the "will of the people." As the libertarian political theorist and economist Rothbard put it,
The intellectual arguments used by the State throughout history to “engineer consent” by the public can be classified into two parts: (1) that rule by the existing government is inevitable, absolutely necessary, and far better than the indescribable evils that would ensue upon its downfall; and (2) that the State rulers are especially great, wise, and altruistic men—far greater, wiser, and better than their simple subjects. In former times, the latter argument took the form of rule by “divine right” or by the “divine ruler” himself, or by an “aristocracy” of men. In modern times, as we indicated earlier, this argument stresses not so much divine approval as rule by a wise guild of “scientific experts” especially endowed in knowledge of statesmanship and the arcane facts of the world. The increasing use of scientific jargon, especially in the social sciences, has permitted intellectuals to weave apologia for State rule which rival the ancient priestcraft in obscurantism. For example, a thief who presumed to justify his theft by saying that he was really helping his victims by his spending, thus giving retail trade a needed boost, would be hooted down without delay. But when this same theory is clothed in Keynesian mathematical equations and impressive references to the “multiplier effect,” it carries far more conviction with a bamboozled public.
The government merely takes from one group to give to another, usually benefiting the rulers:
State power, as we have seen, is the coercive and parasitic seizure of this production—a draining of the fruits of society for the benefit of nonproductive (actually antiproductive) rulers. While social power is over nature, State power is power over man.
Replacing The State (Score:1)
Sounds about right. But we need some form of leadership; what replaces the State?
Re: (Score:2)
The current system where there is a s
The Differences Between Parasites And Leaders (Score:1)
I would not mind this, if our leaders were also good and took only a reasonable amount. Instead, they take almost everything, and they seem to be some combination of incompetent, perverse, pathological, megalomaniac, and deranged.
A parasite takes for itself and gives back only as much as it has to; a leader serves the interest of the civilization, which he sees as bound up with his own success.
Re: (Score:2)
You are making poor assumptions about it being a zero sum game.. Specifically, you are assuming that what we do now is the best we could possibly do.
We don't need to "give up" cars, we could switch to less polluting cars. Doesn't even have to be electrical, just smaller ones.
We can EASILY limit our impact WITHOUT being anti-indivualistic. All you need to do is set up well designed taxes and laws and ENFORCE them.
A simple carbon tax applied universally would drive the price of more polluting methods - i.e
Re: (Score:2)
Just look at what the NSA was doing, geeks knew about the FBI programs in the 90's, they knew where the tech was and could "follow the money" so to speak. Assuming the NSA
Re: (Score:1)
I'm glad how far we've come since Nixon created the EPA. Back then we had rivers catching on fire. Lead in gasoline and detectable on the side of the road - easily. Smog. Fish floating to the surface of the Potomac river that flows by Washington. Bad times. Used to be you wouldn't swim in the Hudson by NYC. Now you can.
I think we have a ways to go, however.
Chemtrails! (Score:3)
Right? :)
He's Not Trolling (Score:1)
He's a bug chaser [beyondpositive.org].
Spoiler Alert! (Score:3, Insightful)
When you look at first world rates of cancer/Alzheimers, is this really surprising? Like, at all?
SOMETHING out there is causing it, and writing it off as a "disease of age" isn't going to bring us any closer to a solution.
Takes me back to my time working at a paint store. The company went to great lengths to make their paint formulas as environmentally safe and healthy (as low VOC) as possible for the environment/customer.
Try and tell that to the customer, though... and the response was always "that sh!t don't work" or "that sh!t don't hold up" gimme the "good stuff". We also need to convince people that this is something worth fighting/changing our ways for.
Maybe the evidence that all this pollution and who-knows-what-the-hell-else is actually showing up in our brains will be the push people need.
Re: (Score:2)
And at the end of all the low VOC and gluten free shit... you're going to die, just like everyone else
But more comfortably, due to better lung function. So no, not just like everyone else. Better.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
The only way is to ban the bad stuff, otherwise people will just act selfishly as often as not. It's human nature.
Re: (Score:2)
Given that those environmental agencies came to exist because the free market was doing the opposite when unregulated I doubt that very much.
"Unfortunately, it is hamstrung by "environmental agencies" that permit corporations to pollute without consequences."
Unfortunately the issue is complicated by the fact that both this AND what I said above are true. The free market has taken control of environmental agencies, the result being intentionaly flawed
Re: (Score:2)
Translation: I don't like what science says, so I'll declare them "progressives" and that way I don't have to use my very small neural capacity to try to come up with an actual critique.
Re: (Score:2)
Translation: I don't like what science says, so I'll declare them "progressives" and that way I don't have to use my very small neural capacity to try to come up with an actual critique.
Oh look. A progressive calling people that disagree stupid. So...... original.
Re: (Score:2)
I have no idea what "progressive" means. What I do know is that people who just discard research simply because they're contrarians or don't like what the research points to are indeed, for lack of a better word, stupid. You don't like the term,. then stop being stupid.
Re: (Score:2)
Oh look. A progressive calling people that disagree stupid. So...... original.
I agree that "progressives" didn't start this.
Re: (Score:2)
Progressive, conservative, liberal, it doesn't matter.
Calling people who disagree with you stupid isn't the signature of any political faction. It's a signature of human nature.
Look on the brtight side (Score:2)
When a zombie eats your brain you can take some satisfaction from knowing that he's going to die. Again.
Nuclear Testing. (Score:3)
I'm sure all those nuclear tests and all that nuclear material that got blasted into the upper atmosphere has had NO effect on humanity. I am also sure that the underwater detonations in the ocean had no effect either.
Re: Nuclear Testing. (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Not sure about that but I would not doubt anything anymore. I know it wasn't good for us. And since the half-life on some radiation is measured in thousands of years.
Re: (Score:1)
The whole planet is radioactive, the the universe outside is even more so.
Those tests almost certainly had no lasting effect, the amounts of material was minute. The average life time consumption of bananas will outstrip any effect of any radioactive waste you will encounter in your lifetime. Unless you expose yourself on purpose.
I am Swedish and I remember when Chernobyl went pop, it was forbidden to sell meat where the winds spread radioactive dust. In the end though, no increase in cancer has been measur
Wait and see (Score:1)
effect can't be too dramatic (Score:2)
If the effect were strong, it would have been picked up by epidemiological studies long ago. There are much more pressing medical issues that require reducing particulate emissions, which is why many countries have already cleaned up their act: http://www.nasa.gov/topics/ear... [nasa.gov]
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
Heavy long range battery cars are worse than ICE on PM.
"Non-exhaust sources account for 90% of PM10 and 85% of PM2.5 from traffic."
http://www.sciencedirect.com/s... [sciencedirect.com]
That is average, but if you take performance cars with excessive acceleration capability and soft tires, PM emissions are increasing drastically due to acceleration. It may get worse than some "clean diesel" economy car.
Re: (Score:2)
No, it wasn't picked up "long ago". The article you point to shows research since the 2000's, doesn't talk about magnetite, and shows weak associations after people specifically looked for this effect. So, the effect may be real, but it can't be all that strong, otherwise it would have shown up much earlier.
Ultrafine particulate matter in general (Score:1)
Re: (Score:1)
Actually, the fact that a chemical is found in your body doesn't necessarily mean it can be found in your brain, because the blood-brain barrier selectively allows some chemical groups into the brain and rejects others (I don't think magnetite nanoparticles would be accepted, but they might be actively transported across, or I might just be wrong).
I don't think it's
Found, now what? (Score:3)
So toxic particles are in our brains, how do we get them out, chelating?
Re: (Score:2)
Got the following from here: http://articles.mercola.com/si... [mercola.com]
Your body has a system to efficiently remove mercury and other heavy metals, as long as your detoxification system is working properly. The problem is, many have one that's broken, and one of the principal causes is inflammation. Your genetic makeup is another factor.
The glutathione system is your body's main detoxification system. Glutathione binds to heavy metals, but it doesn't do it alone, it requires the assistance of enzymes, antioxidants,
Re: (Score:2)
Mercola spends his time peddling new-age-sounding and medical-sounding fraud. Trusting him is like trusting Enron on running an electrical grid.
Re: (Score:2)
Interesting. Thanks.
From other reading, it does seem that there's a lot of potential positives to trying to supplement/strengthen your body's glutathione system though. Its not as simple as taking Glutathione orally as it doesn't get absorbed so consider alternatives, such as taking it nasally or supplementing the inputs to your own glutathione production.
Re: (Score:2)
"Mercola" is the technical Latin term for 'complete shit'.
Re: (Score:2)
So toxic particles are in our brains, how do we get them out, chelating?
An extremely through colon cleanse.
laser printer nanoparticles (Score:2)
Makes you wonder how bad the health effects of indoor laser printer pollution will turn out to be. The toner nanoparticles are much more dense in operation than people realize. See serious academics:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pm... [nih.gov]
http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/wp-co... [nih.gov] "Effects of Laser Printer–Emitted Engineered Nanoparticles on Cytotoxicity, Chemokine Expression, Reactive Oxygen Species, DNA Methylation, and DNA Damage: A Comprehensive in Vitro Analysis in Human Small Airway Epithelial Cells, Macrophage
EM sensitivity explained? (Score:2)
Any chance that EM sensitivity is really caused by magnetic particles in the sufferer's brain?
One pre-mortem way to look for evidence is to see if there's a correlation between length of time spent in zones of high air pollution and complaint severity. Heck, if magnetite is found in the brain, then it must be in the blood stream, too, and other tissues as well. There's potentially some serious science to be done here.
While correlation is not causation (Score:2)
language, counts. (Score:2)
I hope, we don't, run out of commas.