Grassroots Science

Lynn Zender posted a series of valuable resources on solid waste management and dumpsite health risk studies in rural Alaska as a comment here on the other site Biocultural Sciences. Because comments from there don’t get noted here, I’m making a post to bring these resources to your attention.

• Adverse birth outcomes associated with open dumpsites in Alaska Native Villages

Lynn mentions SWAN

• “Solid Waste Alaska Network, Solid Waste Management (SWM) for Alaska Native Villages.” http://www.ccthita-swan.org/main/index.cfm

I thought I had referred folks to SWAN which is a highly useful discussion site and resource. My apologies because it is very well done. The site is sponsored by CCTHITA (Central Council of the Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska)

After 15 good years, the Dog Who Smiles (Tewa terrier, from Española to Bethel) developed kidney disease. Among her contributions to innumerable neighbor kids, alpaca camp, her cat, and myself, she left just as the swallows were arriving. For the first time I could put up a bird box, jerryrigged but evidently acceptable.

The box is placed on the north side of the house to keep it from getting too hot. There is a hinge so I can clean the box after the birds leave, about the 2nd or 3rd week in July (keeps pests and parasites down for next year.) I still don’t know why the birds start so many nests in different boxes and why so many birds try to build in the same box. It’s also hard to tell who the parents are supposed to be as there seems to be more than one pair involved with this box. I recorded the sounds from the box and the approaching adults, but it is tedious to edit so will provide a link later.

The mud swallows come later than these swallows which are among the earliest birds to arrive and they therefore leave about 2 weeks later. I once had the mud swallows build in a hole in the west wall of the house, but only that once.

For some reason, I and others around town have noticed fewer birds, big and little, than in years past. It’s not just because people build on the tundra or fill in the ponds or drive too fast on the dirt roads. Maybe it is just this colder spring.

Sanitation is important to birds and other animals like us. Click on these images to see the larger versions.

This bird is carrying out the fecal sack from the nest. I used the binoculars one time to watch as one adult arrived. The adult inside the box deftly turned and neatly defecated the anuk bag so the arriving adult could take it away.

Fecal bag. When I have been watching, the birds will take the sack out of sight behind the neighbors, towards the tundra pond (”naturally constructed wetlands system”)

Fecal splat. The usual kind of bird dropping.

part of the Toilets and trash in the Last Frontier (Alaska) (Pool) at Flickr

Site Search Tags: swallows, birdnest, WatSan, honey+bucket, migration, science+project, housekeeping, tundra

I’ve argued for a long time based on water quality that we should turn the issue of sanitation on its head [turn the head on its head, so to speak]– forget about a flush sewer system but instead examine how to get and maintain water which is clean enough for what we need it for. Why waste scarce and precious and energy-intensive drinking water to remove urine and feces when we need clean water for cooking, drinking, and washing hands? It may be that a piped system is best for a community or household, but let’s prove it.

http://sanitationupdates.wordpress.com/2008/06/17/latrines-trounce-toilets/

Newswise ­

While Americans may consider flush-and-forget-it indoor plumbing to be the pinnacle of sanitary science, the lowly latrine could be a far better solution for many parts of the developing world, say researchers at Michigan Technological University.

…University’s Sustainable Futures Institute analyzed worldwide barriers to sanitation. … a scarcity of clean drinking water is not as big an issue as one might expect.

In fact, installing water-guzzling appliances such as toilets can actually promote unsanitary conditions when the effluent is discharged untreated into once-clean rivers and streams. A properly built latrine, on the other hand, keeps sewage safely separate from drinking water.

“Our challenge has been to look at what interventions make the most difference,” Watkins said. Their findings show that small changes can be more important in preserving health than big engineering projects, a fact that Watkins, an engineer, relates with some consternation. “As engineers, we like to build stuff. But handwashing is really important, too,” he said. “Even a simple thing like not dipping your hand into the water pot can make a big difference.”

Site Search Tags: watsan, water, toilets, dry+sanitation, sustainable,
, sanitationupdates.wordpress.com
YKAlaska, Grassroots Science, Bumsted

Just in the past couple of weeks, some of those in Bethel got appalled at the number of plastic grocery bags they have trapped in the bushes around the city dump [ Massive trashy tundra clean up effort planned]

Beautiful Bethel beaches (Sadowski & Froehlich) is the same city that refused to ban the little fly-by-nights a couple of years ago because a few folks ordering delivery lunch wanted them. This is the same public works that ordered new dumpsters that are too tall for folks to use, especially children. This is the same landfill, adjacent to the giant septic pond unlined sewage lagoon, which for years did not use daily cover; the same dump/pond which feeds the gulls and the ravens all year round.

see related entries–

• solid+waste
• Manuals Available to Assist Communities with Solid Waste Planning and Education
• Take ugly butts home
• Interim rural solid waste management IV
• Toilets and Trash sanitation in the frontier
• Solid waste management in emergencies
• SWMP flying anuk
• Trash money available SWMP
• SWMP EPA grants
• Trash into electricity– Tactical biorefinery

China targets plastic bags http://link.latimes.com/r/0Q7X8Z/A75RX/S1MZ9L/6245/NPR1J/LE/h
By Mark Magnier
A ban on the thinnest goes into effect in June. Some wonder how effective it will be.

Earth Matters: Bags don’t have to be ubiquitous
Mona Blaber | The New Mexican1/25/2008 - 1/26/08

Last summer, I decided to go bag-neutral. Armed with a mountain of sacks from previous purchases, I vowed never to take another bag.

It went well until I actually bought something. I walked into a salon intending to buy just a brush and walked out with a brush, two jumbo bottles of shampoo and conditioner and one plastic bag. Before the day was out, I slipped up again, forgetting until it was too late that a Subway sandwich means a plastic bag unless you speak up.

Plastic bags are convenient and difficult to avoid; conservation groups estimate that between 80 billion and 100 billion are given to consumers every year in the United States. Those 100 billion bags require about 12 million barrels of oil to manufacture and take up to 1,000 years to break down. Standard plastic bags don’t biodegrade. They photodegrade, … Even when properly disposed of, the sacks can fly away and sully the landscape. In South Africa, where they’re now banned, they’re so ubiquitous as litter they’re called the national flower…

The industry also argues that plastic bags are more environmentally friendly than paper, because paper uses trees and requires more energy in manufacture and transport, which is true, according to a study by the Institute for Lifecycle Environmental Assessment. That’s the point: If we use our own bags, we don’t need either. Paper and plastic both use precious resources and energy, contributing to carbon emissions and climate change. [...]

http://www.santafenewmexican.com/HealthandScience/Bags_don_t_have_to_be_ubiquitous

Old shipping crates reborn as Taloyoak garbage bins
Last Updated: Friday, January 25, 2008 CBC News

A Nunavut community has found an innovative use for discarded wooden crates from barge shipments: make them into badly needed garbage bins for residents… Covers on the new bins prevent ravens and dogs from getting into people’s garbage, a major problem… [...]

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/north/story/2008/01/25/tal-boxes.html?ref=rss

Powered by Zoundry

Maryn McKenna who provided valuable references to historical pandemic flu (1918-1919), is currently working on a book about Methicillin-resistant staph infections, MRSA.

• More historical resources (Brevig Mission)

She’s using a web log for her research. This allows us to track some of the latest research findings through her, but also allows interaction with readers as she is developing the book.

• Superbug http://drugresistantstaph.blogspot.com/

This blog is the virtual whiteboard for my new book, SUPERBUG: The Rise of Drug-Resistant Staph and the Danger of a World Without Antibiotics, coming in 2009 from Free Press. Whether you’re a MRSA researcher or a MRSA victim — or simply a major disease geek — I’m interested in your leads, thoughts, comments and stories. Watch this space for drafts and details as SUPERBUG moves forward.

I’m a freelance writer and author specializing in public health, medicine and health policy. I write features for national magazines and news stories for an infectious-disease website. In addition to this new book about the rise of drug-resistant staph around the world, I’m working on a multi-year research project on emergency room overcrowding and stress. … I’m interested in hearing from researchers, victims and disease geeks; all tips, thoughts, leads and personal stories are welcome. For more about me, check my website in the blogroll, along with other important sites about public health and disease. Let’s get started.

MRSA is now part of our tundra environment, along with various respiratory diseases (RSV, pneumonias) and skin infections (impetigo). This makes us part of the larger world– which we have been, of course, although some readers of the Anchorage Daily News seem blinded to the concept (Respiratory infections in Bush raise alarm : comments). MRSA is an example of evolution, an inadvertent selection by the medical system against the more benign or easier to kill (therefore less dangerous) microbes by killing them off with antibiotics. This allows the resistant microbes to take over. It also allows the resistant microbes to live outside the healthcare system in the community.

See previous posts,

• 3 things everyone should know to prevent pandemic flu, MRSA, RSV, pink-eye
• clean-hands-week-how-will-you-celebrate/ (and references)
• surviving-the-new-killer-bug-mrsa/
• give-germs-the-boot-not-your-baby

It would be interesting to apply some of the understanding about MRSA to that of the higher rate of infectious diseases related to sanitation in our region. Inadequate clean water supplies are part, but not all, of the problem suggested by the recently published study. The region focussed on in the research is also served by just one health corporation which in the past, at least, has used antibiotics freely.

• Increased Health Risk Associated with Lack of In-home Running Water
  http://www.cdc.gov/od/oc/media/pressrel/2008/r080401.htm
• CDC STUDY: Villages that have to haul water have higher illness rates 2008
  http://www.adn.com/life/health/story/363026.html
• Alaska study links bad plumbing, disease. Published: Feb. 28, 2006 http://www.upi.com/NewsTrack/Business/2006/02/27/alaska_study_links_bad_plumbing_disease/7842/

Also,

• Staph. aureus and MRSA in Alaska

It’s not just steambaths and high school wrestling mats. As a couple of people have found in Bethel, even bumping a knee can be dangerous.

• http://tundramedicinedreams.blogspot.com/2006/11/steambath-boil.html
• http://tundramedicinedreams.blogspot.com/2006/09/boils-101-workshop-for-health-aides.html

Medical photos from DermNet of Cellulitis
Furuncles Carbuncles (boils)
Staphylococcal Folliculitis (boils)

Site Search Tags: MRSA, staph, Maryn+McKenna, evolution, antibiotic, resistance, superbug, handwashing, hygiene, hospital, antimicrobial, disinfect, epidemiology, environment, rural+health, Bethel, CDC, lung, ADN.com, steam+bath, Yukon+Kuskokwim, staph, septicemia, blood+poisoning, boils

Hands should be washed for 20 seconds, at least. That’s very hard for many adults to time, so it is suggested to sing Good Morning to You (royalty free) or Happy Birthday twice. See previous, Song to time hand washing for hygiene and disease prevention

A young friend of mine and her younger brother helped me record this version of the birthday song in Yup’ik Eskimo. Total playing time is 20 seconds (mp3 file).

• The file Yupik_HBday0049.mp3 identified by urn:sha1:KPQRDRWNTGAC5FPTO7JT5KRSZZROMVTG is licensed to the public under the Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported license.
• Happy Birthday song in Yup’ik Eskimo. Click to play in your browser or right click to download and play (mp3)

Site Search Tags: hands, handwashing, song, mp3, Yup’ik, children, hygiene, timer, Central Eskimo, Alaska, birthday, Kuskokwim, schools

Once again, babies are sick, but this time in the YK Delta. Inflammation can lead to scarring of lungs; high fevers can stop children’s bone and tooth growth for a short while; other infections may take advantage of weaknesses.

• Give germs the boot, not our babies: unwashed hands make everyone sick (see comments and post)

[revised 1] and not just for babies–

Virus that struck Our Island Home no longer concern
Nantucket Independent, USA -
10, four of the home’s residents, aged 71 to 96, are believed to have succumbed to respiratory syncytial virus, a virus so common most children have been [...] http://www.nantucketindependent.com/news/2008/0220/Other_news/007.html

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Virus hits Western Alaska children hard, ALEX DeMARBAN, Tundra Drums
February 19, 2008 at 4:55PM AKST

State health officials are warning Alaskans to scrub hands frequently to help stem a nasty respiratory illness that’s walloping children in Western Alaska.

Health-care providers said they believe more than 82 children have contracted respiratory syncytial virus, known as RSV, in the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta since Jan. 1. At least 47 children have been hospitalized, according to a written statement from the state Department of Health and Social Services.
…
More than one-fourth of RSV-infected infants and young children develop bronchial inflammation or pneumonia, according to physicians. Recoveries may take two weeks or more.

The Bethel-region hospital, the Yukon-Kuskokwim Health Corp., has flown some children to Anchorage hospitals because beds overflowed with sick youngsters [...]

• http://thetundradrums.com/news/show/1499

[revised 2] At http://aprn.org/2008/02/20/y-k-virus-targets-infants/ you can hear that this year’s RSV is the worst since 1995 (presumably number of cases) and that RSV in our region is not seasonal but nearly a year-round infection. There hasn’t been any mention of the implication of lack of local hospital beds for pandemics or serious epidemics such as seasonal influenza.

It is difficult to change one’s habits but it can be done. See these posts and comments for further references and suggestions

• Sanitizers — Handwashing
• Kung-fu-choo Do it in your sleeve
• Song to time hand washing for hygiene and disease prevention
• Baby care handwashing
• Why cover sneezes?

Site Search Tags: RSV, pneumonia, bronchitis, hands, handwashing, respiratory, bed+capacity, YKHC, Yukon, Kuskokwim, Tundra+Drums, seasonal, babies, infants, virus, APRN.org, preparedness

Testing confirms Seinfeld phobia: Double dippers turn dip into bacterial soup
Canoe.ca - Toronto,Ontario,Canada
By Helen Branswell, Medical Reporter, THE CANADIAN PRESS

Seems the famous Seinfeld episode was right - double-dipping does transfer mouth microbes…

The research was done under Clemson’s creative inquiry program, which teaches undergraduates how to conduct research while encouraging outside-the-box thinking.

Teams made up of students at various points in an undergraduate degree set out to explore interesting ideas, often producing scientific journal-worthy results in the process.

(An earlier effort by Dawson’s students tested the five-second theory** - the notion that no significant transfer of germs occurs if dropped food is retrieved immediately. Their conclusion? You may move fast, but microbes move faster.)

read the disgusting details here

• http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/WeirdNews/2008/02/01/4808181-cp.html

** in England this is related to the “jambootie law” — the jambootie cookie always falls jam side down.

Lynne asks how old a baby can be before a caregiver (or stranger) cuts back on frequency of handwashing before touching the child.

I haven’t kept up with the latest pediatric advice. I would check with a doctor first or the university extension program, especially about a specific baby. Surprisingly, this is another topic difficult to locate specifics for implementation. I suspect the information needed (with supporting documentation) is there, just locked behind subscriptions and as an unfunded person I can’t get to it.

Lynne’s question is really about assessing risk. Here are general guidelines.

• Age-related development terms are: Newborns or neonates are under 1 month old; Infants or babies are usually 3 months to 18 months; toddlers 12-2 years
• Situation posed by Lynne is likely–
  “Normal” or routine baby maintenance
  involving some strangers and family
  with or without other babies around
  We aren’t talking about neonates (newborn) nor day care and play groups nor nurseries. We aren’t speaking of health care providers (who are exposed to many ill people).

In general, my guess would be 18 months is an age when others can resume everyday handwashing, certainly no sooner than 12 months or whenever infants can get around on their own (crawling or scooting). Their immune system should be in good shape then. If I remember my development biology correctly, babies get some immunity protection from their mothers for the first few months, while they switch over to their own developing system. However, getting born is a shock. Babies even experience a growth suppression then growth spurt. A lot is going on with them, so hand hygiene by others is important.

I would think there are three four main considerations–
* everyone should practice good hygiene (not excessive germ phobia) because as people we share our environment This includes keeping the living areas clean and dry.
* babies usually have pretty intimate contact with others (diapers, kissing, sharing food, sharing toys, mouthing everything) so others need to be aware of how they transmit germs to babies (don’t share chewed food or teething toys, for example)
* babies are developing their own immune systems. They need exposure to the normal environment, but intense exposure or exposure to contaminated environments can overwhelm.
* if you live in a community with an ongoing outbreak of salmonella, listeria, RSV, pneumonia, TB, norovirus, etc. and / or difficult access to clean water, then be extra vigilant with hand hygiene. see related, Give germs the boot, not our babies: unwashed hands make everyone sick

As babies get older, regular hand hygiene *by everyone* should be sufficient (by everyone is the key) for simple contact with the baby. That is, wash hands after bathroom use, after food preparation, after returning home from work, after contact sports, after petting the cow, etc.

I’m not real happy with this answer because I think it is too general. However, I’ll keep looking. I don’t really trust a lot of those new baby books either, but I don’t have access to their science to evaluate them. If anyone runs across a better suggestion, please let us know.

Protecting Against Flu - Infant Care
http://www.cdc.gov/flu/protect/pdf/infantcare.pdf

for hcw (health care workers) http://www.cec.health.nsw.gov.au/campaigns/cleanhandssavelives/documents/FAQ020207.pdf

Site Search Tags: handwashing, baby, neonate, newborn, toddler, hygiene, risk, childcare, caregiver

Influenza and Personal Protective Respiratory Equipment

The Council of Canadian Academies was asked by the Government of Canada to undertake an assessment on the modes of transmission of influenza and the contribution of respirators or surgical masks towards inhibiting the spread of the virus.

Question: How and where is influenza (both seasonal and pandemic) transmitted? Based on the conclusions of this review, what is the contribution that N95 respirators or surgical masks will make in the prevention of transmission of influenza?

in pdf file format
The Complete Report (0.98 mb)
Report in Focus (235 kb)
News Release (102 kb)

• http://scienceadvice.ca/influenza.html

Site Search Tags: PPE, masks, Canada, review, influenza, sneeze, handwashing, business