Portugal's New Solar Plant

This post is based off the BBC article:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6505221.stm

Portugal has now opened the most powerful solar power plant in the world, which creates enough energy to power 8000 homes. This translates to 30,000 tons of green house gases eliminated if fossil fuels were used for the same amount of power. It has created development and jobs in one of Portugal's poorer regions. Portugal is set to invest $10 billion in renewable energy and has a goal of 45% of it power consumption from renewable resources by 2010.

Imagine the impact if more countries had goals such as these and really had a vested interest in renewable resources. Moreover imagine the health impact of eliminating thousands of tons of green house gases. Clean sources such as wind and solar energy would have a particularly large impact in countries, such as China, that currently have a heavy reliance on coal. Investing in these sort of resources should be a goal for countries. Furthermore, there should be a partnership among countries working together to develop viable "green" energy sources, especially in developing countries--making sure that they do not make the same mistakes that the developed nations have done.

Individual

Later today I will be presenting my individual oral report (my last powerpoint presentation in the semester. yeay!), which I hope all of you will enjoy. Since we are focusing and monitoring, surveillance, and preparedness this week, I chose an article that outlines some important aspects that must be met when setting up a successful global monitoring system, with the focus being on creating a "gold standard" in which to give global reports. Moreover when receiving data on other countries, it is necessary to question if any of the data is skewed or incorrect in any ways. My article noted that in countries like Oman and Honduras, there was over a 100% smear positive when testing for TB. Obviously having over 100% is not plausible. So why are statistics like this being reported on the WHO, a primary resource for researchers, governments, and people world wide. There needs to be an effort to make data viable and comparable so the right allocation of resources, aid, and interventions can be disseminated among various countries.

And this is a touch of what I will be discussing today. Enjoy!

Star Wars, Robots, Ethics, and Health.

Since we are talking about technology and global health this week, this article popped up just at the right time:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/6425927.stm

It basically says that a robots ethical code is being drawn up in South Korea and will be instated later this year. This is to prevent abuse between humans and robots and robots and humans.

Being the huge Star Wars dork that I am, when I think robots, I think the two droids C-3PO and R2D2. Their versatility is boundless. They can speak and translate millions of languages and fix almost every sort of machinery. To think that this technology is at the cusp of emerging is truly exciting. When I think about robots from a health perspective I think of the medic droids used in Star Wars. Everything from Luke getting a new bionic hand to helping Padme give birth was done with medic droids. The BBC article said that "a recent government report forecast that robots would routinely carry out surgery by 2018." In 11 years I could be getting knee surgery by a robot. My doctor wouldn't run the risk of being contaminated with my blood, people could be delegated to other tasks to make a hospital run more efficiently, and the programmed function of the robot would make the surgury accurate. This report also noted the aging population of South Korea. Imagine the benefit for aging populations worldwide if they could receive adequate medical care from the comfort of their own homes. The risk of catching an additional infection while at the hospital would substantially decrease, there would be more beds available for emergency situations, and there would be no need to transport the elderly (especially those that would be particularly feeble) and run the risk of them falling while being transported from place to place.

The concept of robots being prevalent in society really does sound like something straight out of a sci-fi film, but when used ethically, there's so many benefits to be asertained. In this day when technology rapidly progresses, I think it is a good thing that ethical matters are brought at the forefront now, rather than later. As many of us in the public health sector believe, prevention is key to ensuring a healthy future.

Adieu 105.1 K-mozart...

A sad sad thing has happened for classical music fans in LA. K-mozart, which was formerly an excellent classical music station, has shut down. It baffles me that such a large metropolitan area can't sustain a radio station such as this. I suppose it can't compete with the mass market commercial radio stations anymore.

This led me to ponder what happens when corporations infiltrate the market of foreign countries. How many countless gems have been lost amidst McDonalds and Nike. It's not that I'm against globalization. I think being able to share and interact with other cultures is amazing. So much new knowledge and interesting facets about the lives of other people can be relayed in the blink of an eye, but what are we missing out on? Moreover, what are we taking away. Are we a generation that is trying to homogenize the people of the globe? And to what extent will the impact of this have on future generations of other countries. They say that "times change and people change". This is a very real prospect, but the real question is, where do you draw the line. There is no way to stop globalization and in many ways globalization adds a lot to society, such as creating global awareness of pressing needs in other countries, but I think it's absolutely pertinent to remember this: when we enter other countries we need to remember that we are guests of that country and we need to be courteous and respectful of the people and their culture. It doesn't matter if we're entrepreneurs or health workers, we need to be mindful of whose space we are encroaching on.

And going back to the travesty of my lack of K-Mozart, at least I can take solace in the last remaining FM classical music station in the Los Angeles area, KUSC.

An Inconvenient Truth

I'm really glad Dr. Shahi suggested that those who haven't yet seen Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth to watch it. That movie does a good job at relaying the potential impact global warming may have on the entire earth. Moreover, he clearly illustrates how pressing the matter is. When seeing a movie that is this moving and well done, it really makes me wonder what it would've been like had Al Gore won the presidency (like he was suppose to).

The environment has a tremendous impact on the health of the population. I suppose it's too late to think about "what if's". We may never know how much the deterioration of the environment impacted the strength in hurricane Katrina, but what we do know is that the effects of global warming are becoming something very tangible to any person. Earlier last week I made a presentation in Dr. Palmer's class, PM 566: China, a country in transition. The article I made my presentation on was regarding projections of the impact of air pollution under various energy scenarios in Shanghai, China for the years 2010 and 2020. Under these energy scenarios the situation with the most stringent environmental rules prevented the most deaths, diseases, and hospital visits. And the preventable numbers all ascended accordingly with how stringent the environmental rules were.

I would just like to close with this final article (yes, once again from BBC. I tend to frequent that site often). http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/6315885.stm This article reports that by 2070, Sydney can become unhospitable to be lived in. To me, that is frightening. Especially since Australia and the US are the only 2 industrialized nations who did not sign Kyoto.

Chad, the next Darfur?

This post is based after reading this article: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/6362597.stm

We all know that fighting has been occuring in Chad's neighbor, Darfur. Now Oxfam is saying that Chad is poised to become the next Darfur, with violence continually escalating. According to the article 120,000+ people have been displaced from their homes because of inter-ethnic fighting. Chad already has thousands of refugees from neighboring country Sudan. It cannot sustain all these refugees and violence within its own country. The UN security coucil is considering sending in a peace keeping force, which the Chadian president whole heartedly is in favor of.

What I don't understand is the "considering" aspect. I don't see why there is a need to consider, what must be done is immediate action. People are dying, being forced from their homes, villages are beng burned down. When lives are being threatened, there is no need for deliberation. I remember when the crisis in Darfur was occuring the US and the UN were wasting time on technicalities like whether or not it was a "genocide". I don't even know if they ever got that settled, but that wasn't the pressing matter. The pressing matter was that thousands of people were dying, and still are dying and that needs to be stopped. How are the poor and the people in this country ever supposed to improve their economy if they can't even have a stable place to live. How is Africa, one of the most povery stricken regions in the world, suppose to take itself out of extreme poverty (which is one of the MDGs) if there is no stability. Countries need to stop spending so much time saying we're "thinking" about sending aid, we're "going" to send aid, we're "defining" the situation and just quickly and efficiently do it.

the Grameen Foundation

I remember when it was announced that Muhammad Yunus won the nobel peace prize for 2006. One thing that I like about the nobel peace prize, is that they try to choose people that aren't as well known. Not that the Grameen foundation isn't a successful and well known organization, but just not as visible on the popular front. For example, common top contenders were also U2's Bono and Bill Gates. While they do many good things for many people, I like the idea of bringing someone else's organization and name to the forefront. In terms of Yunus the truth was, I still really did not know much about the Grameen Bank. I read the blurb about Yunus, but that paragraph long description gave no real insight into what was going on.

Our discussion last week in conjunction with the video for this weeks lecture proved to be much more informative. What the foundation is doing makes perfect sense. What astonishes me is that, this wasn't really prevalent before. I looked up Grameen Bank on wikipedia.org and under criticism it said, "Sudhirendar Sharma, a development analyst, claims that it has 'landed poor communities in a perpetual debt-trap,' and that its ultimate benefit goes to the corporations that sell capital goods and infrastructure to the borrowers. Former Finance Minister of Bangladesh, Saifur Rahman, commented that giving the poor some money does not make them well off. They are suceptible when larger corporations take over." Yes, these people are in debt, but as stated in the wikipedia article the loans are interest free, the repayment period is arbitrarily long, and the borrower is covered under life insurance free of cost. Not exactly what I'd call a "debt trap". I think it gives people a chance to get out of their poverty stricken state and gives them the opportunity to use their talents to flourish. How are people suppose to get out of their debt state if they can't make enough to buy food? Normal banks won't lend them money and it leaves them some choices as to just barely make it, make a dishonest living in crime or other such ways, or borrow money from a loan shark that would charge exorbitant interest rates. I'm sure not everyone is successful after getting their loan, but it seems to have helped a lot of people. These people at least deserve a chance, and this foundation seems to be giving it to them. Moreover their rural telephone programme not only is profitable for the villagers, but it helps bring a wealth of new resources available to these people.