Eating animals

Despite the common belief that drinking milk or eating eggs does not kill animals , commercially-raised dairy cows and egg-laying chickens, whether factory-farmed or "free range", are slaughtered when their production rates decline. The same factory farm methods that are used to produce most meats are also used to produce most milk and eggs. These cows and chickens live their short lives caged, drugged, mutilated, and deprived of their most basic freedoms.

On U.S. farms, an average of 7 egg-laying hens spend their entire lives in a battery cage with a floor area the size of a vinyl record cover. Living on wire floors that deform their feet, in cages so tiny they cannot stretch their wings, and covered with excrement from cages above them, these chickens suffer lameness, bone disease, and obsessive pecking, which is curbed by searing the beaks off young chicks. Although chickens can live up to 15 years, they are usually slaughtered when their egg production rates decline after two years. Hatcheries have no use for male chicks, so they are killed by suffocation, decapitation, gassing, or crushing.

As with any mammal, cows produce milk only when pregnant and stop after their calves have been weaned. When a dairy cow delivers a female calf, the calf becomes a dairy cow herself, born to live in the same conditions as her mother. But when a dairy cow delivers a male calf, the calf is sold to a veal farm within days of birth, where he is tethered to a stall, deprived of food and exercise, and soon slaughtered for meat . Life is only a few years longer for the mother. Because it is unprofitable to keep cows alive once their milk production declines, dairy cows are usually slaughtered at 5 years of age. Thus, a cow's normal lifespan of 25 years is cut 20 years short just to cut costs and maximize production.

Today's farms are not like the ones most of us learned about in school; they are mechanized factories where an animal's welfare is of little concern compared to profit. Veganism emerges as the lifestyle most consistent with the philosophy that animals are not ours to use.
Animal agriculture takes a devastating toll on the earth. It is an inefficient way of producing food, since feed for farm animals requires land, water, fertilizer, and other resources that could otherwise have been used directly for producing human food.

Animal agriculture's dependence on higher yields accelerates topsoil erosion on our farmlands, rendering land less productive for crop cultivation, and forcing the conversion of wilderness to grazing and farm lands. Animal waste from massive feedlots and factory farms is a leading cause of pollution in our groundwater and rivers. The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization has linked animal agriculture to a number of other environmental problems, including: contamination of aquatic ecosystems, soil, and drinking water by manure, pesticides, and fertilizers; acid rain from ammonia emissions; greenhouse gas production; and depletion of aquifers for irrigation.

In a time when population pressures have become an increasing stress on the environment , there are additional arguments for a vegan diet . The United Nations has reported that a vegan diet can feed many more people than an animal-based diet. For instance, projections have estimated that the 1992 food supply could have fed about 6.3 billion people on a purely vegetarian diet, 4.2 billion people on a 85% vegetarian diet, or 3.2 billion people on a 75% vegetarian diet.
The consumption of animal fats and proteins has been linked to heart disease, colon and lung cancer , osteoporosis, diabetes, kidney disease, hypertension, obesity , and a number of other debilitating conditions. Cows' milk contains ideal amounts of fat and protein for young calves, but far too much for humans. And eggs are higher in cholesterol than any other food, making them a leading contributor to cardiovascular disease. The American Dietetic Association reports that vegetarian/vegan diets are associated with reduced risks for all of these conditions.

Vegan foods, such as whole grains, vegetables, fruits, and beans, are low in fat, contain no cholesterol, and are rich in fiber and nutrients. Vegans can get all the protein they need from legumes (e.g., beans, tofu, peanuts) and grains (e.g., rice, corn, whole wheat breads and pastas); calcium from broccoli, kale, collard greens, tofu, fortified juices and soymilks; iron from chickpeas, spinach, pinto beans, and soy products; and B12 from fortified foods or supplements.

With planning, a vegan diet can provide all the nutrients we were taught as schoolchildren came only from animal products.

ENVIRONMENTAL PROBLEMS IN CHINA

Environmental problems in China are already at a critical level and they are getting worse. Rapid development has transformed huge swaths of the country into environmental wastelands. Acid rain corrodes the Great Wall; parts of the Grand Canal resemble open sewers; parts of Shanghai are slowly sinking because water beneath them has been sucked out; and some cities are so clogged with air pollution they don't appear in satellite pictures. Reports indicate that only 32 percent of China's industrial waste is treated in any sort of way. Already there are concerns of millions of environmental refugees in China and sulfurous rain clouds drifting from China to Japan and Korea. The main problem is China’s greatest success—it phenomenal economic growth—is the main forces behind its environmental problems. Factories that dump pollutants into the air and water produce cheaper products than ones that filter out pollutants and treat waste water. It is hard to see the Chinese making sacrifices to improve their environment if it means slowing economic growth. What’s different about China is the scale and speed of pollution and environmental degradation...It’s like nothing the world has ever seen. With this health problems known to the west are on the rise.

Air Pollution Facts

Air pollution is a phenomenon by which particles (solid or liquid) and gases contaminate the environment. Such contamination can result in health effects on the population, which might be either chronic (arising from long-term exposure), or acute (due to accidents). Other effects of pollution include damage to materials (e.g., the marble statues on the Parthenon are corroded as a result of air pollution in the city of Athens), agricultural damage (such as reduced crop yields and tree growth), impairment of visibility (tiny particles scatter light very efficiently), and even climate change (certain gases absorb energy emitted by the earth, leading to global warming).

Air pollution is certainly not a new phenomenon. Early references to it date back to the Middle Ages, when smoke from burning coal was already such a serious problem that in 1307 King Edward I banned its use in lime kilns in London. More recently, there have been major episodes of air pollution, such as the 1930 catastrophe in the Meuse Valley, Belgium, where SO2 and particulate matter, combined with a high relative humidity, caused sixty-three excess deaths in five days. In 1948 similar conditions in Donora, Pennsylvania, a small industrial city, caused twenty excess deaths in five days,and in the early 1950s in London, England, two episodes of "killer fogs" claimed the lives of more than 6,000 people.

Some countries are more understanding

In Sweden, science and education has developed further in regards to electromagnetic sensitivity , this has resulted in recognition of electro-sensitivity as a severe disability in the Scandinavian country. There are, for example, even hospital departments and controlled electromagnetic radiation-free units.

Discriminated environmentally ill people put up a fight

It is not surprising that scientists have found that people who are sensitive to their environment, are discriminated against in their professional lives more often than people with AIDS, allergies, asthma, stomach ailments, trauma or tuberculosis. But now they seek legal help more often than people with "common" disabilities to enable them to work without restrictions and health responses. Often these processes are even in favor of other handicapped persons , because people with environmental sensitivities need, like any other disability, consideration and adjustments in everyday life and especially in professional life. If consideration is not used and instead harassment or bullying are being used, we can speak of discrimination against the disabled.

Is Amalgam a partial cause of MCS - Multiple Chemical Sensitivity?

Amalgam is still a material used for filling teeth for all patients, although the health dangers by the mercury contained in amalgam have been discovered by a large number of international studies

Immune damage, neurological damage and allergies are known results from amalgam. Currently the Swedish government has banned amalgam.

Nearly every day we are being flooded with stories on TV and in newspapers about various chemical disasters. A tidal wave of poisonous mud buries entire villages in Hungary. Contaminated plots of land are detected and chemicals are dumped around in the open countryside. The industry sends huge quantities of toxic waste water and toxic smoke out into the environment, thus causing harmful damage to humans and animals. Certain fish are no longer edible due to heavy metals contamination. Even polar bears, living so far away from civilization, are exposed to chemicals and pollution via their food, thus developing deformed genital organs. The air is thick with pollution, and we incinerate fossil fuels in increasing quantities. We have gradually developed ”immunity” to all these gruesome stories. The madness goes on, driven by man’s tendency toward greediness.

In the 1950s, the consumption of chemicals exploded; it became trendy to produce food additives, chemicals, detergents to ease housewives daily chores, and personal care products full of chemicals, etc. The result of this development is that today over 100,000 different chemicals are constantly circulating in the environment, and we do not yet know the impact of the vast majority of these chemicals on the human organism. Yet, today the cocktail effect of chemicals is being gradually discussed. A number of various chemicals together are much more harmful than single isolated chemicals. However, the motivation to investigate into this problem is not particularly high. A number of chemicals have a hormone-like-effect thus resulting in presexual maturity, childlessness, etc. It is a known fact that some chemicals are cancer-producing, but even this fact is being ignored to a large extent.Farmers spray increasingly more aggressively with a huge number of various pesticides – substances designed to kill living organisms: pests, weeds, and fungi. It is a known fact that these pesticides certainly seep down into the groundwater. But what is being done about it? Oh yes, limit values are set forth on how much pollution is allowed in our drinking water. Limit values are set for how much toxic waste our food may contain. That is indeed sheer madness. Without protest, we accept eating, drinking and breathing in toxic waste. If pesticides are designed to kill living organisms, what makes us believe that these harmful chemicals are harmless to humans?Nearly every day we are being flooded with stories on TV and in newspapers about various chemical disasters. A tidal wave of poisonous mud buries entire villages in Hungary. Contaminated plots of land are detected and chemicals are dumped around in the open countryside. The industry sends huge quantities of toxic waste water and toxic smoke out into the environment, thus causing harmful damage to humans and animals. Certain fish are no longer edible due to heavy metals contamination. Even polar bears, living so far away from civilization, are exposed to chemicals and pollution via their food, thus developing deformed genital organs. The air is thick with pollution, and we incinerate fossil fuels in increasing quantities. We have gradually developed ”immunity” to all these gruesome stories. The madness goes on, driven by man’s tendency toward greediness.Over the last 50 years or so, gradually, increasing numbers of people turn up, developing environmental diseases such as MCS. No wonder that the weakest of us is defeated by this devastating chemical pressure, foreign to the human body, as well as by the increasing spread of wireless devices, also being a devastating and unnatural strain on the human organism. Man was created to live commune with nature, so even if it feels ”natural” to live as society does today, having daily contact with and consumption of hundreds of chemicals, the body is of course, not geared to defend against all those substances foreign on the human body. Some members of society become ill from this overwhelming chemical build up of pressure and develop chemical sensitivity.There are always greedy research scientists and physicians who can be bought off to produce predetermined research results, as well as predetermined diagnoses. That was evident with regard to the impact of tobacco on health, and that is also evident with regard to the impact of toxic chemicals on health. Many physicians diagnose MCS sufferers with psychiatric disorders, but such misdiagnoses do not, of course, make MCS sufferers less chemically sensitive. On the contrary, increasingly more people do develop MCS, and if the chemical problem is not taken seriously very soon man will be the disaster about to destroy Earth and life on Earth.

Environmental pollution fuelling skin

Ninety percent of the people are suffering from skin diseases caused by environment pollution. Skin diseases had increased in the country in recent years, as pollution had also increased manifolds.
Skin diseases are common in males and females and can be very serious.

Uof different creams, soaps and food items to maintain skin was another reason for skin disease. People should use only prescribed soaps and creams for skin diseases.

There are more than 3,000 kinds of skin diseases. Some of them are serious and can cause skin cancer if they are not treated properly.

Leukemia

Although we divide diseases into “genetic” and “infectious” categories, many diseases are influenced by a combination of factors. These diseases are harder to classify and treat than diseases that are caused by one determining factor. Many researchers have studied leukemia, but the underlying cause of the disease has not been conclusively demonstrated. Leukemia is not caused by a disease organism and is not infectious. It is a genetic disease, in that it is caused by malfunctioning genes, but it is acquired rather than inherited, with the exception of CML. It is caused by an injury to the genes of bone marrow cells. This injury, which makes the cells function incorrectly, also gives them a competitive advantage over normal cells, allowing them to multiply and replace normal cells.

This genetic damage seems to have a variety of causes. Risk factors may lie in a person's genetic inheritance. People with Down's syndrome and certain other genetic disorders are also more likely to get leukemia. In some cases, leukemia seems to run in families. This may be due to an inherited susceptibility to gene abnormalities. In addition, population studies have shown that unlike other cancers, immigrant groups retain the leukemia risk of their countries of origin rather than their new environments, suggesting an important genetic role in the disease.

More often, leukemia is caused by a person's exposure to a substance in their environment. Environmental risk factors affecting adults include “exposure to radiation, benzene, pesticides, cigarette smoke, and extremely low-frequency electromagnetic fields” (Robien and Ulrich, 2003). Each of these environmental factors induces genetic mutation, which can lead to leukemia. However, in most cases of leukemia, none of these risk factors are present. Leukemia often develops in people with no family history of the disease or significant exposure to any of the environmental risk factors.

Environmental burden of disease

Environmental hazards such as air pollutants, noise and chemicals can cause illness, disability or even death. The results of international studies on the environmental burden of disease vary widely in different countries, with estimates ranging from about 2 to 20% of the total disease burden caused by environmental exposures (ENHIS). These differences are mainly due to differences in methodology (e.g. which risk factors are included) and partly related to actual differences in environmental conditions.

In 2006, the World Health Organisation (WHO) estimated that in the WHO European Region as much as 14-19% of disease is caused by environmental exposures that can be averted (WHO, 2006d).

It is important to recognise that these percentages refer to a selected set of the currently known environmental risk factors for which quantification of health impacts is possible. In addition, disease burden calculations are a simplification of a very complex reality consisting of combined exposures to different risk factors by different pathways.

Creativity Movement

The Creativity Movement (formerly known as World Church Of The Creator), is a white separatist organization that advocates the whites-only religion, Creativity. It was also a descriptive phrase used by Ben Klassen, that included all adherents of the religion. The use of the term creator does not refer to a deity, but rather to themselves (white people). Despite the former use of the word Church in its name, the movement is atheistic. Creativity is a White Separatist religion that was founded by Ben Klassen in early 1973 under the name Church of the Creator. After Klassen’s death in 1993, Creativity almost died out as a religion until the New Church of the Creator was established three years later by Matthew F. Hale as its Pontifex Maximus (high priest), until his incarceration in January 2003 for plotting with the movement’s head of security, Anthony Evola (an FBI informant), to murder a federal judge.

Environmental diseases are no mysteries, but scientifically explainable

More attention needed to the disease factor in indoor pollutantsThe awareness of the importance of uncontaminated food and pollution-free products in everyday life is growing worldwide. People are striving for a healthy and unpolluted living environment. Especially noteworthy are efforts that have been observed recently in Norway. In this Scandinavian country, efforts are prioritized to protect children, particularly against pollutants and allergens. One of the most active pioneers is Kjell Aas, a retired professor who supports the Norwegian Asthma and Allergy Association, with his profound knowledge. This scientist is anxious to clear ignorance about environmental and pollution-related diseases. He clarifies the facts to the authorities and population in ways which are understandable.

For many people it is still difficult to understand that polluted air can also cause health problems or symptoms beyond just the respiratory tract. Research has delivered to us today only fragmentary explanations, but there are some entirely understandable explanations and solid scientific evidence of things not delivered to us.
Medical science has not yet managed to explore all the biochemical mechanisms behind the disease. The same goes for the so-called environmental diseases, such as hyperactivity, migraines, and multiple chemical sensitivity (MCS). To think that these environmental illnesses are something mysterious or inexplicable, or even that they are psychologically conditioned is just incorrect. This can be explained by one or more biochemical reactions. Both the physical and mental functions and activities are regulated by more or less complex chemical processes. The reactions are dependent on the dose and individual tolerance levels.

Electrohypersensitivity

A small percentage of extensive computer users develops a hypersensitivity towards electric and electromagnetic fields emitted by PC and TV screens and several other pieces of electric and electronic equipment in home and office. Symptoms vary and range from itching, dizziness and headache to skin rashes and intense fatigue. Work may become impossible altogether. Social isolation may follow.

Electrical Sensitivity

Electrical sensitivity is where the electrical currents, that surround us all the time in our daily lives, effect our health. Electrical sensitivity has been blamed for unexplained skin and eye problems, sleep problems and fatigue, problems thinking, difficulty concentrating and headaches. It is thought to only affect sensitive individuals.Electrical sensitivity has been written about for a long time by forward thinking health writers, and concerned individuals who blame this for their health problems, but is only just starting to be mentioned by the UK government health agencies.
Electrical sensitivity has also been called ElectroSensivity (ES), electrical hypersensitivity, electromagnetic sensitivity, or electromagnetic hypersensitivity (EHS). This shows that it is not a topic published in the mainstream medical journals, as there is not a universally agreed word for it. It also used to be called radiation sickness, which mostly affected people working in the electricity or radar industries.
The number of people who have electrical sensitivity is difficult to estimate.

MCS - a chronic condition with no cure

The best information currently available suggests that MCS is a chronic condition with no cure. Although some treatments (such as acupuncture) seem to help some patients, recent surveys by the Chemical Injury Information Network, a nonprofit education and advocacy organization for people with chemical sensitivities, found that avoidance of problem chemicals was the only consistently effective treatment.

If only avoidance were as simple as it sounds. Just as modern life almost inevitably involves contributing greenhouse gases to the heating atmosphere, it is all but impossible to navigate the industrialized world without being immersed in tens of thousands of potentially troublesome human-made chemicals. And just as an honest fight against global warming would pose a huge threat to powerful energy companies, a real effort to take MCS seriously could throw a wrench into the operations of a huge range of industries that produce chemicals and chemical-laden products.

Multiple Chemical Sensitivities can force sufferers into poverty as well as ill health

Environmentalists usually think about chemical toxicity as either a dramatic local crisis, the simmering concern of those far away or far in the future. But for people suffering from Multiple Chemical Sensitivities, the chemical crisis is already here. Indeed, thanks to industrialization, it is already everywhere. And, like so many environment-related health issues, it disproportionately affects the poor -- and, moreover, drives many once financially stable people into poverty.

As a disease, Multiple Chemical Sensitivities doesn't have an official case definition yet, but rather refers to a broad range of adverse symptoms brought on by an even more broad array of everyday chemicals. These symptoms are often provoked at exposure levels far below those that seem to affect the rest of the population -- levels virtually always present in our homes, workplaces, and social venues. They commonly include severe headaches, food intolerances, difficulty breathing, nausea, irritation of the eyes, ears, nose, throat, and skin, and disorientation or confusion, but there are many more.

Wireless sensitivity

How can it be, that most people use wireless connection to get onto the internet and their mobile phones to call their family and friends and this is completely normal. On the other hand there are a handful of people who feel really ill, when they do exactly the same. What is it, that causes this reaction? It is so difficult to find out, that some doctors do not even recognise this "allergy" to wireless connections as an existing condition. This is exactly the point that makes it so difficult to find a treatment and for the effected people to be respected in society.

Simple precautions

The more distance to the radiation sources, the better. Most of the electromagnetic fields fall off exponentially. A few centimetres distance can already show an effect. This applies to electrical household appliances as well as for wireless or cordless phones. Even newer, low-radiation devices are useful. The criterion here is the SAR value. It stands for specific absorption rate. It shows how much energy tissue absorbs. Those who use the phone as little as possible in the car or only use the external antenna and headset minimizes the risk further. Because the cell phone increases its radiation intensity to overcome the insulation of the car body and also to keep the connection despite the moving vehicle. Holding the phone correctly can also reduce the radiation. Because when you cover it with your hand, it has to use more power. Shielding devices, however, do only one thing: the have no effect - and therefore are not worth the money. Electro sensitive people are certain: rays make you sick. Mobile phones and masts are the enemies of modernity. Insidious and invisible, they do their malicious work - from headaches to hair loss to brain tumours. 80 percent of people worldwide have access to mobile networks, most of them don’t see the danger. Nevertheless, almost everyone has had thoughts about strong electromagnetic exposure and their consequences before.

Different reactions of different people to the same environment are nothing new

We all know and accept that, for example, people with red hair and blue eyes are very sensitive to sunlight and sunburn quicker as dark-skinned people. With reactions to chemicals, it is difficult to gain acceptance and consideration, because you cannot see purely by the appearance of a person if he or she has health problems due to a perfume, exhaust fumes, cleaning products, cigarette smoke, pesticides, or colours. Approximately 15-30% of the population belong to the group of chemical sensitives, reacting with headaches, dizziness, nausea, up to complete collapse, to everyday chemicals that cause no or very little problems to “normal” people.

What is MCS?

Being chemically sensitive means your body reacts to chemicals in everyday life with many physical ailments. The disease is known as MCS - Multiple Chemical Sensitivity. It occurs particularly in developed countries and affects, according to scientific studies, between 15-30% of the total population in various degrees of severity. Regardless of this,  the disease is rarely discussed among the public.

Tree-hugger?

To the outside world chemical sensitive people like the before mentioned may seem like weird tree-hugger. But what chance do they have? Who feels responsible for people like them, who cannot live in any normal house in a town or city because of the severity of their disease? Where do they go? Where are the dead spots where they can stay without pain? How can these people go  back to normal life? Is it correct that a society violates and ridicules those it made sick?

Wireless and Internet

There are various organizations who support the rights of people who are chemical sensitive and most of them are also present on the Internet. Nevertheless, the choice appears to be insufficient. Adding to this is the fact that it is not easy for those affected, to use the internet, because they cannot tolerate wireless normally. Many are creative and have thus, for example, Internet cable with them to get their  laptops connected anywhere they can. In this way, they keep in contact with their families and other activists if they are no longer able to participate on the daily "normal" life (that includes living in an apartment or a house). They often try to live in “dead spots” and do not leave these  "islands" very often. Unfortunately, persons affected often have little energy left  to help each other. Contacts do exist, but unfortunately not enough because these diseases are still not being taken seriously.

WHERE CAN PEOPLE GO WHO ARE SENSITIVE TO CHEMICALS AND ELECTRICALS?

Even more problematic than having to deal with chemical sensitivity in the living room  is the electro-sensitivity, or people who respond to microwave radiation. Affected people spend years looking for a place where they can live. A few even live in caravans in the woods, as they cannot manage to tolerate normal flats and houses. Unfortunately this is not a very known problem.

MCS and sensitivity towards electrics

Every week, thousands of chemical-sensitive people are in search of acceptable housing. For most of these desperate people, it does not matter where they end up, as long as they have one or two rooms without pollution. Housing for people with MCS (multiple chemical sensitivity) is not supported by the state so far, although the UK has signed the UN disability convention and should support these disabled people. People sensitive to chemicals and radio frequency radiation are not so rare. They live a life on the run, because the areas where there is no radiation becomes less every day.