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Cigarettes May be Killing Me, What About You? July 24, 2008

Posted by Bob Aronson in Health Threats.
5 comments
I wrote this blog several months ago under the name “The Smoking Gun,” and posted it on my organ donation/transplantation site http://bobsnewheart.wordpress.com.  I am reprinting it here because the issue is one that affects every facet of our lives.  Additionally, the New York Times reports that billionares Bill Gates and Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg announced on Wednesday (yesterday) that they would spend $500 million to stop people around the world from smoking.  Amazingly muich of the response was negative.  Many thought the commitment was silly and the money would be wasted.  What do you think?

 

The Airbus A380-800, is the biggest airplane in the sky.  It can carry 555 people, maybe more depending on how the seats are configured.  What would you think — how would you react if two of these monstrous planes crashed every day for evermore?  I imagine the public outrage would be monumental.  “But wait,” as the commercial says, “There’s more.”  What if these disasters were totally preventable?  What if the planes were crashing because of a faulty switch that everyone knew about but ignored — and the planes just kept on crashing killing 438,000 Americans a year — year after year.  Would there be outrage?  Would congress act?  Would there be demonstrations in the streets?  Count on it! 

Far-fetched as it may seem the equivalent of two fully loaded Airbus A390-800’s are crashing every day.  438,000, that’s the number of Americans who die as a result of cigarette smoke each year.  And — these deaths are almost totally preventable, like fixing the switches on the airplanes.  This disgraceful situation is a national tragedy, a crisis that is killing us and draining our treasury at the same time.  .  

I’m writing this because there is a clear and present danger to every one of us, even the unborn and those not yet conceived.  There is also a direct relationship between smoking and organ transplantation.  Simply put, if fewer people smoked, the need for organs and tissue would be greatly diminished and there would probably be a corresponding increase in the availability of tissue and organs.  Wow!  

Cigarettes are like bullets only far more deadly.  Bullets generally harm or kill only the people they strike.  Cigarettes not only affect anyone who inhales the smoke, they kill you slowly and painfully. I started smoking in 1954 at the age of 15.  There were no warnings then and almost everyone smoked.  Cigarette advertising even alluded to the beneficial health effects of smoking, “XXX brand cigarettes relieve scratchy throat…etc. “ 

I’ve seen the effects of smoking up close and personal.  My father died of emphysema and I lost a wife to lung cancer.  Both were smokers.  Now I am suffering from Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD).  COPD is progressive and cannot be cured.  Almost a year ago I had a heart transplant, probably necessitated in part because of 37 years of smoking three or more packs a day.  My heart is working exceptionally well but my lungs are in a weakened condition.  Even though I quite smoking 18 years ago the effects may slowly be killing me.  But — had I not quit I would probably have died long ago.

Smoking affects every part of you.  According to “The Scoop on Smoking”  (http://thescooponsmoking.org/), smoking has a negative effect on the following:  Respiratory system (lungs), Skeletal system (bones), Muscular system (muscles, joints), Circulatory system (heart, arteries), Urinary system (kidneys, bladder), Digestive system (stomach, intestines) Nervous system (brain, nerves), Endocrine system (thyroid, hormones), Female reproductive system (uterus, ovaries), Male reproductive system (penis, testes), Immune system (t-cells, anti-bodies), Skin, The senses (eyes, ears, nose, mouth, throat) and mental health. 

While the number of deaths caused by cigarette smoke is appalling, the cost in dollars is also extremely disturbing.  Smoking costs taxpayers nearly $200 billion a year in health-care alone.  Can you imagine the good that would come from properly spending that $200 billion on medical research and education? 

I have but three messages.  1) I know it is hard to quit, it took a dozen tries for me to do so but you can do it!.  You owe it to yourself, your family and all the people affected by your second hand smoke.  2) Don’t start, it’s not cool and it likely will kill  you and maybe some of your family and friends.  3) Spread the word.  Out of love, encourage and help friends and loved ones to quit so none of them are in my position and feel compelled to write a blog on how smoking may be killing them.

 

Please read and comment on my Organ Donation and Transplantation blogs on

http://bobsnewheart.wordpress.com

Also…visit my Facebook site, Organ Transplant Patients, Friends and You at  http://tinyurl.com/225cfh  OR — my Facebook home page http://www.facebook.com/home.php  

GEORGE W. BUSH PRESIDENTIAL LIBRARY ROOMS July 21, 2008

Posted by Bob Aronson in George W. Bush.
1 comment so far

I got the following list via email the other day.  I would be happy to give it attribution but I have no idea who wrote it or when so read and enjoy.

 

The Hurricane Katrina Room (still under construction).

 

The Alberto Gonzales Room, where you won’t be able to remember anything.  

 

The Texas Air National Guard Room, where you  don’t even have to show up.

 

The Walter Reed Hospital Room, where they don’t let you in.

 

The Guantanamo Bay Room, where they don’t let you out.

 

The Weapons of Mass Destruction Room, which no one has been able to find.

 

The National Debt room which is huge and has no ceiling.

 

The Tax Cut  Room with entry only to the wealthy.

 

The Economy Room which is in the toilet.

 

The Iraq War Room. After you complete your first tour, they make you go back for a  second, third, fourth, and sometimes fifth tour.

 

The Dick Cheney Room, in the famous undisclosed location, complete with shotgun gallery.

 

The Environmental  Conservation Room, still empty.

 

The Supremes  Gift Shop, where you can buy an election.

 

The  Airport Men’s Room, where you can meet some of your favorite Republican Senators.

 

The Decider Room complete  with dart board , magic 8-ball, Ouijaboard, dice, coins, and  straws.

 

The museum will have an electron  microscope to help you locate the President’s accomplishments.

 

Admission: Republicans – free;   Democrats -$ 1000 or 3 Euros    

Please read and comment on my Organ Donation and Transplantation blogs on

http://bobsnewheart.wordpress.com

Also…visit my Facebook site, Organ Transplant Patients, Friends and You at  http://tinyurl.com/225cfh  OR — my Facebook home page http://www.facebook.com/home.php  

 

Bush Fails on Afghanistan, Global Warming and The Energy Crisis July 15, 2008

Posted by Bob Aronson in Bush issues.
4 comments

 

“President Bush and his fellow oil baron, Dick Cheney, have spent 7 1⁄2 years doing next to nothing to curb the greenhouse gases that are the chief contributor to global warming. And they made it clear last week that they will leave office in January with their dirty slate intact.”  That is the opening paragraph in a front-page story in today’s Salt Lake Tribune.  http://www.sltrib.com/ci_9877003

 

I read the Salt Lake Tribune just as I was writing the following blog: 

 

We have no leadership at the very moment when our economy is in shambles, oil prices are out of control, global warming is a daily reality and we are fighting two wars (the economy will require a seperate blog)..

 

We have no leadership that is concerned about average every-day Americans and the country’s future.  Instead, we have President Howdy Doody whose every utterance and move are controlled by Vice President Darth Vader and which string he chooses to pull. 

 

Today puppet George W. Bush with the applause and encouragement of John McCain lifted the ban on offshore oil drilling that was imposed by his father George H.W. Bush (W is not even loyal to his dad).

 

This gesture by our president is equivalent to giving the (obscene gesture) to the great majority of Americans who know that finding more oil is not a solution to the energy problem.  The solution is alternative energy and becoming more energy sufficient.  “This is one emergency we can’t drill our way out of,” says Oil Magnate T. Boone Pickens in a nationwide advertising campaign he paid for himself.  He says he has a solution and will tell us about it soon.  He makes it clear that we must support alternative energy development.

 

But why should we be surprised by Bush’s action, when just a few days ago President Doody gave the same (obscene gesture) to the entire world when he emerged from the G8 talks after successfully pushing these gutless elitists to reach no decision on global warming.  The August group issued a hard-hitting statement saying something like, “We agree that something must be done.”  Then they broke up and went home.  Behind the dark mask, Darth Vader smiled and saw dollar signs.    

 

Tied to all of this is the brutal, unjustified war in Iraq that has caused the deaths of thousands of American and allied soldiers along with a million or more Iraqis.  The issues are related because the war in Iraq, despite protestations by Bush and McCain, is about oil (they say it is about hitting the center of the war on terrorism, wait — didn’t he say Afghanistan was the center if not why did we attack them?).  We are losing the war in Afghanistan because the White House decided it was and is more important to get Iraq’s oil to further enrich a few of his oil Baron friends than to fight the real terrorists who killed over 3000 of us on 9-11.

 

Irony of ironies, though, we have not received a single drop of free oil from Iraq because their corrupt leadership has decided to keep the oil and the money while our brave soldiers fight for Iraq’s freedom to exploit us during our energy crisis.  You, President Bush, are a perfect example of the worst kind of leader.  One who would send innocent, patriotic, young people to their deaths in order to satisfy his oil buddies, and then to continue his wrong-headed war in an attempt to hide the blunder.

 

In the meantime, more American troops have died in Afghanistan over the past couple of months than have died in Iraq but we don’t have any help to send, no troops, because our military is bogged down in Iraq a war in which there never was a plan to get out.  The plan was to occupy the land (for a hundred years or so) and steal the oil.

 

Notice if you will the lack of attention the war in Afghanistan gets.  Just yesterday, nine Americans died in a brutal attack by the Taliban.    According to the New York Times, “The attack, the worst against Americans in Afghanistan in three years, illustrated the growing threat of Taliban militants and their associates, who in recent months have made Afghanistan a far deadlier war zone for American-led forces than Iraq.”     http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/14/world/asia/14afghan.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=war+in+afghanistan&st=nyt&oref=slogin   How can Doody and Vader say no when our troops in Afghanistan are dying and begging for help? 

The question in November is pretty clear to me.  Do you want to continue the Bush administration for another four years (McCain has voted with them on every issue concerning the war) or do you think it’s time for a change?

           

   

  

 

Please read and comment on my Organ Donation and Transplantation blogs on

http://bobsnewheart.wordpress.com

 Also…visit my Facebook site, Organ Transplant Patients, Friends and You at  http://tinyurl.com/225cfh  OR — my Facebook home page http://www.facebook.com/home.php

Obama, McCain – Substance Abuse is Killing America, How Will You Stop It? July 7, 2008

Posted by Bob Aronson in Campaign 2008, Drugs and Alcohol, Substance Abuse.
3 comments

There is an issue in America that Presidential candidates and other politicians do not want to talk about.  It is an orphan issue, not unlike the metaphorical elephant in the living room.  Everyone walks around the pungent pachyderm because no one wants to admit it is there and/or take the responsibility of doing something about it.  They’ll do anything to hide good old “Jumbo.”  Some even wrap it with a pleated skirt topped by a fancy vase.  Regardless of the illusionistic attempt, though, “Jumbo” is still there.  “Jumbo” you see, is substance abuse.  It is not only illegal drugs like cocaine and heroin; it is also tobacco, prescription and over the counter drugs, and alcohol. 

 

 

Substance abuse is an issue that dwarfs the war in Iraq in terms of death, injury and depletion of national treasure. It is so huge and so pervasive that it affects virtually every corner of our society and every part of everyone’s life.  Do you know of anyone who is not affected in some way?  Why don’t Obama and McCain address it?   The answer — they must think the issue is too complex to explain never mind boiliing it down to a TV “sound-bite” so like the elephant in the living room, the issue is just ignored.    

 

 

 

 

I am not suggesting a return to the prohibition era of the ‘20’s and ‘30’s of the last century but rather a recognition that substance abuse is the single-most dangerous threat to the economy, public health and national security and a commitment to do something about it being as the “War on Drugs” is a colossal failure.  The so-called war has failed and will continue to fail because it doesn’t attack the problem, it attacks the symptoms only.  The solution is a lesson in economic simplicity, diminish the demand and the suppliers will disappear.  Our wrong-headed approach attacks the suppliers but ignores those who are threatened and need help.   

 

 

So, Senators McCain and Obama — invest in America by embarking on a massive drug and alcohol education program coupled with the dollars needed for effective treatment.  Want a sound bite?  Here it is,   “Education and treatment,” Senators,   “Education and treatment!”   Commit to that and we can begin to address a problem that is causing us to decay from within.  Want proof of the magnitude of the problem?  Read this startling data from The National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA): http://www.nida.nih.gov/about/welcome/aboutdrugabuse/magnitude/

 

Economics:

      Substance Abuse Costs Our Nation More than $484 Billion per Year.  The Costs of Drug Abuse are as Substantial as that of other Chronic Conditions:

o         Diabetes costs society $131.7 billion annually

o         Cancer costs society $171.6 billion annually

 

Consequences of substance abuse:

 

Deaths:

   In 2000, approximately 460,000 deaths were attributable to substance abuse and smoking.

   Each year approximately 40 million debilitating illnesses or injuries occur among Americans as the result of their use of tobacco, alcohol, or other addictive/destructive substances. 

 

Crime:

   As many as 60% of adults in Federal prisons are there for drug-related crimes.

 

Child Abuse:

   Approximately 50% to 80% of all child abuse and neglect cases substantiated by child protective services involve some degree of substance abuse by the child’s parents.

 

 

While I am not an expert on the economy, public health, national security or addiction, I am an expert at becoming addicted.  I am a recovering alcoholic (1982), recovering Oxycontin user (now) and former smoker (1991).  Recently I wrote a brief blog about my dependency on Oxycontin a prescription drug I used that killed the pain I suffered and now threatens to kill me.  I am currently going through detox and all is well so far but would I be if I was not informed, not insured and had no access to either?  I doubt it.  I also know the pain and suffering I have caused my family and friends during my periods of abuse. 

 

Education and treatment, Senators, education and treatment!

 

Please read and comment on my Organ Donation and Transplantation blogs on

http://bobsnewheart.wordpress.com

 Also…visit my Facebook site, Organ Transplant Patients, Friends and You at  http://tinyurl.com/225cfh  OR — my Facebook home page http://www.facebook.com/home.php