I took almost no pictures yesterday, so these are from earlier in the week. First, the garden of my neighbor down the street. I think that's a peony? I didn't know they turned such bright colors, but there you have it.
Not a lot of activity around here yesterday. I finished John Green's book about tuberculosis, always an uplifting subject (ha!) but honestly quite interesting. It's not something I've ever given much thought to, but that is exactly Green's point -- we wealthier people in wealthier countries tend to dismiss tuberculosis as an infection that can be easily cured, but in much of the world where resources are more limited, it can still be a death sentence. He wrote about how vital aid agencies and various government programs have been in helping fight this scourge, and I couldn't help wondering where all that assistance is now, given Trump's evisceration of overseas aid from the USA. How many people in Africa or Asia who used to reliably get their medication now must go without? You gotta wonder.
Here's a random factoid from Green's book that I found interesting. Writing about the year 1804, when inventor and industrialist James Watt's son Gregory died of tuberculosis, Green said: "I understand if this all feels like ancient history, but it's really not. As of 2025, around 117 billion modern humans have lived. Over 100 billion were born before 1804. Almost everything that ever happened to us, and almost everyone who ever happened, happened before 1804."
That gives some context to our modern lives, doesn't it?
Life expectancies in that year were not much different than they had been thousands of years earlier. Now, of course, our life expectancies have grown, even in developing countries -- but tuberculosis remains a stubborn problem because of pharmaceutical capitalism, government inaction, conflict and persistent poverty and lack of opportunity. "We know how to live in a world without tuberculosis," Green wrote. "But we choose not to live in that world."
I was out in the garden a little bit, but not much. About the only thing I did yesterday of any benefit to our household was water the indoor plants. It looks like our Thanksgiving/Christmas cacti are poised to have a good year -- I see buds on every plant. Hopefully they'll last. (Now that I've mentioned them, I've cursed them.)
Here's another look at some of our orchids, which got a shower yesterday. That seems to give them a boost and help battle any insect pests. They sure are blooming up a storm!
And here's an unusual sight I came across on my walk to work on Friday -- a glass of milk (I assume) sitting out on the street. Someone must have been trying to feed a stray cat. Looks like the cat did not partake, or hadn't yet, anyway. Hopefully it was pasteurized. Otherwise -- tuberculosis!
It is an interesting subject... especially as now TB is proving resistant to the drugs used.
ReplyDeleteTB and milk.. selling unpasteurised or raw milk is illegal in Scotland .
However most don't realise that dairies producing this have to meet far higher standards and more frequent inspections. One scare in the past years of infections caused by dairy products was not actually caused by the producers, but but subsequent handling further down the food chain.
I hope the milk wasn't left out for a cat...as they are lactose intolerant
Yes, GZ. Total mystery to me why cats are given milk. An even bigger mystery that cats tend to circle most food with suspicion (particularly if you, "cleverly", have hidden a pill in a delicious morsel - don't ask) yet milk they'll fall for. There is even that old saying: The cat who got the cream.
DeleteWell, mine only got water.
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A further thought...TB is closer than people think. My paternal grandmother died in 1935, indirectly because she had TB. Her father in law died in 1951with TB.
ReplyDeleteMy maternal grandmother was tested for TB in the late 1960s because a friend she visited often contracted TB...
Tuberculosis. The romance of it. Think pale. Think Sanatorium in Switzerland. Languishing on a recliner. In fresh air. Blankets draped over you. All you need to be is a poet to make it, well, more poetic.
ReplyDeleteMy mother who is (or rather was - she died a few weeks ago so am still not used to using the past tense) NOT given to catastrophizing got it into her head that I might have TB. I was about eight or so. Was put into some frightful contraption to x-ray my lungs. Naturally, I came out as clear and immaculate as the white driven snow. No poetry on a recliner in the mountains for me.
As to pasteurized milk: I was brought up on body warm (yes, yuck) milk straight from the cow's udder. Possibly accounts for the fact that I am not dead yet.
Fact is, Steve, countries choose on what to spend money on. A bit of TB here or there? It's one way of keeping population figures down whilst complaining about decline in birth rates.
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Back in the 70s I worked in the Chest Clinic at our local hospital, which was the closest to Heathrow Airport. The majority of patients there were recent immigrants arriving from the Indian subcontinent who were screened and then treated for TB, all courtesy of the NHS.
ReplyDeleteI just remember so many sample pots of sputum being handed over at reception and then very carefully carried to Sister in the sluice room!
That factoid does put things into context. Fascinating. SG just discovered that his 5-greats grandfather died of TB in Maine in 1799.
ReplyDeleteNope. Died of Typhus. Never mind!
DeleteJohn Green is a multi-faceted author. When I was teaching 7th grade, I used to show my class his crash course videos on various historical topics. He would talk a mile a minute and my students were mesmerized.
ReplyDeleteMy mother used to worry that I might become 'consumptive.' My sister, 15 years older than me, had a tubercular gland in her neck removed, and also had boyfriends in sanatoria.
ReplyDeleteCodex: If Green is claiming this is easily treatable it's dangerous info. Not prevalent in the western world, but there nonetheless.
ReplyDeleteHe's not saying that. He's saying easy treatment is our western misconception. But even drug-resistant TB can usually be treated by newer medicines. The problem is, the pharmaceutical industry lacks the incentive to invest in developing more TB drugs, because they are used for a relatively short term (compared to blood pressure or cholesterol medication, for example, which are taken indefinitely).
DeleteCodex: Ah. It came across that way. Pharmaceutical companies are unable to find new antibiotics. The ones used are a combo also used for other illnesses. Specific to TB only is unlikely and not lucrative to invest in. None of the ones given were developed for TB. The problem is that it may make those antibiotics ineffective for other illnesses. I'm not sure he understands that. Antibiotics are a complex subject matter.
DeleteI'm curious -- are you a doctor, or do you have a medical background?
DeleteMentioned it before. Affirmative.
Deletehttps://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1369527424001383
DeleteAbove an article that's a little less technical. The intro is a reason but not the main one. Basically its like scientists are trying to invent a new flower that would bloom year round. Not a great analogy, but the cost is prohibitive because it's something completely new
Perhaps a saucer is better utilized; I can't see a cat getting much more than a snout in a glass.
ReplyDelete😆😆😆😆
DeleteThe TB book sounds interesting. My great grandmother died (as many did in the 1800s) of "consumption," which I'm led to understand is the same as tuberculosis. I remember getting the poking tests in school and they still check me now.
ReplyDeleteI had schoolfriends vanish for years into the local tb sanatorium, when rest and fresh air were the main treatment. Friends also had tb in their joints, not just the lungs. This isn't ancient history in the west.
ReplyDeleteIt's a sad situation and brings up a moral question that I struggle with a lot. How much suffering do we inflict upon our own population to pay for helping those in far away countries better their lives/health? According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 20+% of our own citizens require food or medical health assistance or both from our government for their day to day survival. Meanwhile, we are still borrowing huge amounts of money to pay for this.
ReplyDeleteI don't know the answer. I just know we are on a unsustainable path and something has to change.
Our local hospital started off in 1907 as a TB sanitarium. Naperville was considered to be out in the country and so patients were sent there from Chicago. Now it is a huge hospital and Naperville has grown to a large city.
ReplyDeleteI guess that TB is one of those things we'll never entirely be rid of unless the entire world makes a unified, concentrated effort to end it. Somehow I can't see that happening.
ReplyDeleteWhen I worked in a group home setting (I was an admin, and didn't work directly with the guys) we all had to be tested for TB once a year. Group homes are petri dishes & you have to really work hard to make sure things don't spread there!
ReplyDeleteAbout hedgehogs -- can you knock a brick out of the base of the wall to help them? They have ground level highways, and just a small opening, few inches, can be very helpful.
ReplyDeleteMy grandmother died of tuberculosis when my father was very little. I remember hearing the stories of how she was placed in a special home for TB patients and put on a porch along with other patients during winter because they thought the cold air would help them. That sounded like a sort of torture to me. When I started working for the place I work now, I had to get a TB test before I began work. I remember at the time that I thought TB was a thing of the past but the test was required for employment.
ReplyDeleteGreen could have written about other diseases with similar histories. Unfortunately these books are not read that much.
ReplyDeleteI was amused by you writing about the christmas cactus and then showing pictures of the orchids. I'm sure they do benefit from a shower now and then. Do you ever take them out in the rain?
ReplyDeleteMy father got tuberculosis after he enlisted and spent two years during WWII in the hospital. Every meal was served on paper plates in an attempt to reduce spreading the infection. Also chicken. He ate so much chicken he swore he would never eat it again (and it was rarely served in my house growing up). Also paper plates. We never used paper plates for the same reason.
I love John Green, but haven't read the book yet. It's on my to read list. Treating TB is not easy and requires people to take their meds for six months and if the first line antibiotics don't work, the next round of meds is two years of meds. That's a long time and a lot of money that many in developing countries can't manage. The alternative, is to stop treating people midway through their antibiotic treatment, which allows for the rise of drug resistant TB. Treating people in far away countries is good for everyone in the world.
ReplyDelete"Cutting For Stone", an excellent book, has an extremely graphic description of one way to die of TB. It's not a benign disease.
I've met only one person diagnosed with TB. According to his story, he worked and traveled the world on cargo ships. In his mid-20's he was diagnosed, quarantined and successfully treated. Upon release he started a successful dot-com business. He died recently at 77 of cancer.
ReplyDeleteIdeally, Big Pharma will produce alternative drugs to solve specific health problems.
Will AI tech facilitate this? New approaches that reduce cost of time-consuming, labor-intensive research which delays bringing new drugs to market could improve things for everyone.
The CDC estimates that 1.3 million in the US have latent TB, which means they've been infected with mycobacterium. It can convert to active TB in people with damaged immune systems, which would include many people who have had Covid. It's sort of a terrible thought.
ReplyDeleteThat glass of milk looks gigantic! My mom had undulant fever from raw milk so was very pro-pasteurization. TB flies under the radar and shouldn't. The cavalier attitude toward vaccines in the US will bring back many scourges of history, unfortunately.
ReplyDeleteThe only patients I’ve nursed with TB are Asian patients suffering from a TB PARALYSIS in my spinal days
ReplyDelete“
TB paralysis, or Pott's paraplegia, is the paralysis of the legs caused by tuberculosis (TB) infection of the spine. This condition arises from Mycobacterium tuberculosis damaging the spine, leading to nerve compression from abscesses, inflammatory tissue, or even direct infection of the spinal cord. Treatment involves addressing the TB infection with antibiotics, often combined with surgical decompression to relieve pressure on the spinal cord”