Is USDA Organic Certifiably Insane?

I saw a very brief and hurried post from ERV on ScienceBlogs. In it, she noted that organic farmers let their animals die from treatable diseases, because to do otherwise would deny them the valuable 'organic' label. WTF? In Europe, organic livestock MUST be treated humanely, and may receive therapeutic medication (including antibiotics) - to do otherwise is a complete denial of everything science and medicine has learned in the past three hundred years. But, apparently, that's what Organic means in the US! As ERV says

'Organic' farmers? All concerned about their free-range, cage-free, at harmony with the Mother Goddess animals? They let their fucking animals die from treatable diseases, because if they treat them with even one dose of antibiotics, the animals are no longer 'organic'.
She quotes Ronnie Cummins, National Director of the Organic Consumers Association
Allowing one-time therapeutic antibiotics is "a slippery slope", and would "undermine consumer confidence in organics. It's the same position [I have] as on human vaccines. They are dangerous, and that's why I didn't vaccinate my kid."
Never mind the epic FAIL in Ronnie Cummin's statement about the dangers of vaccines - that woo is worthy of a post all by itself! The issue is that animals are allowed to die, often painfully, from completely preventable and treatable diseases. Why is this so? ERV linked to her source (this article at the blog "In These Times"). According to that article,
Department of Agriculture (USDA) regulations defining organic standards mandate that if [a] calf had gotten one dose of antibiotics, even to save her life, she could never give organic milk—even after the two years it takes for her to become a milker, and even though neither she nor her milk would retain any trace of antibiotics.
So why would the USDA have such nonsensical standards for 'organic'?

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Egg recall shows (again) how broken our industrial-foods model has become

How many times will it take for the consumer to wake up? Back in May, I wrote a post about the generally dismal state of regulation in matters of food safety, which allows large producers all the slack in the world at the expense of the consumer. I wish I could say that the state of affairs had changed dramatically in the meantime, but the current recall of over half a billion eggs reveals that nothing has changed.

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Alzheimer’s Fears

Today would be the anniversary of my mother's birthday, but she's been dead for some time now. Alzheimer's killed her. She lost the ability to swallow, so she couldn't eat or drink. Since she had left an advance health care directive that no feeding tubes would be used, essentially she starved to death. She was only 66. Mom was diagnosed with the disease when she was 52. She'd been having troubles for a good while before that, so hers was a very early onset. You lose people twice when they have Alzheimer's: once when their mind goes and they are no longer themselves, and then when the body finally dies. Early onset Alzheimer's may be genetic, and even dominant, according to a number of studies, such as this one. There are lots more studies, but many are very technical and not worthwhile to link here. Essentially, some forms of early Alzheimer's are inherited about 25% of the time. So my siblings and I have a big shadow lurking: which one of the four of us will be the one that develops the disease?

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Promiscuous Teens Earn Barely Lower Grades

It's all in how you present a subject. A recent study currently making its way through reportage shows a slight negative correlation between number of sex partners and GPA in high school. The headlines depend on who you read. Some headlines (linked to the articles) for example: Survey: Sex affects grades and Teen sex doesn't cause bad grades and Teen Sex Not Always Bad for Grades all cite the same study presented to the American Sociological Association in Atlanta yesterday. The American Family Council declared that the study confirms the negative link between teenage sexuality and academic performance. It really doesn't. There was no academic difference between abstinent kids and those who have committed relationships including sex. But girls in the promiscuous hook-up crowd earned GPA's of 0.16 points less than virgins. That's about 1/3 of the way between an A and an A-. Horrors. But everyone knows that the adolescent emotional problems that lead to promiscuity also tend to lead to bad grades. But that's just folk wisdom; common sense. Now there is an Actual Study to confirm the correlation. It's a pity that none of the coverage I've found links to the study itself.

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The mystery of early puberty

A new study available from the journal Pediatrics (subscription required) shows that girls are entering puberty at steadily younger ages. WebMD explains:

The researchers assessed the onset of puberty by a standard measurement of breast development. They compared the findings to a 1997 study of age of puberty. They found the following in a study of girls aged 6-8:
  • 10.4% of white girls in the current study had breast development, compared to 5% in the 1997 study.
  • 23.4% of African-American girls had breast development, compared to 15.4% in the 1997 study.
The early onset of puberty is found to be correlated with both race and body-mass index (BMI). But what's causing girls to enter puberty sooner?
The researchers also collected urine and blood specimens from the girls to look at levels of compounds called endocrine-disrupting chemicals, Biro says, to see what role these environmental exposures might play in early puberty. ''It appears that some of the endocrine-disrupting chemicals are interacting with body composition and this may be the reason some girls are going into puberty earlier and others later," Biro tells WebMD. "That would have to be speculation," he says of the interaction idea. "But we do know BMI is doing it."

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