Quickies

Quickies: Poverty and Disease in America, Menstruation and Respect, and Whole Foods

  • 100 Wonders: The Gates of Hell – “An incredible and strange spectacle, the Gates of Hell is only one example of the kinds of disasters that can happen when you dig blindly.”
  • The Challenge of Being Transgender in a Nursing Home – “Many elder-care facilities are ill-equipped to deal with the needs of transgender seniors, who fear that a move to assisted living may leave them vulnerable to discrimination and harassment.”
  • Why Are We Letting Infectious Diseases Make A Comeback? – “An estimated 45 million Americans live in poverty, including more than one in five children. Approximately 1.65 million live in extreme poverty, defined as living on less than $2 per day. Economists estimate that the disparity between rich and poor Americans now is greater than at any time since the Great Depression, and this includes the South.”
  • Cancer Alley: Big Industry, Big Problems – “Mile by mile, town by town, there’s another little cluster of poverty and sickness. Most of these small towns are poor and black and nearly all are a stone’s throw from the petrochemical processing facilities that dot the region.”
  • A Matter of Black Lives – “Since 1980, more than 260,000 black men have been killed in America. Mitch Landrieu, the mayor of New Orleans, is on a crusade to stop the killing.” Content note: child death. 
  • Rare Photographs of Jazz Icons From the Archives of Metronome Magazine – Check out these photos of the Jazz Age, including legends like Billie Holiday and Dizzy Gillespie.
  • “Everything Is Not The Wire” – “David Simon would like you to stop trying to understand what’s going on in Baltimore by quoting his TV show.”
  • Some Cultures Treat Menstruation With Respect – “But some cultures have a different attitude. In societies where women might have their period only every two years or so because of frequent pregnancies and long breastfeeding, there might be fewer negative associations with menstruation, says Alma Gottlieb, professor of anthropology and gender and women’s studies at the University of Illinois and author of Blood Magic: The Anthropology of Menstruation.”
  • The counterintuitive secret to weight loss Coca-Cola doesn’t want you to know – “A new campaign urges us to focus on getting more exercise. Reams of data tell us that’s not enough.” I don’t know how “counterintuitive” this “secret” is but regardless, Coke’s campaign to promote exercise over eating responsibly is shady.
  • How White Users Made Heroin a Public-Health Problem – “The response to the current epidemic forms a striking contrast to the more punitive reactions sparked by earlier drug crazes.”
  • What Level of Atrocity Must Whole Foods Commit Before I Stop Shopping There? – You’ve made it to the end of this rather depressing news cycle, so have a funny :)

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Mary

Mary Brock works as an Immunology scientist by day and takes care of a pink-loving princess child by night. She likes cloudy days, crafting, cooking, and Fall weather in New England.

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