Author: Ken Goetz

Exploring Iceland, the Land of Fire and Ice

Posted on by Ken Goetz

Do you enjoy tramping through spectacular terrains, like an array of glaciers, waterfalls, and active volcanoes? If so, head for the land of fire and ice. I suggest that destination with great enthusiasm because I recently spent eight days exploring Iceland, a truly amazing island. One thrilling adventure led to another, time after time again, and the combined impact made me glow brighter than most travels ever have. And, as long term readers know, I’ve nosed around quite a few spots on this earth (see 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15).

To come back to Iceland (see here), my impressions of that sizeable island have been formed mainly by my recent trip. Admittedly, I knew little about the place before visiting it, although I had watched its weather closely during my three years of Air Force duty in Europe many decades ago. My recent visit was a gift from my daughter, Anne, for my birthday. I had reached 90 earlier this year, and she 50, but we delayed the trip until August, thinking that would be a fine month to venture northward.

Anne and I boarded an Icelandic Airlines flight in Chicago late one Friday evening and flew to Reykjavik, Iceland’s capital, in just over 6 hours, arriving shortly before 10 a.m. Saturday local time (Icelandic clocks are set five hours earlier than those in Chicago). Reykjavik has the distinction of being the world’s northernmost capital of a sovereign state, and the upper edge of Iceland lies just below the Arctic Circle.

It was misting when we arrived, but fortunately rain held off for most of the day, and we managed to complete the Reykjavik food walk Anne had planned for that afternoon. Not a single drop spattered us during the 2 1/2 hour walk led by Thor, a native Icelander who spoke perfect English with an American accent. He took us to five different eateries, some fancy, some not, and provided a nice introduction to the streets of downtown Reykjavik. Our first stop on the tour was at the Forretta Barin where Anne and I had a beer and the best lamb we ever tasted. It was so good that I would eat lamb at least every week if it were always so delicious.

I’ll now jump to our last stop of the walk because we finished at a well-established bakery, one first opened in 1932, some 90 years ago. Since I was an early January, 1932, baby myself, and probably even a few months older than that ancient bakery, Anne took my photo in front of the place. Note the hiking pants and boots, all waterproof and soon to be tested.

Our food walk group included an interesting mix of individuals, among them were three dentists who had graduated from the University of Michigan dental school, a retired professor from California, and four sisters, Ireland born, but now living not far from Anne in Chicago; one had just graduated from law school, another was a medical student, and a third had recently set a number of Illinois state high school records for weight lifting. A most impressive and delightful set of siblings.

 

Enjoying cake with four Irish lassies
After our tour of organized walking and eating ended about 5:30 p.m., Anne and I headed back to our Foss Hotel, taking just the slightest detour through the main shopping street in Reykjavik, Laugavegur.  In the middle of the street, which was limited to pedestrians, someone had painted an ultra long hopscotch lane, one often used. We watched a variety of kids and adults hopping happily along the course. One guy, probably in his 30s, did a great job of keeping his balance as he hopped high on one leg and landed perfectly within each square, bouncing quickly along the route with considerable skill.  Anne took photos of the 50th square, and the 90th, to commemorate our birthdays.
 
 
After reaching our hotel, we turned in fairly early, for the next day would be our first of road travel. I’ll say more about exploring Iceland in my next post.

Is a Nuclear Explosion Coming Your Way?

Posted on by Ken Goetz

You probably saw earlier this week that the The United Nations chief warned that “humanity is just one misunderstanding, one miscalculation away from nuclear annihilation.” Notice he didn’t say explosions, he didn’t say destruction, he said annihilation. He went on to mention the obvious tinderboxes, the continuing nuclear activity in the Mideast and Asia, and of course the threats of Mr. Russian Strongman, who according to The Associated Press said soon after his troops attacked the Ukraine, “Whoever tries to impede us, let alone create threats for our country and its people, must know that the Russian response will be immediate and lead to the consequences you have never seen in history.” Putin polished his unmistakable meaning by adding that Russia is one of the most potent nuclear powers.

I mention this newsworthy item because I rarely see articles about the threats of nuclear warfare in newspapers. Nor has it been a hot topic in the TV news I watch. On the other hand, who can miss the heavy winds blowing constantly about global warming? When it comes to temperature, the sky is definitely falling.  Angst that our temperatures may rise a degree or two by the end of the century is palpable and widespread. If temperatures do warm as feared by many, will humanity be annihilated? I certainly hope not. I imagine that folks alive at the future date will adapt, and that they will not greet each day with horror. I’ve compared the challenges of global warming versus nuclear winter in an earlier post (Read it here).

Having lived long enough that I’m now less than a decade from becoming a centenarian myself, I have no hope of being around when 2100 dawns, but I sincerely hope billions of people will still be breathing fresh air then, my descendants included, and that our planet won’t have been scorched by rising temperatures. To achieve that pleasant goal, it seems quite clear, we need to avoid nuclear annihilation. Do you think it would it be wise for us citizens, and especially for our representatives, to be more concerned about avoiding nuclear annihilation?  Perhaps it would help if our leaders took a good look at Nevil Shute’s On The Beach (See here) the realistic, post-apocalyptic novel which takes place about a year after nuclear World War III, a time when radioactive clouds are slowly circling the earth and killing all remaining humans and animals in its wake. (If given the choice between the two, I’d opt for a slightly warmer earth.)

NOTE:

As you may have noticed, I’ve been missing in action for about a month. I apologize for my absence. I’ve been plugging away on other matters that kept me occupied and left little time to post anything here. Now I have another short interval scheduled, one that has me more focused on cool weather, and rain, both likely in my immediate future. I’ll be heading for Iceland this weekend, thanks to my fine daughter who is taking us there to inspect the island for a week or so. Iceland’s temperatures in August usually range between the mid-50s to the mid-40s, and rain falls often, so we’ve prepared ourselves for that.  We’ll be flying to Reykjavik and exploring the southwest coast by car. I’ll let you know how things go.

 

 

Congressional Approval is at 20%. Shockingly high.

Posted on by Ken Goetz

Have you seen the latest political poll? I read recently that 20% of respondents (as of June 2022) approve of the way congress is handling its job (see here). Are you as shocked as I am? Do you know anyone who thinks congress is doing its job well? Can you guess who those one-out-of-every-fives might be, those who approve of the mess congress is making? Could they be government employees? Or might they simply lack analytical skills?

Congress excels at shouting among its members as arguments erupt about regulating every animal, vegetable, and mineral in the country (Do something! is the cry.), while the same group is simultaneously spending us into bankruptcy. I don’t claim to be an economist, but I have been exposed to the basics of that dismal science, as documented by my undergraduate degree (B.S. in Economics, University of Wisconsin).

Surging inflation is the latest fiasco out of Washington. Various factors can induce inflation, the prime ones being excessive government spending and printing too much money (let’s not forget FOMC chairman Jerome H Powell and his cohorts who kept interest rates ridiculously low while flooding our economy with cheap money, one of their reasons being to get inflation above 2%). Boy, did they succeed! So now Powell et al. are raising interest rates in a hurry to recover from their blunder. To add one more obvious cause, a general shortage of services and goods also is inflationary. 

With interest rates rising, another problem is looming. The cost of servicing our huge national debt at higher interest rates will siphon more and more dollars from other government spending. The numbers are huge. Here are some data provided by Red Jahncke in a column in the June 30th Wall Street Journal. Take a deep breath and read on.

Total federal gross interest cost over the 12 months ending on May 31 was $666 billion. If we include the impending extra interest on Treasury bills and the maturing notes, that figure rises to $863 billion. This is a staggering cost. National military spending was $746 billion over the past 12 months; Medicare spending was $700 billion. (My emphasis) Ouch, think of spending more for governmental debt than for Medicare, or for national defense? Is that where you want your tax dollars to go? Will our representatives ever be held accountable?

To put the above numbers into context, congress’s deficit spending will cost us, the taxpayers, nearly a trillion dollars per year, just to pay off federal borrowing necessitated by congressional splurging, which of course has inflated our national debt. As I type this, the debt is $30,550,000,000 (Yep, that’s 30+ TRILLIONS), and rocketing upward by the second. If you want to see how fast the ugly beast grows, just take a look here. Warning! Watching it grow will make you shudder.

To bring this down to the level of individuals like you and me, our present national debt comes to nearly $92,000 per citizen. So if Mom and Dad and each of the kids would write a check for nearly a hundred grand, payable to the U.S. Government, we would be free of debt, at least until our Washington hoodlums resumed spending more than our government takes in. It isn’t their money, but they do love to spend it, and sometimes, it is clear, merely spend it to get reelected. Some aren’t even shy about admitting that fact, as I read recently.

“It is actually delusional to believe Dems can get reelected without acting on filibuster or student debt,” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tweeted in December. Rep. Ayanna Pressley said in May: “Democrats win when we deliver, and we have to deliver in ways that are impactful, tangible and transformative, like canceling student debt.” A headline on an April column in the Los Angeles Times read “Elizabeth Warren knows how Democrats can win the midterms. It starts with canceling student loan debt.” For the full text of this article, see here.

Ah yes, the government’s “free” cafeteria (remember, we taxpayers end up with the bill). Is it possible that the above dollars for votes scheme may backfire? I think President’s Biden latest goal is to cancel $10,000 of student debt for all those indebted. But what about those who have paid off their student loans? What about the rest of us who never had college debt? What can our sleazy politicians offer us? Couldn’t we all use an extra ten grand? Where shall we stand in line with hands out for our comparable bribes?

If this sounds like a shot at the above politicians, it definitely is, but I am an equal opportunity marksman, as I’ve demonstrated earlier (See here, here, here, and here), and I see no redeeming value in congressional republicans. If we ever needed term limits for our congressional crew, I am convinced we need them now more than ever.

Writing about politics raises my blood pressure, so I’ll avoid the topic for a while now. Next time I’ll get back to talking more about the science of aging. Stay tuned.

 

 

Medicare advantage changes this interaction.

Exorbitant Costs of Our Medical Care

Posted on by Ken Goetz

If you were around for a good part of the last century, you probably have noticed what I have, the exorbitant costs of medical care, not to mention other unwelcome changes, here in the USA. Call a physician’s office these days and you’re likely to get a recording, not an answer by a live human. Want an appointment with your doctor? Don’t expect to get it soon. And when you finally arrive in the office, are you happy as a nurse or the doctor stares at a computer screen while talking with you? The human interaction between physician and patient had degraded as the cost of medical care has skyrocketed.

Here are some numbers from a a table I copied from a book (sorry, I’ve lost the reference; it may have been titled Dark Medicine). The table compared numbers from 1975 and 2017. I had trouble reproducing the table, so I’ll provide the data in narrative form. In 1975, health care spending was $550 per person compared with >$11,000 per person in 2017. Quite a jump, don’t you think? Time allotted for doctor’s office visits in 1975 were 60 minutes for new patients and 30 minutes for return visits. In 2017, the times had been reduced to 12 minutes for new patients and 7 minutes for return visits. How is that for cutting you short of time? In 1975, the average hospital daily room charge was about $100. In 2017, the charge for a daily hospital room had increased to $4,600.  Not an increase designed to draw applause.

According to a more recent article (in the February 24, 2022, New England Journal of Medicine), U.S. national health care expenditures increased from 4% of the gross domestic product in 1950 to nearly 18% of GDP in 2019. In short, now nearly one dollar out of every five spent in the USA now goes to “healthcare.”

The “healthcare industry” has become the biggest business in the United States. How did this massive growth occur? Here is my simple two word answer. Government intervention. One can quibble over the details, but certain facts are undeniable. In my younger years, free care for indigent patients was common at all levels of medicine. Practicing physicians often received little or nothing from patients unable to pay, yet they made a very good living despite that concession.

Hospitals did much the same. When I was a medical student at the University of Wisconsin and later at the University of Kansas, patients without financial resources were known as teaching patients and hospitalized and treated at no cost to them. The patients usually were attended to first by medical students, then residents, and finally by staff physicians, but they received free standard care. That system was still common practice when I interned in 1969 at St. Luke’s Hospital of Kansas City, with the hospital and physicians writing off the care of teaching patients.

The system wasn’t perfect, but it worked well. All of this changed, of course, when the government got into the business and launched programs that overrode the old system. With government money available, doctors and hospitals were eligible to be paid for services they once had provided free, and they not surprisingly chose to collect the cash. Free care went out the window. With government money, of course, came governmental control, illustrated by the emerging web of proliferating laws and requirements along with the burgeoning army of bureaucrats hired to ensure compliance with the new laws. This new army now naturally has its fingers in the “healthcare industry” pie, pulling cash from it.

An equally impressive growth of private medical insurance has occurred simultaneously, it too with its heavy dose of administrators and its own regulations and requirements, thus inflating the cost of medical care without adding one drop of health to anybody. No wonder “healthcare” has become the largest industry in the country.

As the growing mass of governmental and insurance company dictates landed on physicians, doctors were forced to hire new employees simply to fill out forms and comply. In turn, this necessitated the government and insurance agencies to hire teams of employees to read those newly required forms to ensure compliance with their regulations, thus bloating the overgrown monster even more.

All of this meant that physicians in private practice, distracted by the increasing regulations and needing to oversee compliance, found less time to spend with their patients, even as they increased their staffs, and their overhead. It soon became difficult for many doctors to survive independently. Hospitals and other organizations began buying physician’s practices and folding the doctors into large groups. According to recent articles in the press, physicians these days are burning out as rapidly as Fourth of July fireworks.

So has all of this improved our satisfaction with our medical care? Not for me! According to a 2019 article in Forbes (see here), American families in that year were paying nearly $20,000 per year for insurance premiums, deductibles, and out-of-pocket costs for healthcare. The exorbitant costs of medical care.

This flood of money is going somewhere, and we know a few places. According to the above article in Forbes, so-called non-profit hospitals are adding billions of dollars annually to their bottom lines, lavishly compensating their CEOs, and spending millions of dollars (generated by patient fees), to lobby government and defend the status quo. Uh huh. That makes sense. Who wouldn’t go all out to make sure that a rich stream of greenbacks would keep flowing in their direction? After all, what are lobbyists for?

There is, of course, plenty of fraud as well. Few government programs avoid that. A recent article in the Washington Post (see here) reveals that a California health system employed a woman to scan health histories of thousands of elderly Medicare patients and then pressure doctors to add false diagnoses found in current medical records. (The woman became a whistleblower.) The point of adding outdated and irrelevant diagnoses such as stroke and cancer to the medical records — often without the knowledge of the patients themselves — was to make the patients appear sicker than they were, and thus send bills to the federal Medicare Advance insurance program inflated by millions of dollars, according to federal allegations.

Finally, we mustn’t forget our health insurance companies. It was reported last week (See here), that the CEOs of American’s seven largest publicly traded health insurance and services companies cumulatively earned more that $283 million in 2021 – by far the most in any year of the last decade. These inflated earnings naturally add to the exorbitant costs of medical care.

There you have it. We’ve barely scratched the surface, but I think an image of this particular governmental-induced sludge is emerging. I chose sludge specifically after reading a recent article in The Wall Street Journal discussing pleas for our government to “do something”(see here). Here is a quote from the above mentioned article. “The American political system has accreted so many solutions and sub-solutions to so many problems that what we have created is a system mired in sludge.” Absolutely true! I can think of no better word than sludge to describe our current ungainly, over-regulated, under-performing, crazy system leading to exorbitant costs of our medical care. What do you think?

HOUSEKEEPING NOTE:

After having written nearly 90 essays and posting them here over the past 18 months, I am going to take a necessary break. I have a growing list of unfinished tasks I’ve avoided while considering topics to be reported here and doing the necessary background work. I need to catch up on other parts of my life, but I plan to return, maybe within a  month, assuming my aging brain continues to function with a modicum of efficiency. While I’m gone, please feel free to browse through my earlier posts. I think some of my best writing appears in those early pieces (a few of my favorites are here, here, here, and here), and all still are available here on this blog. In the meantime, enjoy life, and stay tuned.

 

 

 

 

Urolithin A Structure

Urolithin A Effectively Tames Inflammation

Posted on by Ken Goetz

A burgeoning flood of laboratory data, along with emerging studies on human subjects, indicate that Urolithin A effectively tames inflammation. Importantly, this molecule also stimulates mitophagy (See here), and it is emerging as a potentially important therapeutic agent.  The next two paragraphs, taken from recent scientific review articles, lay out the direction this specific branch of medicine is heading, a direction I believe has great promise. Read on.

“Chronic inflammatory diseases are the most significant cause of death in the world. The World Health Organization (WHO) ranks chronic diseases as the greatest threat to human health. The prevalence of diseases associated with chronic inflammation is anticipated to increase persistently for the next 30 years in the United States. in 2000, nearly 125 million Americans were living with chronic conditions and 61 million (21%) had more than one. In recent estimates by Rand Corporation, in 2014 nearly 60% of Americans had at least one chronic condition, 42% had more than one and 12% of adults had 5 or more chronic conditions. Worldwide, 3 of 5 people die due to chronic inflammatory diseases like stroke, chronic respiratory diseases, heart disorders, cancer, obesity, and diabetes.” (This quote comes from an excellent review article published in 2021. To find it, click here, and then click of Free full text.)

A powerful anti-inflammatory agent

“Urolithin A (UroA) is a gut metabolite produced from ellagic acid-containing foods such as pomegranates, berries, and walnuts. UroA is of growing interest due to its therapeutic potential for various metabolic diseases based on immunomodulatory properties. Recent advances in UroA research suggest that UroA administration attenuates inflammation in various tissues, including the brain, adipose, heart, and liver tissues, leading to the potential delay or prevention of the onset of Alzheimer’s disease, type 2 diabetes mellitus, and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease. In this review, we focus on recent updates of the anti-inflammatory function of UroA and summarize the potential mechanisms by which UroA may help attenuate the onset of diseases in a tissue-specific manner. Therefore, this review aims to shed new insights into UroA as a potent anti-inflammatory molecule to prevent immunometabolic diseases, either by dietary intervention with ellagic acid-rich food or by UroA administration as a new pharmaceutical drug.” (To read in full this informative article, click here, then click on View Full-Text.) There is no doubt that Urolithin A tames inflation.

Important basics to remember

Before I go on, I think it bears emphasizing that healthy nutrition and continuing exercise are known to slow the declines in muscle strength as one ages and to inhibit the development of metabolic diseases. We must not forget these two healthful practices as we consider other options that stretch beyond them.

If you have been following this blog for a while, you may recall my mentioning the old truism that people who eat nuts daily (or at least often) tend to live longer than those who rarely eat nuts (see that post by clicking here)  In that article I explained that some types of nuts contain resveratrol, the substance that extends lives in lower forms, and possibly in humans as well, thus supporting the hypothesis that the resveratrol in nuts may explain why nut eaters live longer.

Another possibility

However, the precursors of Urolithin A also are found in certain nuts, so one might argue that Urolithin A’s anti-inflammatory effects could be responsible for lengthening the lives of those who often eat nuts. This too seems to be a reasonable assumption, even though not all of us have in our gut microbiome the necessary bacteria that convert the above-mentioned ellagic acids to Urolithin A.

Apparently only about 40% of us, at most, have detectable levels of circulating Urolithin A after eating the foods mentioned above. The rest of us are out of luck. How, you might ask, can we identify the lucky ones? Can we determine whether we have the necessary gut bacteria to convert those ellagic acids to Urolithin A? It wouldn’t be easy. I’ve searched online to see if any tests might be available, but nothing popped up.  Numerous research laboratories could perform such tests, but I found nothing commercially available. So, if you’re among the unlucky majority, you could stuff your tummy with pomegranates and end up with no healthful Urolithin A in your blood stream.

Hope for the unlucky 60%

What is described as pure Urolithin A is now available from at least one provider (See here). Full disclosure: I have been taking this product for the better part of a year (I believe in supplements), and I do believe it has strengthened my muscles and likely has improved my mitochondrial function. I have no connection with the company and will add that the product is expensive. A paper published this month (May 2022) reports that this specific Urolithin A improved muscle strength, exercise performance, and mitochondrial health in middle-aged adults (see that article by clicking here). I was particularly impressed by the evidence that this molecule stimulated mitophagy and improved mitochondrial performance, especially since mitochondrial performance is known to diminish as one ages. It seems beyond doubt that Urolithin A effectively tames inflammation. It is, I think, a compound to keep our eyes on.

A look ahead

I have identified a few more substances, molecules that may improve health and extend lives, that I plan to describe in later posts, but next time, if my intention holds, I plan to take a detour and look at changes in our medical system over the years, changes that have been, in my opinion, mostly bad. Stay tuned.

The Awesome Science of Anti-Aging: An Introductory Peek

Posted on by Ken Goetz

Fountains of youth and magic elixirs have been touted for millennia, each illusion tantalizing
many, and disappointing all. That era has ended, replaced by the awesome science of anti-aging.
New strategies are evolving to improve and prolong the function of practically every part of the
body, organs like the heart, brain, kidney, lung, and more.

Optimism that human healthspans and lifespans will be extended is boundless. Here is what the
CEO of a UK-based anti-aging biotech said recently as he likened the outcome of anti-aging
research to the study of flight. “In 1903, two brothers flew a glorified kite for 14 seconds, the
Kitty Hawk. Fifteen years later they were flying planes in WWI, and 35 years later, the Germans
had invented the jet. Sixty-five years later we landed a man on the moon. For robotics and for
aging, divide that number by 10. That’s how fast this is going to happen.” (see here)

Geneticists and Biochemists

Over the past few decades geneticists have identified gene variants that extend the lifespans of
multiple species. Simultaneously we’ve learned how individual lifestyles influence
our epigenome, that clever regulator that follows through and turns our genes on, or turns them
off (See here). And biochemists have unraveled intricate pathways within our cells that influence
the rate at which they age.

Researchers have learned how to stimulate autophagy (we’ve talked about that neat process
here and here), the housekeeping maneuver by which our cells maintain their health, as well as
mitophagy, a related process that renews our mitochondria (the organelles that supply most of
the chemical energy needed to power the cell’s biochemical reactions.)
Autophagy and mitophagy improve health and very likely prolong life.

Other sources of information

As the title indicates, this is merely an introductory peek. Any single sentence above could be
expanded to full book length by scientists in the field (which I am not), so I am staying simplistic
here. But many of the details are absolutely fascinating. If you would like a check out some the
marvelous things being discovered, you can find further information in either of these two
reviews (here, and here).

All that glistens is not gold

One must proceed with caution. There still are plenty of useless nostrums for sale. The CEO I
quoted above also said this. “There’s an enormous number of charlatans . . . Walk into your local
drugstore, you’re going to see about 50 products that claim to be anti-aging, and I can assure you
that none of them are.”

Here is what someone wrote in 2014: Gullible America will spend this year some seventy-five
millions of dollars in the purchase of patent medicines. In consideration of this sum it will
swallow huge quantities of alcohol, an appalling amount of opiates and narcotics, a wide
assortment of varied drugs ranging from powerful and dangerous heart depressants to insidious
liver stimulants; and, far in excess of all other ingredients, undiluted fraud.  (See here)\

But there are good products too

Although there is lots of worthless products out there, even dangerous ones,
there are good ones as well. Some have great potential. I plan to describe a number of those in
future posts, offering more about the awesome science of anti-aging.

Featured Image Cartoon from: <a href=’https://www.freepik.com/vectors/different-ages’>Different ages vector created by pch.vector – www.freepik.com</a>

(National Archives, image 200-SFF-52)

E. B. White on War. A Historical Parallel?

Posted on by Ken Goetz

Today, May 9th, is Victory Day in Russia (1) as it celebrates the surrender of Germany in WWII. And
Russia is at war again today. An early column by E. B. White may provide an historical parallel.

Decades ago E. B. White wrote in The New Yorker, The long vigil at the radio is beginning to tell
on us. We have been tuned in, off and on, for forty-eight hours, trying to snare intimations of our
destiny, as in a butterfly net. . . We still twitch nervously from the likelihood of war at 86 on the
dial to the possibility of peace at 100 on the dial. . . We sit with diners at the darkened tables in
the French cafés, . . .we march alongside the German troops approaching the Polish border. . . If
war comes, it will be war, and no one wants that.

Border Parallel?

In the spring of 2021, Russian troops began approaching the Ukrainian border. In mid-January of
this year, as many as 100,000 Russian troops had been amassed along that border, leading
President Biden to say on television, “How can I say this in a public forum,” He hesitated briefly
before saying of Putin, “My guess is he will move in.”

Date of White’s Column

Mr. White wrote his column on August 27th, 1939. Hitler’s troops invaded Poland five days later,
on September 1st (The New Yorker published White’s column on September 2nd). On September
3rd, the United Kingdom and France declared war on Germany, the beginning of World War II, a
conflict that quickly expanded, as we all know.

Historical Parallel?

On February 24, 2022, Russian troops invaded the Ukraine. Land and air battles erupted, leading
to massive destruction of cities and human lives. NATO is ramping up its efforts to provide more
and more weapons and supplies to the beleaguered Ukrainians. Fighting is ferocious. War is here,
and escalating. Most of us do not want it. Weapons are more powerful than ever (2). Unleashing
even a fraction of present-day nuclear warheads likely would eliminate all of humanity, or cripple
it in unimaginable ways. Where do we go from here? Do our politicians know?

German soldier photo from National Archives (image 200-SFF-52) 

What Scares You More? Global Warming or Nuclear Winter?

Posted on by Ken Goetz

Global warming and nuclear winter are two different, and in some ways contrasting, risks to the
lives of the nearly 8 billion humans living on this planet. My last few posts have focused on
what we can do individually to live healthier and longer lives (See 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6), and I’ll get back
to that theme next time, but today I’ll focus on differing risks to all life on this planet. I’ll keep it
short and simplistic. You can take it from there.

The dangers of global warming rush toward us as incessantly as Niagara Falls. We are informed
that a few degrees Celsius rise in global temperature will be our doom, that we must react quickly
to save the planet. (Note: from my brief look into the subject, scientific evidence is not as strong
as portrayed by the media, but here we consider the warming scenario to be completely valid.)

Effects of global warming

NASA has summarized some of the effects as follows (See here) The effects of human-caused global
warming are happening now, are irreversible on the timescale of people alive today, and will
worsen in the decades to come. This article then goes on to discuss certain effects of this
warming under the following headlines: 

Frost-free Season (and Growing Season) will Lengthen. More Droughts and Heat Waves.
Hurricanes Will Become Stronger and More Intense. Sea Level Will Rise 1-8 feet by 2100. Arctic
Likely to Become Ice-Free. Temperatures Will Continue to Rise. Change Will Continue Through
This Century and Beyond. Changes in Precipitation Patterns.


 What is nuclear winter?

Although less visible in today’s media, a 2015 article published by the American Federation
of Scientists (see here), quoted in blue below, offers a summary.

Since the early 1980s, the world has known that a large nuclear war could cause severe global
environmental effects, including dramatic cooling of surface temperatures, declines in
precipitation, and increased ultraviolet radiation. The term nuclear winter was coined
specifically to refer to cooling that result in winter-like temperatures occurring year-round.
Regardless of whether such temperatures are reached, there would be severe consequences for
humanity.

Did you catch that downdraft? . . . dramatic cooling of the surface temperatures. Would that wipe
out global warming and chill (too much) the planet?

Here is another segment from the above article: Carl Sagan . . . believed nuclear winter could
cause human extinction, in which case all members of future generations would be lost. He
argued that this made nuclear winter vastly more important than the direct effects of nuclear
war, which could, in his words, “kill ‘only’ hundreds of millions of people.”

That sounds a bit scary, but are Sagan’s arguments pertinent today? How many nuclear weapons
are around in 2022? I dug up the answer: (From here)

Countries that have Nuclear Weapons in 2022 (and How Many They Have)

Russia – 6,255 nuclear warheads
United States of America – 5,550 nuclear warheads
China – 350 nuclear warheads
France – 290 nuclear warheads
United Kingdom – 225 nuclear warheads
Pakistan – 165 nuclear warheads
India – 156 nuclear warheads
Israel – 90 nuclear warheads
North Korea – none, but material to build 40-50 nuclear warheads

Odds of warheads being used

What are the odds that this massive collection of nuclear weapons would be unleashed? At
this very moment the world is witnessing how one determined leader can systematically
launch an attack and bombard another country with conventional weaponry, the same leader
who more than once has touted his nuclear arsenal and hinted at its possible use.

Note, Iran is not in the above list, but little to no political will has been imposed on that country
during its path toward nuclear weapons. When that goal is achieved, could you guess what
targets might be favored by extremists in that country?

Evidence indicates that some of the countries listed are not led by rational individuals. Is it
possible that, before the century is out, some megalomaniac might, in a moment of pique,
demonstrate his brute force? Could an impulsive mind push a disastrous button and alter forever
human history?

Obviously this is a highly complex subject worthy of many thick treatises, but the basics
seem to be rather clear, and of vital importance. So, perhaps it would be useful for all of us to
puzzle over the question posed in the title above. Which is scarier, global warming or nuclear winter?
And what steps might be taken to ease our minds?

ADDENDUM: 9 May 2022

After reading this post, someone pointed out to me that John Kerry, President Biden’s climate
czar, warned that Russia’s war against Ukraine could distract the world from the climate change
crisis and produce “massive emissions” that will negatively impact the globe.

I think Kerry’s premonition was correct. The war certainly distracted me. But those emissions,
John, if they become nuclear, will almost certainly cool down the planet. That will please neither
of us.

I’ll quickly add that the climate czar and I are in full agreement on one important point. Mr.
Kerry said in a late February interview, “I thought we lived in a world that had said no to that
kind of activity. And I hope diplomacy will win.” Right on! John Kerry.

Would Restricting Calories Improve Your Health? Would Fasting? Let’s See.

Posted on by Ken Goetz

Do we benefit by restricting calories? As I’ve mentioned before (see here), scientists for years
have known that a calorie-restricted diet, or simply eating less, improves the health and extends
the lives of laboratory species ranging from yeast cells to primates. But what about you and me?
If we limited our intake of calories, would we live longer and healthier? Whatever the answer, I
offer a guaranteed method to achieve both at the end of this post.

For obvious reasons, human experiments on calorie restriction have been limited, and necessarily
less controlled than animal studies. Those that have been reported (studies extending for up to
two years), haven’t been of sufficient length to draw any inferences on possible effects on life
span. Nevertheless experiments are ongoing, some showing positive health effects. So we may
benefit by limiting calories. For up to date information, click here.

Studies on human volunteers

Beyond that, any lengthy studies on human volunteers have basic weaknesses. Can
you guess what some might be? Just two months ago, a paper published electronically revealed
two weaknesses (called “challenges”) in its own study on human volunteers. I quote the paper’s
conclusion below (CR refers to calorie restriction).

Conclusion: The results highlight the challenges of: 1) setting a single CR goal vs. a range of
acceptable values, and 2) obtaining real-time and valid measures of CR adherence to facilitate
adherence.

What does #2 above mean simple English? It means a laboratory mouse gets its chow
metered out precisely by time and amount, so the experimental data collected from such animal
experiments are solid. On the other hand, a human volunteer in a long-term dietary experiment,
and safely at home away from prying eyes, could easily down an extra glass of wine, or substitute an
8 oz steak for the 4 oz specified, or even end his dinner with an unauthorized apple pie à la mode.
Who would be the wiser? Not the scientific investigator collecting the information.

Have calorie restriction experiments been properly interpreted?

Is it possible that the experiments on calorie restriction have been misinterpreted? Could another
factor in these experiments explain why “calorie restriction” improves health and extends lives?

Maybe so. Thanks to a magazine from my alma mater, I learned of recent experiments led by
Professor Dudley Lamming at the University of Wisconsin. He and his coworkers noted that
most experiments that imposed calorie restriction on mice have also included a period of fasting.
(In most earlier studies the animals had routinely consumed their daily ration within two hours of
their daily feeding and consequently endured a fast of about 22 hours each day.)

So what did Lamming and his colleagues do? They devised a method to separate the effects of
calorie deprivation from the effects of fasting. They accomplished this by studying
three experimental groups of mice, all of whom were calorie deprived for 16 weeks, and
comparing the end results with a control group of mice that ate a normal diet for the same time
period.

To simplify the results, two of the three groups of those calorie deprived mice ate their food
over multiple times throughout the day, but the third group was fed only once a day and devoured
the entire diet withing 2 hours. In short, this third group fasted for 22 hours each day.

Important result: of these three calorie-deprived groups, only the mice that actually fasted
developed typical changes of a calorie deficient diet. This indicated that the fasting, not the
calorie deficiency itself, had elicited the beneficial effects observed in earlier experiments.
Remember fasting and autophagy? (see here)

A Crucial Experiment

These investigators then followed up with an obvious experiment. They gave another group
of mice the full amount of food eaten by their control cohorts (thus no calorie restriction), but the
food was given to the mice all at once, and it was consumed over a 2-hour period. So these mice
fasted for 22 hours each day for 16 weeks, but never were calorie deprived. Results from these
mice were essentially the same as the group that had fasted while eating a calorie-deficient diet.
So 22-hour fasting by itself did the trick.

My simple summary of this important study doesn’t reflect the complex nature of much of its
content. Please understand that these experiments also employed several highly technical methods to
demonstrate an important truth.

You already know the basics. Our parents provided us with our unique set of 20,000-plus genes
(our genome, the DNA that make us who we are). But we must also remember that we have the
power to alter what our genes do, thanks to our epigenome, an extensive set of chemicals that
determines which of our genes are expressed, i.e., which are turned on, or off, that is whether
they are doing their job or staying silent. And we can influence our epigenome.

Adaptability of the epigenome

To demonstrate the adaptability of the epigenome, let’s return to the study of Lamming and his
colleagues mentioned above. These investigators measured gene expression in their fasting
fasting mice and compared those results with others from mice on a regular diet. The findings
astonished me. The researchers identified 2,700 genes in the liver and more than 1,800 genes in
fat tissue that were differently expressed in mice that had fasted when compared to the normal
controls. Fasting clearly produced huge effects on gene activity via the epigenome.

Although the study was performed on rodents, it has implications for you and me.
Clearly our genes are not all that matter. Our genes are regulated by our epigenome. And we,
by influencing our epigenomes, can impact our genes — and our lives.

A miracle worth pondering

So how do we influence our epigenome? Through our lifestyles, by what we eat and when we
eat, by how far and how fast we move, by where we go, and likely by nearly all we do. In short,
our activities influence our epigenome, some positively and some negatively (exercise plus,
smoking minus). Those changes in our epigenome affect our genes, which in turn influence our
health and our longevity. That chain of events, I think, is a miracle worth pondering, a miracle
that can be set in motion by every one of us.

Healthful Effects From Resveratrol and Pterostilbene

Posted on by Ken Goetz

In my last post, I described some of the healthful effects produced by resveratrol, a chemical found in grapes, blueberries, peanuts, and cocoa powder, among other food sources. Not surprisingly, it also is available in differing forms from numerous commercial sources. Resveratrol has a chemical cousin named pterostilbene, which I’ll mention below.

Resveratrol seemingly is magical in many ways (see here). Not only does it extend the lives of species ranging from yeast cells to mice (I know of no published results from larger animals or humans), it also seems to have beneficial effects on cancers of the colon, breast, and prostate. Other reports indicate that it impedes the development of Alzheimer’s disease, that it has positive effects on kidney disease, hypertension, diabetes mellitus, and other data suggest that it is therapeutic in certain inflammatory diseases, and several other disorders as well.

This is not a technical blog, so we will glide over an ocean of scientific studies here. Suffice it to say that the so-called bioavailability of resveratrol (whether enough of it gets to the places where it does its job) has been questioned. According to careful studies, 75% of orally ingested trans-resveratrol is absorbed into the blood stream, but the amount in blood is quickly metabolized in the intestines and liver. This metabolism rapidly destroys much of the absorbed resveratrol, thus leading to low concentrations in the blood after it is ingested.

This may or may not be a problem. In what appear to be well-controlled human experiments, the amount circulating in the bloodstream after volunteers ingested 500 mg of trans-resveratrol reportedly remained high enough to produce many of the reported therapeutic effects. And the downstream products produced by the metabolism of resveratrol also have biological effects. Does resveratrol produce serious side effects? There are some suggestions that it may cause some, but overall it appears to be quite safe to take.

Pterostilbene

Now let’s focus our attention to that close cousin of resveratrol, a chemical knows as pterostilbene, and one that seems to have many of the beneficial effects of resveratrol. This cousin also appears to have an important advantage over reserpine. Data indicate that it is more biologically active than resveratrol (I’ll interrupt myself here to mention that this is my first day of typing with Word, and I’m a bit miffed because Microsoft’s Word underlined the word indicate earlier in this sentence, suggesting I should have used indicates. May I pass along to the creators of Word that data is the plural form of the singular form, datum, thus “data indicate” is grammatically correct.)

 Sorry for the above diversion, but I have been a fan of WordPerfect for decades, and I haven’t yet warmed up to this new kid on my block. I would still be using WordPerfect if I could manage it, but my old favorite lies dying in tatters in Windows 11, the operating system on my newly acquired computer.

To come back to pterostilbene, it hasn’t gotten nearly the press attention that reserpine has, but from my limited probing into these two compounds, I have the impression that pterostilbene does have an edge over resveratrol. Nevertheless, I am an equal opportunity consumer of supplements, as I’ve mentioned earlier (see here), so I continue to take 1200 mg of resveratrol every morning. About a year ago I began taking 150 mg of pterostilbene as well. Do I recommend these two to you? Not really. I just write essays here. If you are interested, I suggest you learn more about each compound and consult your physician before taking either of these two intriguing compounds.

Eat Nuts, Live Longer

It has been reported for years that people who consume nuts daily (or at least often), tend to live longer than those who rarely eat nuts. And nutritionists and other scientists have long extolled the health virtues of blueberries and similar fruits. It turns out that many nuts and berries contain both resveratrol and pterostilbene. Is it possible that the health benefits of nuts and blueberries are at least partly attributable to the resveratrol and pterostilbene within them? I think it is a logical question.

I have just scratched the surface here, drawing out only a small bucket of water from this gigantic ocean. If you would like to swim out for a more detailed look at this intriguing subject, I will suggest a source that contains abundant information on both compounds. Spoiler alert: it is a thorough scientific review of resveratrol, pterostilbene, and a third cousin I haven’t mentioned. Like nearly all scientific reviews, it written with plenty of typical jargon, but any reader should derive important general information from it (to see it, click here).

I’ll stay with the theme of health and aging for a while. Hope to see you back here soon.