HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Citizen, 1998-05-20, Page 5A Final Thought
The human species is unique because it
alone can create, recognize and exercise
options. It is part of human uniqueness that
we are endowed with the faculty of choice.
— Norman Cousins
•
THE CITIZEN, WEDNESDAY, MAY 20, 1998. PAGE 5.
Arthur Black
As ye smoke,
so shall ye reek
No one ever went broke underestimating
the intelligence of the public
P.T. Barnum
I guess its true. I guess folks will buy just
about anything, as long as some ad agency
guy dreams up a way to convince them they
need it.
Take cigars. Please.
There was a time, not so very long ago,
when cigars were recognized for what they
are: stinky cylinders of a foul herb that
pollute the air, soil the drapes and burn holes
in one's lungs and lapels with impartial
abandon.
But cigars have had a Madison Avenue
makeover. They've become chic, trendy,
cool.
Visit a newsstand these days and you see
the likes of Arnold Schwarznegger, Sylvester
Stallone, Peter Falk (not to mention Goldy
Hawn, Demi . Moore and Sharon Stone) —
grimacing back at you, their capped teeth
clenched around a stogie the size of a
Rottweiler's hind leg.
Cigar Afficionado is the pretentious
moniker of one of the rags. Another one bills
Water water
everywhere . . .
When our children were young, we used to
have a difficult time getting them to turn out
the lights and turn off-the taps. Not to
mention, how they liked standing in the
shower for half an hour.
Informing them that water and electricity
did riot come cheap did not seem to have
much effect; for them it was totally free. One
of my boys stated one day that we seemed to
use more water on the lawn than on anything
else and I had to admit that he had a point.
Being an economist, I often talk about
what is called a replacement cost, that is,
what it costs to replace something that you
have used up. In this respect, what we pay
for our water does not even come close to
paying for the cost of replacing it, i.e. finding
new sources, etc.
If you don't count the glaciers or the salt
water of the sea, only about one per cent of
the planet's water is the drinkable kind. If we
were to divide that up equally among all the
people of the world, there would be enough
to last for the next century but, unfortunately,
there is a surplus in some countries such as
Canada or Iceland and an abject shortage in
others such as North Africa and the Middle
East. Right now the total number of countries'
in the latter category is 20; by the year 2025
the World Bank estimates that it will almost
double.
Already there are disputes arising over
itself as The Smoker. Perhaps the least
pompous is one called simply Cigar.
The trouble is, these publications are
devoted to one thing and one thing only: to
the notion that sticking a large tube of weed
in your mouth and sucking on one end while
you ignite the other will make you a more
attractive person.
And we're not talking El Cheapo cigars
here. The readers who fall for the cigars-are-
cool line will be paying big bucks for the
privilege of courting lip cancer and smelling
like a pool room.
Nowadays, Trendoids don't bat an eye at
the prospect of paying 25 or 30 bucks for a
'pleasure' that will last approximately as long
as it takes to drink a cup of coffee.
We seem to have collectively forgotten one
of Sigmund Freud's most famous dictums:
"Sometimes," Freud warned, "a cigar is just a
cigar".
Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime
minister, recently found himself in agua
caliente as a result of his passion for
Davidoff RRs.
Davidoff RRs sound like anti-ballistic
missiles -- and indeed, they're not too far off,
size and shape wise. But actually, they are
extremely rare and expensive hand-rolled
cigars.•
Davidoffs cost the equivalent of $43
Canadian.
water. For openers just look at the Middle
East where the Trigris and Euphrates Rivers
flow through three countries, each of the
three is watching the others suspiciously
when it comes to the quantity of water being
retained. Nearby the same situation exists
between Israel and the neighbouring
countries with regards to the flow of the
Jordan River.
Even closer to home the United States has
been trying to find ways to get some of
Canada's surplus water.
One way to solve the problem is to invest
in desalinization plants. The technology is
geared toward changing sea water into fresh
water but the cost is, so far, too high to
permit such a system to be utilized on a large
scale. This has not prevented some of the
countries in the Middle East from resorting
to such a method since energy and money are
relatively abundant, at least up to now, and
fresh water is extremely scarce.
The Canary Islands, which also utilize the
desalinization method, have discovered that
its cost is about four times as much as
traditional systems. However, more efficient
ways are being developed and this cost may
come down. It has, nevertheless, still a long
way to go before it can rival that of providing
ordinary water.
When oil prices started to rise rapidly in
1973, we learned one very important lesson.
It was that we were somewhat less than
economical in our use of the product.
We are learning the same about water. The
British, for example, found that no less than
one-third of water supplied leaks out just in
Each.
Since he took office two years ago, Prime
Minister Netanyahu has been handing out
Davidoff RRs to visiting bigwigs like kiss
candies at Halloween. He's also managed to
puff his way through an incredible $114,000
worth of the things.
The problem is, Netanyahu has been
putting those cigars 'on his tab' as long as he's
been in office. Israeli taxpayers have just
learned that they've been paying the bills for
Netanyahu's habit all along.
Benji's not the only one in the world with
expensive tobacco tastes. At a Christie's
auction held in Bern, Switzerland recently,
an anonymous oil tycoon from Saudi Arabia
eagerly shelled out the Canadian equivalent
of $25,000 for 25 — that's twenty-five cigars.
Now, it's true that these were creme de la
creme cigars that are almost impossible to
find these days — rare "Trinidad" cigars,
hand-made in Cuba by master craftsmen.
Still, anyway you slice it, that guy is laying
out an incredible $1,000 for every after-
dinner stogie he smokes.
Mind you, the Christie's brochure points
out that the prized products came "packed in
their original cedar box".
Somewhat smaller, one assumes, than the
wooden box the purchaser will be packed in
if he continues to smoke cigars.
getting it to consumers.
Then, again, we tend to overuse supplies of
water simply because we are heavily
subsidized in this use. By that I mean that we
pay far less than the cost of getting the water
to us.
That may not seem like much of a problem
when we are living close to such large lakes
but, for 'countries such as Bangladesh and
Thailand, it encourages all sorts of wasteful
use. The cost there is calculated to be only
one-tenth of the expense of supplying it.
Even there most of the water drains away
before it can even be used.
Right now farmers have little if any
incentive to invest in more efficient
technologies such as drop irrigation
pioneered by the Israelis in the Negev desert.
However, such investment is what may be
necessary in many parts of the world until
desalinization becomes competitive. Even
then, the cost of getting such water to inland
consumers may still be too high for many
countries.
It took us quite a while to learn how to use
oil much more efficiently and we did that
only when we were forced to. We may well
have to follow the same path when it comes
to water supply.
Guest column
Poison
weeds,
poison us
How many parents realize that the
herbicides and pesticides used in lawn and
garden care are literally killing their children?
A recent publication by the Environmental
Health Committee (EHC) of 'the Ontario
College of Family Physicians warns of such
dangers to human health.
The EHC have searched the medical and
scientific literature and found that there is an
increased risk of leukemia, brain cancer and
soft tissue sarcomas in children who have
been exposed to herbicides and pesticides. As
we all know, leukemia, brain cancer and
sarcoma often prove to be deadly diseases.
Adults do not escape the health effects of
exposure to pesticides. However, studies show
that adults appear to be less sensitive, and
more resistant to the dangers of pesticides
than do infants and children.
In the U.S.A., the National Research
Council and Academy of Science was
commissioned to study pesticides in the diets
of infants and children. They came to the
following conclusions.
• The amounts and variety of pesticides now
used are far greater than in any other time in
history.
• Infants and children are more likely than
adults to suffer the toxic effects of exposure
to pesticides as a result of different
metabolic rates, a greater absorptive area,
diets more concentrated in certain foods high
in pesticide residues and a relatively
immature immune system.
• Statutory government-controlled guidelines
for the safety of the use of pesticides often
use laboratory and scientific data which does
not necessarily represent the dangers to
human health.
• Current regulatory systems only look at the
average exposure of the entire population.
As a consequence, variations in exposure to
pesticides related to age, geographic location
and ethnic behavioural differences are not
addressed.
So, why do many families continue to make
their lawns and gardens a health hazard to
their children, themselves, their pets and
wildlife? Why do municipalities and school
boards continue to spray public grounds and
playing fields where little children play and
frolic? How would an earthling explain the
use of such agents to an extraterrestrial
'intelligent being? The earthling would have to
admit that he sprayed to control weeds. When
asked by the extraterrestrial to define a weed,
the earthling would have to reply that a weed
is a plant that has not made the accepted list.
When asked if killing such weeds was worth
causing fatal diseases in his children, I invite
you to fashion your own reply.
Many individuals and some wise and
concerned municipalities such as Cote St.
Luc, Quebec, have ceased to use such agents
in order to protect the health of their families,
their pets and the wildlife for whom their yard
is also home. It is increasingly apparent that,
for communities to obtain a greater lever of
health and well being, political leadership of
the type offered in Cote St. Luc is mandatory.
Institutions, organizations and governments
have been progressive and assertive in
protecting individuals from the risks of
second-hand smoke. Now is the time to make
our private and public lands a safer place for
all by banning the unnecessary urban use of
pesticides. We should always remember the
words of Chief Seattle, "Whatever we do unto
the web of life, we do unto ourselves."
Further information on this issue may be
obtained by sending a stamped, addressed
envelope to the Goderich Medical Center, 181
Cambria Rd. North, Goderich, Ontario, N7A
2R2.
Or. Jim Hollingworth, is a practising family
physician in Goderich and a founding
member of the Canadian Association of
Physicians for the Environment.
International Scene
By Raymond Canon