Revenge of the Pangolin
Revenge of the Pangolin
What on earth is a Pangolin?
I had never heard of one, until my dear cousin, Jeff Salz, sent me this article that he has recently published.
Jeff is a guy with a colorful and interesting past, having experienced a wide array of many ‘near death’ situations in his time. Here’s the article which I hope you will enjoy reading.
Do let me know what you think about it. To me, it sheds yet another light to ponder on with regard to the coronavirus COVID 19 pandemic that we’re all, globally, part of today.
Stay Safe
Stay in Place
Cover your Face
This too will Pass
Revenge of the Pangolin
Corona Time with the ‘World’s Most Unusual Mammal
It’s only a tragedy if nothing changes.
While ultimate blame has not been assigned for the source of our current pandemic, one unusual animal remains the primary suspect. If found guilty, there will never have been a perpetrator more innocent.
The pangolin is so non-aggressive that it doesn’t even have teeth. Instead, it picks up insects with a sticky tongue longer than its entire body – including its elongated, snouty head. It’s only mammal covered from head to toes in scales, the scales that are the gentle pangolin’s only defense. Feeling threatened it curls itself into a spiny ball – until it resembles something like a giant artichoke – emits a stinky fluid from its posterior and hopes for the best (don’t try this at home).
Timid loners, pangolin’s social life consists of a handful of meet-ups over course of a lifetime to mate and produce a litter which they raise as a couple for about two years. Sleeping by day in a cozy underground burrow, heading out at night to feast on ants and termites – a pangolin’s existence is solitary and largely uneventful.
Until now.
Newborn Pangolin at the Taipei Zoo
In recent years, an onslaught of loggers and farmers has led to extensive deforestation and habitat destruction. The new roadways bring hunters in search of exotic species to harvest for local and international consumption. The money is too good to resist. Pangolin flesh, valued up to $600 a kilogram, is a popular delicacy in the upscale restaurants of China and Vietnam.
Dried and powdered, Pangolin scales are a prized ingredient for Chinese folk remedies prescribed for a wide variety of issues including anxiety, poor circulation, acne, hysterical crying in children, women thought to be possessed by devils or ogres and male impotence. In China, ‘decoctions and infused liquids made from pangolins’ remained eligible for reimbursement by government-funded health insurance as recently as last year.
In Zimbabwe, the Pangolin Men of the Tiki Hywood Trust insure the safety of their charges
To meet the almost limitless demand, hunters from Saharan Africa to southeast Asia, beat and boil alive hundreds of pangolins every day.“While they may look like dinosaurs, with their unique scales and claws, pangolins are very docile animals. They aren’t aggressive at all,” says zoologist Scott Wilson, Head of Field Programs at the Chester Zoo. “When traffickers approach using dogs to track down the nocturnal mammals or others choking them out from their nests with smokers, the terrified pangolins will not fight back. Frightened by the hunters they just curl up into a ball to try and protect themselves. Wilson adds: “It would be a very scary experience for them.”
Smuggled across international borders by the many thousands every year has thrust the shy pangolins into the celebrity limelight – winner of the world’s most dubious distinction: ‘most trafficked animals on planet Earth’.
Rescued Pangolins Require Specialized One-on-one Care to be Re-habilitated and Returned to the Wild
Zoonosis A Word You’ll Need to Know
So what’s the plight of a pangolin got to do with the pandemic that is killing hundreds of thousands of humans, bringing sickness and suffering to millions more?
Maybe everything.
It’s called zoonosis – the transmission of disease from animals to humans.
According to the United States Agency for International Development, about 75% of all emerging and re-emerging infectious diseases are zoonotic – meaning they come from animals. These include, among others, SARS, H5N1 avian flu, and the H1N1 influenza virus and now we welcome to the list… Covid-19.
Peter Daszak – aka The Virus Hunter – knows a lot about zoonosis. As president of EcoHealth Alliance, a nonprofit that works globally to identify and study our vulnerabilities to emerging infectious diseases, he was among a team of experts who warned the World Health Organization in early 2018 that a disease bearing Covid-19’s characteristics could cause the next pandemic. Says Daszak: “The idea that this virus escaped from a lab is just pure baloney. These pandemic viruses originate in wildlife.”
“We’ve been working on this for 20 years. We tracked every known emerging disease to its origin, from the scientific literature. Then we tested, with mathematical models, what’s driving that, what are the causes that could underlie the emergence of these new diseases. And what we found is they emerge in places where human populations are very dense and growing. They emerge in the tropics mainly, because that’s where the wildlife diversity is, and that the viruses that become pandemic come from wildlife.
“And the other key factor is land-use change, people moving into new areas, encroachment into wildlife habitat, building roads into a forest for a mine or for a logging camp. There are many, many examples of diseases, like Ebola, SARS and others, HIV itself, from this. And that’s a global trend that will drive the rise of future pandemics.”
Bats Comprise One Fifth of Mammals on the Planet
Since January 2020, the consensus among the scientific community has been that the novel corona virus had originated in horseshoe bats; however, based on what was known about transmission of earlier zoonotic diseases, it was unlikely that bats directly gave the virus to humans . Instead, scientists suspected that the bat coronavirus infected another animal, an “intermediate host,” which subsequently transmitted the virus to humans. Analyzing DNA samples, researchers from the Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas traced the disease back to the pangolins.
Dr Joseph F. Petrosino, Baylor Chair in the Department of Molecular Virology and Microbiology and head of the research team explains: “It appears a pangolin virus and bat virus found themselves in the same animal, which led to a devastating recombination event, creating the pandemic strain. This may have happened in the wild, or where these animals were brought together in unnaturally close proximity.” Bats and pangolins were among the tightly packed tenants of stacked cages in the open markets of Wuhan where waste and fluids of all kinds flowed freely from one species to another.
Most Trafficked Animal in the World
Eight Species of Pangolin Range from Vulnerable to Critically Endangered
Eight Species of Pangolin Range from Vulnerable to Critically Endangered
It’s also possible that the DNA mash-up could have occurred in the wild. Ray Jansen of Tswane University in Pretoria who heads the African Pangolin Working Group notes that pangolins “forage pretty much blindly. Their long tongue waves around in the nest randomly and collects ants and termites on its sticky surface. This creates a very high likelihood of infection from bat feces. Of course, the cross-contamination could also very well have taken place in the market itself where the meat of both species was prepared on the same chopping board … However, the mutated virus was very likely in the pangolin already.”Kate Jones, Chair of Ecology and Biodiversity at University College London sees the challenge as an ongoing and systemic.
“The disruption of pristine forests driven by logging, mining, and rapid urbanization is bringing people into closer contact with animal species they may never have been near before. We invade tropical forests and other wild landscapes, which harbor so many species of animals and plants — and within those creatures, so many unknown viruses. We cut the trees; we kill the animals or cage them and send them to markets. We disrupt ecosystems, and we shake viruses loose from their natural hosts. When that happens, they need a new host. Often, we are it.”
As a freshman studying ecology at Prescott College in the ‘60’s, I learned that disease is the pruning shears wielded by Mother Nature to trim back any species that grows so large it threatens the survival of other species or the delicate balance of the ecosystem itself. You don’t have to be a believer in the Gaia hypothesis to observe that humans are out of control, running amok on the planet, pulling everything out by its roots. Here she comes… to the rescue. Running with scissors.The current pandemic is not something that just happened. Nor is this is something we did. This is something we are doing… and, if we keep doing, will likely get worse. A lot worse. It’s quite possible this may be a training exercise, that the next iteration of virus will be even meaner. Maybe it won’t be so nice to babies. Or be content culling such a small percentage of our herd.
But please, let’s be clear: Mother Nature is not the antagonist here.
If there is a villain in this viral kabuki gone global – it appears to be us. However, as we all know, the seemingly dastardly evildoer is himself a victim, trapped in a darkness to which even he is blind. It’s not intention but circumstance that has caused us to become ‘bad actors’. In the words of Jessica Rabbit: “I’m not bad… I’m just drawn that way.” Will we awaken in time to realize that we’re both protagonists and authors of this ‘graphic novel covid-19’ event. The final scene is yet to be penned. Will our potential for making good choices finally overcome our propensity for making bad ones? It’s only a tragedy if nothing changes.
Virus Hunter, Peter Daszak concludes: “We are making ourselves sick by making the planet sick. That’s really the message that needs to come through from this. Because if we just treat this as another disease, wait for a vaccine and then think, ‘Great, it’s all over,’ well, I’ve got news. There are 1.7 million more viruses out there that will be emerging in the future. We can either wait for them to emerge and get sick and have another global recession, or we can get out there and readdress our relationship with wildlife and make the planet a little bit healthier.”
Pangolins are the most trafficked animals on Earth. As we mourn the affect this trade has on the individuals that suffer it, we must also see that this global demand and tragedy created the circumstances that have likely resulted in the current pandemic. The risk it poses to humans is certainly another reason to stand up against this behavior.
– Jane Goodall –
I had a waking dream the other afternoon. I saw a grandfather pangolin – graying and shambling Yoda-like from his burrow, shading his eyes from the sun with one great curved claw as he looked up at me with dark black eyes along his impossibly long snout.
“Hrrrumph,” he snorted. “What are you doing in my dream?”
“This is my dream,” I replied.
“Hrrumph”, he repeated. “Who was here first?”
“I suppose you were. You pangolins, I mean.”
“Correct,” he announced, seemingly pleased. ‘Would that not make this my dream?”
“I suppose so,” I admitted. “Then I must ask what does this dream of yours consist of?”
With surprising agility he reached into the ample gray hair of his furry tummy – the only place on his body not covered in scales – emerging with a pair spectacles that he ceremoniously placed upon the base of his nose causing him to appear most studious.
“Hrrrrrumph,” he said. “It was about you. You and all your brothers and sisters. Suddenly you all stopped being in such a hurry. You stayed in your houses so all the rest of us could come out again. You played with each other and took time to remember how fun it is just to be alive… to explore and climb trees and discover things… to marvel… maybe just snack some ants now and then and relax. And little by little your hearts opened again to each other and to all the rest of us, your brothers and sisters in nature.”
“And then what happened?” I asked.
“That’s all,” he turned and shuffled back toward his hole. “Then we just had fun.”
What to Do?
Helpful Hints from a ‘Pangolian Perspective’
Helpful Hints from a ‘Pangolian Perspective’
In Wildness is the Preservation of World – Henry David Thoreau.
Trees have standing. Pangolins pursue their own purposes. The planet has a plan of its own. It does not belong to us; we belong to it. Curb your reproductive enthusiasm. Let’s stop screwing around and concern ourselves primarily with insuring that we leave enough for everyone else.
Voluntary simplicity… not involuntary complicity
Buying into mass consumerism undermines every form of life, including our own. It’s supremely important to – as EF Schumacher wrote “Live simply so others may simply live.” One gift of the pandemic is to remind us that we become immensely rich the instant we realize there is so very little we actually need.
Exercise your right to exercise!
Get out there… and go! Whether it’s the back lot or the back of beyond, adventure is not about risking death; it’s about daring to truly live. Step out past your comfort zone, your pre-conceived self-limitations, interact with the world in a way that expands your ‘circle of compassion’ (thank you Albert E.) until it includes life in all its forms so deeply and personally that any affront to nature – be it a person a pangolin – is felt by you so profoundly that you cannot help but ‘stand’.
· Adopt a Pangolin ·
_________________________________________________________________
Support World Wildlife’s Fund’s global efforts to protect wild animals and their habitats by adopting a plush pangolin for yourself or a friend. Included are formal adoption certificate, full-color photo and species spotlight card full of fascinating information about your new pangolin pal.
When you donate through WWFGifts, you help create a safer world for wildlife, protect amazing places, and build a future where people live in harmony with nature. Your donation will support WWF’s conservation work around the globe and makes you a WWF member.
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Learn more here about:
The Pangolin Men :
https://africageographic.com/stories/pangolins-pangolin-men/The Tiki Hywood Trust and How You Can Help: https://www.tikkihywoodfoundation.org/how-you-can-help/
The Pangolin Men :
https://africageographic.com/stories/pangolins-pangolin-men/The Tiki Hywood Trust and How You Can Help: https://www.tikkihywoodfoundation.org/how-you-can-help/
Acclaimed “America’s leading anthropologist/adventurer” by the Discovery Network and the History Channel, Dr. Jeff is equally at home sharing stories with gauchos around a campfire in Patagonia… leading C-Suite executives around a boardroom table in Silicon Valley … or collaborating with Quichua shamans in his home town of Cuenca, Ecuador.
In 2013, after over 20 years as a full-time keynote presenter for hundreds of audiences all over the world, he was awarded the greatest honor of the speaking profession – induction in the National Speakers Association “Speakers Hall of Fame”.
When it comes to building effective leadership teams and connecting individuals through their highest values, Dr. Jeff Salz is unsurpassed!
– Kevin Turner, Chief Operating Officer
Microsoft Corporation
Microsoft Corporation
Become a Shamanic
Leader/Speaker
Leader/Speaker
Is your group of friends or team interested in sharing the transformative journey of a lifetime?
Jeff Salz and Lisa Jaffe offer week-long experiential, adventure-based programs on shamanic leadership for groups in the mountains of Ecuador.Interested in story creation, presentation magic and heart-centered speaking? Perhaps you’re an experienced or beginning speaker wanting to go from good to great? A leader looking to hone your effectiveness as communicator? Jeff is currently accepting students for individual, online speaker coaching. Experience a fun and uniquely effective approach. Satisfaction (and excitement) guaranteed!
Jeff Salz and Lisa Jaffe offer week-long experiential, adventure-based programs on shamanic leadership for groups in the mountains of Ecuador.Interested in story creation, presentation magic and heart-centered speaking? Perhaps you’re an experienced or beginning speaker wanting to go from good to great? A leader looking to hone your effectiveness as communicator? Jeff is currently accepting students for individual, online speaker coaching. Experience a fun and uniquely effective approach. Satisfaction (and excitement) guaranteed!
Share the story with your friends!
For more information on keynotes, training, treks and speaker coaching for individuals and teams please go to www.drjeffsalz.com or contact Dr Jeff at: [email protected]
Coping with Fear & COVID 19
Where there is light, darkness cannot be, and where there is love, fear cannot be.”
Coping with Fear
To date, the jobless rate during the USA nation wide lockdown is nearing 18 percent. Fear creeps in and surrounds us, ever changing on a daily basis. Today, our fears are numerous. Which bills can I not pay? What about the protests? Am I safe? What’s more important ‘economy and individual freedom’ versus ‘the pandemic and remaining at home’? What do we do with all this fear? Some are finding solace in prayer and spiritual practice. Others are writing …blogging, creating art..singing.
Marianne Williamson on Coping with Fear
Sandi Dolbee, writer for San Diego Union Tribune interviewed Marianne Williamson, best-selling, self-help author. She says the first step to making peace with our fear is acceptance. She says. “It is appropriate to be depressed when a situation is this depressing. It is appropriate to be heartbroken when a situation is this heartbreaking. And it is appropriate to be horrified when a situation is this horrifying.”
She continues,
“We also need to realize we’re in this together, and third: “to realize that love is to fear, what light is to the darkness.
Where there is light, darkness cannot be, and where there is love, fear cannot be.”
Marianne cautions us about going back to what we’re referring to as “normal.” To her, before this pandemic, we put short-term gain over long-term equity and our irreverence — toward the planet, animals and each other — was epidemic. “Normal is what got us here,” she says.
She continues to express her philosophy, saying, “There are a lot of women who have been acting like little girls, who aren’t going to be acting like little girls anymore. There are also a lot of men who have been acting like little boys, who aren’t going to be acting like little boys anymore. This is going to mature a generation of Americans.”
“It’s painful. It’s horrifying. It’s tragic. It’s heartbreaking. But ultimately, I think it will make us better people and it will make us a better country. And I think in that sense, our work will be to make sure that those who died will not have died in vain.”
Control Stress and Fear with Covid19
Dr. Niladri Sekhar Dash is Professor at Linguistic Research Unit, Indian Statistical Institute, Calcutta, India. He is an expert in Corpus Linguistics. He has some very good advice to give everyone on how to control stress and fear caused by Covid19 Pandemic.
It’s interesting to note that all the methods that are part of Stress Help Center’s program are included in his list of suggestions to control stress and fear. You receive a variety of choices over a period of 8 weeks. You can have it now for only $2.99
He writes:
Dear Friends,
I share here my last three days’ effort in compiling data from the Internet. I shall be happy if you practice some of these tasks to manage your stress, anxiety, tension, and fear. My best wishes and regards.
How to kill Stress, Anxiety, and Tension (SAT)
Control Stress and Fear
1. Meditate, Meditate, and Meditate
Chilling out has a direct impact on stress. Research out of Georgetown University Medical Center finds that after an eight-week course in mindful meditation, people with anxiety disorders lowered inflammatory markers and stress hormones in their blood by 15 per cent. Meditation brings short-term stress relief as well as lasting stress management benefits. There are many different forms of meditation to try — each one is unique and brings its own appeal. You might develop a mantra that you repeat in your mind as you take slow deep breaths. Or, you might take a few minutes to practice mindfulness, which involves being in the moment. Simply pay attention to what you see, hear, taste, touch, and smell.
2. Sit Up Straight
Research published in the Journal Health Psychology finds that — compared to a hunched over position — sitting upright in the face of stress can boost self-esteem, fending off further angst. The idea boils down to something called embodied cognition, an idea that our bodies impact our emotions (and vice versa). And it could be that simply feeling taller boosts confidence, shooing stress away, researchers say.
3. Breathe the Right Way
There are reasons doctors sometimes prescribe breathing exercises to people struggling with truly stressful times. Deep breathing — which encourages the full exchange of oxygen in the body — activates your body’s calming parasympathetic response, lowering levels of inflammatory compounds linked to stress.
4. Seek Out Nature (and Sunshine)
A 60-minute walk in the park can calm the mind, lowering activity in a brain region linked to depression, finds Stanford University research. It is not just the walking either: People strolling urban settings filled with traffic instead of trees did not reap the benefits. Our bodies were designed to be in and near green spaces, forests, or the ocean, researchers say. Thus, studies confirm that these spaces are inherently relaxing.
5. Say Thank You
Scientists are no strangers to the powers of gratitude. In fact, gratitude is linked to 23 per cent lower levels of the stress hormone cortisol. Even more: A study out of the University of California San Diego’s School of Medicine found that grateful folks were happier, slept better, had more energy, and had lower levels of inflammatory biomarkers — some of which correlated with heart health.
6. Sleep It Off
While you snooze, your brain processes all of the emotions and happenings from the day — helping your mind remain even-keeled and keeping stress levels from boiling up. That’s why a lack of shuteye can impair your ability to control your emotions, including anxiety and stress.
7. Phone a Friend
The healthiest (and calmest) among us tend to have something in common: a huge social life. Because friends and family can help us talk through and manage life’s stressors, a strong support system is often linked with being more resilient in the face of stress itself. Making a phone call and releasing your pent-up emotions to the person of your heart can provide you with tremendous relief from stress and tension. Whether listening to you vent your frustrations or offering words of encouragement, friends can provide needed social support. If your friend can make you laugh, all the better, since laughter has been shown to reduce stress and tension.
8. Stop the Snowball Effect
Dwelling or ruminating over things that have happened or things that may happen is very dangerous. Research published in the Journal PLOS one finds that brooding over negative events is the №1 biggest predictor of issues like depression and anxiety and plays a huge role in how much stress you experience. Keeping yourself away from past events and future fears are rubrics that can make you cool and serene.
9. Get a Hug from a Loved One
Physical touch can do a lot to relieve your stress. Hugging a loved one can be especially beneficial. When you hug someone, oxytocin (also known as the “cuddle hormone”) is released. Oxytocin is associated with higher levels of happiness and lower levels of stress. Oxytocin also causes a reduction in blood pressure. It reduces the stress hormone norepinephrine and can produce a sense of relaxation. So don’t be afraid to ask a loved one for a hug if you need it. It’s good for both of you and it can be one of the simplest forms of stress relief available.
10. Express Gratitude
Gratitude helps you recognize all the things you have to be thankful for. Whether you’re grateful for a sunny day or thankful you arrived at work safely, think about all the good things you have in life. Gratitude also reminds you of all of the resources you have to cope with stress, which can be quite empowering. Studies also show grateful people enjoy better mental health, lower stress, and a better quality of life. So whether you decide to make it a habit to identify what you’re grateful for as you sit around the dinner table or you decide to write down three things you’re grateful for in a gratitude journal every day, make gratitude a regular habit.
11. Eat Green Vegetables
Comfort foods aren’t so comforting. It’s the vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants in healthy eat that lower your stress levels. Take a study from the University of Otago — it found that students who ate more fruits and vegetables also tended to feel calmer and happier.
12. Enjoy Aromatherapy
Aromatherapy has real benefits for stress relief — it can help you to feel energized, more relaxed, or more present in the moment. Emerging research suggests certain scents can alter brain wave activity and decrease stress hormones in the body. So whether you enjoy candles, diffusers, or body products, consider incorporating some aromatherapy into your day.
13. Create Artwork
Getting in touch with your creative side may have been easy for you during childhood, but if you’ve lost touch with your penchant for artwork, it’s not too late to pick it up again. If you aren’t into drawing or painting, consider colouring in a colouring book. Adult colouring books have risen in popularity and for good reason — colouring can be a great stress reliever. Research consistently shows that colouring can have a meditative effect. One study found that anxiety levels decline in people who were colouring complex geometric patterns, making it a perfect outlet for stress reduction.
14. Make Time for Leisure Activities
Leisure activities can be a wonderful way to relieve stress. Yet, many people feel as though their lives are too busy for hobbies, games, or extra fun. But building time for leisure into your schedule could be key to helping you feel your best. And when you feel better, you’ll perform better, which means leisure time may make your work time more efficient. Whether you find joy in caring for a garden or you like making quilts, hobbies and leisure are key to living your best life.
15. Develop a Positive Self-Talk Habit
The way you talk to yourself matters. Harsh self-criticism, self-doubt, and catastrophic predictions aren’t helpful. If you’re constantly thinking things like, “I don’t have time for this,” and “I can’t stand this,” you’ll stress yourself out. It’s important to learn to talk to yourself in a more realistic, compassionate and positive manner. When you call yourself names or doubt your ability to succeed, reply with a kinder inner dialogue. Positive self-talk helps you develop a healthier outlook. And an optimistic and compassionate conversation can help you manage your emotions and take positive action.
16. Be Positive in Attitude
Look for the positives in life and things for which you’re grateful. “People don’t always appreciate what they have,” says Professor Cooper. “Try to be a glass half full instead of glass half empty,” he says. Try writing down 3 things that went well, or for which you’re grateful, at the end of every day. Attitude counts! Be positive in attitude, many of our problems will be diminished and are easily solved.
17. Practice Yoga
Yoga combines physical movement, meditation, light exercise, and controlled breathing — all of which provide excellent stress relief. And while you’re likely to reap immediate benefits from a single yoga session, you’re likely to receive long-term benefits if you incorporate it into your life in a consistent way. Yoga offers a variety of physical, psychological, and spiritual benefits.
18. Try Guided Imagery
Guided imagery is like taking a short vacation in your mind. At the individual level, it can involve imaging yourself being in your ‘happy place’ — maybe picturing yourself sitting on a beach, listening to the waves, smelling the ocean, and feeling the warm sand underneath you. At the partner level, you can imagine yourself being in the embrace of your loved one at your ‘favourite place’ — imagining yourself sitting at a lonely seashore, catching the hands of your partner, feeling the breathing of your partner, and feeling the joy and harmony of togetherness.
Guided imagery can be done with a recording where you listen to someone walk you through a peaceful scene. Or, once you know how to do it yourself, you can practice guided imagery on your own. Simply close your eyes for a minute and walk yourself through a peaceful scene. Think about all the sensory experiences you’d engage in and allow yourself to feel as though you’re really there. After a few minutes, open your eyes and return to the present moment.
19. Take Control
There’s a solution to any problem. “If you remain passive, thinking, ‘I can’t do anything about my problem’, your stress will get worse,” says Professor Cooper. “That feeling of loss of control is one of the main causes of stress and lack of wellbeing.” The act of taking control is in itself empowering, and it’s a crucial part of finding a solution that satisfies you and not someone else.
20. Have Sex
Sex often comes with a chemical cocktail of hormones like ‘feel good’ oxytocin as well as a release of endorphins. When running through the bloodstream these molecules can help us chill out. Also, it creates lasting bondage between the partners to sail through the turbulent waters. The strong and scintillating memories of stimulant sex acts that are preserved in our brain also act as a catalyst to get relief from stress and anxiety.
21. Have some ‘me time’
People work the longest hours in Europe, meaning they often don’t spend enough time doing things they really enjoy. They all need to take some time for socializing, relaxation or exercise, says Prof. Cooper. He recommends setting aside a couple of nights a week for some quality ‘me time” away from work. By earmarking those 2 days, it means they are not to be tempted to work overtime. Evidence shows that people who help others, through activities such as volunteering or community work, become more resilient. The more you give, the more resilient and happy you feel. If you don’t have time to volunteer, try to do someone a favour every day. It can be something as small as helping someone cross the road or going on a coffee run for colleagues.
22. Smile As You Mean It
Stop stressing and smile! There’s something to the old adage, “Grin and bear it.” Smiling when you feel stressed creates a little tension in facial muscles that helps reduce stress. Smiles are particularly stress-busting when they’re genuine, using muscles around the mouth and eyes. Smiling can also help an elevated heart rate recover faster once a stressful situation has passed.
23. Tune In
If you have to give a talk at work or you’re facing a similar stressful event, music can help keep you calm. Participants in one study had lower levels of cortisol (a stress hormone) when listening to Latin choral music (Miserere by Gregorio Allegri) than when they just listened to the sound of rippling water. Listening to soothing music is one of the easiest ways to stop stress.
24. Catching it Early
Signs and symptoms such as headache, gut discomfort, tense muscles, and fidgety sleep may be early indicators of too much stress. When you feel stress coming on, take a breath and put your stress management techniques into practice. A short walk can improve mood and reduce feelings of stress.
25. Setting limits
Say ‘NO’ to those tasks that can make you less productive and successful. Accept or do those tasks that you choose to take on and that you love to do. It can make you less stressful.
A good book or a movie can help redirect your thoughts from unproductive worry. True relaxation involves a feeling of peace of mind. You may find a hobby or certain exercises particularly relaxing. Meditation, prayer or deep, slow breathing are other ways of feeling calm.
Reframing
Throughout the day, stop and evaluate the endless stream of thoughts that run through your mind. If they are negative, try to reframe those thoughts in a positive way. If stress is affecting your ability to work or find pleasure in life, seek help from your doctor or mental health provider. Getting outside help is not a sign of weakness. It takes strength to admit that you may need help — — and getting help shows good judgment.
20th April 2020
Saliva Test Help COVID19
New Saliva Test to Help Diagnose COVID19
A Saliva Test to help diagnose COVID19 is on the horizon. This stands to be an extremely helpful and safe method for coronavirus COVID19 testing in the future. This is happening at Rutgers University in New Jersey. The most encouraging news is that the researchers have received US Government clearance for the first saliva test to help diagnose covid-19.
Consequently, this new and unique approach could help expand possible options for testing. Not only that but it will also reduce the risk of infection for healthcare workers. Rutgers’ RUCDR Infinite Biologics and its collaborators are responsible for this new collection approach.
Current COVID19 Testing
Up until now, the way that screening for covid19 is conducted, it requires healthcare workers to take a swab from a patient’s nose or throat. Because of this imminent danger and to try and lessen infection risks, many hospitals and clinics have been instructed to discard their gloves and masks after every test contact. This applies to anyone who may have the virus.
New Saliva Test Procedure
Right now many of institutions are struggling with shortages of basic medical supplies. This includes gowns and masks. The new saliva-based tests uses a completely different procedure. They give each patient a plastic tube. The patient spits into the tube several times. After that, they hand the tube back to the health care worker.
This method prevents the healthcare professionals from having to actually be in the face of someone who may be symptomatic, says Andrew Brooks, who directed the Rutgers research that developed the test.
It’s noteworthy to find out that Rutgers tested this method for accuracy by taking both saliva and swab samples from sixty different patients. The results show, without a doubt, that the patients’ saliva samples are a 100% match with the results from the swabs.
Suggestions on how to Cope with Coronavirus COVID19 Pandemic
Tiger at Bronx Zoo Positive for Coronavirus
We’ve just learned that a tiger at the Bronx Zoo has tested positive for the coronavirus. The zoo believes it to be the first known infection in an animal in the U.S.A or a tiger anywhere.
Nadia, a 4-year-old Malayan tiger as well as six other tigers and lions that have all fallen ill. They think a zoo employee who had coronavirus but wasn’t showing symptoms yet infected them. Symptoms appeared in the first animal on March 27. They are all expected to recover..
Zoo officials are astonished. The director Jim Breheny said he hopes the finding can contribute to the global fight against coronavirus that causes COVID-19. He went on to say, “Any kind of knowledge that we get on how it’s transmitted, how different species react to it, that knowledge somehow is going to provide a greater base resource for people.”
These coronavirus findings bring up new questions with regard to the transmission of the virus in animals. The U.S. Department of Agriculture says there are no known cases of the virus in U.S. pets or livestock.
Veterinarian Reports
Dr. Jane Rooney, a veterinarian and a USDA official, made a statement. She said that there doesn’t appear to be any evidence that suggests that animals can spread the corona virus to people or that they can be a source of the infection in the United States.
On Sunday, the USDA said it’s not suggesting routine coronavirus testing of animals, in zoos or elsewhere, or of zoo employees. Rooney said USDA’s National Veterinary Services Laboratories have tested a small number of animals in the U.S. All those tests came back negative except Nadia’s.
There have been a few reports outside the U.S. of pet dogs or cats that became infected with coronavirus after close contact with contagious people. There was a Hong Kong dog that tested positive for a low level of the pathogen in February/March. The authorities think that pet dogs and cats couldn’t pass the virus to human beings. Consequently, they indicate it’s possible for the animals to test positive if they are exposed by their owners, .
The American Veterinary Medical Association and the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have recommended that people ill with the coronavirus ought to limit contact with animals.
Animal Testing for Corona Virus
Dr. Paul Calle, the zoo’s chief veterinarian reported that Nadia, her sister Azul, two Amur tigers and three African lions all developed dry coughs. Some of them suffered with wheezing and loss of appetite. A coronavirus test was performed on only Nadia, the tiger. This is because it takes anesthesia to get a sample from a big cat. They were reluctant to do that again. Unfortunately, in order to be examined, they had to knock Nadia out once before.
Dr. Paul Calle, Bronx Zoo chief veterinarian posted on Facebook and said; “The COVID-19 testing that was performed on our Malayan tiger Nadia was performed in a veterinary school laboratory and is not the same test as is used for people. You cannot send human samples to the veterinary laboratory, and you cannot send animal tests to the human laboratories, so there is no competition for testing between these very different situations.”
Information provided by
JENNIFER PELTZ
NEW YORK