Reclaim the red wolf
While confusion over what comprises a species does indeed complicate conservation, as described in “Will overcrowding sink Noah’s ark?”, the authors’ dismissal of the red wolf is misplaced (22 November 2003, p 6). Recent genetic analyses by Paul Wilson and co-workers provide convincing evidence that the red wolf is indeed a species 鈥� for example see the Canadian Journal of Zoology, vol 78 p 2156. They also show that it is still living in central Ontario and Quebec, where it faces the same coyote hybridisation and hunting pressures which once exterminated it south of the border.
Far from conservationists wasting their time, attempting to save the red wolf preserves eastern America’s native apex carnivore. Canada has management regulations that treat the two wolf species as the same, despite the red (or eastern) wolf entering Canada’s Species at Risk register. It is not yet clear whether the genetic discovery will trigger adequate protection, or simply be a record for future generations of what has been lost.
Sharp problem
I have worked for the last 15 years on the problem of how to clean up injection practices. Auto-disposable (AD) syringes do have their place, but they are not the simple cure-all some people seem to think they are (6 December 2003, p 8).
The piston on an AD syringe can only be drawn back once, but if you have a syringe that holds 2 millilitres there is nothing to stop you using it to give four 0.5 millilitre injections. Neither do AD syringes stop cross-infection by needle-stick injuries to the health worker, or from carelessly discarded syringes. Generally it costs as much to destroy a disposable syringe as it costs to buy it in the first place. For countries with small budgets this is a huge problem. Cleaning up the health services of the world is vital but please let’s not be deluded into thinking that it is “not such a major task”.
Beet beef
That genetically modified sugar beet is up to “15 to 50 per cent better for the environment” than conventional varieties is a rather strange assertion (6 December 2003, p 17). The Richard Phipps study you reported has yet to be published in a peer-reviewed journal. There is, however, clear scientific evidence showing the environmental harm that GM sugar beet will cause: the recent farm-scale evaluations were a case in point.
Further research by the UK government also found that “the consequences of introducing GM sugar beet were extremely severe, with a rapid decline, and the extinction of the skylark in 20 years”. Add to this the pronouncements from the government’s GM Science Review about its inherent unpredictability, and all of a sudden GM sugar beet looks distinctly less palatable.
Time to grieve
I went through a breast cancer operation and radiotherapy some 13 years ago, aged 49. Reading your article “No need to put on a brave face”, I remember how I constantly received well-meant advice on how I should be positive and think positive (13 December 2003, p 19). I was told that the power of the mind “could do miracles”. At the time I was going through what I considered a reasonable depression and every time I looked at the smiling cheery faces I felt that, rather than helping me, they were burdening me, making me feel even worse for not “cooperating” in my own recovery with the power of “positive thinking”.
If it is acceptable to have “time to grieve” for the loss of a loved one, why can one not have time to come to terms with the possibility of one’s own demise?
What I needed most was empathy. However, what really saved me was early diagnosis and good medical treatment!
Falkland foxes
I was interested to read about the demise of the warrah or Falklands fox which had formed the basis of Charles Darwin’s first musings about evolution (20 December 2003, p 80). Once isolated, this wolf-like canine inhabiting the main East and West Falkland islands appeared to be evolving into separate and distinct species.
The isolation of such a large carnivore would have rightly puzzled many 19th-century scientists. But Darwin was a fellow of the Geological Society and held the Wollaston medal 鈥� still the highest honour in earth science. He would thus find the answer in geology, which was equally significant in developing his revolutionary ideas.
Our present Quaternary climate has been punctuated by ices ages roughly every 100,000 years, during which global mean sea level fell significantly as vast ice sheets developed, removing water from the oceans. Global sea levels fell by at least 120 to 150 metres on average, depending on how this is measured. As the Falkland islands are now separated from Patagonia and the Argentine mainland by just over 150 metres of water at the deepest point, it is probable that these islands became a peninsula during the last ice age, which ended roughly 11,500 years ago.
Thus South American foxes became established in the unglaciated Falklands some time before 20,000 years ago, and were then isolated as the sea started to rise. In turn the weight of an extra 120 metres of water depressed the edge of the modern continental shelf by roughly a further 35 metres. Britain and Ireland also formed a peninsula during the last ice age and later developed an impoverished flora and fauna compared with continental Europe.
The red-nosed robin
I read with interest the description of tippling birds (20 December 2003, p 58). My parents planted a number of cherry and crab apple trees around their house, and every year we would observe birds staggering about the garden after sampling fruit that had fallen to the ground and fermented. The most serious imbibers were robins: some became so snockered that they would not even try to flee an approaching human and would allow themselves to be scooped up from the lawn.
Civilian deaths
Unfortunately the focus of Matt Walker’s concern in “Truth and technology at war” seems to be solely for western soldiers (20 December 2003, p 12) although he did mention dangers to Iraqi civilians from depleted uranium. Let me list a few of the other risks.
There is documented evidence of Iraqi civilians being killed by the coalition’s battlefield munitions and “precision” missiles. There are continuing civilian deaths at checkpoints, and in attacks on suspected resistance sites.
More generally, there are the likely health effects of the loss of water supply, particularly on the elderly and the very young. And, of course, the regime of sanctions imposed by the US and the UK in the 10 years before the war may have killed up to 1 million Iraqi civilians including 500,000 children.
Madeleine Albright, who was then US secretary of state, said of these deaths, “I think this is a very hard choice, but the price 鈥� we think the price is worth it.”
War inevitably kills civilians, and western commentators would do well to remember this, especially in Britain with its imperial past of attempts to “bring civilisation” to non-whites everywhere. As Ghandi said when asked what he thought about western civilisation: “It would be a good idea”.
Smart bugs
You report a proposed therapy which makes it impossible for bacteria to adhere to the mucous membranes of its hosts (29 November 2003, p 34). An objective appraisal gives grounds for less optimism than the piece suggests.
The history of antibiotic resistance has taught us that bacteria are able to acquire new capabilities to resist interventions not just by chance mutations but, more significantly and much more quickly, by the transfer of complete functioning genes from other species of bacteria. The most likely challenge will come from the naturally occurring chemicals referred to in the article, such as cranberry juice, which have had a long history of coexistence with bacteria. If they protect cranberries and the like from bacterial attack by the same mechanism as the proposed therapy, then almost certainly some bacteria will have genes that get round it. Either these genes are already in the present population of pathogenic bacteria, or they can very quickly pick them up.
One hoped-for advantage of this therapy over antibiotics is that rather than killing bacteria it evicts them. Thus any that have developed resistance in the wild would be in competition with, and outnumbered by, non-resistant strains 鈥� and so, it is hoped, the risk of future infection by resistant strains would be small. But if this proposed therapy is successful, it is bound to be adopted on a large scale: hospitals will then become selective incubators of resistant strains, as they already are for antibiotic-resistant strains.
Noise in the air
In the article “The shape of wings to come” Paul Marks gives the impression that the so-called “airframe noise” generated by aircraft landing in a “dirty” configuration (high-lift surfaces deployed and landing gear down) is caused by vibration of the structure (13 December 2003, p 28). But the vibrating structure radiates a negligible amount of sound compared with noise from the interaction between turbulent flow and the surface of the structure 鈥� especially thin trailing edges and corners of flaps. The noise would occur even if the structure were totally rigid, as one can demonstrate by blowing strongly across the edge of a thin plate, or even a fingertip.
Divergent quote
In “Saving the world, plan B” Fred Pearce mischaracterises the Pew Center’s position on the idea of controlling greenhouse gas emissions through “contraction and convergence” (13 December 2003, p 6). The quotes he attributes to our president, Eileen Classen, are taken from a Pew Center publication which she did not write.
Moreover, they are taken out of context and used to support a point of view not shared by the report’s authors. In fact, taken in context, they argue against contraction and convergence as a basis for future climate negotiations.
Plane speaking
Paul Marks’s article on the future of flight failed to mention what measures will be needed to modernise check-in and baggage-reclaim procedures for the 800 passengers the Airbus A380 would carry (13 December 2003, p 28). It’s already chaotic with 300 passengers. The thought of standing at a carousel awaiting luggage along with another 799 people is quite mind-boggling.
How can 800 passengers embark and disembark in what Marks quotes as “greater comfort”, when the aircraft industry cannot manage this for the present generation of aircraft?
Letter
So, Marks describes aviation planning 50 or perhaps 100 years ahead. What will they use for fuel? I know airships can get off the ground on hydrogen 鈥� but I’d love to see an airliner try it.
Letter
Paul Marks comments that “Air traffic worldwide is increasing at 4.7 per cent per year and is expected to triple by 2030” (22 November 2003, p 26). This highly optimistic forecast ignores a fact that the world’s leading petroleum geologists know all too well: total global oil production is expected to peak out somewhere between 2009 and 2015, and then decline sharply. By 2030, oil prices are likely to be so high that jet fuel will be available only to the very wealthy and the military.
Unless we find a fantastic new way of storing hydrogen to replace jet fuel, civilian air traffic might shrink to a tiny fraction of what it is today. Most travellers may eventually get across the Atlantic in solar-powered hydrogen blimps, which do not generate the noise pollution of today’s fuel-hungry jet aircraft.