Monthly Archives: January 2022

If you have a cold, dont ask your doctor for antibiotics thats the golden rule. Theyre for bacterial infections, not viral ones. Were told not only that they wont work, but that by using antibiotics when they arent needed, were helping bacteria become resistant to them.

Yet in a recent study conducted in an Egyptian hospital, we showed that treating moderate-to-severe COVID patients with either one of two antibiotics (ceftazidime or cefepime, in combination with a steroid) resulted in similar recovery times compared to patients given standard treatment.

This standard treatment, authorised by the Egyptian government and approved by the World Health Organization, was made up of at least seven different medications, suggesting that treating COVID with antibiotics could be a much simpler way of making people better.

Yet by doing this, we went against the established medical convention that antibiotics arent for viruses. So why did we break this rule?

Traditionally, creating new drugs to treat diseases takes a long time. Trying to develop a new treatment can take years, costs a lot of money, and has a very low success rate. Nevertheless, this process is generally acceptable when targeting common diseases.

However, this time-consuming process is not viable when there is a high threat posed by an emerging infectious disease, such as Zika, Ebola, Mers and now COVID. Without quick action or effective treatments that are ready to go, emerging diseases can evolve into pandemics that take a lot of lives. There have been hundreds of millions of confirmed cases of COVID, for example, and over 5.4 million deaths globally.

Because of this, when faced with a new threat, drug developers and major pharmaceutical companies look for quicker alternatives to the typical drug-development process. One practical strategy is drug repurposing. This is where drugs already created and approved for one use are tested to see if they can also help treat the new disease.

As the drugs have already been shown to be safe, and plenty is known about how they work, this is potentially a much less risky and time-consuming way of coming up with a treatment for the new disease. Its a strategy thats been used often in the past and one my colleagues and I wanted to try to use it during COVID because of the pressing need.

Drug repurposing begins by using computer-based techniques to model how existing drugs and the new disease-causing agent in this case the coronavirus might interact. Drugs that show promise are then tested in real-life lab studies to validate the computers findings and confirm that they could be of clinical use.

With a viral disease like COVID, a drug considered for repurposing should show one of these three qualities: it should either be able to inhibit one or more stages of the coronaviruss replication cycle; relieve the bad effects of the virus; or manipulate the immune system so that the body can deal with the virus.

And surprisingly, antibiotics are often the substances that show potential. Although viruses are different to bacteria, they are sometimes also susceptible to antibiotics. The statement that antibiotics dont work against viruses doesnt apply 100% of the time.

For example, in response to the Zika crisis five or so years ago, an American study evaluated more than 2,000 drugs already approved by the US Food and Drug Administration to see if they could potentially be safely used in pregnancy against the virus. The study found that the antibiotic azithromycin could reduce the proliferation of the virus in the brains of unborn children, thus potentially protecting against microcephaly, a condition caused by the virus in newborns.

Separately, testing also showed that the antibiotic novobiocin had a strong antiviral effect against the Zika virus. And a 2016 drug-repurposing study conducted in Thailand identified minocycline as a promising antiviral drug against dengue virus, with this antibiotic inhibiting the viruss growth at various stages of its life cycle.

All of these studies gave us confidence that repurposing antibiotics as COVID treatments was a plausible idea.

Research had already shown that a number of antibiotics were good at stopping the coronavirus reproducing in lab tests including ceftazidime and others of the same class, which is known as beta-lactams. We therefore knew this drug class had potential.

And when we ran computer simulations of how ceftazidime and cefepime (another beta-lactam) would interact with the virus, they were both effective at disrupting its protease, a key enzyme the virus uses to reproduce.

Ceftazidime and cefepime are also broad-spectrum antibiotics that are widely used to treat critically ill patients who pick up infections in hospital. As COVID patients often end up with other infections at the same time, we also thought these drugs might help badly ill patients by clearing other infections they might have, helping prevent conditions such as pneumonia.

However, it isnt clear how much of the antibiotics effect in our Egyptian hospital study was down to clearing coinfections versus how much was due to them attacking the coronavirus directly. Indeed, the notion that beta-lactams have antiviral properties is based on computer simulations and lab experiments it hasnt been definitively proven.

Nevertheless, our work has made a good case that these drugs can fight the coronavirus. While we still need to use antibiotics carefully, they might therefore have a role to play against COVID in the future.

Read more here:

COVID is caused by a virus so why are researchers treating it with antibiotics? - The Conversation UK

By: Luke Kerr-Dineen January 7, 2022

Tinker as much as you want, but if the ball stops flying straight, start tinkering with something else.

Foresight

Welcome to Play Smart, a game-improvement column that drops every Monday, Wednesday and Friday fromGame Improvement Editor Luke Kerr-Dineento help raise your golf IQ and play smarter, better golf.

When it comes to golf, Im a classic tinkerer. When something gets off in my game, my first instinct is to change it. When things are working well, its hard for me to leave it alone. I want to know why its working, and I want to make it ever better. Its hard for me to chalk off disappointing days as well, thats golf. Bad rounds demand enquiry.

Periodically throughout my life Ive been told I need to get out of my own way, but that advice never resonates or, frankly, seems to work whenever Ive tried it. When Im on the golf course, it feels like Im flying airplane. It requires constant steering, monitoring, adjusting. Theres no such thing as a pilot getting out of the way when the airplane is in mid-air, unless, of course, you want the airplane to crash.

Recently, at the GOLF Top 100 Teachers Summit, Collin Morikawas coach Rick Sessinghaus said something that did resonate: That every golfer, no matter how good or bad, has a different trigger, he said, something abstract that helps you focus at your best, in golf or life. Scrolling down the list of common triggers, there were a few that I thought could fit, and one that I was certain did: Immediate feedback.

Every golfer is different, which one is your trigger?

GOLF.com

Everybodys different, but for me, realizing how important feedback was for me started making everything make sense. Its why my best practice sessions involve some kind of ball-tracking device, and why I tend towards video cameras, or using the line on my golf ball to see if my ball is rolling end over end. Getting good feedback, leads to me perfecting; having no feedback leaves me feeling lost and aimlessly searching.

Which is why in 2022, Im not going to try to suppress my urge to tinker with my game. Instead, Im going to embrace it, and channel it in a more productive way. Heres how.

Left untouched, golfers fundamentals tend to move around. When I overlook my own setup, my ball position tends to creep forward, my feet start pointing out to the right, my posture gets sloppy, and my shoulders start pointing left to counteract.

The only way to prevent this from happening is by constantly making small adjustments to my setup to make sure it stays in a good spot.

To help with this, Ive resolved to use a mirror more when I practice, and two alignment sticks the way you see Ian Poulter using below: One pointing at the ball, and the other down his footline. Those will give me all the feedback I need to, and wont leave me guessing.

When I get to the range, and especially whenever Im using a launch monitor, Im going to take extra care to aim at a specific target. I know it sounds like a small thing, but slamming golf balls out into the distance is a really bad habit. If you dont know exactlywhere youre aiming, you have no reference point for what the golf ball is doing. If you know that youre aiming at a specific spot, and the ball is ending to the right of it, as least you know whats happening, and you can start tinkering your way back to straight.

Positions and moves in the golf swing are important, but the one golden rule in golf remains: The ball flight never lies. If Im tinkering and the ball isnt flying straight, thats a cue to start tinkering with something else. Tinkering for tinkerings sake isnt the goal. Ill tinker as much as I want as long as the ball goes straight.

Along those, well, lines, I invested in a few of these white-black golf balls, and those are what Im practicing my putting with. Similar to the full swing, my goal is to simply make sure the ball is rolling end-over-end. If I notice myself pulling putts (my common miss) my goal becomes tinkering with ways of how to keep the face more open.

It all goes back to feedback. If I give myself good feedback, I can channel my instinct to tinker in a productive way. At least in theory.

Luke Kerr-Dineen is the Director of Service Journalism at GOLF Magazine and GOLF.com. In his role he oversees the brands game improvement content spanning instruction, equipment, health and fitness, across all of GOLFs multimedia platforms.

An alumni of the International Junior Golf Academy and the University of South CarolinaBeaufort golf team, where he helped them to No. 1 in the national NAIA rankings, Luke moved to New York in 2012 to pursue his Masters degree in Journalism from Columbia University and in 2017 was named News Media Alliances Rising Star. His work has also appeared in USA Today, Golf Digest, Newsweek and The Daily Beast.

See more here:

Why Im going to embrace golf swing tinkering in 2022 - Golf.com

Ever since the last movie in the sequel trilogy concluded the Skywalker Saga, Star Wars fans have been patiently waiting to see where the Mouse House will take the movie franchise next. What the company settled on instead is something that no one could have predicted back in 2015 when The Force Awakens originally came out.

Disney has realized the golden rule when it comes to the galaxy far, far away, something hidden in plain sight but quite effective once you figure it out. Its that the legacy of George Lucass film saga and its impact on cinema is simply too big to live up to, but that doesnt mean that other creators cant chime in with their own unique tapestries across different storytelling mediums.

Thats probably the reason why most Star Wars games, TV shows, and even books have enjoyed relative success over the past four decades, whereas the films always end up polarizing the audience and generating controversy. That has also been the case with The Mandalorian and the latest Book of Boba Fett by Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni.

The return of Boba Fett to live-action, and in his own series, no less, has hyped up a lot of fans again, though the process of producing stuff like that never gets any easier for Lucasfilm. Last night, the shows cinematographer Dave Klein appeared on Kevin Smiths YouTube channel and talked about the challenges of working on a Star Wars project.

The biggest challenge is getting jaded towards Star Wars, He revealed. It hasnt happened yet. Ive been here for two years Well, I got to tell you, the first time I was ever in a Star Destroyer hallway, shooting Stormtroopers, I was 12 years old again. I told this story on the set. Because I actually had that Boba Fett special edition. The one that is probably worth $20,000 now. I had that one, where I sent the General Mills boxtops in with a check for $3.35 or whatever it was. They promised it was going to have the rocket that shoots out of the back. It shows up, and that rocket is glued in. I blew it all to hell when I was making a 16 mm stop-animation film.

I guess when you really are a Star Wars fanboy and get to be hands-on with everything behind the scenes, the magic can lose its touch. Though fortunately for us, that hasnt been the case for Klein so far lets hope it stays that way!

See the article here:

The Book Of Boba Fett Cameraman On The Challenges Of Making The Show - We Got This Covered

KANSAS CITY, Mo. Mother Nature had been kind with mostly mild temperatures and wintry weather in the metro at the beginning of the season, but as FOX4s weather team predicts a second round of wintry weather in less than a week on Thursday, its a perfect reminder to prepare for the safety of your car and others.

Missouri AAA spokesperson Nick Chabarria says the scene of gridlocked drivers on I-95 in Virginia is evidence that encountering an emergency while on the roads during winter storms can happen to anyone.

No one really thinks they are going to get stranded that way when they go out for a road trip, or to work, he said. But we know that in winter weather, things can turn bad pretty quickly.

He says doing things like aquick quarter trick is the first step to staying safe.

[Place the quarter upside down in the treading] If you can see the top of Washingtons head, its probably time for some new tires, he said.

He says an emergency kit with items like blankets, water, food and extra layers can help if you happen to find yourself stranded.

Missouri Highway Patrol Sergeant Andy Bell says for many people in a winter storm, the golden rule is to stay home.

Just leaving the house because they are bored, or they want to see the winter storm, thats just not safe, when they could totally stay home and be safe, he said.

If you must get on the road, preparation is key with returning safely to your destination.

You dont want to wait until its too late to get ready, Chabarria said.

Read more:

More winter weather serves reminder to keep an emergency kit in your vehicle - WDAF FOX4 Kansas City

COVID cases are surging again across the U.S., which is causing disruption for schools and people returning to work after the holidays; the world is reporting nearly 1.5 million new cases every day, two times as many per day as were recorded just last week. How can you possibly stay safe? There are precautions we can take to help prevent catching the virus and Eat This, Not That! Health talked to infectious diseases specialist Dr. Javeed Siddiqui MD/MPH, Co-Founder and Chief Medical Officer at TeleMed2U who explained the common ways people are catching COVID and what to do to avoid getting the virus. Read onand to ensure your health and the health of others, don't miss these Sure Signs You've Already Had COVID.

Dr. Siddiqui says, "As we enter the third year of this pandemic the epidemiology of the virus has not changed from day one. This is a respiratory virus that continues to increase its ability to infect people through respiratory secretions and contact with mucous membranes with infected secretions." A golden rule is: Don't Share Your Air. If you're indoors with someone, and do not know their vaccination status, wear a mask.

"Masks are neither a political statement or a referendum on society and social beliefs; they are an effective and powerful tool in protecting each and everyone of us from exposure to respiratory viruses," Dr. Siddiqui explains. "One of the common mistakes made while wearing a mask is lack of fit. I remind everyone that if the mask does not leave a mark around your nose and mouth after removal, it's likely not fitting well. Masks that have gaps or loose fitting masks compromise their effectiveness. Please wear a mask when you are in public, especially if you're near large groups of people or a mass gathering such as sporting events and concerts."

RELATED: I'm a Doctor and Beg You Read This Now

According to Dr. Siddiqui, "the most significant tool that we possess to decrease not only the risk of infection but to decrease the severity of infection is vaccination. Unfortunately there's a great deal of misinformation surrounding the various vaccines, their efficacy and their side effects. If you have concerns or questions regarding vaccination please speak to a healthcare professional and have an appropriate discussion on the risk benefit ratio of vaccination to your healthcare status. The vaccine was never meant to be 100% preventative and the fact that they are breakthrough infections does not mean the vaccine is not effective. In addition a key aspect of vaccination is to reduce the intensity and decrease the risk of complications from Covid 19 infection."

RELATED: Dr. Fauci Just Predicted This Will Happen Next

Washing your hands frequently and using hand sanitizer helps protect you from COVID, Dr. Siddiqui states. "Hand gels and hand based alcohol sprays play an important role in helping fight infection from respiratory viruses. The key is to use them frequently when you believe that your hands have been soiled from respiratory secretions or that you've come in contact with inanimate objects that are used by a number of people such as door handles, remote controls for televisions and telephones. Do use masks plus COVID-19 vaccination plus hand sanitizers. It will play a role in helping protect an individual from infection."

RELATED: I'm a Doctor and This is the COVID Test You Should Use Now

Dr. Siddiqui says, "Social distancing and wearing masks are among the best public health measures anyone can do in order to decrease the risk of infection."

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention states, "COVID-19 spreads between people who are in close contact (within about 6 feet) through respiratory droplets, created when someone talks, coughs or sneezes. Staying away from others helps stop the spread of COVID-19."

RELATED: Don't Take This Vitamin Anymore, Experts Warn

Follow the public health fundamentals and help end this pandemic, no matter where you liveget vaccinated or boosted ASAP; if you live in an area with low vaccination rates, wear an N95 face mask, don't travel, social distance, avoid large crowds, don't go indoors with people you're not sheltering with (especially in bars), practice good hand hygiene, and to protect your life and the lives of others, don't visit any of these 35 Places You're Most Likely to Catch COVID.

See more here:

5 Ways You're Most Likely to Catch COVID Eat This Not That - Eat This, Not That

Europes pre-Covid fiscal rules were the product of a cultural climate prevailing in the 1980s and 90s. Back then, the belief in the effectiveness of fiscal policies on Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and employment was limited, and monetary policy was seen as a universal solution. We have known that this is not the case for some time now. The existing rules also had well-known technical bugs that made them procyclical, whatever the intended contrary effects.

After the disastrous consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic, the lesson is that not only do the fiscal rules need to be amended, but the new rules must also be complemented by a system of safeguards designed to protect the integrity of the European Monetary Union (EMU) in the event of systemic shocks. As argued in our recent paper, any reform must take account of four changed circumstances.

First, interest rates are much lower than they were in the 1990s when the existing rules were drawn up. The Eurozone expenditure on interest payments is now a much smaller percentage of its GDP despite debt being significantly higher. Given the persistence of excess savings worldwide, which exerts downward pressure on real interest rates, this means that higher debt to GDP ratios would remain sustainable for some time.

Secondly, post-pandemic debts of all EMU members have grown considerably relative to GDP, making the 60 per cent threshold enshrined in the Stability and Growth Pact (SGP) entirely out of the reach for many of them (in Southern Europe but also in France, Belgium, and Austria), except at the cost of a demand squeeze capable of throwing the continent back into recession.

Interest rates have stuck close to zero for almost a decade: a clear sign of the weaknesses of monetary policy in tackling widespread negative shocks.

Third, in a cyclical downturn of GDP, the debt/GDP ratio increases even if debt does not. Expecting the ratio to go down always and for a long period of time is thus entirely illogical. While it is true that the SGP allows the rules to be suspended in the event of exceptional circumstances (such as the 2008 financial crisis or the pandemic), its macroeconomic impact over time can be quite asymmetrical (like in the 2011-14 period) and this makes the application of a uniform rule vulnerable and practically unworkable.

Fourth, interest rates have stuck close to zero for almost a decade: a clear sign of the weaknesses of monetary policy in tackling widespread negative shocks, including those of a symmetrical nature. Increased use of fiscal policy for the purpose of stabilisation and related macroeconomic externalities must be carefully considered. In the wake of the pandemic, it has become clear that the future economic sustainability of EMU members is bound up with an extraordinary (but anything but temporary) budgetary effort.

It should by now be clear that maintaining fiscal policy entirely at the level of individual member countries, constrained by a set of rules which ignore macroeconomic externalities, is no longer possible. The era of do your homework alone is over. As Buti and Messori, among others, have stressed, individual state budgetary policies must not only be controlled but also be co-ordinated and harmonised to maintain a balanced Eurozone fiscal stance. This can serve to minimise negative spill-overs from individual budgetary policies onto other member states via macroeconomic externalities.

Moreover, as existing federal unions such as the US show, a sufficiently large and flexible central budget is a necessary precondition to keep members budgets small and disciplined. If NGEU and, in particular, SURE (the shared funding tool for cyclical unemployment benefits) were to become permanent European Union tools, national budgetary constraints might immediately gain political acceptability and be easier to control. Thats because a significant part of the macroeconomic stabilisation task would be entrusted to the common budget, which would be mainly funded by nations own resources.

Whenever technical evaluation must be translated into political decisions competence should be assigned to politically responsible institutions.

We should resist perpetuating the harmful illusion that in a democratic Europe, an automatic algorithm may, or should, replace the so-called political discretion. Rules are useful to create a framework for technical evaluation of the state of public finances in the various member states and of the EMU as a whole. Whenever technical evaluation must be translated into political decisions, however, competence should be assigned to politically responsible institutions.

In the EMU, political responsibility stays with member state governments. However, national governments must agree to share sovereignty with an institution capable of guaranteeing the EUs collective interests. In our view, this can only be the European Commission. Of course, the Commission must make use of independent technical structures such as the European Fiscal Board (EFB) and the national parliamentary budget offices for technical analysis and the formulation of guidelines for the implementation of standards.

We entirely agree with the suggestion by Blanchard et al. (2021) that the focus should be public debt sustainability. This would eliminate all reference to fixed targets valid for all member states without distinction and, even more importantly, it would break free the sustainability analysis from the weight of non-observable variables, such as potential GDP and the output gap, requiring ongoing (and retrospective) review.

Sustainability analysis should be performed on individual member states periodically and be designed to assess the probability that debt is sustainable, taking account of the specific features of each nation with reference to growth, population dynamics, interest rate trends (and thus overall debt servicing spending) but also current budgetary policies and those planned for the future.

This type of analysis is by no means straightforward and should thus be entrusted to a strengthened European Fiscal Board (EFB) in conjunction with national institutions. If debt sustainability analysis should reveal a high likelihood that debt may become unsustainable, the Commission based on a proposal by the EFB would have to negotiate a deficit reduction trajectory over several years with the country concerned. That would require the debt sustainability risks to be balanced against the costs of adjustment in terms of production, with the explicit goal of averting a debt crisis for the individual country concerned and the EMU as a whole.

Back in 2019 the EFB suggested that, in the event that debt reduction should require it, a primary spending ceiling could be resorted to, also preserving a predetermined investment spending quota (the golden rule). However, the energy transition, for example, requires huge and long-term investment that cannot realistically be done while simultaneously maintaining significant primary surpluses in all European nations. It has been noted that post-pandemic resilience and recovery are based on capital build-up and growth (especially human and social capital), which require increases in spending. Accounting conventions would classify this spending as current expenditures, but it could also be seen as investment expenditure. Think of health and education spending. Reforms of the European fiscal rules and the introduction of the golden rule could, not unreasonably, be accompanied by a (at least experimental) modification of certain key spending classifications.

See the original post here:

Breathing in new life into the European fiscal monster - IPS Journal

Take the rest of the noodles and the pak choi and you can have it for your lunch tomorrow. My dad pushed the takeaway containers and their remaining contents across the table towards me.

Ive got loads of food at mine, why dont you and Mum keep it? I protested. I knew hed insist I take the leftovers with me. This routine would always play out at the end of family dinners once Id left home and, this time around, it felt both familiar and oddly comforting because it had been a while since our last dinner.

Well, more than a while. It was spring, last year, and the pandemic had meant that, for months, like most families, wed only seen one another through our screens. This was the first time in a long while that wed been able to get together for a meal. We were even legally allowed to hug (if we exercised care and common sense!). I had brought champagne to celebrate, and we ordered from the local Chinese takeaway. Id like to say it was a bid to support an Asian business that had been struggling, like many others, during the pandemic, but in truth it was sheer laziness. Wed talked and gorged ourselves on crispy aromatic duck with pancakes, stir-fried king prawns with peppers in black bean sauce, and chow mein with beansprouts. My childhood favourites.

OK, Ill take them, I said, but my bags too small to carry the boxes. My dad got up from the table and went to the hallway to retrieve his rucksack. He rummaged around inside for a moment and then pulled out a neatly folded plastic bag. Opening it out, he offered it to me. I reached for it and then my hand paused in mid-air as I gawped in disbelief.

How long have you had this? I asked in amazement. He shrugged. This was no ordinary plastic bag. Indeed, the bag was not of this millennium.

It was vintage Marks & Spencer, made from thick white polythene emblazoned with St Michael QUALITY FOODS in blue lettering, the St Michael logo in a distinctive handwritten style. If you shopped in M&S in the 90s, you may remember it. Its a classic. Ive since found out that the St Michael brand was phased out in the year 2000, making this bag at least 20 years old.

My dad isnt a man of many words, but that night hed had a few glasses of wine. He told us that he used the bag regularly, despite its pristine appearance, and that the last time hed used it in the local M&S the cashier had shrieked, Oh my lord, I havent seen one of these in years, and made the other members of staff gather round to take a look. This moment perfectly encapsulated what I would describe as Dads Golden Rule No 1: nothing goes to waste, which applies equally to food, clothes, household items, cars everything really. Things will be used until they break, if they can be mended they will be mended, but rarely will anything be thrown away. This was established in his childhood out of necessity, but even now, in relative comfort, he still treats everything with such care and hates wastefulness.

A couple of weeks later, I came across an article written by the journalist Dan Hancox in the Guardian. I had thought I was pretty familiar with the long history of anti-Asian racism and discrimination in the UK and elsewhere; the shifting stereotypes, the scapegoating, Yellow Peril and the like, and the erasure of the contributions of the 140,000 men of the Chinese Labour Corps who risked their lives carrying out essential work for the allies in the first world war. But this was a story I had never heard before.

In the aftermath of the second world war, Britain forcibly deported hundreds of Chinese seamen who had served in the merchant navy, deeming them an undesirable element of British society. These men had helped keep the UK fed and fuelled on highly dangerous crossings of the Atlantic (approximately 3,500 vessels of the merchant navy were sunk by German U-boats, with the loss of 72,000 lives).

Many of the surviving men had married and started families with British women in Liverpool. However, they were secretly rounded up without notice and shipped back to east Asia. Many of their wives never knew what happened to them, and their children grew up believing they had been abandoned.

The fact that this story is only now coming to light, with no official acknowledgment or apology, may not be surprising, but it is still heartbreaking and enraging. By the time I finished reading the article, I was in tears. I realised that this had struck a deep chord because my own father had served for years in the merchant navy before he settled in the UK.

My dad grew up as one of six kids in a poor, single-parent household in Hong Kong. He was the third child and the oldest son. My ah-ma (his mother: barely 5ft tall, very fierce, could out-haggle anyone) worked three jobs to support her children. One was as a seamstress, with long hours bent over a sewing machine in a sweatshop, earning the equivalent of less than 1 a day. Initially my dads family lived in a shack on a hillside, with no running water. Then they moved into a block where they had one room, sharing a bathroom with 30 other families on the same floor. At one point they were made homeless when the block of flats burned down.

After leaving school, my dad worked for years on ships mostly oil tankers at sea for months at a time, and sent money home to pay for his siblings school fees. Only after they had all finished school could he save enough to pay for his own degree, coming to the UK to study engineering at the University of Strathclyde, where he would meet my mum (her own familys tumultuous journey to the UK is a story for another time).

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During my childhood, my dad was the most selfless and diligent father. His love for my sister and me was expressed not through words but through small acts of devotion: always cutting fresh fruit for us; making sure we drank two full glasses of milk each day so our bones would grow strong (milk being a luxury they rarely had in Hong Kong); patiently teaching us how to swim (Golden Rule No 2: learn how to swim). However, when I was younger, there were some things about him that I found hard to understand: his obsession with education, his aversion to waste of any kind, his insistence that we finish every bit of food on our plates; and his constant reminders not to take anything for granted. It was because he knew what it was like to have nothing.

After I sent him the article about the Chinese seamen, we had a long conversation on the phone. He doesnt often speak about his past, but we talked about his time in the merchant navy. Some things I remembered him telling me long ago: how hard and lonely those years at sea were, how much he missed his family, and how dangerous it could be. On his third voyage, his ship, a chemical tanker, was sailing between Taipei and Kobe when they were caught in the tail end of a typhoon. The chief officer went out on deck to help secure the cover of the anchor chain locker, which was filling up with water, and was killed when a large wave dashed him against the ship. He was buried at sea.

But other details were new. I found out that, after seven continuous months at sea on his first voyage, my dad had noticed that the white British officers and crew spent six months at sea at most, with some serving four-month contracts before getting tickets to fly home to be with their families. This was in contrast to the Chinese crew, who usually had to serve long periods of nine months.

While some of his fellow junior engineers were apprehensive about being seen to be causing trouble, he represented other Chinese crew members on board and took it up with the shipping companys superintendent. He found out that the British crew were employed under Article A (better pay, shorter sea time, paid study leave, etc), whereas the Chinese crew were employed under Article B (less pay, longer sea time, fewer benefits). The company told my dad he was the first person to complain. Dad told them he just wanted equal treatment. As a result, he and the others who protested were allowed to fly back home with holiday pay. They had docked in Trinidad, so he flew from there to Toronto, on to Vancouver, then Honolulu, then Tokyo. Finally, after three days of flying, he was reunited with his family in Hong Kong.

When I heard this story, it was impossible not to think again of the deported Chinese seamen. One of the reasons they were considered undesirable was because they had gone on strike to fight for an increase in their basic pay (originally less than half that of their British crew mates) and for the payment of the standard 10-a-month war risk bonus.

Its a precarious business simply to stand up for your rights, especially if you are poor or a person of colour; and it unfortunately remains the case that those in power usually dont appreciate being held to account. I hope that one day there will be an official acknowledgment of this terrible act of state-sanctioned racism and of the wrong done to those men and their families. I hope that the surviving children get the answers and justice they deserve, and that they can find peace.

My relationship with my dad hasnt always been easy as is often the case, its possible to derive both pain and gratitude from the same place but I know how lucky we are to have him. And I will be forever thankful for the sacrifices he made for our family and for the things he taught me: the value of hard work, never to look down on those who have less, to stand up for others, and that a Bag for Life truly means life.

This essay appears in East Side Voices, edited by Helena Lee, published by Hodder & Stoughton on 20 January at 14.99. To support The Guardian and Observer, order your copy at guardianbookshop.com. Delivery charges may apply.

The rest is here:

Gemma Chan on the truth about her fathers life at sea: He knew what it was like to have nothing - The Guardian

Millions of people could starve to death in Afghanistan this winter.

Two Philadelphians are trying to prevent that from happening.

This is a campaign for humanity, said Naser Shahalemi, 42, a Kabul-born, University City businessman who helps lead a new and burgeoning awareness campaign, End Afghan Starvation. Twenty years we were helping them, and now were not helping them?

He and Gulmakai Popal Saleh, 44, a childrens book author in Northeast Philadelphia, started and lead a movement thats gained supporters across the globe, spread across the internet, and generated demonstrations in three cities. Nearly 10,000 people have signed online petitions pleading for U.S. action to avoid a humanitarian disaster.

Why Philadelphia as a starting point?

Things spark up in Philly, Shahalemi said. He and Saleh, both Afghan Americans who immigrated here as children, decided they had to act as they saw a crisis developing.

Afghanistan has long been beset by malnutrition. But now its being racked by a convergence of drought, war, poverty, unemployment, and pandemic thats wiped out crops and cut off international aid.

More than half the population, 22.8 million people, face severe hunger, according to U.N. analyses, and more than 8.7 million of those are nearing famine.

The billions of dollars in aid that flowed to the U.S.-backed Afghan government vanished when the country fell to the Taliban in August. Subsequent American economic sanctions have limited Afghanistans access to global financial markets and left humanitarian organizations unable to pay workers, buy supplies, and distribute food.

The Biden administration moved to exempt aid groups from the sanctions shortly before Christmas, but its unclear whether that will be sufficient to forestall famine.

Part of the challenge is political the Biden administration risks being seen as supporting the Taliban if it provides assistance.

End Afghan Starvation calls on the administration to ignore political concerns and get food to hungry people, mounting Twitter storms under the hashtag #endafghanstarvation.

The group seeks no monetary donations, noting that funding for food programs already is being sought and collected by groups that include the World Food Programme, International Rescue Committee, UNICEF, and Action Against Hunger.

More than 4,100 people have signed a petition that urges immediate action, to be submitted to the Biden administration, the United Nations, the European Union, and the United Kingdom governments.

For Gods sake, please help Afghans meet their basic needs! wrote one signer, Shahla Sadiq of McKinney, Texas, near Dallas. Each one of us knows what its like to be hungry for a couple of hours and not be able to eat, never mind not having the food!

A similar petition by Just Foreign Policy, a Washington-based reform group, has drawn 5,300 signatures.

Particularly vulnerable this winter are three million Afghans who have been internally displaced, that is, forced by war and violence to flee their homes but not to leave their homeland.

An estimated 50,000 fled to the capital of Kabul a city higher than Denver in elevation where winter temperatures often fall below zero at night. Many will spend the winter in makeshift shelters or unheated rooms, according to the U.N. High Commission on Refugees.

Roughly 3.2 million Afghan children under age 5 are acutely malnourished,according to UNICEF, and an estimated 1.1 million could die. Many mothers struggle to breastfeed because they themselves are undernourished.

This week End Afghan Starvation intends to reach out to the 40-some House Democrats who called on Biden and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen to unfreeze Afghanistans bank reserves. The lawmakers say that continuing to enforce international restrictions on Afghanistans banking system risks economic pain and humanitarian collapse.

Were American citizens, Saleh said. At the same time we care about our people, the place we were born.

The author of four childrens books is the founder and director of the Golden Tree of Goodness, which seeks to promote kindness through reading and encourages children to follow the golden rule.

She came to the United States at age 4 in 1981, two years after the Soviet invasion. Last month she helped gather speakers for a rally outside the White House, as similar demonstrations against hunger took place in London and Vienna.

Were getting phone calls from around the world, she said. The support is growing. Were uniting, regardless of what ethnic group or religion you belong to.

Shahalemi, a business consultant who arrived in this country at age 1 in 1980, said action is needed now, as winter snows threaten to cut off remote areas of Afghanistan.

Were speaking up for the defenseless children of Afghanistan. Every day, another child could die.

For more information, or to contact the organizers, visit endafghanstarvation.org.

See the article here:

Millions face starvation in Afghanistan. Two Philadelphians are trying to stop it. - The Philadelphia Inquirer

Navarro is the assistant editor for The San Diego Union-Tribune en Espaol. She lives in Tijuana.

Like many binational kids in our CaliBaja region, I grew up in Tijuana, believing in Santa Claus and singing carols in English and Spanish, eating spicy tamales and turkey with gravy. And while my White friends will usually take down their holiday decorations right after Christmas, in my house everything stays the same until Jan. 6. Im sure that Im not the only one who follows the unwritten tradition: For Mexicans, the holidays go from Dec. 12, on the Day of the Virgen de Guadalupe feast, to Jan. 6, the Epiphany a time frame that even has its own name, el maratn Guadalupe-Reyes.

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For many Latino families, on both sides of the border, the Da de Reyes on Jan. 6 is the last day of the season to celebrate and cherish the joy with your loved ones, and it is also the last chance to bring gifts to the little ones while celebrating an important date in our faith. The story in the Bible describes three wise men who visited Jesus after his birth, bearing gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. They symbolize the first gentiles converted to Christianity. Even now, the kings are always present on my moms nativity ornaments, el nacimiento. I remember them in my grandmas decorations: Melchior, a white-skinned and golden bearded king riding a camel; Gaspar, with an Arabic look, riding a horse; and Balthazar with dark skin, riding an elephant. All three men wore fine capes and jeweled crowns. I also remember how my grandma use to play with the three figurines when I was a kid.

First, she would place them away from the nativity manger, and every day she would move them, so they could walk closer to the nativity scene. There are different traditions associated with the Three Kings Day. The first one has to do with presents. Before going to sleep, on Jan. 5, the children place one shoe near the nativity decorations or next to a window, so they can collect a gift from the wise man the following morning. Then there is food, just like in any other celebration. Before the date, and on Jan. 6, we drink hot chocolate, champurrado (a thick drink made of corn masa and Mexican chocolate, with or without milk) or coffee while eating the rosca de Reyes. The sweet bread, shaped like a wreath and decorated with nuts and fruits, represents the kings crowns and another biblical passage. Inside each rosca, the baker hides a tiny baby figure that represents the hiding of baby Jesus from King Herods troops. On larger roscas, there are several babies hidden.

Most recently, the baby has morphed into popular figures, like Grogu (aka Baby Yoda) and many other characters. Also, the extravagant and exquisite cuisine of our region innovates every year, offering a wide variety of roscas on both sides of the border. From the classic sweet bread that you can find for cheap at any Hispanic market to gourmet creations from exclusive bakeries and upscale prices stuffed with cream cheese, chocolate, cajeta (dulce de leche) or fruits. For those on a special diet, a quick search on social media can lead them to specialty places where its possible to order vegan and gluten-free choices.

Once you choose your rosca, you should know that, at least in my house, there is one rule to obtain your piece of that special cake: no one else can cut your piece of rosca, because if you touch it, the baby is yours. And of course, there is a golden rule: If your piece of bread has the baby figure, then you must serve tamales the following month, on Feb. 2. Some say that receiving the baby is a symbol of good luck, others that it is just an excuse to keep partying with your loved ones, with more champurrado and tamales. No matter on what side of the border you celebrate the Epiphany, this will be the last day of this seasons holidays. After this day, its fine to remove the Christmas decorations and start working out to lose those extra holiday pounds. Because if you eat rosca, tamales will be back next month!

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Opinion: For many Latino families the holidays arent over until the Epiphany - The San Diego Union-Tribune

January is the time of the year when many try to shed extra Christmas pounds and get fighting fit for the year ahead.

But it's not always straightforward, maybe you hate the gym, love eating lots of food or are just generally lazy.

However, if you are looking for advice, Irish Mirror sports reporter Gavin Quinn, 24, has you covered.

Gavin lost five stone in just seven months without once going to the gym - here's how he did it, from his diet to level of exercise.

I lost 70 pounds (32 kg or five stone) in seven months after deciding to make a change in October 2020.

Tipping the scales at around 17 stone, I wasn't massively overweight but I'd noticed a gradual increase since I was a teenager that was accelerated by the initial Covid-19 lockdown.

I looked into what I was eating and slowly turned around my diet and found cycling as a great way to get active to compliment the changes I'd made.

By Christmas I had lost over two stone and I kept it up in the new year before hitting the five stone mark in May 2021.

After getting down to 12 stone (just over 76 kg), I was happy enough to ease off and work on fitness goals rather than focus on my weight.

For some people it's an epiphany moment like a favourite shirt no longer fitting them or seeing an old picture and noticing a big difference.

But for me it was just a culmination of all the right things, I don't have any overriding reason for making a change.

At the time Ireland was staring at another Covid-19 lockdown - which incidentally lasted almost the entire seven months of my journey barring the weeks before Christmas.

I'd tried almost all of the 'fad diets' to no avail in the months and years before, and I could just feel my confidence was at an all-time-low.

And on October 4, a Sunday morning, I said to myself that I need to make a change and that day would be day one.

The first thing I tackled was my eating and sleeping habits.

My working hours would often see me work mornings one week and evenings the next, so I'd struggled with establishing a structure to my diet and often just ate with no thoughts on how much I was eating and what kind of food.

I gave myself a simple plan to start off with - get eight hours sleep as often as possible and have three meals a day at roughly the same time.

When it comes to weight loss, on paper the simplest way to think about it is creating a calorie deficit - if you burn more calories than you consume each day then you will lose weight.

Of course it takes a lot of planning and preparation to follow a strict calorie deficit, but I set myself a rough target of 2,000 daily calories and used apps such as MyFitnessPal to help track what I was eating.

Initially I didn't pay too much attention to my macro-nutrients but made an effort to ensure I was drinking plenty of water, eating foods with high fibre, vitamins and lower fat counts - particularly saturated fats.

On my first day I had no grand plan or target weight to reach.

But Christmas provided a perfect landing point, and I set myself the target of losing two stone (12.7 kg) before the Christmas break.

A huge goal can often make the task of losing weight seem like an upward battle, so if you can take it step by step and set attainable goals.

Gyms are great, but they're not for everybody.

Personally, I never took to the gym when I was younger and always liked to exercise as a means of engaging in a sport or activity.

Gyms can be intimidating if you've never become a member, but I'd suggest anybody looking to get active consider it.

For me, I found a means to exercise in cycling - which has grown into somewhat of a passion for me over the past 15 months.

I spoke about this in greater detail with online health coach Cillian McCahey on The Confidence Code podcast.

It can be difficult to follow a calorie deficit, when you're consuming less calories than you're burning your body is being forced to eat into fat reserves to fill that void.

I made sure not to overdo it - deliberately eating just 1,000 calories per day can be too much and you could risk reverting back to old ways.

Having my breakfast and lunches at very similar times (9-10 am for breakfast and 1-2 pm for lunch) helped build early eating habits that would set me up for the day.

Again to ensure I wasn't completely flipping my diet completely I used a degree of leniency when it came to dinner time, small changes like portion control and avoiding fatty foods when you have the option can make all the difference.

Initially I found myself eating a lot of the same foods I already had, particularly snacks, but doing so meant I'd simply be eating less of what I used to rather than eating right.

After the first week I began replacing some snack foods with lower calorie snacks, which in turn meant I had more calories to play with for my substantial meals.

If I was eating a pack of 200 calorie crisps, I'd replace them with 100 calorie crisps, swap the Cadbury chocolate bars for lower calorie rice cake bars, treating myself to a zero calorie fizzy drink rather than a full sugar alternative.

This meant I still had treats and snacks to enjoy, but the small changes slowly begin to add up and the 2,000 calories I consumed each day began to feel like more and more as the days and weeks went by.

Some days it was 1,700 calories and other days it was 2,200 calories - don't beat yourself up over going over your allowance every once in a while.

It's not about cutting yourself off from food, but rather improving your relationship with food.

I've found so many great foods the past 15 months that I never enjoyed before, and I'd be confident in saying my relationship with food has really grown as I became more aware of what I was putting into my body.

Here's some of my favoured foods these days:

Cous Cous: I sometimes use it as a lighter alternative to rice, it's easy to make and is high in carbohydrates and fibre.

Rice crispy bars: Excellent for a quick snack, they're a lot better than a bar of chocolate.

Lentil curls: A low calorie alternative to many brands of crisps, I've grown to love them.

Nuts and seeds: A great snack, good source of protein and fats.

Turkey burgers: Lean, high in protein and delicious - no explanation needed.

Vegetables: Whatever they are eat plenty of them, they're good for you and should be an essential pillar of your diet.

Not really.

We've always had a 'Takeaway Friday' at home so I made sure to allow myself the Friday treat. Although instead of chips in the chinese takeaway some weeks I'd get rice or even eat a smaller portion.

I initially gave up alcohol until Christmas, but when I did drink I opted for lower calorie light beers or spirits more often than not instead of calorie-dense lagers or stout.

Everybody needs support when undertaking such a big change.

Whether that be a personal trainer, or just a family member or close friend, I'd recommend you get someone on board to be there for support.

In my case, I asked a close friend to act almost like my 'coach' to keep me honest. He would get in touch every now and then to see how I was getting on, was there to listen if I had problems and cheer me on to my goals.

Needless to say that educated professionals are much more qualified to play such a role, but having someone to bounce off and hold you accountable on the journey is essential.

Yeah, I came pretty close on November 1.

I was making good progress in the weeks before but that morning I weighed in after a particularly tough week and had lost just one pound.

In hindsight losing a pound in a week is a good achievement, but that week had been so difficult and the loss was a lot lower than I was expecting.

I was agitated and questioning what I was doing for hours before I was convinced to take an hour to go on a short cycle to clear my mind.

If I hadn't walked out to get some headspace I would've broken and dialled back weeks of progress, especially since I'd already been fully committed to nearly a month.

If you're about to give in - take a step back and remember why you're doing it.

Some days you just wake up and the same motivation you initially had just isn't there - it'll happen to everybody.

Of course motivation is great, but it comes and goes. Behind the motivation you do need to have a certain amount of discipline.

It can be very tough but you need discipline for when the inspiration and motivation just isn't there.

Weekly goals can help keep you focused.

The real goal wasn't to get down to a certain weight or number, it was to feel good and take back some confidence that I'd probably lost.

I started to notice a difference in how I looked around Christmas time (two months in), but had already felt better after about 10 days or so.

I tipped the scales initially every week but increased that to twice weekly to avoid any discouraging fluctuations.

Weighing yourself can be a good way of mapping out progress, but it's not the most important.

If you're not getting the expected results one week, don't get discouraged, it's important to make sure to keep doing the right things - the results will come.

Quite important.

I found a passion in cycling during my weight loss journey, but any form of exercise can give you similar results. Some people like running, walking, playing certain sports or of course the gym.

It really doesn't matter what your form of exercise is, if you have a healthy and balanced diet then exercise is your best friend.

Think of it as a complimentary relationship, the old saying of you cant out-exercise a bad diet can also be true for having a healthy diet but sitting on the couch all day.

As little as a walk in the park, a short hike, leisurely bike ride or a dip in the sea can compliment whatever calories deficits you're creating and help you reach your goals faster.

But if you are taking on more rigorous exercise, it's important to ensure you aren't creating too large of a deficit and are re-fuelling adequately.

Everyone has their golden rules for weight loss, and although these particularly rules won't work for everyone, here's a couple of mine:

- Calorie deficit: If you create a daily calorie deficit, you will lose weight. It's simple when you break it down like that.

- Always treat yourself: It's not about burning your bridges with certain foods, it's about improving your relationship with food.

- Take your time: There's no rush, everyone's bodies are different and once you're moving in the right direction that's all that matters.

- Find your support network: Find someone to keep you on the right path and hold you accountable in the long run.

- Exercise: Doesn't matter what it is, get out there and get active.

- Listen to your body: If you're hungry, eat something. If you're over-exercising, rest.

If you were to take one thing from reading this, it would be my real golden rule.

Sustainability.

Whatever habits, calorie deficits or exercise regimes you're trying to put in place - you have to ask yourself if it's sustainable.

When I set out to lose some weight, the one huge difference between all my failed attempts in the past was I asked myself is it sustainable?

You should be trying to implementing a lifestyle, not a 'lose weight quick' hack.

When you start on day one, ask yourself could you see yourself doing the same on day 100 or day 1000?

Because to lose weight and live a healthy and well balanced lifestyle, whatever way you go about it needs be sustainable in the long term.

See the article here:

I lost 70 pounds in seven months without a gym - here's my guide to how I did it - Irish Mirror