Michael Jackson’s Health Issues: The Price of Fame?

After “fighting tooth and nail” to be crowned as the undisputed King of Pop, did Michael Jackson’s meteoric rise to fame and fortune eventually took a toll on his health and well being?


By: Ringo Bones


Even though I’m but a casual fan in comparison to the more dedicated Michael Jackson fan that I’ve met over the years, I can’t help myself but to think that most of us will never probably get over the untimely passing of the eternally reigning King of Pop. Though most of us have seen Michael Jackson’s private struggles from the prism of supermarket tabloids, it was probably his tell-all interview with Oprah that everyone of us eventually found out that Jackson’s “unhappy” childhood is probably what we perceive is the root cause of his “eccentricities”. Nonetheless, Michael Jackson will probably go down in history as a case study for celebrity health in America.

Growing up with a less-than-ideal childhood in the supposedly child-friendly society of post-World War II America is probably the consensus explanation on why Michael Jackson eventually spent countless millions of dollars to recapture his lost childhood via the Neverland Ranch. While the primary suspected reason of his untimely passing last June 25, 2009 is blamed on Jackson’s chronic prescription painkiller abuse that started after that fateful accident while shooting a Pepsi commercial back in 1984.

Michael Jackson’s personal doctor, which he hired just recently back around May 2009, is now the prime suspect of his death and could face charges of negligent homicide. Dr. Conrad Murray, more a close personal friend than a physician, is now seen by investigators as an “enabler” – i.e. allowing Michael Jackson access to prescription painkillers to which he became chronically addicted over the years. And authorities investigating the untimely death of Michael Jackson became even more concerned when Dr. Murray enabled Jackson to receive doses of the anaesthetic propofol / diprivan – which is reserved only for operating room use during surgery.

The diprivan use in a domestic setting is probably the last straw that eventually made Dr. Conrad Murray the prime suspect in the untimely and suspicious death of Michael Jackson, given that the doctor should have been exercising his Hippocratic Oath in the first place – i.e. first do no harm. Diprivan was probably administered to Michael Jackson - according to the investigators – to enable him to sleep by subjecting him to a narcotic coma that supposedly reduces the stress of jet lag as the singer does his upcoming concert tour through different time zones.

Being addicted to strictly controlled pharmaceuticals is not the only malady suffered by Michael Jackson during his relentless pursuit of fame and fortune. His “unhappy” childhood is probably the primary cause of his “eternal dissatisfaction” with his own physical appearance. The scores of cosmetic surgery, which the King of Pop endured through the years - is a case in point. Michael Jackson is indeed an artist who suffers for his work. Despite of his relatively short and tortured life, Michael Jackson’s legacy lives on through his underwriting of philanthropic causes to help sick and needy children; Not to mention his musical legacy, which the long-time fan and the newly-initiated never seems to get enough of.

Who’s Afraid of Swine Flu?

Even though it did create a somewhat irrational-leaning panic since the mainstream press reported it, but does the rest of the world be concerned over the swift spread of swine flu?


By: Ringo Bones


News of the relatively rapid spread of the H1N1 virus – also known as swine flu – did somewhat ruin the festivities slated for President Obama’s 100 days in office. Or maybe it was that April 28, 2009 breaking news live coverage of CNN when the World Health Organization spokesperson Gregory Hartl announced the raising of the Threat Level of the H1N1 / swine flu “pandemic” from Threat Level Three to Threat Level Four, there are six global pandemic threat levels by the way as established by the WHO. Which the WHO had taken into effect, especially when the suspected death toll throughout Mexico reached 152. Although this was later proven to be an exaggeration because three weeks later it was verified that the death toll in Mexico due to the H1N1 virus or swine flu now stands at 101. Given that seasonal flu death toll of the previous years are magnitudes greater in comparison to current swine flu deaths, why is everyone “deathly” afraid of swine flu?

Compared to the H5N1 virus a few years back, the H1N1 virus that causes swine flu is 800 times less – I and every molecular biologist on the planet can attest, repeat 800 times less – virulent in comparison to the bird flu virus. The problem is that the swine flu virus managed to spread very quickly in a very short amount of time. As cases of the H1N1 virus were reported on every major metropolitan city within the airline route of Mexico City. Thus everyone unfamiliar with the mechanisms of how viruses reproduce and spread to new hosts tend to err on the side of caution – namely switch on to a mode of irrational panic.

Given that the H1N1 virus’s 800 times more virulent cousin has yet to kill over a billion people, the most sensible way to err on the side of caution is to follow the WHO guidelines of avoiding catching the virus - namely covering your nose and mouth as you sneeze to avoid unintentionally spreading the virus. Plus avoiding unnecessary travel to the H1N1 virus’s point of origin, which can be a bummer if you are on a global personal crusade to kick-start the ailing global economy via tourism.

When the Great Influenza Pandemic of 1918 happened, humanity still hasn’t known a single iota about flu viruses – let alone had seen one. Electron microscopes were still a few years away. This was still before a UN-based WHO was established. It was still known as the Health Organization, an agency of the League of Nations formed during the Treaty of Versailles of 1919-1920. Even though the influenza pandemic eventually died out, it managed to kill over 20 million people around the world back then.

So far, it looks like the specter of a global pandemic rivaling that of the Influenza Pandemic of 1918 won’t be repeated this time by the lowly H1N1 virus, which just so happens to have crossed the species barrier to manage to infect a few hundred souls while killing just over a hundred. Maybe it is by luck or if fate is on our side, let’s just hope that what we currently know about flu viruses can protect us from another global pandemic like that of 1918.

Of The Gulf of Aden Anti-Piracy Campaign and Gulf War Syndrome

Even though the rumored hazardous toxic waste dumps in the Gulf of Aden are yet to receive press attention, are the anti-piracy campaigns in these waters a veritable occupational hazard?


By: Ringo Bones


Ever since the extensive press coverage of the dramatic rescue of the Maersk Alabama’s skipper Capt. Richard Phillips from the clutches of bloodthirsty Somali pirates by a US Navy SEAL team highlighted the growing danger of piracy on commercial maritime traffic on the Gulf of Aden. The world’s press had yet to highlight another serious – yet relatively underreported threat – lurking in the waters off the Somali coast. Namely the menace posed by illegally dumped hazardous toxic chemical and radioactive wastes.

United Nations envoy for Somalia Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah said there is “reliable information” that European and Asian companies are illegally dumping hazardous toxic chemical wastes, including radioactive wastes, off the Somali coastline. Which could explain why a majority of the Somali pirates are former fisherman who can no longer eke-out a living from their regular fishing grounds due to the environmental destruction caused by the illegal dumping of these toxic chemical and radioactive wastes.

Even though the evidence of this illegal dumping can be traced as far back as 20 years ago, it was the tsunami of December 26, 2004 that literally dumped the evidence of such illegally dumped toxic chemical and radioactive wastes on the beaches of northern Somalia. The United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP) reported that the tsunami had washed up rusting containers of illegally dumped toxic chemical wastes on the shores of Puntland.

UNEP spokesman Nick Nuttall states that when the barrels were smashed open by the force of the waves, the containers exposed a “frightening activity” that has been going on for more than a decade. The bad news is, is that the UNEP cannot simply send a team of scientists to evaluate and report on the extent of toxic chemical and radioactive waste contamination on the shores of Puntland in Somalia because of the on-going conflict. And the team of scientists could easily be kidnapped, taken hostage then held for ransom by lawless elements running free in Somalia.

Conflict zones and areas with on-going civil war are an attractive site for cheap illegal hazardous toxic chemical waste dumps by highly organized transnational criminal gangs because of the breakdown in the rule of law. The Lebanese civil war of the 1980s has literally mounds of evidence of illegally dumped toxic wastes across the countryside brought there by transnational criminal gangs with enough money to bribe underpaid and overworked government officials to look the other way. These criminal gangs usually charge around US$2.50 per tonne to dump someone’s hazardous waste illegally without questions asked. Given that it costs on average US$1,000 per tonne to legally dispose off hazardous wastes, its no wonder why these criminal gangs are literally making a killing in disposing hazardous wastes in the world’s ungovernable conflict zones.

Given that the war risk insurance and kidnap coverage premiums issued by insurance brokers to maritime shipping firms plying in the Gulf of Aden recently rose by tenfold due to the increase in pirate activity. Shipping firms plying in the Gulf of Aden are now facing risks on two fronts. From the obvious occupational hazards and risks posed by pirates and the other less obvious – but nonetheless grave threat – the occupational health hazards and risks posed by the hazardous toxic chemical and radioactive wastes being illegally dumped in the Gulf of Aden.

Various military personnel policing these waters could face occupational health risks comparable to that faced by allied troops in Operation Desert Storm of 1991. The world’s navies policing the Gulf of Aden could suffer a 21st Century version of the Gulf War Syndrome, especially if their operations involve swimming without any protective gear in these waters. Maybe Capt. Richard Phillips and the US Navy SEAL team who rescued him needs to be examined for toxic chemical waste and radioactive waste exposure since they swam a number of times in the waters of the Gulf of Aden with nary a protective gear. Especially for radioactive cesium 137 which is the most common illegally dumped radioactive waste.

Lasik: An Eyeglass Eliminating Miracle Cure?

Ever since the medical procedure became widely available to anyone, does Lasik fulfill the promise of freeing each and every eyeglass-wearers from the tyranny of their own eyeglasses?


By: Ringo Bones


In our contemporary vanity obsessed society, it seems like it was only a matter of time before another everyday necessity was deemed to be as useless as a Victorian-era whalebone corset by the more-money-than-common-sense fashionistas. Their latest consensus-casualty: eyeglasses. Given that the hype behind contact lenses waned faster than everyone’s interest on the Iran-Contra affair of the late 1980s. Medical science has thus been given another impetus with a far greater motivational factor than a multi-million dollar grant in order to divert everyone’s navel gazing about how not everyone of us is born with perfect 20 / 20 vision. Thus making the Lasik surgery the latest elective surgery novelty since Botox treatments.

Lasik or laser-assisted in situ keratomileusis is a type of refractive laser surgery performed by ophthalmologists for correcting the 3 most common forms of eye defects due to a misshapen cornea that necessitates the wearing of eyeglasses to enable the afflicted to see normally in 20 / 20 vision. These eye defects are myopia or near-sightedness, hyperopia or farsightedness, and astigmatism. The first patent for Lasik was granted by the US Patent Office to Dr. Gholam A. Payman, M.D. on June 20, 1989 as US Patent # 4,840,175; “METHOD FOR MODIFYING CORNEAL CURVATURE”. Lasik became the most popular elective procedure in Asia since it was made available. At the Asian Eye Institute in Manila, for instance, about 1,000 people avail of the procedure every year jut to abandon the use of their eyeglasses. And the number of people who had the procedure had been growing at a rate of 20% annually.

Even though the procedure is far from risk-free, Lasik is nevertheless somewhat ingenious in its simplicity. The procedure starts by opening the anaesthetized eye, then the surgeon marks the cornea with soluble ink as a guide in cutting and repositioning of the flap. A suction ring provides an increased pressure in the eye so that it becomes firm thus making it easier to cut cleanly. Next, a motorized blade slices the cornea. The surgeon then lifts the flap, exposing the inner surface of the cornea that will reshaped by a cool laser. Then the patient’s corneas are reshaped depending on the kind of eye defect the patient has. Those with near-sightedness are corrected by flattening the center of the cornea. Those with farsightedness are usually fixed by removing a ring of tissue around the center of the cornea, thus making the cornea steeper. While those with astigmatism, the misshapen oblong-shaped cornea is reshaped to make it more spherical.

Even though Lasik has a high-rate of success in comparison to other procedures, it is not for everyone and you could be designated a poor candidate once your ophthalmologists checks your eyes. Especially if you have severe vision problems, have glaucoma, cataracts or retinal problems, is still under 18 years of age, is currently pregnant, or your corneas aren’t thick enough for safe Lasik surgery. Also, Lasik is no panacea against age-related macular degeneration or those vision problems that come with old age.

Even though ophthalmologic surgeons are highly regulated by law – even as far back as ancient Babylon circa 1,000 BC. Where the fees of eye surgeons were rigidly fixed by law and were quite generous. At the time when the state of the art in eye surgery was the ultra-sharp obsidian scalpel – instead of today’s femto-second pulse laser for eye surgery – a successful operation on a rich freeman costs 10 shekels of silver, as much as a chariot mechanic makes in a year. The same operation on a slave was priced at 2 shekels. However, the life of the surgeon – though financially rewarding – was not without it’s own hazards. If the wealthy freeman lost the sight of his eye in the operation, the surgeon’s hand was cut off; if the slave was blinded, he or she has had to be replaced by the doctor.

However in our contemporary society, for an industry that promises clarity and transparency, many eye centers – especially those in Asia where the Lasik is relatively new - have kept their patients in the dark about the risks and realities. Governments are more than likely of no help either because there are still no restrictions on who can buy medical instruments and equipment. But most government and private hospitals insist that doctors have some form of medical accreditation before they are allowed to perform eye surgery. Though there are still no high-profile medical malpractice or wrongful death lawsuits involving Lasik, it is still seen by the “Old Guard” in the medical community as a “Wild West” in terms of costs versus benefits.

Good as the procedure really is, many patients find the post-operative consequences of Lasik a little bit hard to live with before they vanish over time. Like light sensitivity and night-vision problems. Which could spell bad news for astronomers and working military and law-enforcement snipers. Plus additional surgery has to be done as follow-ups / touch-ups when the results fall below expectations. And the jury is still out over the long-term effects on patients who had undergone Lasik surgery. If you can live with these caveats and you had recently grown to hate yourself wearing eyeglasses, then Lasik might be for you.

Did Our Prehistoric Ancestors Practice Acupuncture?

Given it’s long history, is there a possibility that the practice of acupuncture pre-dates its formal use in traditional Chinese medicine?


By: Ringo Bones


When the mummified remains of a 5,300 year-old “ice man” was discovered in the warm summer back in 1991 in the Niederjoch Glacier, above the Ötz Valley in the Tyrolean Alps. Little did the first responding archeologist knew the impact of their discovery would create on what we then assumed so far of what we supposedly knew of our prehistoric ancestors. It was only nine years after the discovery of Ötzi – named after the place in which our 5,300 year-old mummified “ice man” was discovered – that two Austrian physiologist found out that Ötzi’s people might be practicing a form of acupuncture. One that even pre-dates the one established in traditional Chinese medicine by a few centuries.

After archeologists had concluded that Ötzi’s possessions were of Early Copper Age in origin via various dating methods, they became curious about Ötzi’s strange ornate tattoos. When the tattoos were examined by Max Moser, a physiologist at the University of Graz in Austria, together with his collegue Leopold Dorfer. The two became curious when Ötzi’s tattoo patterns resembles those of traditional acupuncture points used to treat backache and stomach upset. Ötzi’s back, right knee, and left ankle were adorned with 15 groups of short, bluish-black lines closely resembling the various meridian-points of traditional Chinese acupuncture. Injecting wood ash through the skin via a bone or wooden needle was probably how Ötzi’s tattoos were made.

The two Austrian physiologists even became more curious because Ötzi lived some 2,000 years before the oldest generally recognized evidence of acupuncture. Thus raising questions whether the now trendy form of alternative medicine – namely Chinese acupuncture – originally started in mainland Europe as opposed to China. Although the jury is still out, Max Moser thinks the history of acupuncture may have been more complicated than we currently assumed. He concludes that back when Ötzi was around, many various shamanistic cultures that lie between mainland Europe and China might have practiced it. But it was probably the one formalized by the practitioners of Chinese traditional medicine that managed to survive until modern times.

Given that the absence of our present-day “hazards” that lie between mainland Europe and China – namely less-than-democratic nation-states and undocumented anti-personnel mines – Ötzi could have easily braved the natural hazards of his day like wild animals and inclement weather. And might have been a frequent traveler between Europe and China, a few thousand years before Marco Polo’s famous trip.

Viagra: Beyond Impotence?

Marketed during the tail end of the1990’s as a revolutionary drug rivaling that of the birth control pill in importance, does Viagra have other uses besides curing male impotence?


By: Vanessa Uy


More commonly known to those who had come of age during the 21st Century as the most hackneyed subject of Spam e-mails, medical researchers around the world are finding out other uses for the wonderful – but controversial - drug sildenafil citrate, commonly known as Viagra besides curing male impotence. In the overly politicized theater of American healthcare policy, Viagra has for a number of years – if you’ll pardon the pun – a bone of contention in the court of public opinion. Especially during the height of the 2008 US Presidential Elections when the Republican / GOP presidential candidate Senator John McCain failed to give a satisfactory disclosure when asked by a certain women’s interest group on why the Bush Administration subsidized Viagra prescriptions while there was none for hormone replacement therapy medications. Thus further reinforcing the public mystique of Viagra.

On the subject of the other newly found uses for Viagra, gastroenterologist Mauro Bortolotti – a professor of internal medicine at Italy’s University of Bologna – has demonstrated that Viagra can be an effective cure for achalasia. Achalasia is a digestive disorder in which the valve between the esophagus and the stomach fails to open regularly after swallowing. Achalasia causes frequent regurgitation, weight loss, and dangerously dilated esophagus. During the course of his research, Bortolotti found out that Viagra dilates and opens the valve between the esophagus and the stomach. According to the study, both functional impotence and achalasia are the physiological result of too little release of nitric oxide from the nerve endings – in which Viagra is used to amplify. Thus explaining the mechanism on how Viagra could be an achalasia cure.

But Bortolotti also found out during his research that although this is good news for those suffering from achalasia, healthy people who use Viagra for sexual purposes are more likely to suffer mild esophageal symptoms. Despite of this, sexually active men around the world are unanimous in ignoring a little heartburn – given the rewards offered by Viagra. Looks like sildenafil citrate / Viagra not only belongs to the bedroom, but also in the dinner table as well.

Allergically Clean?

Are we in the Industrial West breeding generations of allergy sufferers due to our overly hygienic lifestyle?


By: Ringo Bones


Loading one’s home with soaps, hand wipes, and antibacterial detergents has always been a sign of good parenting in the Western world. But ever since that somewhat controversial study on allergies whose data began to emerge near the end of the 1990’s showing that our modern overly hygienic lifestyle may actually trigger a heightened vulnerability to allergies – even to asthma – has sent shock waves across households of the affluent West.

Although some scientists have speculated as far back as the 1970’s that if the human immune system is not exposed to harmful pathogens during childhood, it may develop an over-active immune responses – hence allergies – to harmless plant pollen and mites. If this is true, then are we in the West guilty of breeding a generation of children with immune systems akin to white lab mice, unable to survive unaided in Mother Nature’s wild blue yonder?

A study conducted during the 1990’s by Paolo Matricardi, an immunologist working for the Italian Air Force, has finally found support for the hygiene theory of allergies. While looking for signs of exposure to the three most common food-borne pathogens – namely Toxoplasma gondii, Helicobacter pylori, and hepatitis A – in two groups of 240 male cadets. During the course of the study Matricardi has found out that one group of cadets had elevated allergic responses, while the other did not. The data of the study also shows that allergies were extremely rare – even nonexistent – among those who had exposure to two or all of the food-borne pathogens during their childhood, while allergy incidences were very common to those who had not.

Basing on the results of his study, Paolo Matricardi believes that our body’s immune cells – especially those in the gut – are primed to respond when they first encounter invading bacteria or viruses. Without such “training” during infancy and childhood, our body’s immune cells may instead multiply in response to innocuous – even to relatively harmless – stimuli. Thus giving primary credence to the theory that the main mechanism behind allergies in the affluent West is an overly hygienic lifestyle.