Greater than the might of atoms - Part II

Read more at the Detroit News

Part I - "Greater than the might of atoms magnified a thousand fold" can be found here.

The picture you see to the left is a picture taken during the General Motors Sit Down Strike of 1936. You may be asking a very good question at this moment. "If it's a sit down strike, why is everyone standing up outside?" If you actually did ask this question or want to know the answer, the please keep reading today's blog.

As always, my point is not to offer a history lesson (I will point you to some good links throughout the blog) but to draw your attention to important events in history that are important to our campaign for better research of and access to stem cell based CURES.

In brief, the Flint Sit Down Strike was just just that, the workers sat down and occupied their factories. Instead of striking outside (and give control of the physical production facilities to the employer), the workers stayed inside to prevent the employer from moving out equipment or trying to restart production. It wasn't the first but it was probably the biggest and most successful and in the end General Motors (the biggest employer on earth at the time) was forced to concede and recognize the United Autoworkers Union, which in turn led to improved wages and working conditions for the mass of US society as workers in other industries were emboldened by this victory.

But the sit down part was just the most dramatic part. If it wasn't for union and citizen supporters who encircled the factory blocking the way of police and later smashing windows to let out the tear gas fired by the police, the strike would have ended very differently.

I also think that it's an important event to study just because of the nature of sitting down. Many of us who could benefit from stem cell therapies are already sitting down (a lockout as opposed to strike) with tremendous impact on the economy. But this is for another blog.

I think that there are three main lessons that can be applied to our campaign for stem cell based CURES for a wide host of diseases.

End the isolation of disease communities
We often hear talk of the FLINT sit down strike and the sit down strike at Fischer #1 plant, but in reality there were strikes and sit down strikes in many different auto plants that were going on at the same time. The basic concept behind the United Autoworkers Union was an industrial union with workers from the whole of the auto industry. This is the exact reason why the UAW was and has been successful.

A search for stem cell advocacy groups leads us almost nowhere, but search for disease specific groups advocating stem cell research and you'll find thousands. Many of these groups do more than just advocate, they fund their own research which means competing against other disease groups for dollars and influence.
This is one of the reasons why industrial unions organized workers in entire industries - to stop the competition amongst workers to undercut wages and conditions in a race to the bottom for jobs.

We are closer than we have ever been to stem cell based cures, it's time for unity, not competition that will leave all groups empty-handed.

Building support among both the inflicted and the healthy

150,000 rally in Cadillac Square

Regardless of how many diseases stem cells could possibly cure, the sick, thank God, are a minority. Any movement which refuses to reach out past a minority will fail. Regardless of how big and powerful the UAW is, workers in the auto industry are still a minority in society and the workers who won the historic sit down strike in the Fischer #1 plant would have lost with out the 150,000 workers that rallied in Cadillac square and the 5000 supporters who ringed the plant when the police tried to stop food deliveries.

How did the UAW get 150,000 people out to a rally to support what was a very small group in comparison? They didn't appeal to people's greed or fear, they appealed to people to see what was right and just. People are remarkable in this way, they react to positive messages.

What is more just than making sure the sick are healed? If the UAW in 1936, a small group, get 150,000 people out to support a strike why can't we in the stem cell advocacy business do the same?

Mobilizing supporters
Which brings us to my final point and what I would love to hear your comments about.

I'm not one to criticize new technology, but I can already hear the voices of some people I know saying, "You can't blog your way to a cure." All I can say to that is; I know, but our ability to reach out to massive audiences is better than it's ever been, so we should be able to get out more than 150,000 supporters in support of stem cell therapies. The big question is, why can't we?

The one reason I can think of is the message that it being put out by many groups advocating stem cell cures. The basic message is, "fund stem cell research because it will cure the diseases that we have." Of course during the Flint sit down strike the UAW had concrete demands about work and pay, but there was also a societal message. It was a movement for a democracy at work. In a society when company totalitarianism was acceptable, the UAW spoke to the democratization of work and society. The 150,000 demonstrating in Cadillac square were not only there to support the Flint workers, they were also there to demand a fundamental change in society.

The pro stem cell groups need to take a page from these battles. Demands need to be more than just, "give us stem cell treatments", we need to be putting out messages about the waste of science for destructive purposes, like atomic bombs. To demand a society where people are given priority, and not just in the developed world. A world where walking on Mars will take a back seat to first getting people in this world to walk on land. The fight for stem cell CURES needs to be about a society where people are put first.

This is why I didn't start today's blog about the sit down strike with a picture of people sitting. If the only people involved in the strike were those sitting in at Fischer #1 the story that we would have been talking about today would have been the Flint Massacre.

Don't mourn. Organize!

Today is 9 August 2010. Sixty five years ago today in Nagasaki, Japan, just 560 kilometres from where I am in Osaka, the last ever atomic bomb was used in a war.


Since this blog is about StemCellsANDAtomBombs I wanted to write something profound to mark this anniversary, but I didn't know what to say. Should I condemn the bombing? But what would condemnation do 65 years later. Should I write about the horror?  But I didn't think that I could say anything as deep as the pictures of the giant mushroom cloud, that you've all seen pictures of, that disintegrated human life, or the actual voice of the survivors that you can hear yourself.


Searching for what to write brought me to this quote by Mother Teresa, "I was once asked why I don't participate in anti-war demonstrations. I said that I will never do that, but as soon as you have a pro-peace rally, I'll be there." 


It doesn't really matter whether you agree or disagree with Mother Teresa or the work that she did. This quote made me understand my own thinking and why I have never wanted to be part of an ANTI anything movement, why I used to cringe seeing ANTI demonstrations. Don't get me wrong, I'm a trade unionist so I have been on my share of demonstrations, strikes, and picket lines, but these actions were always FOR something: wages, holidays, insurance, trade union rights.


That's why today, I would like to say thank you to the nuclear disarmament movement in Japan and internationally for making sure that Nagasaki was the last time a nuclear bomb was used. These groups have kept us safe by actively campaigning for a ban on nuclear weapons. I guess subconsciously I chose to write about the last time the atomic bomb was used as opposed to the first time it was used in Hiroshima, on 6 August, to highlight the fact that peace groups do have an impact on global politics.


You can view the Nagasaki Peace Declaration here. Notice that it's not the Nagasaki Anti-War Declaration. 


Visiting countries all around the world. Lobbying politicians. Making public declarations. Educating the public. Talking to the United Nations but more importantly talking to people like you and me. All these things have kept the campaign for a nuclear free world alive. They didn't just say 'War is Bad', nor did they just say 'Peace is Good'. Who would disagree? They actively promote peace and ask us to play role in fighting FOR peace, and because of this they have prevented more Hiroshimas or Nagasakis from happening again.


People are moved by these peace groups because, one - most regular people are on a gut level opposed to destruction and murder regardless of the perpetrator, two - they can see themselves in the stories of the victims, and three - the peace groups give people a chance to participate; signing a petition, participating in activities, listening to those who have experienced the bomb. But most importantly these groups present a viable alternative to blowing up the world with atomic weapons. So people listen to them and politicians listen to people. This is active campaigning.


In short, the disarmament and peace groups have done something very important; by using the terrible lessons of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, they actively engage people to participate to prevent it from happening again. This is the basic idea behind 'Don't mourn. Organize!'.


My own personal reason for 'Don't mourn. Organize!' is simple. When I first got sick and lost the use of my legs I had a couple of choices. One, fall into a deep depression, or two, get used to life in a chair. I was told that two was preferable because if I didn't accept option two, option one would would happen naturally. I decided to take another choice and that choice is to campaign for a cure. Not just because I want one. When I learned the science was there but the science wasn't getting the necessary resources, I decided that I didn't want to get used to the chair, I wanted to walk and it's a waste not to try to get me and millions of others to walk.


In the coming weeks I hope to give you more information on what different pro stem-cell-research groups are doing to make sure that money, science, and human potential are no longer wasted on death. By actively engaging you in the fight to cure disease, I hope that you don't just watch, but participate.

Atomic lessons for stem cell funding

In my last post, Wasted, I promised to offer an efficient, alternative way to finance, administer, and plan stem cell research. Today I will attempt to do this.

I think that most people don't see any possible alternatives to the current approach, which can be summed up like this. Start off with public funding (your taxes) and then divide it up in small sums between many different universities and private research facilities. The private research facilities then try to attract private investors to raise even more money and universities partner with private research facilities. Is what I’m writing true? Have a look at what ‘institutions’ are being funded in California alone.

Now because private profit is at stake no one will share any of their information. Now all the private research facilities and universities with an appetite for public funds (your taxes) begin to clamour for more research funds and we the public, and especially those with illnesses that could be cured with stem cells, add or voices for more money. Sometimes the public even gets involved by trying to raise donations to again divide up into small portions among private companies that will never cooperate because their bottom line is at stake. 

Like I stated in, Wasted, this is not a criticism of profit or the profit motive or any kind of theoretical perspective about the free market. It is simply to illustrate a very important point. Not enough money, divided amongst many groups who have no motivation to cooperate is inefficient and will no more bring CURE therapies than if we prayed to the 'Spagehtti god'. So what's my great idea you ask?

Well, it's not my great idea. It's a proven way with proven results and it shows that with the right amount of money and more importantly planning and management things that seem impossible can get done. Welcome to Atomic Lessons for Stem Cell Research.

Before I get stuck writing a whole history of the atomic bomb project let me tell you that that's not my goal. At the end of this post I will give you some good links if you're interested. What I will do is point out the main similarities and the main differences. At the end you can judge whether proper planning can bring stem cells from research to cure.

Neither stem cells nor atom bombs are pipe dreams:

We cannot will away disease anymore than they could will the creation of an atom bomb. Money with no science will not work. When the US, the Soviet Union, Britain, Germany and Japan became interested in the atomic bomb there was already a lot of science behind the idea and the governments of these four countries put a lot of resources in trying to make the science into an atomic　bomb. Britain under attack by Germany was not in a position to develop it and from an early point brought their important atomic ideas to the US in a letter from the MAUD committee. Nazi Germany with some of the best scientific minds in the world and the most developed chemical industry in the world could not do it after most of their top minds became refugees from the Nazis. Japan by 1943 was already suffering scarcities that made their atomic bomb project take a back seat to more pragmatic war efforts. It was the USA, an economic and industrial powerhouse protected from the war by two oceans, with the help of the British and Canadian governments that built the bomb. 

Just like today with stem cells, a lot of the science for the atomic bomb was there, just in many different places. Until the founding of the Manhattan Project by Roosevelt in 1941 most of the research was carried out by government (from 1939) and private foundation funded research at universities (just like stem cells today) throughout the US. The Manhattan Project finally took all the main research and researchers and put it under four main roofs. Four years later two atomic bombs were dropped on Japan.

Stem cell research may already be much more advanced than the atomic bomb research in 1941. In 1939 Enrico Fermi, an Italian physicist known for his work in developing the first nuclear reactor stated, "little likelihood of an atomic bomb, little proof that we were not pursuing a chimera." Compare this to Hans Keirstead, an eminent stem cell researcher, who said stem cells for Spinal Cord Injuries were not a matter of if, but of when but criticized a lack of funding; and you'll see that a Manhattan Project style push for stem cells will start moving stem cell therapies from laboratories into hospitals even more quickly than the creation of the atomic bomb.

When the Manhattan Project was founded in 1941 there was still a long way to go and a lot of questions remaining. There was the question of isotope separation (separating the right uranium from the wrong uranium), and which method was best as there were about three important methods being studied. Then there was the question of whether the fissile material for the chain reaction be uranium or plutonium, would it be a fission bomb or a fusion bomb. These problems were all worked out because all the main players were together and cooperated.

There is always talk about how planning, or even worse, government planning, will stifle research and innovation, but it’s actually not true. With stem cell research there is a lot of different research and innovation going on but what we need is a way to get the best of the research from the lab to the bedside and that means accelerating the process. Like with the atomic bomb, government involvement, actually government control, made sure that scientists picked the best methods to get the bomb made, they couldn't just debate the best method. They were under the gun, because...

There was/is a war going on:

The main US motivator to start atomic bomb research was the fear that the Nazis were on their way to building one first. Einstein wrote to Roosevelt, the American president, a little less than one month before the Nazi invasion of Poland, with his belief that Germany was on their way to obtaining a bomb. Even though America wasn’t yet in the war, Roosevelt knew very clearly that in the near future, America could not stay out of this war and would have to deal with the problem of a future enemy getting their hands on the most powerful weapon in the world. I’m sure that’s quite motivating.

Not including any other disease that could be CURED with stem cell therapies except Spinal Cord Injury, you already have more disabled people from this one condition (450,000 in the United States) than all the American war dead in the Second World War. Two hundred thousand more than the 250,000 American lives that some believe would have been lost if America had invaded Japan instead of dropping the atomic bomb. Over one hundred times the number of American war dead in Iraq. These numbers are not meant to lessen the meaning of those who have died in wars. On the contrary, it shows meaning in the fight for the lives that stem cell CURES could save. We are in a war like situation now. When there was no possibility of a cure, the war was being lost, now there is a chance to win.

Business should no more have an atomic bomb than they should have stem cells:

Private companies must not be able to control who gets stem cell cures either through overpricing or patent controls. This is not a new cough syrup, it will fundamentally change society, just like atomic power did, and the owner of the patent should not dictate who gets cured. 

Oddly enough even the atomic bomb had patent problems. Leo Szilard, a Hungarian physicist, held the patent for the nuclear chain reaction. Rightly or wrongly, it was basically ignored as the government would not be dictated to. It may have taken a maverick, as Szilard is often described, to come up with this idea, but in the end Szilard wasn’t able to get financing for his project. Szilard didn’t make the atomic bomb, the US government did.

The sick should not be at the mercy of private companies who will decide if, since they will have the patent, a new stem cell therapy will make it to the ‘market’. Is it possible for a life saving drug NOT to be made available by private patent holders. You can have a look yourself.

The case of eflornithine.

Tamiflu and others (also includes alternative funding suggestions)

AIDS

The bomb exists, stem cell cures don’t:

Four years after the Manhattan project, run by the government of the United States, was set up, there was an atomic bomb.

Where are we with stem cell research and how far are we from a cure? Even when new cures seem to exist (see ‘Such great news that it will sicken you’) they are not being widely used.

Now I will wait for someone to disagree and show me evidence that leaving stem cell research in private hands will get cures into the world population.

Further atomic bomb reading:

Atomic Archive

Atomic bomb timeline

Wikipedia

Wasted

"Government failure to play a central planning and coordinating role is the main reason why stem cell therapies have not lead to curing disease and this failure will cost you money now and more in the future."

Today I am starting with a bold statement. Just making a statement like this with no explanation will get you a reputation for being a crackpot. But sit with someone at their kitchen table and talk about the reasons and you'll get a lot of understanding and maybe even some anger. So today, pull up a chair, put out the cups and pour the coffee. Let's talk about the failure to cure disease.

Let's start with a little clarification. The point of today's post is not to criticize stem cell research companies for putting profits ahead of a cure. This would be like criticizing cats for eating mice. But I will be clear; profits are interfering in the search for a cure. Let's face it, the company that cures spinal cord injury or diabetes will make tremendous profits, therefore there is no motivation for them to share research. This causes duplication with three, four, or four hundred companies doing the same research because there is no benefit for private companies to coordinate or share their work. This is a waste of not only money but a waste of human resources and human potential.

I'll give a clear example so that people don't just think I'm making this up. Associated Press reported on 11 June 2010 that, "In an unusual step, a dozen competing drug companies have agreed to share data on thousands of Alzheimer's patients in hopes that the extra information will spark new ideas for treatments...it's the kind of collaboration that does represent a major shift in thinking about how to accelerate drug development…It is led by the Critical Path Institute, a nonprofit partnership with the FDA that aims to speed discovery of new drugs."

Now let's look at three most important words in this article. You'll find them bolded in the story.

Unusual: This is not something that regularly happens with medical research companies, thus the use of the adjective 'unusual'. It is not the norm in stem cell research either. So why did this happen? It happened because past efforts by private companies have failed. That's not me saying that these companies have failed, it's the Associated Press.

Accelerate: To speed up. To quicken. This happens because when you have collaboration you share data and don't spend money (in most cases tax dollars) repeating the same failed experiments. Again, this is not me saying that collaboration will accelerate research, it's the US Food and Drug Administration.

Nonprofit: No profits. Of course it has to be nonprofit. When profits are in the way no one will cooperate. That's not because profits are inherently bad, but they do not lead to cooperation. The kind of cooperation that private companies are now forced into after years of failure due to non-cooperation.

Other than being a waste of human resources, it would be OK if it were only their own money they were using to fund the research, but it's NOT. Governments all over the world are using your money to fund private ventures whose goal is to make profits while trying to develop stem cell therapies, not very free enterprise sounding to me.

Let's look at the the three billion dollar California Stem Cell fund example. Now before I start getting comments telling me that this fund flies in the face of my logic that government is not playing a big enough roll, let me make three points. Good things are coming out of this fund AND it is a bureaucratic nightmare AND an inefficient use of tax dollars because it's not enough money so it is actually a waste of money (trying buying a one dollar bottle of pop for 25 cents and you'll see what I'm talking about. The clerk will take your quarter if you insist but he won't give you the pop).


Now let me tell you why it's not enough. It's not enough because it's ONLY three billion dollars and even after six years the fund has only put out one billion dollars in funding. Yes, ONLY one billion (the remaining two billion is set to take seven more years to dole out). 


So you can see how small one billion dollars is, I'll give you a very interesting fact.


Pressure sores. People with spinal cord injuries get them and they can be not only uncomfortable but dangerous. The cost of treating just this one simple secondary problem related to spinal cord injury is 1.2 billion dollars per year in the US alone. So that's how small one billion dollars in stem cell funding is.


Remember, spinal cord injury is just one potential health issue that could be cured using stem cell therapies, there are about seventy other conditions. Add up the costs of treating these diseases and you'll see that a CURE is much, much cheaper than care. The failure to properly fund stem cell research is not free, it's costing you money already and will continue to cost you money in the future.


Also, the bureaucracy needed to control the funding is expensive, the California fund alone will spend 1.25 million dollars (not including staff costs) in creating a computer program to monitor and track the funding requests (taking money away from actual stem cell research, and it is time consuming. Basically you have a bunch of public and private (again, your money going to fund private profits) research facilities and they make requests. These requests need to be checked and rechecked. This is one main reason why it will take thirteen years to spend three billion dollars in grants that are desperately needed right now.


And California is not the only place doing it. Maryland, New Jersey, and New York, plus the US federal government all have their own funds with their own bureaucracy to administer the fund. Then repeat this to include the top five or six stem cell research countries and you have MASSIVE WASTE! This is money that is being used solely to administer stem cell research money. Money that will never create a new eye, or cure multiple sclerosis.

We need to both applaud California and other American states for their gumption in funding stem cells while the Bush White House refused funds, and, for the good of everyone, we must criticize the inefficient and wasteful way it's being done.


But I can criticize all I want, and if I don't start putting forward some alternatives I'll get tagged as a real crackpot. But today's blog is getting way too long, so I'll give you a break and invite myself around for coffee again during the next post about an efficient, alternative way to finance, administer, and plan stem cell research.


PS. Just a fun little exercise. I found the Alzheimer's information by using a news feed, but I get loads of articles everyday that I go through. Since I wanted to use the information for today's post and couldn't remember the name of the article, I did a simple search to try to find it again. Try it out.
1. Google: "alzheimer's companies share research" - you'll find the story I linked to and a bunch of others.
2. Google: "stem cell companies share research". I was hoping to find similar stories to the Alzheimer's story with companies sharing their data. At first I didn't understand the search results as I got a bunch of financial news related to stem cells. See if you know why? It gives a new meaning to "share and share alike".

That's expensive.

I'm trying out a new wheelchair. I've actually tried out a lot of different wheelchairs. People probably think that my new hobby is trying out wheelchairs.

150,000YEN=$1500USD

When I first got a new non-hospital type wheelchair to test drive my family and friends were really impressed by how sporty it looked. But by the fifth test model I'm sure they were thinking, "How's that different from the first, second, or fourth one?" Well, when you have to sit in a chair from morning to night, you want the chair to be perfect, because you have to sit, sit, sit, sit. Until I found the chair that stands.

Those in the spinal cord injury world may already know what I'm talking about, but for those of you that don't I'm providing a few links: Levo Standing Wheelchair, Hero Standing Wheelchair, and if you google 'standing wheelchair' you'll see others.

450,000YEN=4,500USD

Standing up is not only cool, but it also has a lot of health benefits like stemming muscle loss and improving kidney and bladder function. This time, people didn't look bored with my newest test model. I got a lot of positive comments but the comment that stuck with me most was, "That looks expensive."

"Well, of course it's expensive. It's high tech," I said, "and it makes me stand up." And it is expensive, about 450,000YEN (about 4,500USD) and it does make me stand up, but I wasn't really convinced about my own statement. So since I have a lot of time, I did a little rethinking about this 'high tech' wheelchair.

You've all seen a wheelchair, so let's be realistic; depending on the all the bells and whistles the frame is no more high tech than a bicycle, and you wouldn't pay $4500 for a bicycle. The 'high tech' standing mechanism is a hydraulic lift (which have been around for a few hundred years).

Of course we all know the basic economics answer to this question. One unit is expensive because there is no volume of sales. Answer number one; correct!

Answer number two is more complex. We all know about another supposed theory of prices, the "what-the-market-can-bare" theory, but is $4500 really "what-the-market-can-bare"? In the case of wheelchairs it seems to be "what-the-insurance-providers-will-tolerate". In many cases, private or public insurance companies do help pay the massively high costs for these low-tech machines, so the inflated cost ends up subsidized by the premiums of the non-wheelchair using community.

In cases where a public or private insurance will not help pay the costs of the chair, the "what-the-market-can-bare" price system completely collapses because with a 63% unemployment rate (USA) the non-insured cannot afford the price, making the market smaller and again pushing up the price.

But this blog is about stem cells not wheelchairs. But before I get criticized for changing the focus of this blog, I'd like to first discuss the ACME Cooking Company of France for a really quick economics lesson.

John Q asked ACME to come up with a new gastronomical delicacy. He was so desperate to satisfy his palette that he agreed to not only pay for the costs of any ingredients that the company would need to create the new dish (whether used or not in the final creation) but to pay for the education of all ACME's chefs and other employees. Most importantly, it was John Q gave money to the company so that they could hire and pay for some big name (and smaller name) chefs.


After many years the ACME company had finished the creation and John Q was ready to eat. When he had heard that the new dish was in it's completion stage he purposely began to starve himself so he could truly enjoy this delicacy. Finally, he seated himself at a fine table decked out on his Sunday best. The president of the ACME company would serve the dinner himself on the fanciest china with diamond studded silverware. As the president approached carrying a silver-lidded tray John Q could hardly contain himself.


What came next truly stopped his heart. As the president uncovered the tray and the contents were unveiled to him he saw that the only thing that was being presented was an enormous bill. He knew that he would have to pay something, but having funded the whole project, he felt that he wouldn't have to pay THIS much. He couldn't afford this and when he spoke up to ask about the exorbitant price he was shocked what he heard. 


The ACME president informed John that since it was he himself who took the risk to create this food extravaganza the price was more than fair. 


John retorted, "I paid for this already. It was me who kept you all working and paid in the years before you invented anything." The ACME president now stunned John. He simply left. John was left with an empty stomach and emptier pockets.


Now a really quick poll. How many think that John got ripped off?

Maybe there is no need to go on to stem cell research in today's blog. Don't want to hit anyone over the head.

Such great news that it will sicken you

"How then were your eyes opened?" they asked. He replied, "The man they call Jesus made some mud and put it on my eyes. He told me to go to Siloam and wash. So I went and washed, and then I could see."

People who are sick pray for miracles. Well, a miracle of sorts has taken place in Italy even though one of the study leaders,  Graziella Pellegrini of the University of Modena's Center for Regenerative Medicine in Italy, brushed it off. "Some said it was a miracle," reported Pelligrini, "It was not a miracle. It was simply a technique."


Well, she's right. It was a medical technique, but to the 82 out of 107 people, including one man who has been blind for sixty years, who had their sight fully restored and 14 others who they are calling a partial success, it was nothing short of miraculous.


Imagine not been able to see for even just one hour and then a simple operation restores your sight. What would you call it. Some believe and some don't, but before this procedure was made public, you could only pray for something like this. How about now?


When I first read this story it was billed as a 'breakthrough' so my first instinct was to see when this all occurred (actually, my first instinct was to think that it was another story about rats - I almost fell out of my chair when I realized it was about people). Was it today? Yesterday? Maybe even last week? My impression of a breakthrough is something that has just happened, especially when I see it written in the newspaper as current news.


This study or experiment, or whatever you wish to call it, was conducted between 1998 and 2007. First I though that the first nine years were just a testing phase. No, as I went on to read the rest of the article it shows very clearly that one person has had his sight back for over ten years. Imagine seeing a NEWSpaper headline mentioning the 'atomic bomb breakthrough' just to find out that it's a piece about 1945.


So why are there two blind people in the hospital here with me? They better keep praying as it doesn't appear that they'll be getting their new corneas any time in the near future. 


Then I noticed something else. The Telegraph article has a 'related articles' box and I saw another article, 'Blind could be cured by stem cells grown in contact lenses'. Why did the paper have two separate articles about the same thing? Well, it's not the same story. Just basically the same procedure, but carried out in Australia in 2009. I started to get a sick feeling in my stomach. 


Why are scientists in Australia and Italy and the Telegraph and other newspapers all talking about breakthroughs. It appears that they did it a long time ago, especially from the perspective of someone who is blind right now. They have healed the blind, but the two blind guys in my hospital are probably wearing out their rosary beads, because they've not heard of this.


I then thought that if it's not yet available  it must be a complicated operation. 'Not so' is the answer from the Australian researchers who call it "totally simple and cheap." They go on about how beautifully simple this procedure is. "It requires no major operation...If you're going to be treating these sorts of diseases in Third World countries all you need is the surgeon and a lab for cell culture. You don't need any fancy equipment."


Where are they doing this procedure? If they can do it in the third world, why aren't they doing it in the first, second or one hundredth world yet?


Let's hope that this isn't scientific research for the sake of scientific research which gets left at three people in Australia and one hundred and six people in Italy.


I will write more after I write to some organizations in both Italy and Australia to find the status of these therapies or research and will therefore save some of my judgement for later, but I must admit that my sick stomach feeling isn't going away.


PS. Thank you to all of you who asked about me not writing for the past week or so. My computer crashed and I was without the internet for about one week. Worse than that, I lost a lot of my research for future stories, but I'm slowly getting back to speed and should have one or two posts per week from now on.

Greater than the might of atoms magnified a thousand fold

Maybe you know this song?
One line is the same as the title of this post.
Do you know it yet?

It's sung to the tune of "Glory, Glory, Hallelujah" (Battle Hymn of the Republic). Know it yet?

One of the verses goes like this:
In our hands we hold a power greater than their hoarded gold,
Greater than the might of atoms magnified a thousand fold.
We can bring to earth a new world from the ashes of the old,
For the union makes us strong.
Do you know it yet?

That's right. It's "Solidarity Forever".

Now I've really done it. You were all waiting for me to slip in something about unions, and now I have. Not only have I talked about unions, but I did it by talking about that corny song. That old cliche. Don't I know yet that people will be turned off by things like "Solidarity Forever"?

My answer to these possible criticisms is - What does that have to do with anything?
It reminds me of a story that I was told when I first joined my union of which I am now general secretary.

"There was an organizing drive at a school and the union organizers were trying to persuade the head teacher to join knowing that his membership would encourage others as he was a well respected teacher. The concern was that the head teacher was 'anti-union'. Another teacher, also thinking that the head teacher was anti union and trying to curry favour with him piped up, 'I don't like unions'. To which the head teacher responded, 'What does that have to do with anything?' "

This one line, "What does that have to do with anything?" sums up my feelings exactly. Some people are against unions' ideas, but very few people are against the idea of unions. I'm writing about unions because it's what I know and if I didn't, people would say; Oh! He's not even thinking about unions now that he's paralyzed.

Well, I'm thinking even more about unions now that I'm paralyzed, because when you strip away any biases (good or bad) about unions that you may have and get down to the basic question of what a union is - a group of people who share a common interest banding together to make sure that their cause, their issue, or their needs are not forgotten - most people see the logic in it. So did the head teacher, and he joined the union despite 'not liking unions'.

And that's what solidarity is; a group of people who have a common interest banding to make sure their cause, their issue, or their needs are not forgotten. It's not rocket science or even radical. It's simply the basis for all human society. People together.

Well, let's see if  getting people from many different 'disease communities' together is easy or not, my feeling is that if it's 'organized' properly and people feel that they can make a difference, then people will react. But people who are sick or paralyzed are a minority, so we need the solidarity of others.

But how can someone who doesn't have multiple sclerosis, or diabetes, or a spinal cord injury, or any other disease that stem cells may cure show solidarity with those of us who do. There is no sense in me saying that these things may also happen to you. No one who is healthy believes that they'll get sick. If you would have told me last year that I would be in the hospital, paralyzed, for almost a year, I would have cracked open a beer, popped a cigarette into my mouth, and told you that you were nuts.


Felipe Zegarra, a Peruvian diocesan priest and professor of theology at the Catholic University of Peru, said it beautifully, "Solidarity is a good alternative for the overused word compassion", and maybe for the underused word love, too.


In the weeks to come I will ask you to show solidarity with me and with the others that you know who are sick. I ask even those of you who "don't like unions" (Wink!). The first thing I will ask you to do this week is simple.


On the left hand side of this blog is a button called "follow". If you click on it you can sign up to get this blog regularly. Also signing up will leave your picture or shadow on the site and will let people know that you are showing "solidarity" with me or someone else that you know, including yourself, who is suffering from one of the many diseases that could be cured with stem cells.


Don't worry, I'm not doing this to increase traffic and then charge for advertising. I'm doing this so that if anyone who is sick or desperate because a person they love is sick, then they will see your face and know that they are not alone. The worst part about being sick is feeling alone and with one click you can help someone, even if it's just me, to feel not alone.


This solidarity/compassion/love is the first step in building something 'greater than the might of atoms magnified a thousand fold' and maybe someday beating diseases that you or a loved one have.


P.S. I hope that I don't have to explain to anyone what today's post has to do with the atom bomb. Wink! Wink! (I really have to learn how to use the brackets and periods to make those cool wink signs).


P.S.S. Also, in the original version the word 'atom' is not used. The original, written in 1915 used the word armies. But look at that. Only 30 years after the song was written an atom bomb had already been produced.