In response to “Texas Man Gets First Full Face Transplant in U.S”
By: The Associated Press
September 22, 2011
This article is about the first man in United States who got a full face transplant. He is Dallas Wiens, 25, a construction worker who got disfigured in a power line accident when he was painting a church in November 2008. He got a new nose, lips, muscle, nerves, and skin from a dead unknown person. The surgery lasted 15 hours, and a group of more than 30 doctors was used. The surgery was paid by the Defense Department, and now Wiens has a medical insurance. He had faith, was motivated by his family, and now feels more comfortable with himself.
At first when I saw Dallas Wiens video in YouTube, I got scared because his face impacted me. Then I thought about it, and realized that he is very strong because he was able to keep on. Also his daughter is very cute, because no matter how bad Dallas’s face looked, she always said that he was handsome. The video taught me that we should never give up, and always try to move on, because life has many good things to offer us. Dallas is a man of incredible qualities because he had inspiration (his daughter), he was motivated by the rest of his family, and he had faith that he would be able to survive, when at first doctors thought that he wouldn’t make it.
I think that these types of surgeries are extremely helpful and they change the lives of people in many good ways. For example, Dallas Wiens is now able to breathe on his own, smell things, feel his little girl give him kisses, and see the world. Your face is one of the most important parts of the body, because it is what identifies you. Face transplants helps patients that got severely hurt, start over with a new normal life.
I didn’t know much stuff about full face transplants, so I decided to do more research about it. I went into a webpage called Discovery Health: Human Face Transplant, in which they talk about these surgeries. I found the tragic story about a little 9 year old girl named Sandeep Kaur. 10 years ago, her face and scalp got torn of in an accident. Doctors were worried, because they didn’t know if the full face transplant would work. They finally did it, and believed that a face transplant is possible.”There comes a point when you have done all the research you can do and the only wayto move forward is to take that step and do it in a human being,” said John Barker, a doctor who makes face transplants. This means that because this is such a complicated procedure, doctors might be afraid of trying it. They have a lot of research, and they know how to do it, but they are afraid. They have to take a risk and try it out in a real person, doing a real transplant.
I also wanted to find out about the advantages, and disadvantages of face transplants. I got to a webpage named Science: How Face Transplants Work. I found out that there are a lot of risks, but the main ones are rejection, or getting infected. There is a big risk of rejection, because the face comes from different person that has different tissues. The medicines given to the patients to avoid rejection are also dangerous because they weaken the immune system. Patients have no choice, because if they don’t take the medicines, they won’t be able to get the surgery done.
There are not only physical risks, butalso physiological risks. These people who get face transplants suffer a lot. They see themselves with the face of someone else, and this is understandably traumatic. People who go through these operations sometimes need to go to the counselor or psychologist to return to their normal lives.
Other inconvenients and risks have to do with the ethical and moral code. First, the donor’s family has to be willing to give the person’s body away. The patient has to assume the risk of major surgery, even though their lives might be in danger. Also ethicists are concerned about the impact that the surgery will have in the patient’s life.“Might there come a day, some have speculated, when the ultra-rich will opt for face transplants simply to look prettier or younger?”
I think that full face transplants are a controversial topic. If they asked me, if I would donate my face, I really wouldn’t know what to say. I would feel lost without my face,because it is what identifies me, but I would be helping someone. I would definitely donate my other organs.
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In response to “Japan’s Nuclear Crisis Widens”
Source: Mark Magnier, Barbara Demick, and Laura King, Los Angeles Times
Japan Nucler Crisis Widens AoW
September 30, 2011
A recent article from Los Angeles Times reports that the nuclear crisis in Japan is growing. The earthquake that happened on March 11, 2011 has been the largest quake reported inJapan’s history. Due to the quake, the zone that was mostly affected is Fukushima. There they have many nuclear power plants that got damaged, and now are risking people’s lives. The government reported that radiation levels increased above legal limits, and many nuclear plants got closed due to potential problems. The International Atomic Energy Agency declared Japan in a state of emergency. An international rescue effort gathered teams from China, USA, New Zealand, and Germany to help Japan.
I’ve always believed that using nuclear power is dangerous, and that it brings negative consequences. Nuclear power is used to generate energy which is produced by a nuclear reaction. The biggest problem that nuclear power plants bring is radioactivity, because power plants use radioactive elements like uranium. Radioactivity can cause short term and long term effects. The short term effects are acute radiation syndrome (vomiting, bleeding, diarrhea, and immunodeficiency), or partial blindness. The long term effects are worse because people have a greater risk of cancer, or death, and unborn babies that are in the uterus can die, be premature, or have mental problems.Japan is not only facing a terrible earthquake, but also huge problems related to radiation in the future.
While reading this article, I began to wonder about Bogotá, and the chance that one day there might be an earthquake in the city. To learn more I researched the earthquake emergency plan that the city has in the website from the Bogotá city hall called Fondo de Prevención y Atención de Emergencias FOPAE. I learned that the mission of this campaign is to reduce the risk of negative effects in the population when natural disasters and accidents happen, and to have the city ready to affront these types of things. I think that this is good, because if an earthquake happens people will be prepared, and they will now what to do. It is great that Bogotá has an emergency plan.
While reading this article, I became curious about earthquakes around the world. To learn more I researched in a university called Berkeley Seismological Laboratory. It is a university in California that since 1887 has a long history in earthquake science and earthquake information. They have information about current earthquakes like the one in Japan that had a magnitude of 9.0. Here I learned that a seismograph is a machine that scientists use to measure earthquakes. They record the movement of the ground during a quake. Another important object used to measure earthquake magnitude is the Richter scale is a scale used to compare earthquakes. The numbers on the scale are measured in 10`s. For example an earthquake that measures 4.0 is 10 times weaker than one that measures 5.0. Micro quakes are very weak quakes, and they measure less than 2.0. Moderate earthquakes measure less than 6.0, and earthquakes more than 6.0 are dangerous because they can cause a lot of damage. The biggest earthquake in the world was in Chile in 1960, and it measured 9.5 on the Richter scale. I was surprised to learn that in the Richter scale each number represents an earthquake 10 times stronger than the number before.
I still think that nuclear power plants are dangerous because not only the earthquake causes damage, but also the nuclear power plant due to radiation. Earthquakes should make us have second thoughts about the use of nuclear power, because as you can see the earthquake in Japan along with the nuclear power plant in Fukushima , made the disaster even worse. While the problem of countries using nuclear power plants can’t be solved overnight, countries should be conscious of the harm that these things do to us. My hope is that one day we can learn how to produce things without depending on nuclear plants so that we can find and use other alternatives.
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In response to “Fighting over Food”
Source: The Week, March 4, 2011
October 7, 2011
A recent article from “The Week” reports that food prices are rising according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization. Prices are very high due to supply, and demand. Demand is increasing because the world population is growing by 219,000 people per day. Thanks to consumerism and globalization, more people in developed countries can afford food that was once too expensive for them, but it is dangerous due to the production of biofuels. High food prices can lead to food riots and poverty, because lots of people can’t afford to pay for it. Also, food shortages are causing riots in the Middle East. There would be enough food available, if it was distributed equally throughout the world.
Many people assume that what happens in one part of the world, doesn’t affect other countries, but I’ve always believed that everything brings consequences. For example, excessive food prices are the effect of globalization, or “development”. Globalization leads to consumerism, because people want more and more so the prices of things increase. Due to consumerism, problems increase and the gap between the rich and the poor grows. Because of high food prices, some people can’t afford to buy food and this leads to starvation. As you can see, globalization is the main cause e of excessive food prices.
While reading this article, I got interested in finding out why food shortages cause riots in the Middle East. Riots are caused by many problems. One of them is that in many countries the government is corrupt and spends all the money on itself. For example in Libia, Muhammad Gaddafi has a lot of money, but citizens live in poverty. Or in Egypt, Hosni Mubarak was very wealthy but citizens lived in bad conditions. Many countries in the Middle East have a huge gap between the rich and the poor, so this is why there is a lot of inequality.
I got interested in the UN Food Organization, so I visited their website called the “Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)”. FAO is an organization, that focuses and makes sure that people have regular access to high quality lives, in order to have healthy lives. FAO improves nutrition levels, agricultural productivity, and contributes to the world economy. In the FAO webpage I read a news article, called “Food crisis looms in Sudan regions”. Here food is unequally distributed, because of fights between the government troops and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North (SPLM-N). The crops are getting ruined, and household food stocks are extremely low. This means that next month’s crops will fail. The food shortage has caused food prices to double. A sorghum bag of 90 kg which costs 70 Sudanese pounds (26$ US), now costs 140 Sudanese pounds, and they expect prices to keep on rising. Large herds are affected because livestock migration has been disrupted, so herds have to live in small areas throughout the borders. At least 235,000 people need urgent help, because the situation is devastating.
FAO is trying to help people in Sudan by giving seeds and tools to 20,000 vulnerable households. These supplies will help provide food for those in need. FAO is trying to reach another 20,000 households to grow winter vegetables to replace the harvest of sorghum. FAO will donate $ 3.5 million dollars for this cause.
While the problem of food inequality can’t be solved overnight, we must continue to find sustainable strategies, and ideas in order to help poor countries get out of poverty. My hope is that one day we can learn how to distribute things properly, so that no one in the world has to fight over food.
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In response to “Kids who skip school are tracked by GPS”
By: Eric Carpenter, the Orange County Register
Kids who skip school are tracked by GPS AoW
October 21, 2011
A recent article from The Orange County Register, reports that in a city called Anaheim police and school officials are using GPS devices to make sure that students go to class. The Anaheim Union High School District was the first to use this GPS program. This device that is the size of a cell phone is given to students that have more than 4 unexcused absences. Students have to enter a code 5 times a day to be able to track their location. The program gets paid by a state grant, and parents volunteer for the program. The idea of this program is not a punishment, but a way to help students have better habits and encourage them to go to school.
I believe that the intended audiences of this article are students, teachers, and parents. It is intended to the students, because they are the ones that need to carry the GPS. This program is intended to help students go to school, and to encourage them to have good habits. If students go to school, they will be able to have better opportunities to succeed in life. It is intended to the teachers, because thanks to the GPS program they will be able to have people to give class to. It is also intended to parents, because they won’t need to worry about their kids. Thanks to the GPS program, they will know where they children are at all times.
You would think that it is completely only the students fault for not going to school, and for skipping school. I know that they are responsible, because they chose to do what they did, and they chose not to go to school and skip class. A perfect example of this is a13 year old boy named Juan Cruz. Juan Cruz states that “Sometimes I’m sick and other times, I just don’t feel like going.” In other words, Juan is saying that he chooses when he goes to school, and when he doesn’t. He makes this decision by himself, and this shows that his parents maybe don’t pay attention to what he does. It is the student’s fault, because everyone is capable of controlling their own actions. The parents are also responsible for what is currently happening, because we get influenced by our parents. My parents are my role models, and I look up to them. We are influenced by our parents actions, because they tell us what is wrong and what is right. Parents should support their kids in all aspects of life, but also they should support them in going to school.
While reading this article, I got interested in finding out how a GPS works, and how it is able to track where someone is. To learn more, I went to a website and read about the “Global Positioning System”. I learned that the GPS is based on a satellite system that gives you location anywhere in the world. The design of a GPS is based on radio-navigation systems that were used in the 1940’s, and during World War II. Satellites provide signal so that these devices are able to work.
While reading this article, I got interested in finding out ways in which parents can help their kids stop skipping school. To learn more, I went to a website and read an article called “School attendance, absence, and your child.” This article explains the importance of attending school: education will open doors in your future, and you will have better opportunities to succeed in life. A study shows that kids that stay focused, and go to school on a regular basis have fewer chances to get involved in dangerous gangs, or participate in crimes.
Key points in this article:
- Good attendance shows that kids can be reliable, and they can be potential good employers.
- Kids who go to school on a regular basis have a smaller risk of getting into gangs, or participating in violent crimes.
- Children between the ages of 5-16 must receive a full-time education, so parents have the obligation to register their kids in a school.
- Parents should show interest in their kids’ education, and they should teach their children the importance of education.
My research activity doesn’t change my reaction, because school is a fundamental part in everyone’s lives, and it opens doors in the future. It is ridiculous for students to waste a great opportunity, because parents work a lot to be able to pay for our education. While this problem can’t be solved overnight, we must continue to teach the importance of education to children in order for them to have a job in the future. My hope is that one day no one skips school, so that everyone has a good future.
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