Tuesday, June 18, 2013
If your commute isn’t douchey enough, ditch the bike for a $2,700 electric unicycle
If your commute isn’t douchey enough, ditch the bike for a $2,700 electric unicycle
If you constantly have the nagging sense that you have too much money and too many wheels, your problem may be that you commute on a normal-person bike instead of a self-balancing electric unicycle from Hammacher Schlemmer. Luckily, for only $2,700 you can solve all these problems at once!
The electric unicycle has a limited range (it will run for 2.5 hours on a charge), limited speed (13 miles per hour), and requires three hours to charge. But it does have a few advantages over a regular bike: It is suitable for people who are lazy or out of shape (though it does have a 250-pound weight limit), it gives you all kinds of street cred among circus folks and carnies*, and it’s tiny, so you can actually just stick it in the trunk of your luxury car and drive that to work instead.
Anyway, here’s what it looks like to ride it. You’d think that for $2,700 one could buy a little dignity.
* almost certainly the opposite, actually
Monday, June 17, 2013
Finding a home for unused medical supplies, eWaste Disposal, Inc
Courtesy, MedShare
Volunteers sort surplus medical items into barrels at a MedShare distribution center.
Those materials are often disposed with red bag waste, but several organizations are attempting to recover these items and redistribute them to hospitals in need.
MedShare, one of the largest medical surplus redistributors, in its last fiscal year collected 550 tons of surplus medical supplies and redistributed them to hospitals in developing countries, medical mission teams and free clinics in the U.S. Founded in 1998, the non-profit organization currently operates two volunteer and distribution centers, one in San Leandro, Calif., and the other near Atlanta, Ga., that together work with more than 80 hospitals to recover surplus supplies and equipment.
Hospitals generate an estimated 2 million tons of waste per year. A study of the San Francisco Bay Area showed hospitals were the third-largest waste producers among 48 studied types of businesses, said Chuck Haupt, executive director of MedShare's western region.
MedShare works with the hospitals surrounding its distribution centers to divert more than 5,000 types of medical supplies, and also accepts working equipment that has, for example, been replaced by a newer model, along with donations from national manufacturers and distributors.
A common challenge in recovering medical surplus is that a large portion of items collected are unusable. Donated supplies may be expired, or equipment is too expensive for a hospital in a developing country to maintain. MedShare aims to minimize that challenge by educating their partner hospitals on what items can be donated.
"We work with the hospital executives to develop a diversion program that benefits the hospital, and benefits the local community, and certainly benefits the recipients that we ship aid to," Haupt said.
MedShare sets up recycling barrels in hospitals wherever a large amount of supplies are used — operating rooms, emergency rooms, etc. — and trains staff to know which items can be recycled. The contents of the bins are then collected by MedShare, which asks hospitals for a donation to cover transportation and other costs.
All supplies are weighed upon reaching a MedShare distribution center, where volunteers then sort the items and prepare them for shipment. Occasionally, hospitals will still donate items that are expired or otherwise unusable, but that is "a very small percentage," Haupt said.
To ensure materials will be properly used, MedShare requires potential recipients to submit an application for aid. In addition to hospitals in developing countries, the organization also supplies traveling medical groups and domestic clinics. The application includes a series of questions intended to verify that recipients are trained in using the items and authorized to accept charitable aid. If approved as a partner, recipients then have access to MedShare's unique online ordering system, where they can pick out exactly what they need.
"What makes us a little bit special is that what we do is establish an online database that's analogous to like Amazon.com," Haupt said. "After we establish a partnership with an overseas hospital in the developing world, they will ... go online and order exactly what they want from us. ... Most aid organizations, while they're doing good, they could do better by allowing the recipient to order what they need to treat their patients."
Top-requested items include basics like surgical and examination gloves, sterile suture and gauze. Haupt said that in hospitals without adequate supplies, he's seen surgeons working without protective gloves, or closing incisions with fishing line. There is also "a tremendous need" for items like diagnostic equipment and imaging equipment, he said.
"The things that we take for granted here in the U.S., they just don't have access to these supplies and equipment and services," Haupt said.
http://www.wasterecyclingnews.com/article/20130531/NEWS01/130539988/finding-a-home-for-unused-medical-supplies
Sunday, June 16, 2013
Asbestos risk to children 'greater over lifetime'
A
committee that advises the government on cancer has said children are
more vulnerable to asbestos than adults over their lifetime.
It says a five-year-old is five times more likely than an
adult of 30 to develop mesothelioma, a type of cancer linked to
asbestos, if they are exposed to it at the same time. This is because a child will normally live longer and have more time for the disease to develop, it says.
Most schools have asbestos.
Campaigners are calling for the material to be removed from all of England's schools.
The government says there is no evidence that children's lungs are more susceptible to mesothelioma, only that the risk to them is greater because of their life-expectancy and the time it can take for the disease to develop.
And it says that the accepted advice remains that it is safer to leave asbestos in place unless it is damaged or disturbed.
The Committee on Carcinogenicity, an independent committee that advises the government on cancer, was asked by the Department for Education to look at the relative vulnerability of children to asbestos compared with adults.
In its final report, published today after a two-year study, it says: "Because of differences in life expectancy, for a given dose of asbestos the lifetime risk of developing mesothelioma is predicted to be about 3.5 times greater for a child first exposed at age five, compared to an adult first exposed at age 25 and about five times greater when compared to an adult first exposed at age 30."
But the picture is complicated, with the experts saying there is a "number of uncertainties and data gaps".
The report continues: "From the available data, it is not possible to say that children are intrinsically more susceptible to asbestos-related injury. However, it is well recognised... that, due to the increased life expectancy of children compared to adults, there is an increased lifetime risk of mesothelioma as a result of the long latency period of the disease."
The experts say that although there is good evidence that childhood exposure to asbestos can cause mesothelioma in later life, data is too limited to say whether children are more intrinsically susceptible to the disease.
About three-quarters of England's 24,000 schools are estimated to have some buildings with asbestos, the study says.
Asbestos is a building material commonly used in the UK from the 1950s to the 1980s, often in fireproofing and insulation.
It becomes dangerous when disturbed or damaged because fibres can break off and get in to the air, where they can be breathed in.
Continue reading the main story
WHAT IS ASBESTOS?
The committee defines it as: the name given to a group of six different fibrous minerals that occur naturally in the environment
Its fibres can damage the lungs and cause diseases.
The government says the Health and Safety Executive advice is
that if asbestos is not disturbed or damaged, then it is safer to leave
it in place and monitor it carefully. A spokeswoman for the Department for Education said: "We welcome the Committee on Carcinogenicity's report on the effect exposure to asbestos can have on children, and have committed to consider the findings when reviewing our policy on asbestos management.
"Schools already must comply with the strict legal duties on asbestos. We have also published guidance on the issue and work closely with the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) to ensure asbestos is managed properly in all schools."
Campaigners want the government to pledge to remove asbestos from all of England's schools over time.
Michael Lees, the founder of Asbestos in Schools, said: "We want them to look at their policy which says it is safer to leave it than move it and we want them to have an audit to see how much fibre is there.
"They have committed to removing asbestos in schools in Australia but people need this done here."
The Department for Education said it was working hard with the HSE to make sure asbestos is managed properly in schools and that schools have to comply with "strict legal duties on asbestos".
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