This Week's Links: Some More Thought for Food

By Emily Lewis

This is not the links blog you want to read over your lunch break, unless you're actually hoping to take a break from lunch. Don't say we didn't warn you.

But for starters, here's something mild to whet your appetite. A recent study from the New England Journal of Medicine may have proved the long-held theory that consuming high-allergen foods actually prevents future allergies. "It may sound radical, but it works: Eating peanuts slashes the chance of a peanut allergy, at least in children at high risk of developing one."

Illustration by Oliver Munday

A little more upsetting to the stomach is the recent research into dysfunctional food regulations in the U.S., where responsibility for food safety is divided among fifteen different federal agencies. The most prominent of these are the F.S.I.S. and the F.D.A. -- but, to give you a taste, "Fish are the province of the F.D.A.—except catfish, which falls under the F.S.I.S. Frozen cheese pizza is regulated by the F.D.A., but frozen pizza with slices of pepperoni is monitored by the F.S.I.S. Bagel dogs are F.D.A.; corn dogs, F.S.I.S. The skin of a link sausage is F.D.A., but the meat inside is F.S.I.S. . . . Both the F.S.I.S. and the F.D.A. are also hampered by internal tensions. The regulatory function at the F.S.I.S. can seem like a distant afterthought at the U.S.D.A., whose primary purpose is to advance the interests of American agriculture." But private litigation is finally moving the concern back to the health of the consumer. Read the whole, juicy thing over at the New Yorker.  

But what if it's not the food industry that's killing us? What if it's the food itself. A new film called Forks Over Knives "examines the profound claim that most, if not all, of the degenerative diseases that afflict us can be controlled, or even reversed, by rejecting our present menu of animal-based and processed foods."

Those so-called "diseases of affluence" afflict many in the first world, but in poorer countries the cause of disease is much simpler and easier to root-out, though it has no less to do with what people put in their mouths."Diseases caused by poor sanitation kill some 700,000 children every year, and they prevent many more from fully developing mentally and physically." In such places, improving health infrastructure is one of the most effective approaches to disease eradication. Enter the new poop project from the Gates Foundation. 

Disease eradication worldwide requires people working at both ends of the wealth spectrum . . . and both ends of the intestine (and everywhere in between). For those as hungry to see change as we are, no other answer will satisfy. 

Emily Lewis is the staff writer and online strategist for the Roberta Winter Institute

This Week's Links: What We Talk About When We Talk About Disease Eradication

By Emily Lewis

Here at the RWI we talk about disease eradication all the time, but that's partly because there aren't a lot of other institutes keeping the conversation going. The idea of global elimination when it comes to infectious disease is fairly new, and one that's only just beginning to catch-on. 

"For most of human history, we have sought to treat and cure diseases. But only in recent decades did it become possible to ensure that a particular disease never threatens humanity again." This great little TED-Ed video tells the story of the eradication of smallpox and how that story can be used to determine the possibility of eradicating other diseases. 

The Drovers Cattle Network has come up with a similar "road map" for disease eradication among animal populations. As we mentioned in our last links blog, "After smallpox, rinderpest is just the second disease—and the first livestock disease—to be eradicated." Which means we have another important piece in the puzzle.

One of the things the Rinderpest article highlights is that it was not researchers or doctors (in this case, veterinarians) who played the key role. For disease eradication to be successful it has to be joint effort between medical professionals and "laymen." As the TED video put it, "Disease eradication is one public health effort that benefits all of humanity and challenges us to work together as a global community."

"Finding a way to manage a group of people who are all quite individualistic and having them work together towards this common goal is critical," says Scott O'Neill, founder of Eliminate Dengue in a fascinating podcast series from NPR that tells the in-depth story of trying to cut off one disease (dengue fever) at its source.

Scott O'Neill wants to rid the world of dengue fever by infecting mosquitoes with bacteria so they can't carry the virus that causes the disease.

The message is clear: if the total elimination of infectious disease is possible, it will only be so if we work together. Let's make this happen. To again quote the TED video, "Disease eradication is the ultimate gift we can give to everyone alive today as well as all future generations of humanity."

Emily Lewis is the RWI's Content Curator and Social Media Manager.

Five Revelations Concerning the Battle Against Disease

Compiled from the writings of Ralph D. Winter

By Emily Lewis

Flickr/svenwerk

1. Healing the sick or seeking the source of the sickness?

The enormous expenditures we as a society make in the medical world are almost entirely focused on healing the sick not seeking the source of the sickness. Neither in the practice of medicine (doctors and hospitals) nor in the pharmaceutical world is there—nor can there be—significant concern or focus upon the origins of disease. 

2. Inexpensive medicines can't obtain FDA approval.

Our well-intended FDA—designed to give approval of helpful medicines—has developed a process of approval which costs, supposedly, from $400 to $800 million. This forces very high prices on what is approved. Even more ominous is the bald truth that no product that is inexpensive to manufacture or that can easily be sold by anyone will ever justify the enormous expense of that approval process.

3. Infections may be at the root of chronic illness.

While the causes of many well-known chronic illnesses (heart disease, cancer, multiple sclerosis, Alzheimer’s disease, and schizophrenia) are commonly attributed to lifestyle and environment (diet and toxic agents), a totally new development in the university world is the strong suspicion that infectious agents, either viral or bacterial, are basically producing all of the mentioned chronic diseases.

4. Neo-Platonism influences our view of disease and evil.

Christian theology since the fourth century has been greatly influenced by Neo-Platonism in respect to ascribing all evil to God, not Satan. Our inherited theology allows us to fight “terrorists” that can be seen with the naked eye but not to fight tiny terrorists that can only be seen in a microscope.  That tiny world we assume is amenable only to God and to our prayers. We have no formulated mission to intervene.

5. God will not make sense.

The effect of this theology upon our efforts of evangelism and mission is that God will NOT make sense if we attribute to Him what Satan does.

Editor's Note: These ideas are excerpted from an essay written by Ralph D. Winter entitled, "A Growing Awareness About Disease." You can read the full essay by clicking to read more.  

Emily Lewis is the RWI's Content Curator and Social Media Manager

Warfare Worldview

By Emily Lewis

Flickr/Debbi Long

When I was in high school my dad introduced a new figurine to our mantelpiece nativity set. It was a sinister looking red dragon that perched atop the porcelain stable, grimacing down at the farm animals as if waiting to snatch away the infant Jesus. This was, of course, a reference to the account of that event in Revelation 12, and my three brothers were thrilled to have some much needed grit added back to a story that had been made innocuous by the retelling. 

My father was making a larger statement, one he made countless times during our formative years, to lend meaning to both the decisions and the tragedies of our existence. He always told us, "Life is war."

My grandfather and RWI founder, Ralph Winter, wrote, "Once Satan is in the picture—if we believe he is—no amount or kind of harsh or heartless evil should be unexpected. When we reinstate his existence as an evil intelligence loose in God’s creation, only then do a lot of things become clear and reasonable. Suffering, in a perverse way, starts to make sense."  Whether making sense of things this way is new to you, or a concept you've grown up with, I invite you to explore it further on our Warfare Worldview page. 

This Week's Links: What Science Can Tell Us About the Past and Future of Disease

Flickr/bartolomeo - African Buffalo like these were nearly wiped out as a species in the Rinderpest epidemic in the 1890's. But thanks to the efforts of UN scientists, Rinderpest was eradicated in 2010.

By Emily Lewis

For once we're talking about the history of disease, and not about making disease history. Modern advances in science have allowed us to chart the genetic code of diseases that plagued mankind for decades. In this case, literally. Researchers are digging up the bodies of "Black Death" victims in London and using them to garner "direct insights into the evolution of human pathogens and historical pandemics."  

If science can do that for the way we see diseases in the past, imagine how it could change the way we see diseases in the future. Already, researchers have invented a game that could use crowdsourcing to help diagnose Malaria, and the day may not be so far off when we have a vaccine for cancer. New technologies are not just changing the way we see disease and the body, but changing what we are able to see. 

But we couldn't talk about the history of disease without mentioning one of our favorite events in modern history, the eradication of Rinderpest. Yes, all you Germanophiles, it's a cow virus. But we can't help it, we just love when the word "virus" and the phrase "wiped out" appear in the same sentence. At the RWI, we're working hard to make the history of Rinderpest the future of all viruses.

Emily Lewis is a graduate of Gordon College with a degree in Communication Arts and Journalism. She lives outside San Francisco, where she's writing a book about her personal journey coming to understand the will of God in regard to sickness.

This Week's Links: Who's Winning in the Battle Against Polio?

Ayan Hassan and Sahro Ahmed, trained vaccinators, travel long distances to deliver polio vaccination in hard to reach areas in Somali region of Ethiopia. Flickr/UNICEF Ethiopia ©UNICEF Ethiopia/2013/Sewunet

By Emily Lewis

In our weekly links blog we like to share things, new and old, that have taken our interest here at the RWI. We don't always agree with the source or theory, but we find them to be important contributions to the discussion of disease eradication and/or theodicy.

Polio has been getting a lot of press this week, as a mysterious doppelgänger disease has shown up in some areas of the United States, according to reports from USA Today and other sources. Polio is a disease we dreamed would follow smallpox into oblivion, but the road to eradication has proven long and arduous. Here we take a closer look at why . . .

Considered "readily preventable" in the developed world, Polio still prevails in poor areas of South Asia. The Tampa Bay Times explains why the disease continues to terrorize underdeveloped communities, even where immunizations are available. 

And in the past few years the fight against polio has attracted another kind of terror. Early in 2013, several groups of aid workers administering the polio vaccine were ambushed and murdered in Pakistan. This article by Wired does a great job of explaining the far-reaching ramifications of those events. 

As the Lancet enumerates the setbacks that have caused projects like the Global Polio Eradication Initiative to continue to push back their target dates, this is a time like no other when the people of God can remind the world that His heart is still for the marginalized and downcast. "How often do we pray for those combating polio?" Dr. Winter was fond of asking.

We want to leave you with that challenge, but also leave you hope, even for those whose lives have been ravaged by polio. Check out this documentary on a polio-survivors' soccer team in Ghana.

Do you pray for polio sufferers and survivors around the world? What about those who are trying to destroy polio?

Emily Lewis is a graduate of Gordon College with a degree in Communication Arts and Journalism. As part of the Strategic Prayer Equipping Group she founded a prayer house in a slum area of New Delhi, India, where she lived for four years. She now resides outside San Francisco, where she's writing a book about her personal journey coming to understand the will of God in regard to sickness.