RUTHFULLY YOURS

Haifa University has conducted a preliminary study that has identified a correlation between the exceptionally hot and dry winter of northeast Brazil and the recent outbreak of the Zika virus which has led to numerous of birth defects.

The study was led by Dr. Shlomit Paz of the Department of Geography and Environmental Studies at the University of Haifa and Professor Jan Semenza of the Stockholm-based European Center for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC).

The main findings of the provisional research contradict the conclusions drawn by the World Health Organization (WHO), which declared a state of emergency last week over the outbreak of the virus.

According to the WHO, the virus is associated with heavy rains in parts of Central and South America as a result of El Nino, a phenomenon that involves a substantial increase in Pacific Ocean water temperatures.

Preliminary research led by Haifa University, however, indicates that the relevant factor associated with the virus is in fact the wave of exceptionally hot and dry conditions, which have reached record levels in the latter half of 2015 in northeastern Brazil where the Zika virus has broken out.

The research argues that the outbreak is not attributable to heavy rains rather it can be attributable to another factor involving climate change and global warming patterns that have affected the planet over recent decades.

Name a black American politician, academician or celebrity who has publicly condemned the atrocities of Boko Haram, Al Shabab or Al Qaeda Affiliates. When did you see a protest march by Black Lives Matter in solidarity with their murdered Nigerian sisters and brothers? Has there been any black voice from any black group concerning the 219 schoolgirls who are still missing from the original 276 black girls kidnapped in Nigeria in 2014? Has Oprah organized a campaign to raise awareness of this ongoing crime among all school-children here and in So. Africa where she has created her own school? Have there been any demonstrations on American campuses concerning the targeting by Boko Haram of black Nigerian students – killing boys and kidnapping, raping and impregnating girls? Which academic groups have organized to pressure our government or the UN to take action to stop the slaughter of thousands of Nigerian civilians, their villages burned by the vicious Muslim group whose name translates as “Western Education Forbidden.” Point to a lead op-ed in the NYTimes written by Cornel West, Alice Walker, Al Sharpton or Spike Lee in the last year that has drawn world attention to the horrific slaughter led by Boko Haram, Al Shabab, Al Qaeda Affiliates or Movement for Unity and Jihad in West Africa.

To the east of Nigeria is Sudan and the newly formed South Sudan which gained its independence from the militantly Islamic north in 2011. The South, comprised of Christian and other native religions has suffered starvation of thousands of its people along with rape, forced cannibalism and the massacres of thousands. Since 1955, more than two million people have died, tens of thousands have been kidnapped and enslaved and five million have been displaced in what was the longest running civil war among all nations. Has the UN established an agency similar to UNRWA, the only relief organization dedicated solely to the needs of Palestinian refugees, kept in that status for more than three generations to sustain anti-Israel political hatred. Have Europeans and Americans donated billions of dollars to help Christian Sudanese as they are threatened and menaced by Arabization and Islamization? Has any Muslim organization offered food, medical care, social service welfare to the thousands of blacks victimized by Islamic violence in South Sudan? The Islamist persecution of blacks has spread all over Africa to countries like Mali, Burkina Faso, Kenya, Somalia and Tanzania – has the Pope issued a plea for world leaders to intercede in this human tragedy?

The number of people killed by heroin and opiate overdose in the United States has been growing exponentially, making this epidemic difficult to ignore in an election year. Thus, President Obama’s 2017 proposed budget includes an increase of $1.1 billion to address this domestic epidemic. The proposed budget also includes $1.8 billion to fight the spread of the Zika virus.
The Zika virus epidemic (causing microcephaly in babies) that started in Latin America in 2015, was identified in 51 cases in continental U.S. No death was reported. Colombia had 20,297 cases, of which 3 were deaths. Brazil reported some 3,500 cases. At the White House press conference on February 8, 2016, Dr. Anne Schuchat, the Principal Deputy Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced today they are “working 24/7 to protect Americans” from the Zika virus, as they should.
Fighting the heroin epidemic, however, is different.

According to available national statistics, “from 2000 to 2014 nearly half a million persons in the United States have died from drug overdoses.” In 2014, of the 47,055 who died 28,647 were killed by heroin. The CDC reported that from “2002 to 2013, heroin overdose death rates nearly quadrupled in the U.S..” The National Institute of Health reported in December 2015 that from 2001 to 2014, prescription drugs overdose deaths saw a 2.8-fold increase while heroin deaths had a 6-fold increase. European and other Western nations reported on similar trends. However, the only ones working 24/7 on the heroin epidemic, are the drug traffickers from Afghanistan through Iran to Russia, from North Korea to Europe and the Middle East and from Bolivia through Mexico to the U.S., the Middle East, and Africa.