Tick-tick-tick

A former student of mine (and current friend) is a veterinarian in Scotland.  Being committed to a scientific approach to health, she frequently weighs in on Skeptophilia posts regarding medical issues of all kinds.

Saturday's post, about the highly dubious alternative-medical claims of a woman named Christina Lopes, prompted her to mention (after she basically gave me a round of applause for calling out Lopes's bullshit) that it's not just in human health that the alternative medicine specter raises its ugly head.  She is understandably frustrated with pet owners who think their home remedies and ten-minute "research" on Google supersedes her DVM and years in practice, and -- just as with Lopes -- frequently want to avoid the expense and pain of an actual effective treatment for what amounts to waving a magic wand and shouting "accio health."

She followed this up by sending me a website claiming to have discovered a new approach to the scourge of dog owners all over: ticks.  Not only are these repulsive little arachnids unpleasant in and of themselves, they carry a number of serious diseases -- most notably Lyme disease, but also Rocky Mountain spotted fever, babesiosis, ehrlichiosis, anaplasmosis, and Powassan virus.  (As an aside, in the southeastern United States, the bite of the lone-star tick can have another dreadful result -- alpha-gal syndrome, the main characteristic of which is a life-threatening anaphylactic allergy to consuming red meat.)

The lone-star tick (Amblyomma americanum)  [Image is in the Public Domain courtesy of the Center for Disease Control]

So it's natural enough for pet owners -- well, anyone who spends time outdoors, actually -- to want a good tick repellant.  The problem is, not much repels them.  Some of the chemical-infused tick collars contain compounds that can harm humans, so while they're probably the best option, I can understand people's reluctance to use them.  We've had decent success with tucking cardboard tubes containing cotton balls soaked with permethrin solution in out-of-the-way parts of our property, the idea being that one of the main tick carriers in our area -- deer mice -- will pull bits of the cotton to make their nests, killing any ticks they happen to be carrying.  We've noticed a significant decrease in ticks in our yard -- last summer we barely saw any -- so our admittedly anecdotal and small-sample-size experiment appears to work fairly well.

But it does take some effort, and handling a Scary Chemical (although it must be said that a thorough analysis by the FDA has found permethrin to be completely safe for humans when used properly, and the World Health Organization includes it on their List of Essential Medicines).  So people who gravitate toward "natural" solutions tend to cast about for other ways to take care of the problem.

It's this impulse that resulted in the British pet supply company Harbour Hounds to market a new approach.  They call it the "EM Tick-Off Necklace."  On their website they remind us repeatedly that all of their names and products are registered and/or trademarked, but I'll hope one mention will fly under the radar, especially since I'm not selling anything and have no plans to swipe their idea.

You'll see why in a moment.

"EM" stands for "Effective Microorganisms."  What they apparently are claiming is that the reason ticks flourish is because the soil microbiome is off, so if you encourage the right kinds of microbes, the problem goes away.  The upshot is what they do is to take three species of beneficial microorganisms (a yeast, a photosynthetic bacterium, and a lactic-acid fermenting bacterium), and incorporate them into some clay beads, then string the beads to make a necklace for your dog.

"How," you may be asking, "does encasing the microbes in clay beads and hanging them around your dog's neck help the soil microbiome?", you may be asking.  I know that's what I was asking, by this point.

Well, it's one step beyond even that.  After mixing the yeast and bacteria in the clay and making it into beads, they "bake it at high temperatures to capture the DNA" of the microbes.

Unfortunately for Harbour Hounds, I'm an amateur potter, and I know something about baking clay.  When I'm making a piece of pottery, the lowest temperature necessary to harden the clay into ceramic is what potters call "cone 06" -- just this side of 1,000 C.  (My wife and I, and a lot of potters, actually go higher than that, to "cone 04," which is around 1,060 C.)  And I've seen what these temperatures do to organic matter.  A while back I was loading our kiln and found that there was a dead fly in a rather hard-to-reach spot on the kiln shelf, so I just shrugged my shoulders and left it.  After firing and cooling, I opened the kiln, and what had been a dead fly was now a tiny pile of completely calcined white ash.

Also unfortunately for Harbour Hounds, I spent thirty-two years teaching biology, so I know something about DNA as well, including the awkward fact that when heated, DNA denatures (breaks down) -- it completely degrades at 190 C, over five times lower than the minimum temperature it takes to fuse clay into ceramic.  So not only would the microbes themselves be gone after firing, so would every last trace of their DNA.

Nevertheless, Harbour Hounds claims that it's still in there, and furthermore, that the DNA in the ceramic emits far-infrared light.  These wavelengths, they say, are "non-evasive," whatever the hell that means.  But apparently they also repel ticks.

And this brings up the third unfortunate thing for Harbour Hounds, which is that I have a bachelor's degree in physics, so I am aware that any object above room temperature emits infrared light.  In fact, you emit infrared light -- that's why you can be seen at night through infrared goggles -- yet the ticks, mosquitoes, and other unpleasant little bastards can find you just fine.

So this claim seems to be batting zero, here.  However, they cover their own asses by two disclaimers: (1) the collars aren't guaranteed to prevent ticks completely, so you should always check your dog thoroughly and pull off ticks when you find them; and (2) you and your dog should avoid walking in areas where there are lots of ticks.

To sum the claim up, then: "send us lots of money for tick collars that do absolutely nothing, making sure to replace them every year, and then do exactly what you were doing before."

Anyhow, thanks to my friend for the lead on this story.  Me, I'm gonna keep using cotton with permethrin and (a little hesitantly, I must admit) standard tick collars for our pups.  It's not a perfect solution, but at least I know it has a better success rate than what Harbour Hounds is claiming.

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Bee all, end all

That a lot of people would prefer it if the world was simple is hardly an earthshattering claim.  You see it all over, especially in political debates -- the single-cause fallacy, attributing complex phenomena to one ultimate origin.  The mess in the Middle East?  George W. Bush, of course.  The loss of jobs to outsourcing?  Thanks, Obama.  Yesterday's unusually hot afternoon?  Has to be climate change.

Oh, but wait.  Climate change doesn't actually exist.  Almost forgot there for a moment.

I suppose it's understandable enough.  Figuring out complicated cause-and-effect relationships is hard work.  Sometimes even with lots of data, the answers are unclear.  We humans don't tend to like uncertainty, especially when we hear that the experts themselves are uncertain.  Much easier to fall back on the simple explanation and stop thinking about it.

Which, I think, explains the reactions I saw to the Washington Post article entitled "Bees Were Just Added to the U.S. Endangered Species List for the First Time."  Most of the comments I saw fell into one of the following categories:

• We're ruining the Earth and we're all gonna die.
• Farms are going to fold for lack of pollinators and we're going to run out of food.
• It's what we deserve for spraying pesticides all over the place.
• Monsanto sucks.

Never mind that when you actually read the article, it turns out that the additions to the ESL were seven rare species of endemic yellow-faced bees native to Hawaii, and the probable reason for their decline is habitat loss and destruction of native wildflowers, not pesticides or the rest of it.  There are actually an estimated 20,000 species of bees worldwide, so assuming that all bees are going extinct because seven uncommon island endemics are endangered is a little like using the near-extinction of the California condor to conclude that pigeons and starlings are about to go the way of the dinosaurs.  (Actually, it's worse; according to the most recent tallies, there are a few more than 10,000 species of birds in the world, so there's actually twice the biodiversity in bee species than in bird species.)

[image courtesy of the Wikimedia Commons]

That's not to say that there haven't been problems with declining numbers of more common bee species recently, but as I alluded to in the first paragraphs, it's not as simple as it sounds.  The still-unexplained colony collapse disorder has reduced the populations of western honeybees, the most common bee species in North America -- particularly among captive hives.  But the truth of the matter is, CCD seems to be declining itself, and honeybee numbers are on the rise in most places.

As far as wild bee species, the situation is even less clear.  A study by Insu Koh et al. last year suggested that in some places, wild bee populations had declined by 23%, but if you look at the study itself, you find that there is a huge amount of uncertainty in the data, mostly due to the difficulty of estimating bee populations in the wild.  The numbers Koh et al. used were developed from spatial-habitat models, using subjective information such as the "quality of nesting sites," and generated numbers that sounded alarming.  A review of the study in Science 2.0 was scathing:

How did they count wild bees when no one else has been able to do so? They didn't, which means it adds to the list of PNAS papers that can't possibly have been peer-reviewed.  The team instead identified forty-five land-use types from two federal land databases and asked fourteen hand-picked experts about each type of land and how suitable it was for providing wild bees with nesting and food resources.  They then averaged the experts' input and levels of certainty (no, really) and built a computer model that they think predicts the relative abundance of wild bees for every area of the contiguous United States, based on their quality for nesting and feeding from flowers.  Lastly, they validated their model against bee collections and field observations they also hand-picked.

In other words, they created an academic model that would get them fired from every single company in existence for being wildly suspect and based on too many assumptions. 

The authors then claim the decline they don't know is happening must be due to pesticides, global warming and farmers.

In fact, a study (this one peer-reviewed) in Nature last year suggested that populations of the dominant (and therefore most agriculturally relevant) species of wild bees are actually doing okay:

Across crops, years and biogeographical regions, crop-visiting wild bee communities are dominated by a small number of common species, and threatened species are rarely observed on crops. Dominant crop pollinators persist under agricultural expansion and many are easily enhanced by simple conservation measures, suggesting that cost-effective management strategies to promote crop pollination should target a different set of species than management strategies to promote threatened bees.

So the bottom line is: colony collapse disorder still exists, but seems to be declining in frequency, and we're still not entirely sure what causes it (neonicotinoid pesticides are one possibility, but there are others).  The western honeybee, the most common and important pollinator species in North America, is actually increasing in numbers.  There are a few species (out of the 20,000) of bees that are threatened or endangered, some because of human activities, but the same is true for any taxon you pick.

In short: the situation is complicated, whether you like it or not.  It'd be convenient to have a clearly-outlined problem with a certain culprit and an obvious solution, but the world seldom works that way.  And as far as "Beemageddon" goes; there are a lot of other ways we could self-destruct that are far more likely than the loss of honeybees.

Maybe it's not justified to be an optimist, but at least be a pessimist about the right things.

An argument over mosquitoes

I broke one of my own cardinal rules a couple of days ago, which is: never argue with strangers on the internet.  This activity is the very definition of futility -- I defy you to cite one example of someone being talked out of a previously-held opinion through a war of words on Facebook.

This particular go-round of vitriol was over the role of the Zika virus in the microcephaly cases in Brazil.  The woman who got my ire up claimed that the combination of irresponsible mainstream media and the outright evil of Monsanto et al. had conspired to pull the wool over our eyes; the actual culprit for the birth defects was a mosquito larvicide called pyriproxyfen.  As support, she cited an article in the Tech Times, because apparently that's not mainstream media.

Before giving up and saying "whatever" (which I did in short order), I referred to several peer-reviewed studies that have established a pretty firm causal link between the virus and microcephaly.  The New England Journal of Medicine published a case study in August 2016 of a microcephalic baby who was Zika-positive at birth and in fact continued to shed the virus for 67 days; three separate studies (outlined and cited in an article in Science from May of this year) demonstrated that Zika infection causes microcephaly and other neurological birth defects in rat fetuses; and a thorough analysis of the available evidence (also from NEJM) concluded that the criteria for establishing a causal relationship had been met.  The authors write:

On the basis of this review, we conclude that a causal relationship exists between prenatal Zika virus infection and microcephaly and other serious brain anomalies.  Evidence that was used to support this causal relationship included Zika virus infection at times during prenatal development that were consistent with the defects observed; a specific, rare phenotype involving microcephaly and associated brain anomalies in fetuses or infants with presumed or confirmed congenital Zika virus infection; and data that strongly support biologic plausibility, including the identification of Zika virus in the brain tissue of affected fetuses and infants.  Given the recognition of this causal relationship, we need to intensify our efforts toward the prevention of adverse outcomes caused by congenital Zika virus infection.

Add to this the fact that the connection to pyriproxyfen was thoroughly smashed by David Gorski over in the wonderful blog Respectful Insolence, and I think if you approach the question without bias, there's no other conclusion you can reach.

[image courtesy of the Wikimedia Commons]

On the other hand, if you assume your own conclusion, there's not a whole lot logic can do for you.  The individual I was doing battle with pulled out the argumentum ad Monsantum, claiming that Monsanto was involved (Monsanto being the stand-in here for "Satan"), even though Monsanto doesn't manufacture pyriproxyfen -- a Japanese company called Sumitomo does.  But Sumitomo is "a Japanese strategic partner to Monsanto," so there you are.  Satan by association.

The funny thing is, I don't have a dog in this race.  If the birth defects had been caused by a pesticide, I would have no problem saying so.  While I think that pulling out the word "Monsanto" is kind of a cheap trick, I certainly am not of the opinion that they're squeaky-clean.

But I think the preponderance of evidence supports Zika as a cause of the birth defects.  I asked (sort of as a parting shot) if my erstwhile adversary had read any of the peer-reviewed studies, and she didn't respond, which I'm taking either as a "no" or as a way of saying "fuck you."  In any case, once you start thinking this way, peer-reviewed studies aren't going to convince you, because you're just one step from claiming that the authors of the studies are shills for the pesticide company.

You can't win.

Which I hope I've finally learned.  I really shouldn't take the bait, but the combative side of my personality (never very deeply buried) just can't stand to let things lie.

Anyhow, I've said my piece on this topic, and I'm really done.

At least until someone claims that I'm a shill for Monsanto.  Because them's fightin' words.

Food fight

There's a logical fallacy I've seen a lot lately.  It's called argumentum ad Monsantum (also known as argumentum ad Hitlerum).  The idea is that you can immediately cast doubt on the motives of a person or organization if you compare them to, or (worse) claim they got their ideas from, a stand-in for The Boogeyman.  Monsanto, Hitler, communists, Muslims, whatever one seems apt at the time.

Of course, this boils down to lazy thinking, which most of the fallacies do.

What's rather maddening about this is that the opposite can happen, too.  Give something an association with a name that's considered positive, and you automatically reap the benefits of a reflected glow of goodness, whether or not it's deserved.

You could call this the Compare-Yourelf-To-Mother-Teresa-And-Declare-Victory ploy.

The argumentum ad Monsantum strategy has been much used in the fight against GMOs, since Monsanto has been heavily involved in developing genetically modified crops for years.  How anyone who has even a smidgen of a background in science can fall for this is beyond me; comparing RoundUp-Ready Wheat with late blight-resistant potatoes makes no sense from any standpoint, from effects on human health to ecological impact.  (Consider that the former results in an increase in the use of chemical pesticides, and the latter decreases it.)

Saying that all GMOs are bad is, in fact, precisely equivalent to claiming that all genes do the same thing.

[image courtesy of photographer Elina Mark and the Wikimedia Commons]

What's wryly amusing about this is that the opposite side of the same coin -- the word organic -- is maybe not as squeaky-clean as it's been billed.  The reputation of organic produce for containing less in the way of Nasty Chemicals is apparently ill-deserved, considering a story by David Zaruk over at The Risk-Monger that revealed a startling fact -- that organic farmers in the United States are certified to use three thousand substances that are designated as toxic, and that are considered acceptable purely because they're "natural."

Copper sulfate, used as a fungicide, is highly toxic to fish, and is completely non-biodegradable.  Pyrethrin and azadirachtin (neem oil), insecticides that come from plants and therefore are somehow thought to be better than synthetics, are lethal to honeybees and carcinogenic in humans.  Rotenone, from the leafy parts of the jicama plant, kills damn near everything you put it on.

Also on the list is nicotine.  Made, presumably, from all-natural, organic, health-supporting tobacco plants.

Worse still, once produce is certified organic, it bypasses any kind of requirement for pesticide residue testing.  Because organic produce isn't supposed to have any pesticides on it, right?

Of course right.

Monsanto = bad.  GMO = bad.  Organic = good.  All a way to give yourself a nice warm feeling of being socially and environmentally responsible, not to mention healthy, and then to stop thinking.  Myself, I would rather the responsible use of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides, which comes along with mountains of information on hazards and requirements for residue testing, than giving free rein to people who believe that Natural Must Mean Good For You.

Now, don't get me wrong; I think that a lot of the organic food movement is driven by the right motives.  Creating our food with as little negative environmental impact as possible, and producing food that is healthy and nutritious, are certainly goals to be lauded.  What is unclear is whether the rules governing organic food production as they now exist are meeting those goals.

But the beat goes on, which is why there was an apparently serious article over at The Organic Authority wherein we learn that artist and practitioner of magic Steven Leyba is mounting a one-man campaign against Monsanto, spurred by his own personal health experiences:

In 2010 I had been overweight and decided to get healthy.  I started eating large amounts of fruits and vegetables from my local grocery store.  I got sick and that was the time I found out about GMOs.  I was appalled.  I couldn’t understand why I would get so sick by eating what I thought was so healthy.  When I switched to organic food I got healthy again.

And since anecdote with a sample size of one is apparently data, Leyba decided to take matters into his own hands, and is launching a magic spell against Monsanto:

Death curses work like any manifestation of will like Gestalt psychology; you visualize and act in accordance and at some point what you can conceive and believe you can achieve.  Medicine men practice this and even medical doctors to some extent practice this.  They plant suggestions in people’s minds for healing and those people start to do things that promote their own healing.  For me I see a great need to identify the cancer (Monsanto and Nestlé) and attack with full force and mirror back this so-called Black Magic they are doing to all of us.

So he made a book full of disturbing imagery that includes demented portraits of executives who work for Monsanto, and also Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, who worked as an attorney for Monsanto in the 1970s.  

"I encourage everyone to Death Curse Monsanto and Nestlé," Leyba says.  "Justifiable Death Curses are effective on many levels, fun, cathartic... and completely legal."

Article author Jill Ettinger, far from casting a wry eye at Leyba's Eye Of Newt approach to taking down Monsanto, seems to think it's a great idea.  And given the recent push in the United States for mandatory labeling of GMOs, "it may just be working," she says.

No harm, I suppose, if it amuses him.  But wouldn't it be better to learn some actual science, rather than giving in to fear talk and ignorance?  Not to mention (literal) magical thinking?

The world is complex, and when the motives of people and corporations get involved, it becomes even worse.  It'd be nice if categorical thinking really worked.  The difficult truth is, if you want to give yourself the best shot at making smart choices for yourself, both with respect to your personal health and the environmental impact, there's no substitute for bypassing the hype on both sides and understanding the reality beneath it all.