March 27, 2011

Water H2O

Just realized that it was world water day this week on march 22nd so though i usually stick to acupuncture herbs and chinese medicine i think this deserves a mention.

If you've ever been to clinic you'll know we always offer you water when you come in, and encourage you to drink more water when you emerge from your acu-bubble back to your busy life :)

As much as i love acupuncture and herbs, we can actually survive without them, but a week without water and we're pretty much gone. Water is the one thing that we can't do without, all 7 billion of us. So let me give you a few interesting water facts:

  • A quarter of the worlds population is without safe drinking water.
  • Less than 1% of the water treated by public water systems is used for drinking and cooking.
  • In the time it took you to read these first three facts another child has just died in the developing world from unsafe drinking water.
  • Water makes up 75% of the human brain. 75% of trees are also made from water!
  • You could live for a month without food, but you would be dead after a week without water!
  • Once it evaporates, a water molecule spends around ten days in the air.
  • 97% of the worlds water is salty or otherwise undrinkable, 2% is stored in glaciers and the ice caps, the remaining 1% is left for humanity's needs.
check out water-treatment.org.uk for more info...

If you want to know/do more have a look at WaterAid's site, their London office is around the way near oval and their vision is of a world where everyone has access to safe water and sanitation.  

I believe everyone should have access to safe clean water too, and i'll leave you with a couple of documentary films about water:

Flow: For Love of Water


Blue Gold: World Water Wars


March 19, 2011

In Praise of the Lowly Clinician

been meaning to write for a while now but clinic has just been choka so been busy being an acupuncturist & herbalist, running a clinic and all the rest of it or as Jake Paul Fratkin puts it a 'lowly clinician'...
so if you'd like to know what its like and why i've been too busy to write have a read of his article in Acupuncture Today:   In Praise of the Lowly Clinician