You are what you eat

You are what you eat

        We are all acquainted with the familiar expression: “you are what you eat” or “tell me what you eat and I’ll tell you who you are”.  Well in this case I can say that we are eating “shit”, I’m sorry for the crude language but it’s the sad truth.

        I have been working as a food safety inspector for almost two months now and I have seen some restaurants that I can only describe as a crime scene:  It’s like hurricane Katrina passed through the kitchen.

During my studies abroad I France and Switzerland I have visited many restaurants and checked their kitchens: the level of hygiene and food safety protocol is impeccable. Therefore, there is no level of comparison with our local standards which are primitive for lack of a better cognitive word.  But even abroad, some restaurants meet the minimum required rules and not more. 

         I’m not over dramatizing the situation, because we are all living it and we know it, drastic solutions are needed to uproot future similar problems.  You don’t have to be a food scientist or quality controller to understand the minimum basics of hygiene, the ones you apply subconsciously at home.

Furthermore, a few elite restaurants have surpassed my expectations and are truly worth an A⁺ , their commitment to customer care and continuous improvement have really made my day. Sadly, they cannot tip the scale when comparing to sub standards restaurants.

The solution is held by the consumer:

•  Dare to ask and check the restaurants background, his quality certificates…

• Be vigilant to the personal hygiene of the staff 
•  Visual inspection, smell and sensory evaluation are clear and simple methods to determine if your food is freshly cooked or prepared.

•  Usually international brands and its affiliate are somewhat a sure option for they have strict norms to follow from the mother company. (However, do not be blinded by that fact)

•  Speak up: when you encounter a problem, leave a comment, talk to the manager and tell everybody you know about what happened.

        Finally, after the recent outbreak of bad and expired products people are being more aware, and new laws are being legislated as we speak. The food sector is having a makeover with a combined effort of the health sector and food scientists and processing engineers.

        I’m proud to be working on that level and making a difference, I wish I could publish a list with all the restaurants to avoid and ban from your every day consumption and the ones where you can actually feel good eating at. However, having signed a confidentiality contract I’m bound by it but rest assure soon the truth will be unfolded.

Read More

HIV-Victory

        The ribbon will be turned upside down soon 

 

        Cured! That is perhaps a word no one would have dared to speak when it came to AIDS.
Timothy Brown, an American who was living with AIDS since 1995 is the first patient to have overcome the infection through a bone marrow transplant performed in 2007.

The future seems bright as 4 methods to treat the virus are being developed: 

1. By grafting an immune system already resistant to HIV

            This is the technique that was used to heal Timothy Brown. 0.3% of the population has a mutation called "double deletion delta 32" which makes them resistant to AIDS through impermeable cells. The principle is to graft a bone marrow taken from a donor whose DNA is compatible with the patient and who has the mutation making it resistant to HIV.

            Since a bone marrow is the source of the formation of the immune system, the patient develops new grafted immune defenses that can fight the virus.
Unfortunately this heavy method is not without risks and can never cover all HIV-positive patients because it requires a specific genetic profile entirely consistent with a donor carrying the mutation ... a rare thing to find.

2. By acting on the genes of white blood cells (results expected in 2020)

            Widely criticized a year ago, this technique has turned a corner in 2012.
The purpose is to build up reserves of white blood cells resistant to HIV. The principle consists of using enzymes that can cut into the genome of white blood cells the genes that control the production of CCR5 a receptor used by the HIV virus to enter the cells. Thus, the white cells without these receptors become impermeable to the virus.
The first tests conducted on 15 people at the University of California, are promising.

3) By awakening the virus to eliminate it (expected results for 2017-2020)

            This technique involves the administration of cocktails of made from various molecules that reactivate latent viruses in cells to enable retroviral tanks to destroy them. The reason is that these treatments can do nothing against dormant viruses who have integrated their genome within the DNA of the tanks. However, these studies are not without danger: some molecules could activate latent retroviruses hidden in our genome for over millions of years ("endovirus") with a cancer risk.

4. Rapidly activating the HIV (expected results for 2015-2016)

            This technique was inspired by a couple of positive people whose immune system has learned to control the virus and from the early stages of infection when the patients stopped taking their antiviral drugs. Thus early and transient administration of antiviral could prevent the destruction of the immune system and limit the damage caused by the virus.In this case, testing must be done very quickly.

Read More