News Ireland daily BLOG by Donie

Saturday 30th May 2015

Irish political parties pocket €12.6m in State funding,

Says watchdog

 

The country’s political parties were paid €12.6m from the State coffers last year, according to figures released by the State’s ethics watchdog.

The four main parties – Fine Gael, Fianna Fail, Sinn Fein and the Labour Party – received combined funding of €5.5m.

The Standards in Public Office Commission (SIPO) details every year the level of funding paid to parties and their politicians under the Electoral Acts.

While the allowances can be used to cover the costs of their political duties, under the rules, an allowance paid under this section can not be used for, or to recoup, election or poll expenses incurred for the purposes of any election or referendum.

Of the political parties in receipt of the funding, Fine Gael received €2.28m – the largest single sum – due to the number of TDs and senators in Taoiseach Enda Kenny’s party.

The Labour Party received €1.29m.

Fianna Fail received €1.17m, according to the figures, followed by Sinn Fein which got €720,000 in funding.

The SIPO figures also detail the extra €7.117m in funding paid to party leaders which is used for staff costs, research and office expenses.

The details released yesterday also show that independent TDs received €563,866 through what is known as the leaders allowance.

Independent senators received €249,130 in State funding in 2014.

The payment of the leaders allowance to independent TDs has been a constant topic of controversy in Dail debates.

Independent TDs have argued that they operate without the backing of large party structures and the money is badly needed.

Analysis by independent TD Catherine Murphy reveals that the 145 deputies belonging to Fine Gael, Labour, Fianna Fail and Sinn Fein will each cost on average 52pc more per year than the Dail’s Technical Group members.

From 2016, SIPO will require all parties to publish national audited accounts.

The decision came after Government ministers pledged greater transparency and accountability over funding.

It is currently carrying out a public consultation process on new rules requiring greater transparency on how the party leaders allowance is spent.

The allowance will be renamed the parliamentary activity allowance, as independent TDs will also be required to report on how they spend it.

In wake of European ruling will it be illegal to slap a child?

  

The Irish Coalition is fearful of wading into an issue where public opinion is divided

Slapping is widely practised, though it’s been declining sharply over recent years.

It’s highly unlikely – despite a ruling by the Council of Europe on Wednesday – that Ireland’s laws which permit the slapping of children are a violation of children’s rights.

While legislation which allowed parents use force against their children was repealed in Ireland almost 15 years ago, the defence of “reasonable chastisement” still exists in common law for parents or child carers.

The council found this defence was a violation of the charter whose signatories promise “to protect children and young persons against negligence, violence or exploitation”.

Even though Ireland is out of kilter with much of the rest of Europe, the Government is fearful of wading into an issue where public opinion is divided. That’s why, for much of the past decade, it has tried to fudge the issue by claiming a ban is “under review”.

The Government’s response on Wednesday was strangely familiar: it announced plans for a new review of whether the defence of reasonable chastisement should be maintained in law.

It insists there are plenty of other laws which outlaw the assault or physical harm of children, such as the Child Care Act and the Criminal Justice Act, along with rules and guidelines.

It did, however, throw a bone to the council by pledging to explicitly ban the smacking of children in foster or residential care through new regulations.

If an outright ban were to be introduced, it could have major repercussions. Slapping is widely practised, though it’s been declining sharply over recent years. The Growing Up in Ireland study of three-year-olds found up to 45 per cent of their primary caregivers had previously smacked them, for example.

In theory, the State is now obliged to introduce a clear ban on slapping – or “corporal punishment” in the words of the council – on foot of this week’s ruling.

But the council issued a similar ruling on Ireland’s laissez-faire stance on slapping just over a decade ago – and little action followed.

In reality, Ireland only faces “political peer pressure” from other member states who have introduced bans on slapping. T he real pressure will come from children’s campaigners such as the Children’s Rights Alliance. The Government, meanwhile, seems more than content to keep the issue “under review”.

Irish Women urged to speak out about suicide

   

Irish women are being urged to start the conversation on suicide by supporting Console’s national awareness campaign.

Sabina Higgins, wife of President Michael D Higgins, joined with the Taoiseach’s wife Fionnuala Kenny to launch the Cosy Up To Console campaign in Swinford, Co Mayo, yesterday.

“Life is our most precious possession and privilege and death our greatest fear and dread. Console’s work shines a light of hope for those who are struggling with darkness and sadness,” said Mrs Higgins.

Console is asking mothers, grandmothers, sisters and friends to get the nation talking about issues surrounding suicide. The campaign is the brainchild of psychotherapist Anne Lynch, manager of the Console Centre in Swinford.

“We have got to get people talking about suicide and what can be done to help those who may be in crisis, a chat over a cuppa is a good way to start that conversation,” said Ms Lynch, who decided to combine knitting sessions with tea and talks.

“We are asking people across the country to get chatting and knitting tea cosies over the next few months. The plan is to sell Console tea cosies as gifts for Christmas. Not only will they raise funds for the organisation, they will also raise awareness as they will get people talking,” said Ms Lynch.

Fionnuala Kenny added her voice to the call, saying: “I am very happy to support this initiative by Console who do fantastic work in the area of suicide prevention and support for people in distress”.

The charity offers counselling services and 24-hour helpline support to people in crisis or affected by suicide.

Speaking about the campaign, Console CEO Paul Kelly added: “Sadly suicide has touched the lives of too many of our people but hope and help are always available at Console and who better to make sure that message is heard in homes and workplaces around the country than the women of Ireland?”

Console can be reached on freephone 1800 247 247 and a list of its resources can be found on http://www.console.ie.

Travel around the world in a first portable ‘eco pod’ luxury hotel

 

Now you can travel around the world and live in a luxurious hotel at the same time, thanks to a new innovative egg-shaped eco pod.

Now you can travel around the world and live in a luxurious hotel at the same time, thanks to a new innovative egg-shaped eco pod.

A creation by Slovakian firm Nice Architects, the UFO style mini-pod, which is powered solely by solar and wind energy, features an energy-efficient shape and includes its own shower and toilet, sleeping area for two, and kitchenette, reported the Daily Star.

The Ecocapsule’s first look will be offered at the Pioneers Festival in Vienna, Austria, on May 28 and 29, and it can be pre-ordered by the end of 2015.

The capsule features membrane water filters to purify 99.99 percent of bacteria, rendering any natural water source suitable for drinking.

Nice Architects stated “strict management of energy resources” as the reason for their successful survival strategy.

He added that their creation enabled people to reach the frontiers with the luxuries of the hotel room, and could serve “as a cottage, pop-up hotel, or even as a charging station for electric cars.”

Stress is good for you because it makes us stronger & smarter  

   

Long the anti-hero of fast-forward lives, researchers now believe stress can make you stronger, smarter and more successful, 

Take a moment out of your too-busy, over-packed day to answer this simple question: if you had to sum up how you feel about stress, which statement would be more accurate?

1. a) Stress is harmful and should be avoided, reduced and managed.
2. b) Stress is helpful and should be accepted, utilised and embraced.

American health psychologist and stress-has-an-upside advocate Dr Kelly McGonigal admits that, like most harried members of the modern world, she was inclined towards ‘a’.

Stress, she told her clients for over a decade, was public enemy number one; a toxic silent killer that was to blame for everything from the common cold to heart disease, premature ageing, depression, and lots more besides.

However, seven years ago, Dr McGonigal changed her tune after making a startling discovery — stress is harmful only if you believe it to be so, according to ground-breaking research.

She swallowed her pride and admitted that what she had been telling people was wrong.

People sat up and took notice. In 2010, Forbes named her one of the 20 most inspiring women to follow on Twitter. Three years later, she did a TED talk explaining how to make stress your friend. An impressive eight million people have already listened to it.

Now, the Stanford University lecturer hopes to reach even more people with her new book, an inspiring read that charts the new science of stress.

But why should we change our minds about stress? The research which stopped Kelly McGonigal in her tracks was a study that followed 30,000 American adults over an eight-year period, from 1998 to 2006. It asked them how much stress they had experienced in the last year and if they thought it harmful to health.

With a note of irony, Dr McGonigal says: “The bad news first. High levels of stress increased the risk of dying by 43%.”

But — and the story of stress is a story of those significant ‘buts’ — researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison found that those who also felt high levels of stress but didn’t believe it to be harmful were not only alive, but thriving.

Researchers looked at death rates among survey respondents and found those who felt stress — and, here’s the clincher, felt negatively about it — were much more likely to fall ill, and even die. However, those with a positive attitude to stress were least affected by it, even less so than those who said they felt almost no stress.

Since the game-changing research, study after study has found that stress isn’t always bad. However, to see for herself Kelly McGonigal went to the Behavioural Research Lab at Columbia University in New York and, under the supervision of psychologist Alia Crum, strapped herself into what she describes as ‘torture equipment’ to assess her physical reactions to a stressful mock interview.

Like those before her, Dr McGonigal was shown one of two videos: the first spelled out the negative impact of stress, while the second explained how stress, if embraced, could enhance your performance.

She was shown the stress-is-enhancing video before being put through her paces by interviewers who were instructed to criticise her no matter what she said.

“One finding blew me away,” she says. “The saliva I had drooled into the test tube provided a sample of two stress hormones: cortisol and dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA).

“Cortisol suppresses some biological functions that are less important during stress, such as digestion, reproduction and growth. DHEA, however, helps your brain grow stronger from stress. It also counters some of the effects of cortisol.”

We need both of these hormones, but the ratio between the two can influence how they affect health in the long term: cortisol can impair the immune system and lead to depression but DHEA can reduce the risk of anxiety, heart-disease and other stress-related illnesses.

Psychologist Alia Crum found that people who saw the stress-is-good video still produced the same amount of cortisol but changing their perception of stress helped them to produce more DHEA which, in turn, helped them to offset the negative effects of stress.

It follows, Dr McGonigal says , how you view stress influences the way it affects your body.

For instance, she says, instead of thinking of the pounding heart, tense muscles and churning stomach as negative reactions, it helps to think that this is your body becoming energised and preparing to meet the challenge.

That’s all very well but how do you cope with the sweating palms and dry mouth when you have to make an important presentation at work?

When Harvard Business School professor Alison Wood Brooks asked hundreds of people that question, 91% said the best thing to do was to calm down.

She decided to experiment. Some were told to be calm while others were told to embrace the anxiety and feel excited and alive. The ‘excited and alive’ group performed better, according to the audience who said they were more persuasive, confident and competent.

“However,” says Dr McGonigal, “seeing the good in stress doesn’t require abandoning the awareness that, in some cases, stress is harmful. The mindset shift that matters is the one that allows you to hold a more balanced view of stress — to fear it less, to trust yourself to handle it and to use it as a resource for engaging with life.”

Research on stress has uncovered another startling finding — a 2012 study at the University of Freiburg suggests that stress makes you more social; it helps you to connect with others.

When stressed, the pituitary gland produces the happy hormone oxytocin. It’s been dubbed the ‘cuddle hormone’ because it fine-tunes the brain’s social instincts and prompts you to surround yourself with people who care.

“I find this amazing, that your stress response has a built-in mechanism for stress resilience — and that mechanism is human connection,” Dr McGonigal says.

She quotes another US study, conducted by researchers at the University at Buffalo over three years. It asked 1,000 adults (aged between 34 and 93) two questions: how much stress they had experienced in the last year and how much time they had spent helping neighbours.

It found that every major stressful experience increased the risk of dying by 30%. But — and here’s that ‘but’ again — people who spent time caring for others did not suffer the harmful effects of stress.

There’s more to report on the upside of stress. It can give meaning to life. In 2005-6, researchers Gallup World Poll asked people from 121 countries about their experience of stress. Those who felt a great deal of stress also reported being more satisfied with their health, work standard of living, and community.

Dr McGonigal calls this the stress paradox. “High levels of stress are associated with both distress and well-being. Happy lives are not stress-free, nor does a stress-free life guarantee happiness. Even though most people view stress as harmful, higher levels of stress seem to go along with things we want: love, health and satisfaction with our lives.”

Perhaps the worst thing that a person can believe about stress is that you can avoid it.

Dr McGonigal explains: “I’ve come to believe that the most harmful belief is that stress can be avoided. We’re clinging to this — understandably attractive — myth that some day our lives could be stress-free if only we take the right pill, or buy the right bubble bath, or finally make time to meditate.

“None of those stress reduction strategies will get rid of your stress. And being unable to eliminate stress becomes one more thing to beat ourselves up about.”

The secret, then, is to do what seems counterintuitive: embrace your stress and learn how to harness it to become happier, healthier and more successful.

Obesity will become the main cancer cause’

 Experts now say?

      

Experts say obesity could replace smoking as the main cause of cancer deaths within 15 years

Tackling obesity is a major priority the Government has said, as a report warns that one in five cancer deaths is caused by it.

The alert came at the world’s biggest conference on cancer, which sounded the warning that obesity is killing tens of thousands of people a year in Britain – and the West is about to see it replace tobacco as the leading preventable cause of the disease, according to The Times.

Jennifer Ligibel of the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute at Harvard University told the American Society of Clinical Oncology in Chicago: “The average weight of our citizens is increasing dramatically.

“We’ve really got a critical mass of evidence where we see this relationship, the heavier people are more at risk.

“I think people are aware that being overweight increases the risk of heart disease and diabetes but not that it increases the risk of cancer and their risk of dying from cancer.

“It’s the case with breast cancer, prostate cancer, cancer of the colon and all the gynaecological cancers.”

Smoking is thought to be responsible for a quarter of Britain’s 160,000 annual cancer deaths and Dr Ligibel said obesity could surpass that figure in 10 to 15 years as the population gets fatter while giving up cigarettes.

A Department of Health spokeswoman said: “The Secretary of State has already mentioned that tackling obesity and diabetes will be one of his major priorities for the new Government term.”

The amazing mechanical cheetah that’s the first four-legged robot able to run and jump over hurdles

  

Could robots take over the world?

Maybe they will, one day. But the intelligence of robots has just leapt forward in a big way (literally) after scientists created a clever mechanical cheetah that can both see and jump over hurdles.

Researchers from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) say their creation is the world’s first four-legged robot able to run and jump over obstacles at the same time.

How does the robotic cheetah work?

The ground-breaking robot plans it path like a human runner. As it approaches an obstacle, it guesses the object’s height and distance, working out the best position to jump from while adjusting its stride accordingly.

What has the four-legged robot achieved?

According to the MIT researchers, the robotic cheetah has cleared hurdles as tall as 18 inches – more than twice its height – while maintaining a speed of 5mph.

What do the MIT scientists have to say?

Sangbae Kim, assistant professor of mechanical engineering, said: “A running jump is a truly dynamic behaviour.

“You have to manage balance and energy, and be able to handle impact after landing. Our robot is specifically designed for those highly dynamic behaviours.”

Kim and his colleagues plan to demonstrate the cheetah’s running jump at he DARPA Robotics Challenge in California in June and will present a paper on it in July.

News Ireland daily BLOG by Donie

Tuesday 26th May 2015

Some 150 small Irish food firms win listings with 221 SuperValu stores

Ice-cream, nettle syrup and spices among products to hit shelves

  

SuperValu Food Academy suppliers The Happy Pear, Nobo and Cool Beans help launch Food Academy 2015. More than 150 small food companies are to have their products stocked in 221 SuperValu stores as part of the retailer’s Food Academy programme run with Bord Bia and the Local Enterprise Office Network.

Over the past 12 months, hundreds of small food producers have had their products in trials in their local SuperValu stores as part of the programme.

  The successful firms are selling diverse food and drink products, including nettle syrup, granola cups, black and white pudding and spices.

SuperValu’s trading director Eamon Howell said the fact SuperValu stores were independently owned and operated meant owners could purchase directly from local suppliers.

He said the supermarket chain was working with an additional 250 small food producers, and there would be trials of their products in local stores.

Walt Disney asked to meet Eamon de Valera – to talk about leprechauns

     

Walt Disney was keen to learn about ‘leprechauns’ and ‘little people’ from Eamon de Valera, a newly uncovered letter reveals.

A letter from the Irish Consulate in San Francisco to the Department of Foreign Affairs in 1946 suggests Disney hoped to discuss plans to produce a film about “Irish life and folklore” with the then-Taoiseach.

The meeting could have formed part of Disney’s research for the 1959 film ‘Darby O’Gill and the Little People’, starring Sean Connery.

The letter, dated September 18, 1946, says that “Mr Walt Disney and a party of six, including himself, will sail from New York on November 14 on the SS Queen Elizabeth for Southampton, and will go directly from there to Dublin.

“The party intends to tour Ireland on a research mission, with the intention of making cartoon motion pictures dealing with Irish life and folklore.”

The author says Mr Disney wanted to meet “parties such as the president of the Irish Tourist Association. Mr Disney would also like to meet An Taoiseach.”

Before he departed for Ireland, Mr Disney, whose great-grandfather emigrated to the US from Kilkenny in 1834, also wrote to his sister Ruth outlining his plans.

“We are starting a picture on the Leprechauns or ‘little people’ as they are called in Ireland, so we plan to spend most of our time gathering background material and learning all we can about Irish folklore,” he said.

Psychiatric nurses to begin industrial action at UCH Galway

  

Union members concerned over staffing levels, assults and safety issues at hospital

Psychiatric nurses at University College Hospital Galway are due to take industrial action on Tuesday over staffing and safety issues.

Psychiatric nurses at the biggest hospital in the west are due to take industrial action on Tuesday over staffing and safety issues.

The nurses at the acute psychiatric unit of University College Hospital (UCHG) in Galway said they had been forced to take industrial action following “the failure of HSE management” to address the issues at the heart of a long-running dispute.

More than 90% of the nurses voted a fortnight ago to step up their action following 36 assaults on staff so far this year.

On April 22nd, 10 nurses refused to take up duty in the unit on health and safety grounds. They said they were doing so out of concern for both staff and patients. The 10 returned to work later that day after an agreement was reached to enter talks at the Labour Relations Commission.

The Psychiatric Nurses Association’s industrial officer, Peter Hughes, said it was time for Minister of State for Disability and Mental Health Kathleen Lynch to demand that the HSE address the health and safety issues of staff and patients at UCHG and avert industrial action.

“The PNA has been left with no option but to proceed to industrial action,” Mr Hughes said, “in an effort to get serious engagement on these issues from HSE management.”

Cold weather kills more people than hot weather

     

Cold weather kills 20 times as many people as hot weather, according to an international study analysing more than 74 million deaths in 384 locations across 13 countries.

The findings, published in The Lancet, also reveal that deaths due to moderately hot or cold weather substantially exceed those resulting from extreme heat waves or cold spells.

“It’s often assumed that extreme weather causes the majority of deaths, with most previous research focusing on the effects of extreme heat waves,” according to lead author Dr Antonio Gasparrini from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine in the UK. “Our findings, from an analysis of the largest dataset of temperature-related deaths ever collected, show that the majority of these deaths actually happen on moderately hot and cold days, with most deaths caused by moderately cold temperatures.”

The study analysed more than 74 million deaths between 1985 and 2012 in 13 countries with a wide range of climates, from cold to subtropical.

Data on daily average temperature, death rates, and confounding variables (e.g. humidity and air pollution) were used to calculate the temperature of minimum mortality (the optimal temperature), and to quantify total deaths due to non-optimal ambient temperature in each location. The researchers then estimated the relative contributions of heat and cold, from moderate to extreme temperatures.

Some 7.71% of all deaths were caused by non-optimal temperatures, with substantial differences between countries, ranging from around 3% in Thailand, Brazil, and Sweden to about 11 per cent in China, Italy, and Japan. Cold was responsible for the majority of these deaths (7.29% of all deaths), while just 0.42 per cent of all deaths were attributable to heat.

The study also found that extreme temperatures were responsible for less than 1% of all deaths, while mildly sub-optimal temperatures accounted for around 7% of all deaths — with most (6.66%) related to moderate cold.

According to Dr Gasparrini, current public-health policies focus almost exclusively on minimising the health consequences of heatwaves. “Our findings suggest that these measures need to be refocused and extended to take account of a whole range of effects associated with temperature.”

Your stomach rumbling doesn’t mean you’re very hungry

     

We associate a large growl in our stomachs as a war cry for food – but it actually means your gut is cleaning itself.

Tummy rumbling comes at a time when we feel hungry, but it isn’t a biological mechanism to remind us to eat.

Around an hour after we finish digesting our system undergoes a muscular contraction to sweep any remaining food from the stomach into our intestines, says Guilia Enders, author of Germany’s hit book Gut: The Inside Story Of Our Body’s Most Underrated Organ.

In her punchy guide to our body, the 25-year-old explains the gut cleaning takes place some time in between meals. Nutritional scientists recommend we leave a five hour gap from one meal to another.

Snacking will stop the cleaning process immediately (Picture: Getty)

Snacking at any time will stop the process.

Guilia also makes the interesting point that our stomach starts just below our left nipple and ends at the bottom of the ribcage – generally much higher than we think.

So when people complain of a stomach ache the pain is more than likely happening in our intestine.

The poo chart: Types 3 or 4 are considered healthy. Experiencing any other type on a regular basis is good grounds to consult your GP.

Type 1: Separate hard lumps, like nuts (hard to pass).

Type 2: Sausage-shaped, but lumpy.

Type 3: Like a sausage but with cracks on its surface.

Type 4: Like a sausage or snake, smooth and soft.

Type 5: Soft blobs with clear-cut edges, passed easily.

Type 6: Fluffy pieces with ragged edges, a mushy stool.

Type 7: Entirely liquid.

Berkeley Robot Learns Through Trial and Error (Like Us Humans)

Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley have developed a robot capable of learning new skills through trial and error.

     

The robot, named BRETT (or Berkeley Robot for the Elimination of Tedious Tasks), taught itself to complete a series of motor tasks without pre-programmed details about its surroundings. Its assignments included stacking Lego blocks, screwing a cap on a water bottle, and assembling a toy plane.

The robot uses a camera, which allows it to survey its hands and the objects in front of it, and an algorithm coded to provide real-time feedback on its efforts. The algorithm responds to a pre-programmed scoring system, which provides BRETT with hot/cold-style clues about the task at hand.

Without any information about its surroundings, BRETT was able to learn new abilities in about three hours. When given beginning and end coordinates for a task, however, that dropped to just 10 minutes. Ultimately, researchers hope to empower robots to adapt to constantly changing environments without the need for reprogramming.

This breakthrough in artificial intelligence involves applying the same “deep learning” techniques used in technology like Google Street View or Apple’s Siri to problem solving in 3D. Loosely inspired by the human brain’s own neurological structure, deep learning involves the processing of vast amounts of data. As such, the capabilities of robots like BRETT will increase as this processing becomes easier. Though BRETT is far from able to wash dishes or do laundry, researchers expect advances in computing speed to drive progress toward such a goal in the coming decades.

The team will present its findings on May 28 at Seattle’s International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA).

News Ireland daily BLOG by Donie

Saturday/Sunday 11 & 12th October 2014

More people at risk of losing their family home are seeking advice

 

As much as 3,588 people has sought advice from Focus Ireland in the first eight months of this year.

Focus Ireland says there has been a 43% increase in the number of people seeking advice and information so far this year because they are homeless or at serious risk of losing their home.

The latest figures released today shows that 3,588 people had sought advice and information in the first eight months of this year, compared to 2,500 people over the same period last year.

Focus Ireland said this significant rise is a reflection of the reality that more people are now at risk of losing their family home. The charity says it has had to expand its advice and information services to meet this growing need.

Fundraising for the expansion of services to meet the growing demand, Focus Ireland is preparing for a charity event taking place next Friday night, which involves nearly 100 business leaders and community leaders, who are all going to sleep rough in Dublin’s Iveagh Gardens and Cork’s City Gaol.

Head of Fundraising Lisa-Nicole Dunne said that the charity has to raise one-third of its income from fundraising so events like the Shine a Light Night are critical to allow Focus Ireland to continue to support families and single people struggling to keep a roof over their heads.

Focus Ireland stressed that early access to advice and information can help to prevent a housing problem from becoming a homeless crisis and appealed to anyone worried about their housing situation to contact the charity as soon as possible.

The charity is also putting out a final call to business leaders who would like to get involved in next week’s event.

To register for Shine A Light or to nominate your boss, see the Focus Ireland website.

Once again “Over 50,000 march in Dublin” to protest against Irish water charges

 

Groups from all over country converge on capital to oppose new measures

People taking part in the anti-water charges protest march in O’Connell Street, Dublin this afternoon.

Upwards of 50,000 people marched against water charges in Dublin today in one of the largest demonstrations seen in the capital in years.

The marchers took one hour and twenty minutes to pass the Spire in O’Connell Street as they made their way from Parnell Square, around the city finishing at the GPO in O’Connell Street.

While the Garda press office could not give a figure for the numbers in attendance, one garda observing the march estimated they could be as high as 100,000.

Banners could be seen from communities across Dublin, including Crumlin, Ayrfield, Clarehall, Brookvale, Donaghmede, Ballyogan, Finglas, Ballymun, Edenmore, Coolock, Tallaght, Clondalkin while others from outside Dublin came included ones from Carlow, Cork, Galway, Limerick, Offaly, Wicklow, Athlone, Ballyphehane, Co Cork, Letterkenny, Leitrim and Mayo.

There were also banners from trade unions Mandate, Unite, the CPSU, the Communication Workers Union and the plasterers’ union, OPATSI.

There was huge anger directed at Taoiseach Enda Kenny, as well as the Labour Party and at Tánaiste Joan Burton in particular for her comments during the week that anti-water charges protesters all seemed to have expensive mobile phones. A number of people carried placards with pairs of tin cans strung together attached, with slogans such as “My little phoney, Joaney” while one man was dressed as an iPhone. Other placards said:“Sold out by our own Government”; “Stick your water meters up your arse” and “Can’t pay, won’t pay”.

A number who spoke to The Irish Times, said the water charge was “the last straw”.

“Enough is enough,” said Kathleen McWilliams, a woman in her 50s from Artane.

“The property tax was bad enough but I have nothing left to give.”

There was also anger directed at the media which many protesters said had been agnoring anti-water meter protests around the country.

Among the chants were, “Enda in your ivory tower, this is called people power” and “From the rivers to the sea, Irish water will be free”.

One man was distributing plastic water meter hub caps which he said could be used to ensure a household’s water supply while others were handing out leaflets advising people that Irish Water did not have a legal right to force people to sign a contract with them, could not pursue money from people’s wages and could not cut off people’s water supply.

The Garda presence was low key, with small numbers standing some distance back from the march mainly on streets adjacent to the route.

Before the main speakers, the Resistance Choir sang from the platform and performed their song Now Is The Time For Rage.

Among the speakers was Audrey Clancy, of the Edenmore Says No campaign who urged people neither to fill in their ‘welcome packs’ from Irish Water nor to pay bills when they start arriving.

“We have to have mass non-compliance when these bills start coming in January. No contract, no consent.. We can beat this. We have to stick together. The power of the people is greater than the people in power. Stand up to them,” she said to enormous cheers.

People Before Profit TD Richard Boyd Barrett urged everyone to take selfies and email their photo to Tánaiste Joan Burton.

“Let her wallpaper her office with all the photos of people here. Will we pay the water charges?,” he asked, to which the crowd responded loudly, “No, no, no.” He urged people to take part in planned demonstrations around the State on November 1st.

“Today we brought Dublin to a standstill. On November 1st we will bring the country to a standstill.”

Independent TD Clare Daly said there were historic days from which point nothing would be the same, and this was one of them.

“The people are here with our mobile phones and our tablets and we’re saying, ‘You are not getting any more blood from these stones’.”

Older peoples mental health in Ireland linked to deprivation

  

Older people living in disadvantaged areas of Ireland are much more likely to have poor mental health, a new study has found.

The results are based on an analysis of data collected as part of the TUDA Ageing study – a study involving over 5,000 older people living in the Republic and Northern Ireland.

The researchers acknowledged that cognitive functioning generally decreases as people age. However, they found that older people living in disadvantaged areas had a greater risk of developing cognitive dysfunction, ranging from mild cognitive impairment to dementia, than those living in less deprived areas.

They also found that those living in the most deprived areas were more likely to be anxious or depressed and had three years less education. They also exercised less, weighed more and smoked more.

“The overall results of our study suggest that older people living in the most deprived areas in Ireland, North and South, are at higher risk of poor mental health and developing cognitive impairment. We should target resources and strategies at this group to reduce the risk of developing cognitive impairment,” commented Prof Helene McNulty of the University of Ulster.

The findings were presented at the recent annual Scientific Meeting of the Irish Gerontological Society in Galway.

Leo Varadkar health Minister says the cycle of cuts in healthcare is over

 

Minister for Health says spending savings will go back into services and not to pay debt any more?

The Minister for Health Leo Varadkar has said the cycle of cuts in health care is now over.

It was revealed yesterday that Mr Varadkar will receive a €500 million supplementary budget estimate this year, with some €300 million to be rolled over into 2015.

The two-year budget deal his department has struck is designed to ensure it can adhere to spending limits without the need for repeated financial bailouts.

“The good news is, the cycle of cuts in health care is over,” he told a conference in Dublin earlier today but cautioned that “we’re not flush with cash”.

“Our spending ceiling is now rising again so it means any savings or efficiencies we do make in our health services will go back into our health services and not into deficits or to pay down debt,” he said.

Mr Varadkar was speaking at the International Street Medicine symposium hosted by Safetynet Ireland and The Street Medicine Institute which looks at health of homeless people and rough sleepers.

He said the number of drug-related deaths was a matter of serious concern and was “surprised” by data from 2011 which showed that there were 60 poisoning deaths from heroin compared to 113 from methadone.

In order to respond to the problem of drug related deaths and overdoses the health service has developed an overdose prevention strategy which recommends making Naloxone routinely available in Ireland, he said.

Naloxone is an antidote to heroin which temporarily reverses the effects of an opiate overdose.

Naloxone is a prescription-only medication in Ireland and an amendment to current legislation would be required for it to be made available to opiate users .

“It is intended that Naloxone can be administered by non medical staff such as care workers, family members and addicts themselves and other people trained in the use of it,” he said.

“There’s no doubt the scale and nature of the drug problem in Ireland is constantly evolving. The emergence new pscyho active substances, the increased strength of cannabis and the prevalence of poly drug use represents serious challenges for our services,” he said.

Mr Varadkar said the area of drug use and deprivation and how it impacts on health is one he will take a personal interest in under his tenure as Minister for Health.

“Under the previous minister, the whole position – and this isn’t a bad thing – was delegated to the Minister for State.”

Mr Varadkar said that responsibility for drugs and drug policy will now full under his remit.

He said the “ social problems left untackled” were a burden on emergency departments and health services and “the cost of not dealing with these things is phenomenal”.

A robot Snake Teach Scientists How Sidewinders Move

  

Elizabeth the robot snake gave scientists insight into sand dune travel

Scientists have finally figured out how sidewinder snakes work their way up sand dunes — thanks to the help of a robot snake (yes, a robot snake) named Elizabeth.

For a study published recently in Science, researchers observed that sidewinding rattlesnakes flattened themselves on steep dunes to maximize body contact with sand, rather than dig their bodies deeper into the dune, the BBC reports.

Researchers took their observations and contacted a lab that develops robot sidewinders to further explore the movement. After a robot snake named Elizabeth was unable to scale a desert dune in Egypt, they brought Elizabeth to a fake dune in Atlanta, where “she” ultimately found more success after researchers applied the flattening technique to her movements.

Following that breakthrough, playing with Elizabeth’s settings gave the scientists insight into how sidewinders move so effortlessly. As it turns out, an out-of-sync combination of left-and-right motions and up-and-down movements working their way down the body helps keep the sand stable underneath the snake, to avoid slipping. The flattening motion helps keep the snake’s contact with the sand at the ideal, moderate amount. Too much contact and the snake can slip; too little, and it can’t successfully scale.

News Ireland daily BLOG by Donie

Saturday/Sunday 23rd & 24th August 2014

Newly crowned Rose of Tralee Maria Walsh reveals that she is gay

  

The Philadelphia Rose Maria Walsh who was crowned The Rose of Tralee 2014 at The Dome in Kerry.

Maria Walsh opened up about her sexuality in an interview with the Irish Sun on Sunday after winning the competition on Tuesday.

“I’m confident in who I am as a person,” the 27-year-old said.

“To me, being gay is normal. I told my parents and they were supportive, as I knew they would be.”

The 56th winner of the Rose of Tralee has said that she started a relationship with a woman some years back which lasted for two years, but she is now single.

A native of Boston, Massachusetts, Maria moved to Shrule in Co Mayo with her family 20 years ago but following her graduation in Journalism and Visual Media at Griffith College, moved to New York and later to Philadelphia.

Maria drew tears from family members during her interview at the Dome in Tralee on Tuesday night when she remembered her cousin 19-year-old Teresa Molloy, one of four women killed in a crash on the N17 near Milltown, Co Galway in November 2009.

“It’s moments like this, like being in the Rose of Tralee, that make you really seize the day and appreciate life and take everything as it comes,” said Maria.

“She has given me a lot of good luck to date, so I know she’s looking down on me and my family.

“I’m not ashamed of my sexuality by any means,” she told the Irish Sun on Sunday.

“The Rose of Tralee is about celebrating women’s intelligence, careers, their volunteer work. The question of sexuality never came up. To me, being gay is normal; it’s natural.”

Former Rose of Tralee Aoibhinn Ní Shúilleabháin tweeted: “Our new @RoseofTralee_ Maria Walsh is a wonderful representative for both the festival and young women everywhere.”

Ms Walsh’s sexuality is likely to “create some interest, hopefully all positive”, the executive chairman of the long-running festival Anthony O’Gara has said.

Next eruption will be much less devastating to global economy

  

The anticipated eruption of an Icelandic volcano will not have as big an impact on aviation as the ash cloud crisis that struck in the summer of 2010.

As much as €3.5bn was wiped off the value of the global economy back in 2010 as a result of the euruption of the Eyjafjallajokull volcano.

More than 100,000 passenger and freight flights were cancelled as a result of no-fly orders because of fears that an ash cloud that spread from Canada to Siberia would damage aircraft flying through the particles.

The direct cost to the airline sector was around €1.3bn.

Airlines were forced to tear up timetables and wait for the ash to disipate.

But this time around the disruption is likely to be far less, because airlines have adopted a more scientific process to identify dangerous skies.

Back in 2010 80pc of flights were grounded on the worst day of the crisis, but a similar event now would bring significantly fewer cancellations, according to airspace manager Eurocontrol.

“There has been a move towards a more harmonised approach which recognises that decisions to perform flights in airborne contamination such as ash or sand should be made by airlines, based on conclusions of their safety risk assessment,” the Brussels-based organisation said.”This approach significantly reduces the number of flights that would have to be cancelled in the event of another ash crisis.”

After the events of 2010 were repeated on a smaller scale the next year, Eurocontrol began annual ash-crisis exercises and developed an interactive tool to map dust-concentration data from volcanic research centers in London and Toulouse, rather than relying on predictions based on weather forecasts.

Seismic activity around Iceland’s Bardarbunga volcano has prompted authorities to lift the risk-assessment estimate to “orange”, the second-highest level.

Air France-KLM, Delta Air Lines and Deutsche Lufthansa are among carriers on alert for ash, which is a menace to jets because the glass-like particles can damage engines.

In the event of a Bardarbunga eruption, EasyJet plans to test ash-detectors it’s developing with partners including Airbus Group and Nicarnica Aviation.

The technology available today would have resulted in the closure of less than 3pc of the airspace affected in 2010, EasyJet’s Paul Moore said.

Meanwhile:-

Airlines on alert as Iceland raises volcano warnings to red after recent eruption

   

A small volcanic eruption has occurred under Iceland’s Dyngjujokull glacier, prompting authorities to raise the warning code for aviation to red, the highest level, Iceland’s meteorological office said on Saturday.

Airlines are on alert and there are fears that flights may have to be cancelled if the situation worsens.

A Virgin Atlantic flight from London Heathrow to San Francisco was re-routed away from the volcano as a “precautionary measure,” the company said today.

The region, in the centre of the North Atlantic island nation, has already been evacuated due to days of heightened seismic activity there.

“It is believed that a small subglacial lava-eruption has begun under the Dyngjujokull glacier,” the Icelandic Met Office said. “The aviation color code for the Bardarbunga volcano has been changed from orange to red.”

Ash from the eruption of Iceland’s Eyjafjallajokull volcano in 2010 shut down much of Europe’s airspace for six days.

The red code indicates that an eruption is imminent or underway with a significant emission of ash likely.

Brussels-based aviation authority Eurocontrol said that as soon as the volcano had erupted, the Volcanic Ash Advisory Centre in London would produce a regular forecast about the levels of volcanic ash in the atmosphere.

Based on this forecast, civil aviation authorities may issue a notice but it was the responsibility of individual airlines whether they would operate and how they would adapt their flight schedules, Eurocontrol said.

Heart surgery can increase the risk of depression 

  

No one knows what led Robin Williams to kill himself. It wasn’t just one thing, but likely a fatal stew of lingering alcohol and drug addiction, depression, being middle-aged and male, and the prospect of facing Parkinson’s disease.

Rarely mentioned, though, is the open-heart surgery he’d undergone five years ago. But according to the Heart and Stroke Foundation, research suggests up to 40 per cent of Canadians may suffer from depression after heart surgery – a one-two calamity with potentially deadly consequences.

Even when the surgery to replace my aortic valve was a success and my lingering irregular heartbeat had been stabilized – in other words, even after I was “well” – I fell into a deep depression. It took me more than a year to crawl back out, plenty of time to wonder how I could be so much better in my body and so much worse in my mind.

What’s the connection between heart surgery and depression?

One media report following Williams’s death pointed to three possible scenarios: Tiny particles of plaque could break off from the heart and move to the brain, altering its structure; the lowering of body temperature during surgery could cause a change in brain chemistry; or major surgery could lead to post-traumatic stress disorder.

(I’ll go with a fourth, more personal explanation: that stopping your heart in order to replace part of it represents a “gross insult” that your heart resents at some profound and mysterious level.)

What’s not in doubt is that we remain dangerously unaware of the connections between heart surgery, depression and suicide. I need to be cautious here: Researchers can’t prove a direct causality between the three. But there is a demonstrable connection between heart surgery and depression, and an even more obvious one between depression and suicide. So the irresistible inference is that we need to pay more attention to the connection.

Approximately 11 out of 100,000 Canadians commit suicide each year, according to Statistics Canada, with depression the most common illness among those who die by suicide.

This may be shocking, but it shouldn’t be surprising. A recent study by the World Economic Forum revealed that in rich countries like ours, 38 per cent of all illness is mental illness, and when it comes to people of working age, mental illness accounts for half of all illness. Yes, half.

The daunting size of these numbers suggests there’s little we can do about them. But we can. Depression can kill, but it’s not necessarily a fatal disease.

Still, too many of us are ashamed of feeling helplessly sad. So we’re slow to seek treatment, and once we do, it’s tough to find timely help in Canada where less than six per cent of our health-care dollars go to treating all mental illnesses.

Things are changing, especially around the tangled trip-wire of heart surgery, depression and suicide. Toronto’s University Health Network has three staff psychologists who specialize in cardiac psychology. One of them is Dr. Adrienne Kovacs.

She strongly recommends that all cardiac patients enter cardiac rehab programs after their surgery. You’d think everyone would, but the astounding fact is that, according to University Health Network research, almost 80 per cent of patients leave the hospital after heart attack or heart surgery and don’t enter cardiac rehab. So one step is to get more of us into rehab, which is offered at no cost in Canada.

The second idea is to add a strong component of psychological rehab to the process.

“I think cardiac psychology is a decade behind psycho-oncology,” Kovacs says. “You wouldn’t think of building a cancer centre today without building in a program to deal with depression and anxiety. I’d like to think we’re headed that way, too.”

She also points to another major risk around depression that’s not getting the attention it deserves – the fact that depression leaves you much more susceptible to heart disease. According to the Canadian Mental Health Association, “if you have any medical condition, you are far more likely to have depression than someone who doesn’t.”

And, Kovacs says, you have double the risk of another cardiac event if you’re depressed.

American author Andrew Solomon, who has written on depresson and suicide, summed up the situation well in a recent piece for the New Yorker: “Depression is a risk factor for heart disease; open-heart surgery is a risk factor for depression.”

Poor Robin Williams, whose heart was so large. He may have broken ours’ because of all this.

Robots could kill us humans out of kindness

 Says a leading Futurist

  

Robots should be taught to appreciate human value to ensure they do not one day “kill us out of kindness,” a leading futurist has warned.

Nell Watson told The Conference in Malmo, Sweden, that robots will soon reach the stage where they have the same level of cognition as a bumblebee, creatures which are both socially aware and can navigate their way around their environment.

This advancement in artificial intelligence will be the first example of machines exhibiting ‘system one’ thinking used by humans to develop assumptions about the world around them.

Robots currently use ‘system two’ intelligence systems which rely on rules, according to Wired.

Ms Watson said the emergence of system one robots will create “huge change” in society globally. Households will have domestic-help robots and self-driving cars, while professions such as stockbroking, law and medical analysis will be undertaken by robots, not humans.

However, Ms Watson expressed concerns over super-intelligent robots. “I can’t help but look at these trends and imagine how then shall we live?” she said. “When we start to see super-intelligent artificial intelligences are they going to be friendly or unfriendly?”

It would not be enough to teach robots benevolence, as they may decide destroying the human race is the kindest thing they could do.

“The most important work of our lifetime is to ensure that machines are capable of understanding human value,” said Ms Watson. “It is those values that will ensure machines don’t end up killing us out of kindness.”

Her words of caution come after Stephen Hawking warned that while the rapid progress in artificial-intelligence (AI) research could be best thing that happened to humanity, it could also be the worst.

Writing in The Independent, he said that while it’s tempting to dismiss the notion of highly intelligent machines as science fiction, “this would be a mistake, and potentially our worst mistake in history.”

The development of robots also sparked concerns earlier this year when Human Rights Watch warned ‘killer robots’ could “jeopardise basic human rights” as the United Nations held its first ever multinational convention on lethal autonomous weapons systems.

So-called killer robots are autonomous machines able to identify and kill targets without human input. Fully autonomous weapons have not yet been developed but technological advances are bringing them closer to fruition.