To Fat To Kill?

I just found this story to be so bizarre and ridiculous that I had to post something about it. A man from Florida is accused of killing his son in law in New Jersey but he says he couldn't have possibly pulled off the killing and get away. Why you ask? He says he's too fat.

Edward Ates of Florida says that the side effects from him being obese make it nearly impossible for him to have climbed a staircase, shoot his son in law, and then make the speedy get away.

This just seems so insanely bizarre to me that I am almost baffled by it. The first thing I thought about when I read this was when some of my friends come up with a ridiculous idea and you think about it, and then you go "hey, that's just crazy enough to work!"

But snap back to reality here. Are we honestly living in a world now that someone is really using the defense that their obesity renders them incapable of committing a crime? I am a firm believer that anyone, no matter who you are, can potentially kill someone. No matter who or what, if they snap one day, they'll do it. But the only way I am going to believe that someone is too obese to commit a crime is if they are so obese that they cannot physically get out of their house. And even then, they could potentially commit a crime without leaving their house!

Do you think that claiming you are too obese to commit a crime should even be merited in a court of law? Tell me what you think.

Flu Shot Can Cause Some Major Problems

It's been a little while since I wrote an entry on here basically because I've been sick with the flu. It seems almost like fate that I found this story online happening at the same time that I got sick. Unfortunately this story is quite a sad one. A 25 year old cheerleader for the Washington Redskins went for her flu shot back in August and now suffers from what the doctors claim is a 1 in a million side effect from getting the flu shot.
Desiree Jennings now suffers from a condition called dystonia. Dystonia causes certain muscle groups and the nerves that innervated them to either become disabled or misfire at any given time similar to a seizure. The disease causes her to be unable to walk forward and causes her to suffer from random seizures. Although she cannot walk forward she can walk backwards perfectly fine. She can also run forwards with a normal gate. And while she runs forward her inability to speak normally disappears and she speaks without any sort of impediment. The movie below will show you what I am trying to explain.


This story really strikes a cord with me and it's extremely sad to see an individual who is so young and had so much going for her and gets knocked down by something as simple as a flu shot. I know doctors say that vaccines are perfectly safe and I believe they are too but to think that this could happen to anyone is just scary. I don't think words can really describe how this story makes me want to react and it really is just a terrible side effect to something that is supposed to make a person healthier in life but clearly this was not the case. It makes me question whether or not I want to get a flu shot again. What do you guys think?


*UPDATE*
I did some more reading on this topic and found out that Desiree now is unable to move her neck and tongue which makes it extremely difficult for her to communicate however with the help of 2 friends who gave her a jump start from walking to running, she successfully completed an 8k road race in Virginia a last week.

Tattoos- Health risk or just a myth?

In light of getting a new tattoo on Tuesday I decided to make a post on whether or not tattoos are a health risk. I'm sure most of you have heard rumors about how tattoo shops are dirty, unsanitary, and just plain gross. However, from my experience going in and out of tattoo parlors over the last 5 years now, I can tell you this accusation is far from the truth. Don't believe me? See for yourself... most parlors look like this or like this. Most of the time the front of shop looks like a retro style living room while the tattoo work station in the back resembles something that looks more like a surgical room at a hospital. Typically the tattoo artists work station will have a stainless steel counter top or a marble counter top to reduce the risk of germs harboring on the surface.

Now that we know tattoo shops aren't a slum bucket like most people think, we can move on to the health risks. It sounds like a broken record when I hear my mother comment about how I'm going to contract Hepatitis from getting tattoos. But did you know that you run less of a chance of getting Hepatitis from a tattoo shop than you do going to the dentist? The Center for Disease Control reports that you are actually more than 300% likely to contract Hepatitis from a dentist office than you are from a tattoo parlor! 300% more likely!!! Even more shocking than that, since tattoos started to be track in 1985, not one case of HIV has been linked to tattoos but 7 cases of HIV contraction have been associated with dentist offices. These numbers make me question whether or not I want to go back for my 6 month cleaning.

Tattoos and individuals who bear tattoos are constantly under the microscope in society today however they are slowly becoming more accepted. What ever the matter I can safely say that yes there are health risks that come with tattoos (i.e. infection and Hepatitis) but I they do not pose a threat for horrible diseases like HIV that they are believed to cause.

http://www.tattooartist.com/health.html

A few weeks ago I was told that the father of one of my good friends in high school was diagnosed with stage 4 non-small cell lung cancer. Sadly stage 4 is so advanced that all you can do is prolong life as much as you can and improve the quality of life as much as you can.

There is a walk being put on in Boston on November 7th by the LUNGevity Foundation to help raise money for lung cancer research in hopes to find a cure. Unfortunately, I won't be able to attend this walk but I was hoping that some of you might by chance be able to attend. Even if you can't attend please consider donating toward the cause. Even the smallest amount can help. Thanks!

Comedians Take on Serving Sizes

After talking in class today about serving sizes I remembered seeing a comedian on TV who talked about serving sizes in one of his shows. What he says is pretty funny and extremely true. Check it out!

HPV Vaccine a Possible Killer?

So I just read this story a few minutes ago and as far as I know there are no other cases like this to have happened. Please correct me if I am wrong. A 14 year old girl from the UK died after receiving routine vaccination treatments for the sexually transmitted infection known as Human Papillomavirus.

Teenage girls from the UK were involve in an immunization program where they receive the HPV vaccine. Shortly after one of the girls receive a vaccine treatment she started experiencing unusual signs and symptoms. The girl died shortly after.

There's not much information regarding whether the vaccine cause the girls death but this causes a few red flags to pop up for me.

Vaccines are supposed to be a safety measure that we take in order to avoid becoming ill with the "real thing". So why is it that this vaccine was examined to the fullest extent to ensure that nothing was wrong with it? Not only has one girl died but others are experiencing similar signs and symptoms!

If I am going to be getting a vaccine I want to know that it is 100% safe for me to get it and I feel that this vaccine that was being given was not 100% safe.

What do you guys think?

Doctor Assisted Suicide

I'd like to talk about an extremely controversial subject today; doctor assisted suicide. Some of you may remember back in the late 90's when Jack Kevorkian, also known as Dr. Death was sentenced to prison for second degree murder for helping terminally ill patients who were not physically able to end their own life, to end their lives.

Here we are 10 years later and the issue of doctor assisted suicide had come back up in the news. Since 1998 when Kevorkian was convicted, doctor assisted suicide has exploded from less than roughly 5 cases per year to nearly 200 cases per year!
These numbers are staggering! As you can see from the chart above, most of the countries are even in their numbers but Germany is "leading the way" and I use that term loosely because this may not be the best topic to lead the way in.

I am usually a person who can take one side or the other on an argument and have a fairly good reason for taking that side. However this is an issue where I am not too sure either way. I can take the side of the patient where they may have a life that is less than favorable to them and they simply can't take it anymore and want to die. But I don't think that it is morally right for a doctor to be the one who administers the "final blow". I feel that there could be personal bonds with the patient that may sway an opinion in certain directions to allow the suicide or to deny it. Personally I am just not sure about this one.

So tell me, do you think it should be legal for a doctor to assist and allow a terminally ill patient who cannot physically end their own life to do so or is there more to the issue?