[Stoves] report with dissapointing results from cleaner cookstoves (Andrew) - Malawi

Wed Dec 7 14:27:59 CST 2016

Ah, another report on "scientific" advance. I see scientists regressing to
infantilism.

Andrew asks, "Is it because there are other vectors of the  illnesses
linked to poverty?" (Do Smoke-free Stoves Really Save Lives
<http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-38160671>, BBC News 7 December 2016)

Possibly, as Roger has pointed out.

Any more details depend on the price. I have been surprised so often over
the last 15-20 years, I stopped being surprised.

For one, the Malawi study "was expected to show children are less likely to
die of pneumonia if they live in a home where food is cooked on a
smoke-free stove rather than an open fire."

Ah, forget about "other vectors". The very premise is presumptuous beyond
common sense. What does "live in a home" mean, and what does "less likely
to die of pneumonia" mean? Where do these pundits get their baseline data
and the methods of testing likelihoods for different samples?

Kevin Mortimer says,""Exposure to household air pollution is a problem of
poverty. If you're not poor, you're not exposed."

What nonsense. Emissions from uncontrolled combustion of fuels occur within
"homes" as well as other cooking places, and they spread "outdoors" where
exposures can occur to the poor as well as non-poor.

They
<http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(16)32507-7/fulltext>
set out with an untenable, ill-defined hypothesis and put 8500+ Malawian
households under the researchers' eyes (no data on researchers' eyes or
brains) - "10 543 children from 8470 households contributed 15 991
child-years of follow-up data to the intention-to-treat analysis." They
"found no evidence".

It is amazing that the first photo in the Beeb story is of a closed smokey
kitchen with open fire, and the other is of a one-pot "improved stove"
OUTSIDE the home. Maybe Gill wanted to allege that even outdoor cooking
with improved stove does not yield any measurable health benefits.

********

BBC wonders *"Where does this leave a huge UN-backed project.. **"*.

Depends on what the meaning of "backed" is and what the meaning of UN is.
Yes, some unrecognized Uber Nuts - otherwise known as GACC, a project with
no legal personhood - have been feeding "Annual Reports", quarterly
reports, CEO's golden words to the gullible media, but that amounts to glib
propaganda, nothing else. Now that Antonio Gueterres is at the helm of the
United Nations, he should formally resign from this gang o
<http://cleancookstoves.org/about/our-team/>f Hillary lovers who have
nothing better to do than host fine-wine-and-dine opportunities. Now that
the South Lawn is beyond reach after 44 days, I would be happy to serve
them wood-fired pizzas at Comet Ping Pong, and measure their pneumonias and
premature deaths. Beer for $10 a pint.

Wait a minute! BBC Action <http://www.bbc.co.uk/mediaaction/about/funding> is
a NEW IMPLEMENTER PARTNER
<http://cleancookstoves.org/about/news/11-27-2016-new-partners-november-2016.html>
of GACC and is funded by the same delusional donors who fund GACC (DfID,
Govt of Norway), some more (US State Dept, EU) including some private
companies (BMB Mott McDonald, DAI) who do "consulting" (which can mean
expertise cooked to recipe).

And, of course, by those saviors of the world looking for Golden Pills and
fund the NIH/CDC kind of poverty porn by, ahem, "research", viz. Bill and
Melinda Gateses.

DfID also funded this "study", passed off as "hard science" to those
gullible enough. Once you imbibe the GBD brew and get all mushy-headed,
"hard science" is incarnated in BBC stories.

Blind pundits parroting platitudes to the public.

Nikhil

>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 5
> Date: Wed, 7 Dec 2016 17:07:06 +0000 (UTC)
> From: Roger Samson <rogerenroute at yahoo.ca>
> To: Discussion of biomass cooking stoves
>         <stoves at lists.bioenergylists.org>
> Subject: Re: [Stoves] report with dissapointing results from cleaner
>         cookstoves
> Message-ID: <2117102759.1561055.1481130426403 at mail.yahoo.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
>
> Hi Andrew and all
>
> I would have to read in more details the study and causes of pneumonia.
> However it is known that most forms of pneumonia are linked to viral or
> bacterial infections that spread from person to person.
>
> Its likely that indoor air pollution is not a primary cause of pneumonia
> its weak immune systems and crowded living conditions ( like TB).  If you
> look at community priorities indoor air pollution is not high on their
> priority list compared to accessing better nutrition and health care.  You
> might be better off to ventilate houses or work on improving food security
> and nutrition in communities than installing expensive cook stoves if your
> target is pneumonia.
>
>
> regards
>
> Roger Samson
>
>
> --------------------------------------------
> On Wed, 12/7/16, Andrew Heggie <aj.heggie at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>  Subject: [Stoves] report with dissapointing results from cleaner
> cookstoves
>  To: "Discussion of biomass cooking stoves" <stoves at lists.bioenergylists.
> org>
>  Received: Wednesday, December 7, 2016, 11:45 AM
>
>  http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-38160671
>
>  It's a surprising result and I would like to know why the cleaner  stoves
> used did not return a lower incidence of respiratory infections.
>
>  Is is because there are other vectors of the? illnesses linked to poverty?
>
>  The two? good results were that the cleaner stoves appear to be
> safer  and more economical to use.
>
>  AJH
>
> -----------------------
>
>
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