[Stoves] Adolescent females killed by WHO (Re: Crispin, Philip)

Roger Samson rogerenroute at yahoo.ca
Thu Jun 1 10:54:10 CDT 2017


I was looking at the data  also and was shocked also how they cherry-picked data and use it out of context. The drownings of young men in India were a bigger problem than respiratory problems of young women. How they  link the respiratory deaths of the women to smoke from stoves is another reach as you said Nikhil.  I do not know if they are deliberately spreading fake news or  if it was an accident. If it was an accident they should withdraw the press release or make a clarification. 

regards
Roger
--------------------------------------------
On Thu, 6/1/17, Nikhil Desai <pienergy2008 at gmail.com> wrote:

 Subject: [Stoves] Adolescent females killed by WHO (Re: Crispin, Philip)
 To: "Discussion of biomass cooking stoves" <stoves at lists.bioenergylists.org>, "Philip Lloyd" <plloyd at mweb.co.za>, "Crispin Pemberton-Pigott" <crispinpigott at outlook.com>
 Cc: "Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves" <info at cleancookstoves.org>
 Received: Thursday, June 1, 2017, 8:32 AM
 
 Crispin, Philip: 
 
 Please recognize that WHO has a gratuitous war against solid
 fuels simply because a house of cards has been built on no
 data on fuel/stove types, paltry emission, concentration,
 and exposure measurements, and patently ludicrous
 assumptions. 
 
 All of these have passed certain standards of practice that
 have been accepted by the public health community (or nobody
 bothers). The most recent GBD 2015 paper in Lancet (link
 posted by Crispin; I have some notes on it) has a couple of
 nice tables and figures about how these standards of
 evidence and methods have been met. It may help to go
 through these in a dispassionate way and try to construct a
 biomedical basis of association between fuel use and disease
 incidence to realize just how illogical the whole enterprise
 is. 
 
 Therefore, it does not matter if you speak of kerosene or
 ethanol. Deaths from fuel use are concocted BY ASSUMPTION.
 Solid fuels are ASSUMED to be uniformly DIRTY FUELs. This is
 "fact-free" science. 
 
 Let's look at this claim - "“the leading cause of
 death for younger adolescent girls aged 10–14 years is
 lower respiratory infections, such as pneumonia – often a
 result of household air pollution from cooking with solid
 fuels.”
 
 A. How many females? WHO press release More
 than 1.2 million adolescents die every year, nearly all
 preventable says, 
 
 
 Data in the report, Global accelerated action for
 the health of adolescents (AA-HA!): Guidance to support
 country implementation, reveal stark differences in
 causes of death when separating the adolescent group by age
 (younger adolescents aged 10–14 years and older ones aged
 15–19 years) and by sex.
 ...........The picture for girls differs
 greatly. The leading cause of death for younger
 adolescent girls aged 10–14 years are lower
 respiratory infections, such as
 pneumonia – often a result of indoor air
 pollution from cooking with dirty
 fuels. 
 
 Female adolescent deaths in the age group
 10-19 from LRI numbered 36, 337 in 2015. The
 corresponding number for males 10-19 was 36,018, negligibly
 lower than that for females.
 
 To put the number in perspective, the
 main report's summary - Global
 Accelerated Action for the Health of Adolescents
 (AA-HA!)Guidance to Support Country Implementation –
 Summary  - shows females age group 10-14 deaths due to
 LRI as 7.3 per 100,000 population, not surprising.
 Nowhere can I find the absolute number for females 10-14
 deaths from LRIs, but it seems to be less than 15,000. 
 
 So the accurate statement could be "An estimated 15,000
 girls aged 10 to 14 died of lower respiratory infections,
 including pneumonia, in 2015. Exposure to pollution from
 household cooking has been established as a risk factor for
 such illnesses. "
 
 I have a problem even with this, because there is no factual
 basis for such assertions. Death data for youth in the
 developing world are just as poor as those for the elderly
 if not more so. (Varies by cause -- accidents and murders
 are one thing, suicides and LRI another.) 
 B. How are they dying? 
 The main report - Global
 Accelerated Action for the Health of Adolescents
 (AA-HA!)Guidance to Support Country Implementation Annexes
 1–6 and Appendices I–IV only says, "Risk factors associated with chronic
 respiratory diseases, including asthma include tobacco use,
 second-hand tobacco smoke; other indoor pollutants; outdoor
 air pollutants; allergens; and occupational agents."
 
 This is standard IHME language and I have no objection to
 it. But note that "other indoor pollutants" and
 "outdoor air pollutants" are mentioned, without
 any specific reference to "dirty fuels". 
 
 Writers of WHO press releases just threw in gratuitous
 language to please UN Foundation (a major donor to WHO and
 contracted to run GACC). 
 Horror, horror. The reality of science in
 Washington and Geneva.  Money sitting in
 Seattle. 
 
 C. Why bother? 
 
 
 THE
 GLOBALSTRATEGYFOR WOMEN’S,CHILDREN’S
 ANDADOLESCENTS’HEALTH(2016-203 0)
 
 
 Cites a 2006 WHO Report to claim,
 "Globally, more than 3 billion people cook with
 wood, dung, coal and other solid fuels on open fires or
 traditional stoves. If 50 per cent of people who use solid
 fuels indoors gained access to cleaner fuels,
 health-system cost savings would amount to US$165 million
 annually. Gains in health-related productivity would range
 from 17 to 62 per cent in urban areas and 6 to 15 per cent
 in rural areas."
 
 That is something I can connect to, instead of aDALY
 blather. 
 
 But then I see meaningless platitudes in "Energy and
 Environment", something WHO should develop better
 skills in: 
 
 "• Reduce household
 and ambient air pollution through the increased use of clean
 energy fuels and technologies in the home (for cooking,
 heating, lighting)• Take steps to mitigate
 and adapt to climate changes that affect the health of
 women, children and adolescents• Eliminate
 non-essential uses of lead (e.g. in paint) and mercury (e.g.
 in health care and artisanal mining) and ensure the safe
 recycling of lead- or mercury-containing
 waste• Reduce air pollution and climate
 emissions and improve green spaces by using lowemissions
 technology and renewable energy"
 Who appointed WHO as the world's
 central planner? 
 
 Or the world's mommy? 
 Just recite "clean energy", "low
 emissions", "renewable", "mitigate and
 adapt to climate changes". Why bother thinking who is
 going to do this how? 
 
 D/. Where are adolescent dying of what? 
 
 By far the largest burden of LRI is in
 Sub-Saharan Africa (p. 19), and slightly lower than what is
 euphemistically called "interpersonal violence" in
 the Americas. 
 
 Go figure. WHO is not going to utter a word about the high
 murder rate of American (north, central and south) youth,
 but has to put in its platitudes about "dirty
 fuels". Once hysteria sets in... 
 
 This is environmental imperialism plain and simple. WHO has
 been hijacked by ideologues of "clean fuels" in
 the name of preventable premature deaths. How ludicrous.
 They don't have a leg to stand on. 
 
 I think Dr Chan is leaving her successor a
 mind-boggling agenda creep. 
 
 What next - "clean cookstoves" to be added to
 the LIFE-SAVING
 COMMODITIESFOR WOMEN AND CHILDREN 
 Nikhil
 
 
 
 ------------------------------
 ------------------------------ ------------
 Nikhil Desai(India +91) 909 995 2080
 Skype: nikhildesai888
 
 
 
 On Thu, Jun 1, 2017 at
 4:05 PM, Crispin Pemberton-Pigott <crispinpigott at outlook.com>
 wrote:
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Dear Philip
 
 
 
 
 
 Is there any evidence for other fuels, and stoves of the
 base superior kind?
 
 
 
 
 
 I fear that ethanol cooking is a similar risk because there
 are so many crummy ethanol combustors, particular ethanol
 gel stoves. ‎Nothing is 'automatically
 clean'. 
 
 
 
 
 
 Chemical pneumonia from evaporated paraffin
 (stoves that overheat the fuel in the tank) is well known
 and if the current standard SANS1906 is adhered to,
 controllable. 
 
 
 
 
 
 For those not familiar with the risk, poor
 combustion of paraffin can directly cause ill health but the
 greater risk is overheating the fuel and evaporating it
 directly into the room. 
 
 
 
 
 
 Where people use a paraffin wick stove for
 space heating, the difference between a good and bad stove
 is very clear. A well designed stove emits very little other
 than CO2 and water vapour. 
 
 
 
 
 
 Regards 
 
 Crispin 
 
 
 
 
 
 “the leading cause of death for
 younger adolescent girls aged 10–14 years is lower
 respiratory infections, such as pneumonia – often a result
 of household air pollution
 from cooking with solid fuels.” [Emphasis
 added]
  
 We have some fairly solid
 evidence that respiratory infections were endemic in
 households cooking and heating on kerosene-fuelled wick
 stoves; and of minimal similar health effects when clean
 stoves were fuelled
  with solid fuel (wood). 
  
 I think it is time for the GACC
 to recognize that it is the fuel/stove combination that
 leads to indoor air pollution, not just the fuel.
  
 Prof Philip Lloyd
 Energy Institute,
 CPUT
 SARETEC, Sachs
 Circle
 Bellville
 Tel 021 959 4323
 Cell 083 441 5247
 PA Nadia 021 959
 4330
  
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