Category Archives: Health

Healthy Housing for Ann – Help Needed

 

My friend Ann needs to relocate soon, and really needs an accessible place where exposures to pollutants are minimized as much as possible.

The Plays that Says Here
Painting by Ann Cognito

 

She has written about her needs here:

Hello, I am a friend of Linda’s, who needs to find safe and accommodative housing. My name is Ann Cognito (pen name – my legal surname is Bucknor).

I am an older woman with disabilities and serious long term health issues including severe chronic pain (multiple causes) and severe environmental/chemical intolerances (probably MCS; I’m on a very long list waiting for assessment at the Women’s College Hospital Environmental Health Clinic). I am also agoraphobic, autistic, and have CPTSD.

Before my health deteriorated so much, I used to have a career, and owned my home.  I am very well educated, and an environmental activist. While I was still able to function more, I walked from Calgary to Ottawa with my support/service dog to raise awareness about the climate crisis. 

I am now looking for safe housing, again.

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Are You Feeling Lucky?

Some of us are fairly independent, (no-one is fully independent  in an interdependent society).

Some of us may need helping hands to exist, sometimes in little ways, sometimes in seemingly big ways, which can seem even larger if policies have been created that make solutions much harder to access or create.

Some people’s basic medical needs which make it possible for them to exist are expensive, and these survival needs may seem elitist to others who can’t afford them, because the system is set up to make healthier (and for some, medically necessary) options more expensive and unavailable to everyone, even though everyone would benefit from access to them.

Society has also been conditioned to add on a quiet “they must be doing something wrong if they can’t manage independently”, and “I can’t afford those things that I would like to have too”, or  “I had to work my ass off for those things, why should someone get them for free”.

Are you feeling lucky today that your basic needs are being met?

Here’s a list of questions to consider:

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MCS Awareness Video by Maria Rizzo

This excellent video about MCS/ES was made in 2020 by Maria Rizzo, who was behind the Fragrance Free Revolution, but has not aged a second.  It is just as relevant today as it was then.

The only thing that has changed, is that Maria is no longer with us. She lost her life in December 2020 after being subjected to too many exposures when spending time in hospitals with her father.

She wasn’t able to recover from those exposures, the broken heart of losing her father, and of the world that harms us instead of welcomes us.

The tribute her partner wrote when he informed the community of her passing can be found here.

I miss collaborating with Maria, I miss her creative energy, and her ability to do things in clear and concise ways.

She’d still be with us if hospitals and the rest of the world stopped inflicting unnecessary poisons on us all, and instead respected our human rights as well as their own vulnerability to 24/7 exposures to unnecessary hazardous substances.

Her death is a great loss to the global MCS/ES community.

 Rest in power Maria.

Text: Multiple Chemical Sensitivity Choose People...Not Products. Be Fragrance Free Always No Fragrance or Fragranced Products

What Now?

 

A brief account of a seriously “sensitive” to pollution person living in a society where fragranced and toxic products are more important than lives, where disabled lives are disposeable, where it’s now easy to be euthanized (even for for externally imposed and inflicted) suffering, but not to receive support to remove the causes of suffering, causes and conditions that have been made systemic for many people with disabilities.

I’m not a poet and I know it and I wrote it anyway…

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When Being Quarantined or Isolated and Broke is “Normal”

But Shouldn’t Have to Be

Guest Post by Joanne Cabe

I read a post from someone who was out of work and broke, who wrote that being quarantined and broke, or being an essential worker and working over time, isn’t normal for anyone.

I had to respond. I don’t know that it will do any good on people’s awareness, but this was my try for the day:

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Dear Quarantined and Socially Distanced

I’m sorry you have to experience this, but am glad that it is just a temporary experience for you and your family. I personally know how difficult it is (times  1000 or more).

Hopefully if you actually do become ill, it will pass quickly and there will be no lasting effects.

It is more than likely that most of you will have all the medical assistance, food, toilet paper, and everything else that you will need to have available to deal with basic creature comforts and needs, so it will be just the habitual and a few social comforts that are temporarily disrupted for you.

Did you know that more than a few people are not as fortunate, and experience this kind of segregation full time, with no vacations, with few, if any of the relatively easily accessible (to most) basic amenities? And they aren’t criminals!

Say what?

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Hyperthyroidism in Cats Exposed to Air “Fresheners”, Upholstered Furniture, and New Buildings

Cats are adversely affected by toxic chemicals too

 

… “Higher TDCIPP exposures were associated with air freshener use, houses built since 2005 and cats that prefer to nap on upholstered furniture.” …

The same things cause disabling adverse effects in people with MCS/ES.

Learn more:

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MCS Survey for May 2019

Survey for People with Multiple Chemical Sensitivities (MCS) and/or Environmental Illness and Injury (EII)

Guest post from Mordecai Cohen Ettinger,
The Health Justice Commons

I’ve had MCS for nearly 20 years. I’m a survivor of of the Three Mile Island partial nuclear meltdown, excessive x-ray radiation from medical treatment as a child from a teaching hospital that has since been ongoingly investigated for bioethics violations, and successive exposures to lead and mold from reckless landlords.

I’ve been a community activist for many years, along with a scholar and teacher of Critical Science, Technology and Medicine Studies.

In late 2016, I founded the Health Justice Commons, a non-profit. Our mission is to re-imagine and remake healthcare for our times.

To support efforts for MCS Awareness Month, we want to address the gap of basic research of our experiences.

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Are Natural Fragrances Really Any Better?

Awareness is growing about the harmful effects of synthetic, artificial fragrances. This is with good reason, but now, many people have jumped onto the natural fragrance and essential oil (EO) bandwagons, believing them to be safe alternatives.

Is this a good thing?

Some believe so, after all, what could be wrong with something that’s natural?

It’s time to have a closer look.

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Product Safety Gaps are Actually Canyons

Many people believe that for a product to be sold, it has to first be proven safe.
Unfortunately this is far from the truth.

I ran across a great in depth article in Fast Company about product safety,
and how:

“There are no laws in place to ensure a company’s
product development process results in safe products,

because product safety is entirely voluntary.”

and to echo what I’ve been saying:

“Today, public outcry is doing much of the work
that government agencies cannot.”

More snippets from the very informative and long article follow:

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