Author: storzwalker

The Case for Letting Malibu Burn, by Mike Davis

In light of the gigantic volume of anecdotal evidence regarding some kind of toxin associated with fire retardant usage, I think it’s worth thinking about the broader social and ecological and financial reasons for our policies of fire suppression and war on fire. We may not be able to prevent climate change or most ecological toxins, but what Lisa Petrison calls “fire retardant associated toxin,” (introduced here: https://paradigmchange.me/wp/outdoor-toxins/) is a tragically preventable toxin, produced by misguided short term fire suppression policies that dont even work to stop fires. And the worst thing is that it affects wilderness areas, so one can’t even escape it just by avoiding civilization.

Mike Davis may not know about mold avoidance and FRAT’s health effects, but his understanding of the economic context of development in California–which incentivizes such blatantly stupid policies as “total fire suppression”–helps us to learn what is sustaining these policies that are poisoning people exposed to these toxins. I chose to read this aloud and record it partially to expose an audience that is typically laser focused on mold avoidance related content, to class and sociological criticism that may be atypical for them, and also because, like the Edward Abbey excerpt I recently recorded, it’s very relevant to a deep understanding of ecology and its effects on human health.

So here is the recording https://youtu.be/JgHOzn4xiS4

And here is the text version of the original article: https://longreads.com/2018/12/04/the-case-for-letting-malibu-burn/


Long Covid and environmental toxins–Lake Tahoe 2.0

Is the covid-19 pandemic, complete with the “mysterious” long term symptoms that linger in its wake, a replay of what happened in Lake Tahoe in 1985? Lisa Petrison thinks it may be.

https://paradigmchange.me/wp/coronavirus/

Here’s a link to an post by Lisa Petrison about the covid-19 pandemic and environmental toxins, specifically mold.

I think that while this post is addressing acute covid-19, that it is relevant to Long Covid. It’s possible that environmental factors could be a two way street. Apparently, clinicians and patients are discovering that covid is leading to MCAS (mast cell activation syndrome) in many patients. Mast cell activation syndrome is not a syndrome with a totally fleshed-out etiology, and the ultimate upstream cause is not known. Infection has been known to trigger MCAS, possibly bc Mast cells are part of the innate immune system which is the most primal first defense of the body to infection or toxin or invader if any kind.

(Theo Theoharides with a relevant piece of info about mast cells reacting to mycotoxins)

If long covid involves immune dysregulation and dysautonomia, its possible that environmental toxins or pollutants are contributing to the syndrome. They wouldn’t have to be a first cause, but could be part of a multi factorial feedback loop.

Theo Theoharides is researching links between long covid and mcas already, claiming that mast cell stabilizer luteolin helps with the characteristic brain fog: https://iubmb.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/biof.1726

In fact, infection and “bad air” working in concert would be just like the original CFS outbreak in Lake Tahoe, or at least how proponents of what user “@Hip” on the Phoenixrising forum calls the “dual-factor theory of ME/CFS ” envision it. Immune suppression by something like mycotoxins or cyanotoxins or pollution makes it easier for a viral infection to become more serious, but also the viral infection causes long term immune dysfunction that makes the immune system react with intense inflammatory surges to environmental triggers. It’s a complex problem that would take many many years of air sampling and thorough epidemiology to get to the root of, but it’s important to start talking about it.

And if there is an overlap in the longcovid/environmental illness/ME/CFS venn diagram, then that means a possibility of increased funding for research on “whatever this cluster of syndromes is”, since long term covid symptoms seems to be receiving far, far more funding than ME/CFS, MCAS, or mold illness. See https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-00586-y for what I’m talking about. Of course it may be overly optimistic that the NIH will actually help us, but it could happen almost by accident, with those funds trickling down somehow, or work in a related field illuminating mechanisms relevant to our disease. Even if we can’t count on the benevolence or competence of Walter koroshetz or Francis Collins, we may be able to count on the collective concern and increased spending on covid research to illuminate an older problem.

Additionally, with the knowledge of how covid is spread, a lot more attention has been paid to building ventilation, sort of vindicating the old “miasma” theory of disease, which was seen as mutually exclusive with the germ theory, which I think is a false dichotomy.

Hopefully, Ron Davis at the Open Medicine Foundation, who has received long covid related grants, will eventually warm up to the idea of using funding to research environmental factors and epidemiology of that disease and ME/CFS as well.

Here are a few relevant videos:

https://youtu.be/CtBJN6iOxU0


A New Discovery about Ecological Toxicity Sheds light on ME/CFS epidemic

https://www.wired.com/story/scientists-finally-identify-a-deadly-toxin-thats-been-killing-birds

Erik Johnson and Lisa Petrison have been sounding the alarm for awhile about the possibility of bio toxins (mostly mold or cyanobacteria and their toxins) combining with chemicals in such a way that would make them far more virulent.

They have not gotten nearly enough credit for or attention to these theories, but recent research, including the above, has vindicated them.

The cyanobacteria in the aforementioned article didn’t make the neurotoxin until bromide was present. The source of the bromide wasn’t identified, but could have been pesticides, fracking fluid, or fire retardant.

In the Lake Tahoe outbreak that led to the coining of term and diagnostic category “chronic fatigue syndrome” by the CDC, a cyanobacteria bloom was pointed to by several people, but most prominently by Erik Johnson, as a possible factor in the illness. (https://cfsuntied.net/2014/12/04/and-now-for-something-completely-different/). He noted some additional things that could have combined with this biotoxin, like cloud seeding with silver nanoparticles, and a trichloroethylene spill in the sewer system. None of this was investigated at the time.

Those theories of cyanobacteria or molds combining with chemicals from the environment are similar to what happened in the original study:

“After finding the toxin, the research team picked up speed. They isolated the compound containing bromide and confirmed it was present in the dead birds that showed lesions. They looked at the hydrilla plant itself and discovered it’s able to enrich bromide from the environment, making it even more available to the cyanobacteria. “The concentration of bromide in the plant is much higher than in the water or in the sediment where the plant grows,” says Niedermeyer. “This is kind of intriguing, but we don’t know why the plant does it.”

But in this murder mystery, identifying the culprit isn’t quite the same as ending the story. The team still has a lot of questions. Did the cyanobacteria invade with the hydrilla or was it already in the water? Is the bromide naturally occurring, or could it be coming from man-made sources like coal-fired power plants and flame retardants? Hydrilla is such a persistent pest that people have tried using herbicides like diquat dibromide to kill it off; could that herbicide be the source of the ingredient that creates this toxin? Wilde and Niedermeyer think it’s possible.”

I believe that many scientists strongly underestimate environmental factors in human disease due to a cognitive bias in which we consider ourselves apart from “nature”. This happens to even the smartest scientist. Robert Naviaux (who may be an exception to the trend of scientists ignoring environmental causes of chronic illness) noted that environmental toxins are likely to be a factor in CFS as well as most diseases. (http://naviauxlab.ucsd.edu/the-28th-amendment-project/).

However, no scientist has investigated Erik Johnsons theories, or Lisa Petrisons. I criticize Ron Davis not because I don’t think he’s intelligent. I consider him more intelligent than most scientists and more intelligent than me. But intelligent people can easily miss simple patterns that a less academic person could pick up with somewhat common sense heuristics. The Open Medicine Foundation and Ron davis have the best minds and skillsets and funding to investigate environmental toxins, out of all of the ME/CFS researchers, but they are doing a poor job on it.

I’m currently in a bad flair, so this is a very incomplete post, but I will update it with more scientific theories related to Fire Retardant Associated Toxins, cyanobacteria, and this recent study; as well as my ideas on deep ecology and cognitive bias. In the meantime, here is a video that is an attempt at me understanding the mechanisms behind this bias by scientist such as Ron Davis of Stanford, and the whole Open Medicine Foundation

Here’s a relevant forum thread about various studies related to cyanobacteria and mold and nanoparticles:

https://forums.phoenixrising.me/threads/mold-colonies-aggregate-and-use-environmental-nanoparticles-becoming-more-pathogenic.77128/

Relevant quote: “

https://www.pnas.org/content/115/27/7087

I really can’t overstate how huge this article is. There have been previous articles showing that molds can use nanoparticles in interesting ways in the lab, and separately that nanoparticles themselves can act differently re the immune system than diffsize particles. But this article puts that all together and studies the interaction Btwn molds and various kinds of nanoparticles both in the lab and in samples from the “wild” showing that mold colonies aggregate nanoparticles in a way that alters the molds pathogenicity! The authors suggest that it’s probable or possible that most mold in the wild is doing this, and so models based on standard mycotoxin toxicity from labs, don’t accounts for this behavior. And it’s published in a good journal.”

Hopefully Ron Davis from the OMF/Open Medicine Foundation will investigate this, or perhaps Robert Naviaux. I have contacted them about similar, previous studies but they were uninterested, which find strange, given that Naviaux has emphasized the importance of a plethora of environmental stressors in chronic disease.

Some closing thoughts and quotes from Erik Johnson about the Lake Tahoe epidemic:

https://mobile.twitter.com/erikmoldwarrior/status/1330212416899133448

“I think it’s pretty obvious. Lake Tahoe had a massive cyanobacteria bloom. Everyone downwind had a suppressed immune system. Doctors blamed all the various viruses and bacterial infections they found, but not the cyano bloom. Creating mass “CFS” confusion…

https://mobile.twitter.com/erikmoldwarrior/status/1330652150754467841

And I believe that when one puts all the clues together, it adds up to an atmospheric influx of particulates which was highly concentrated in the “bowl” of Lake Tahoe due to the shape of the Sierra Nevada’s. ‘Mountain Effect” Launching the cyanobacteria bloom”


Concrete Demands for the Open Medicine Foundation and Other ME/CFS researchers

It could be argued that my demands thus far have been too vague. I don’t believe this to be true, but “study environmental factors” could be seen as too vague a demand. Of course, it shouldn’t be for a scientist that has basic knowledge of epidemiology or ecology or biology; but just to not leave these kinds of things open to chance or accusations of vagueness, I have made more specific demands here. As always, interested in feedback.

I think that there are a wide variety of ways that the Open Medicine Foundation could conduct studies on environmental factors, even with their budget which is limited compared to the budget researchers studying more well-known diseases have. Basic epidemiological types of studies, like detailed maps, down to the county level or even neighborhood and house, would be helpful. Looking for geographical clusters. But also air samples with use of mass spectrometry: basically looking for anything that may be different in the air of houses of people with ME/CFS than controls. This could be anything from mold spores, to mycotoxins, to nanoparticulates of various materials. I admit the latter would be a bit more difficult than basic epidemiological study but its worth doing. If Ron Davis were to get in touch with me, or if anyone from the OMF were to, that is what I would desperately urge them to do.

This article is an excellent example of the detail, rigor, persistence, and ability to see second-order effects one needs when looking into possible environmental toxins. I recommend reading the full article, but the big reveal is essentially that while a given cyanobacteria was indeed producing the suspected eagle-killing toxin, it couldn’t do so without a particular chemical compound that is not “natural” and would be present only as a result of human-made pollution.

Another demand is that instead of simply telling patients that their real enemies are the NIH, who don’t fund this research generously enough, the healthy volunteers and employees at the OMF should actually help us with activism. I am bedbound, and I know the NIH is an enemy, but they find it even easier to ignore me/us, than the OMF does. So if the OMF is truly on our side, Ron Davis, and Linda Tannenbaum, and Janet Dafoe, should all be holding signs outside the NIH, or chaining themselves to something inside the building, rather than just pushing off the responsibility to patients who are far too sick to do this work. I am planning some virtual actions against the NIH, but god knows, it’ll take me way longer and more of my precious energy than it would a normal, healthy person.

My original video asking the OMF and Ron Davis to look into this was so long ago, I scarcely remember what I said, but I think it was fairly politely phrased. It didn’t seem to work. I hardly have any hope left, for a variety of reasons. I am sicker than ever. I am out of money. I am strongly considering assisted suicide. But the OMF and the NIH could change all of our lives. I continue to insist that it’s not impolite and that it’s totally warranted to go after the OMF like this. They receive the most research funding of any ME/CFS institution I’m aware of, much of it from patients, and they have refused to look into environmental causes for a long while.


Open Letter to the Open Medicine Foundation, by Jeanette Godby

I may edit this, to say more later, but all I can say is I feel bad for not posting this before and I’m thankful to Jeanette for helping me with this project. And I hope the Open Medicine Foundation and Ron Davis finally choose to listen to Jeanette and me and the many others who have asked them to look into environmental factors in their research.

As I have said in a lot of the recent posts, I am simple too tired to continue being the driving force behind this activist work, but I hope to have planted a seed, and I hope others read this and get in touch with me about doing webdesign or writing copy: storzwalker@gmail.com is the best place to reach me. Let’s try and work out a good plan to make the Open Medicine Foundation finally listen to reason.

By the way, I’d like to add a list of links to relevant websites:

Home

A very important theory of the etiology of this disease

A very important post by Erik Johnson on his nanoparticle/mold combination theory

Very foundational article on outdoor toxins by Lisa Petrison

Recent Letter to the OMF

Recent Letter to the OMF 2

Recent Letter to the OMF 3

Recent Letter to the OMF 4


Open Letter to the Open Medicine Foundation, by Adrian Becker

This was made awhile back, I really should’ve posted it then, but I’ve been doing terribly. Which has made it hard for me to do much useful in terms of theory or political action. But I will continue to try to pressure the Open Medicine Foundation into studying environmental toxins, and craniocervical instability, even though I’m very sick at the moment.


Open Letter to the Open Medicine Foundation, by Thea Storz

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rqRbXK_QVyc

Hi All, this is Admin/OP. I’ve been silent for awhile due to dealing with a lot of the challenges of this illness, but I plan to recover and to do a lot more work a lot better and quicker once I am recovered. And I plan to develop this website far beyond what it is now, and to put lots of pressure on the Open Medicine Foundation to make them research toxic mold/environmental toxins in general, and their role in ME/CFS. For now, just updating the site by posting some of these older videos should be enough to make me feel like I’m doing something.

We all know that the NIH counts on ME/CFS patients to be too weakened by their illness to fight back much, but as controversial as it may be to say I think that that this may be true of the Open Medicine Foundation too. They may be happy to not have to deal with more angry protestors–only one real thorn in their side–the thoroughly recovered, and basically fully healthy, but angry Erik Johnson. Imagine if there were many more patients like him! They would have to crumble to their demands. I’m trying to make the virtual version of that real, but an IRL version would be nice too, so if any of you are well enough to protest at Stanford, please consider it.

By the way, i’ll be adding some external links to, to sites that I think deserve the attention, if I remember to do it in between disturbing hypersomnia episodes (where I’m sleeping over 20 hours at a time).

(for SEO, some tags, lets see if this works: Open Medicine Foundation, Ron Davis, Open Medicine Foundation, OMF, CCI, Craniocervical Instability, Mold Illness, Toxic Mold, nanoparticles, MCAS)


An Open Letter to the Open Medicine Foundation, by Andrew Cramer

Thanks for this letter, Andrew. This really demonstrates the necessity of studying outdoor toxins as well as indoor mold, and the extent to which they encroach on even locations that we think of as pristine wilderness, like the Rockies. I’m hoping that the Open Medicine Foundation will look into this as a result of this video series.


An Open Letter to the Open Medicine Foundation, by Kaylin Jones

Thank you Kaylin for helping me with this project. Every one of these stories illuminates how much we need the research community to hear us. I hope that with enough stories like yours we can break through the floodgates and make the research establishment, and in particular the Open Medicine Foundation, listen.


Open Letter to the Open Medicine Foundation

I’m making this site out of desperation–the desperation of someone with a severe illness that knows a cure is possible if those who have the power to do so act decisively. It’s desperation, but a reasoned desperation.

This is my message:

I have started out meekly, just asking Ron Davis, a reknowned scientist, to look into the environmental aspects of ME/CFS. But I got no response. I felt powerless. The NIH and CDC has failed us, and I will do as much as my sick brain and body can to reach them as well, but even researchers that are working on this illness are not listening. I want to create a movement to make them listen.

Please watch this video. Please read more on this issue. And then please contact the Open Medicine Foundation, on their facebook or Twitter pages, or at this email address, and ask them to help us canaries.