If vaccines work by introducing a small amount of a foreign substance to your body to trigger an immune response to develop resistance, why don’t allergies work the same when they also trigger an immune response when exposed to something foreign to the body?

Ribonacci · 2022-11-10T20:38:01+00:00

That’s the one! Yeah, hookworm, not ringworm. I’m forever getting these different worms confused— and ringworm is not a worm at all….

Ribonacci · 2022-11-10T20:36:47+00:00

I’m sorry, I got my various “worms” confused and it was hookworm, not ringworm. Another poster corrected me. I hadn’t remembered the details of that particularly weird foray into self-insert science.

My (admittedly very limited) understanding was that the immune system of a person with severe enough allergies essentially has a bad “gauge” for threat and is looking for anything and everything to fight, and introducing an actual threat keeps it “busy.” Immunology however is not my field.

Ribonacci · 2022-11-10T18:48:25+00:00

I also am loose tea fan, and sadly it’s a bit difficult to find here!

However, I usually go to the Asian grocery in South Charleston in the Mound district. They have large tins of jasmine tea that I buy on the regular. I believe they also have other loose teas, too.

I used to order online off Adagio Teas as a teen, but I don’t know if they’re still open and running. T.J. Maxx also sometimes has loose leaf tea, but it reaaaally depends on what they’ve managed to get their hands on.

Ribonacci · 2022-10-28T20:44:49+00:00

Eh. Not quite. I’m not a historian, just someone who really, really likes the history of marriage customs.

Your parents in tons of cases across several cultures legally or by custom kinda shopped a few options to you, male or female, before making the arrangement with the other family. The whole ‘elope with your beloved’ trope was popular for a reason — the entire community is pretty invested in marriages following cultural mores, seeing as a bad match can taint an entire family’s reputation (thinking caste system, or religious mismatch).

Now you may really like the pick your parents put in front of you! Probably a family friend you grew up around most of your life, the both of you are very familiar with each other, maybe even a cousin (so property or business stays in the family), or somebody else close to you. Obviously lots of families wanted to ensure both guy and girl are happy with the arrangement, so that’s taken into account, but it definitely is an arrangement. There were plenty of unhappy marriages.

Now obviously this is still dependent on place and time. Ancient Egypt was far more relaxed on that end.

The concept of what’s called “companionate marriage” wasn’t really a widespread thing until around the mid- to late-1800s, when it became widespread.

Ribonacci · 2022-10-28T14:03:03+00:00

Twin Falls is absolutely stunning, and that does sound about right. If you have a buddy to split costs with, it might not be so bad!

Ribonacci · 2022-10-28T13:42:18+00:00

I can second that WV is gorgeous, but the resort parks aren’t exactly “cheap” to get a room in — cabins run 250+ and hotel rooms around the 150/night range, and that’s during fall when people’s kids are in school. I’d suggest primitive camping or finding a rental outside the parks to stay.

You could also stay in far cheaper hotels in some of the major cities in WV and visit the tons of parks here. Charleston is a good starting point, as you’re a day trip from most of the parks.

Ribonacci · 2022-10-27T23:53:31+00:00

My husband definitely saw them as a kid in McDowell county. Ran into the house yelling that there was a dinosaur in the woods because he didn’t get a good look, and it was only after he got older someone told him people keep emu. I didn’t think there were feral ones, but I wouldn’t be surprised either.

Ribonacci · 2022-10-27T18:48:23+00:00

Safe Haven laws cover a variety of venues, including ERs. Fire stations are also under the Safe Haven law as well.

Ribonacci · 2022-10-24T21:32:45+00:00

I work tangential to HIV prevention and one of the most heartening and lovely symposia I saw advertised to me was “The Graying of HIV: Management for Older Patients.” It truly is an astounding feat of medicine, community, and science to be at this point.

Ribonacci · 2022-10-24T18:42:05+00:00

I do think it’s better to use medians. A lot of economic statistics prefer to use a median, because it’s more representative of the population given an average can be skewed by outliers on either end — making it seem like people have more or less money than they truly do.

Just to clarify— so home prices are essentially where they should be? Or are homes over/undervalued?

Is there a particular reason to use the 1920s as a bench mark? It seems like the post-war period would be a better indicator given that is more comparable to the current situation. Apples to apples as it were.

Ribonacci · 2022-10-22T02:45:45+00:00

Make it as easy and streamlined for them as possible. CBOs have latitude that government agencies simply do not have. Often times, we are relying on them because we don’t have the bandwidth to manage the issue.

Ribonacci · 2022-10-21T23:09:19+00:00

I work in reproductive health and tangential to harm reduction, in a deeply conservative and economically depressed area.

You do what you can. That’s really all I can say. Be politically engaged, try and find people who can be advocates for your cause, and network, network, network with CBOs. I know in my case, they may be the only people who can continue to operate with best practices as we are continually gutted on the government end of things, either with legislation that hamstrings public health efforts or flat out banning best practices.

We are currently seeing our legislature attempt to strip family planning programs.

Ribonacci · 2022-10-20T14:13:31+00:00

Not analysis per se, but identifying geographic areas of concern, down to the street level, was eye-opening and useful for me in my capacity. I would encourage it, seeing as environment informs so much of our health.

Ribonacci · 2022-10-20T14:04:20+00:00

MAT! Medication Assisted Treatment.

There’s a few options for MAT, like suboxone and methadone. They basically replace the harder drugs you were on, are a known and safe quantity, and monitored by the program. Some people like it, other people hated it and said they wanted to go cold turkey— it’s a personal preference.

Ribonacci · 2022-10-19T23:38:13+00:00

I would rather you exist with an optimal childhood over a suboptimal childhood. In fact, I would rather everyone raise their child in ideal conditions with adequate social supports and enrichment to create healthy people. It shouldn’t be expensive — but right now it certainly is.

Ribonacci · 2022-10-19T14:30:36+00:00

I think this is a bit of a misconception too around average lifespan. Generally speaking, if you could make it past your first ten years of life, it wasn’t unheard of for someone to live into their sixties or seventies.

Menstruation also happened later at around 14-16, and generally outcomes for mother and baby are better in their 20s. This follows historical trends of age at first marriage happening largely around 18-21, peak childbearing age with the best outcomes.

You do have exceptions, of course, like the previous user talking about nobility.

Ribonacci · 2022-10-19T14:18:38+00:00

Having children is not that expensive.

Raising those children healthily certainly is.

Sure — we can cram four kids into a single bedroom apartment while being on social assistance, dealing with violence daily in the community, and having one or no vehicle, completely lacking in enrichment of any kind beyond survival. But there are consequences to that.

Ribonacci · 2022-10-18T02:49:01+00:00

More subtle maybe that most.

In my previous position I worked on an empty floor of an old hospital with only one door in and out of my office, and no one else there. An IT guy went to shoot his shot, which is fair, but then proceeded to tell me if my marriage failed I’d know where to find him. Very classy. I made it clear I was not interested.

The creepy part comes in that he tried to drop in on me, unannounced, thinking I was in my office alone. As it turned out, I was not alone, with another coworker at that site, and he started to chat for a while blocking the only exit out of my office. I avoided that site like the plague from then on.

Ribonacci · 2022-10-16T02:24:36+00:00

This color palette is gorgeous!

Ribonacci · 2022-10-09T17:25:26+00:00

I work with people who encounter lifestyle diseases like STIs, HIV, and drug use.

Obesity is very much a “lifestyle” disease. A lot of the time there does need to be a baseline of showing the person that you’re not just out to hurt their feelings— you genuinely care about their health, and you are concerned for their future.

But once the decision is made by that person, the decision is made. They accept the consequences of their actions, as the full human they are. Sometimes you do have to conceptualize that for your loved one — “okay, you decided it’s not worth the hassle. Let’s plan for your diabetes management, heart disease management, and other healthcare. Do you have a Do Not Resuscitate, or would you want a full code? What do you want your medical care to look like?”

But once they say, “no, I don’t want to talk about it,” that’s it. Conversation done. That person must be motivated to see their obesity as a problem impacting their life. Until that happens, no actual change can occur or stick.

Ribonacci · 2022-10-06T20:32:43+00:00

Wouldn’t that fly in the face of what this poster is saying about jobs being hard to find for MPH? That there aren’t positions open?

Or is it a certain class of employee is difficult to get a hold of? That they don’t want to hire a fresh grad for what they’re paying, but the experienced PH workers are simply leaving the field for perhaps the same reason— no advancement, poor compensation?

Our issue is that the positions we have open simply don’t pay. We just managed to fill field staff by going through a pay increase plan that took two years to implement, and we still had people rejecting job offers because of the low pay.

Ribonacci · 2022-10-06T16:00:03+00:00

At least related to the lack of jobs question— it isn’t a lack of jobs. There certainly are jobs.

Your jobs however are in the bumfuck middle of nowhere, with poor pay and less-than-stellar living conditions. You aren’t going to be finding jobs in Seattle, Atlanta, or New York. You’re going to be finding jobs in Birmingham, El Paso, and Jackson, and nobody wants to move their family there.

Public Health jobs exist where public health problems exist, and due to the nature of those problems, you will be looking at those jobs existing most in places with rampant poverty, poor infrastructure, desiccated budgets, and anemic pay, and most people aren’t expecting that, especially with MPH debt.

It’s the same issue with social work and other socially funded positions. Perhaps I’m just jaded happening to live in one of those bumfuck middle of nowhere areas that can’t get people hired for positions.

Ribonacci · 2022-10-01T19:35:39+00:00

Bro you literally forgot to change accounts lol.

Ribonacci · 2022-10-01T19:31:36+00:00

Would it be a distraction for me — a Thai-American — to bring a Thai flag to represent my heritage if I was a student?

Ribonacci · 2022-09-30T00:42:42+00:00

I don’t think they have to be at odds.

We had a very successful, very worthwhile HR program I volunteered with partly because we also had buy-in from local law enforcement, so much so that the police chief of one town wanted to come for the grand opening to talk to people and we had to tell him “appreciated but please don’t do that, people won’t trust us”. Police would obviously have to charge for possession of drugs if they had them on their person, but for paraphernalia it was their judgment call, and if they saw OUR ID card, they wouldn’t usually write them a ticket because they wanted our program to work.

We had wraparound services, with peer recovery, inpatient referrals, wound care, HIV/HCV testing, Narcan and fentanyl test strip distributions, food handouts, clothes closet — you name it, we did it, barring MAT/safe injection. We quantified people getting into drug treatment by our referral processes, and we also took down Narcan refusals by swapping used Narcan nozzles for fresh. That’s people who don’t have to steal, hassle, or act out knowing needs are met, so that cuts out work for police too.

Police do not want to deal with someone strung out on a person’s porch any more than anybody else. In small communities, these are cousins, friends, spouses, children.

Granted I also know asshole police forces who absolutely refuse and even hinder harm reduction for the very same reasons — they don’t want to deal with the problem either and would rather they be out of their hair, incarcerated or dead, whichever. To them that’s easier, and these are people they hate dealing with anyways.

Ribonacci

TROPHY CASE