Results tagged “disease”

The same disease that caused the Irish Potato Famine in the 1840s is spreading with an “explosive” rate of infection through Northeast tomato farms. Called "late blight" disease, the fungus causes white-mold-encircled gray spots on leaves, blackened stems, wilting and death. Organically grown crops are particularly vulnerable, and some farmers in Rhode Island have plowed tomato fields under at the first sign of blight. Vegetable pathologist Meg McGrath tells Newsday why everyone should probably be hoarding tomatoes: "People need to realize this is probably one of the worst diseases we have in the vegetable world." Yikes, this makes last year's Salmonella tomato scare seem like a leisurely Bloody Mary brunch!

It was bound to happen: YouTube-itis, or more accurately "Truman Show Delusion," which is what doctors are calling the malady that has patients claiming they're starring in their own reality television shows. Joel Gold of Bellevue Hospital is currently treating five patients with the disease that he says "involves the entire world." The patients are men between the ages of 25 and 34 who believe they are the "focus of attention by millions and millions of people" and that everyone has been written into their script. One patient said "he planned to climb to the top of the Statue of Liberty, and if his true love were waiting for him, the puppeteer strings would be cut. If she failed to show up, he would jump to his death." There's clearly only one way to stop this disease from spreading: end all reality television.

The common rule of thumb is that there are eight or nine rats for every human being in New York City, which means a scurrying verminous population of 64-72 million lurking in walls, below streets, in trash cans, and sometimes in plain sight. Being a rat catcher or, better yet, a rat exterminator is a profession that will never end, and the NY Times spoke to some exterminators about the unwinnable battle.

Mr. Cruz, who started working as an exterminator in 1996, opened his business five years ago, and in his opinion, there is a difference between Manhattan and Brooklyn rodents. “Manhattan rats look like cats, not like rats,” Mr. Cruz said. “Brooklyn rats look like rats.”

Continue reading "A Plague Upon All Our Houses: Rats"

This past week things got stirred up at celebrity hotspot Socialista with a bit of a a Hepatitis A scare. Amongst the hundreds urged to get vaccinated were celebrities who attended actor Ashton Kutcher’s 30th birthday party at the bar; those on the Hepatitis A-list included Madonna and Gwyneth Paltrow.