In a recent address to the American Academy for the Advancement
of Science, Vice President Al Gore warned that carbon emissions
are damaging the atmosphere and only tighter controls on industry
can save the planet. He took his evidence from a series of articles
published earlier this year which suggested that global warming
could help incubate and spread killer germs. (One study found
infection listed as the fatal factor 58 percent more frequently
in 1992 than 1980.) In other words, heat up the air, and infectious
diseases will be on the rise.
However, most scientists believe the global warming crowd is simply
practicing bad science.
- Epidemiologists didn't measure AIDS deaths in 1982; taking
the rise of AIDS mortality into account, the difference in infectious
disease deaths is only 22 percent.
- People live longer than in 1980, and the elderly often die
of pneumonia and other infectious diseases -- something the studies
didn't take into account.
- In fact, according to one report which did factor in these
points, AIDS, drug use and longer life spans account for virtually
all the "increase" in infectious disease death rates.
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It would seem, therefore, that AIDS and longer life spans are
brought about by global warming, a concept for which there are
conflicting data. Indeed, if the government wants to save lives,
it ought to consider reforming its own Food and Drug Administration.
- Total drug development time has jumped from an average of
eight years in 1960 to fifteen years today a near-doubling almost
wholly caused by FDA roadblocks.
- Of the 154 new drugs introduced in this country during the
last six years, 66 percent were first cleared for use in other
countries.
- While 82 percent of all bio-tech-based drugs came from America,
75 percent were first marketed in Europe.
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Source: Tony Snow, "Global Warming Plague Looming? Wrong,"
USA Today, February 19, 1996. [Tony Snow is a Senior Fellow
at the National Center for Policy Analysis in Dallas, Texas.]
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