SMOKE TILL YOU CHOKE

In the United States smoking became increasingly popular from the early 1900s through the mid-1960s, but it then declined substantially. During the 1950s, the link between smoking and respiratory diseases and cancer became known. In 1964, the first Surgeon General's Report on smoking noted the substantial health hazards associated with smoking. Cigarette smoke contains more than 4,000 chemicals, of which forty-three are known to cause cancer. Among the more toxic chemicals in tobacco are ammonia, arsenic, carbon monoxide, and benzene. Cigarette smoking is now known to cause chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), heart disease, stroke, multiple cancers (including lung cancer), and adverse reproductive outcomes. Smoking causes about 21 percent of all deaths from heart disease, 86 percent of deaths from lung cancer, and 81 percent of all deaths from chronic lung disease.
Nicotine is highly addictive and causes persistent and compulsive smoking behavior. Most users make four to six quit attempts before they are able to remain nicotine-free. Smoking cessation produces major and immediate health benefits by reducing mortality and morbidity from heart disease, stroke, cancer, and various lung diseases.

Secondhand smoke, or environmental tobacco smoke (ETS), causes lung cancer and cardiovascular disease in nonsmoking adults. About 43 percent of U.S. children are exposed to cigarette smoke by household members. Childhood exposure to ETS has been shown to cause asthma and to increase the number of episodes and severity of the disease. ETS exposure of very young children is also causally associated with an increased risk of bronchitis, pneumonia, and ear infections. For these reasons, the importance of smoking cessation extends beyond the health benefit of the smokers themselves.

http://www.healthline.com/galecontent/smoking-cessation?utm_source=z_smoking_cessation&utm_medium=google&utm_campaign=gale&utm_term=smoking

So you see, smoking does not only affects the people using it but also the people and the environment around them. So please, stop smoking and live a long life.

Top 10 Amazing Earth Facts

Our Earth is constantly changing, shifting, and exposing new secrets for humans to marvel at. With this, new species and creatures are being specified. As a modern man, we should all be aware of these changes. Here are some of the most amazing facts about our Earth that may leave you wondering....

10- The Atmosphere

Many layers of atmosphere coat our planet including the mesosphere, ionosphere, exosphere, and the thermosphere, but it’s the troposphere, closest to the planet itself, that supports our lives and is, in fact, the thinnest at only about 10 miles high.

9- Deserts

Believe it or not, most of the Earth’s deserts are not composed entirely of sand. Much, about 85% of them, are rocks and gravel. The largest, the Sahara, fills about 1/3 of Africa (and it is growing constantly) which would nearly fill the continental United States.

8- The Big Blue Marble

The Earth is, in fact, not really round. It is called an oblate spheroid meaning it’s slightly flattened on the top and bottom poles.

7- Salty Oceans

If you could evaporate all the water out of all the oceans and spread the resulting salt over all the land on Earth, you would have a five hundred-foot layer coating everything.

6- Lakes and Seas

The largest inland sea (or, sometimes called a lake) is the Caspian Sea which is on the border of Iran and Russia.

5- Mountains

The Andes Mountain range in South America is 4,525 miles long and ranks, as the world’s longest. Second Longest: The Rockies; Third: Himalayas; Fourth: The Great Dividing Range in Australia; Fifth: Trans-Antarctic Mountains. For every 980 feet you climb up a mountain, the temperature drops 3-1/2 degrees.

4- Deep Water

The deepest lake in the world is in the former USSR and it is Lake Baikal. It has a length of 400 miles, a width of roughly 30, but its depth is just over a mile: 5,371 feet down. It is deep enough, so is speculated, that all five of the next largest lakes: The Great Lakes could be emptied into it.

3- Shaky Ground

Earthquakes can be catastrophically destructive and many a year are deadly. However, the Earth releases about 1 million a year, almost all are never even registered.

2- Hot, hot, hot

Most people believe that Death Valley, California, U.S.A. is the hottest place on Earth. Well, occasionally it is, but the hottest recorded temperature was from Azizia in Libya recording a temperature of 136 degrees Fahrenheit (57.8 Celsius) on Sept. 13, 1922. In Death Valley, it got up to 134 Fahrenheit on July 10, 1913.

1- Dust in the Wind

Experts from the USGS claim that roughly 1,000 tons of space debris rains down on Earth every year.

Isn't it great how the earth cope up with this changes? It is really up to us on how we will protect it :)

Earth 4 Energy - Save Our Planet from Global Warming

Please watch the short ad below :)

This is an ad about global warming and I find the message to be powerful.



We must act soon. If we will, we will not only save the Earth but we will save the future generations as well.


Source: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IsTOy3ZgAcs

Half of the Philippines' endemic wildlife is with extinction

More than half the birds, amphibians and mammals endemic to the Philippines are threatened with extinction, according to a statement released by the country's environment and natural resources department and reported by AFP.

Environment and Natural Resources Secretary Joselito Atienza said that 592 of the 1,137 species of amphibians, birds and mammals found only in the Philippines are considered "threatened or endangered." 227 endemic species of plants are "critically endangered."

Large-scale deforestation is the primary driver of wildlife decline in the archipelago. High population growth and demand for timber and agricultural land contribute to forest loss.

Source: http://news.mongabay.com/2008/0722-philippines.html

U.S. pledges $40M toward coral reef conservation
mongabay.com
October 23, 2008

The U.S. government has pledged almost $40 million to protect biologically-rich coral reefs in Southeast Asia, according to the U.S. embassy in the Philippines.

The U.S. will contribute $39.45 million to the Coral Triangle Initiative, an effort that seeks to protect and promote sustainable fisheries in East Timor, Indonesia, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, and the Solomon Islands.

The Coral Triangle, a six million square kilometer (2.3 million square mile) expanse of ocean and coastline, is home to 30 percent of the world's coral reefs, 3,000 species of fish, and three-quarters of the planet's reef-building coral species, according to WWF. The region's bounty supports artisanal fisheries and tourism, but is increasingly at risk from unsustainable fishing practices, pollution, and reef degradation. Climate change could further threaten these marine ecosystems by increasing the incidence of coral bleaching, while rising CO2 emissions are leading to ocean acidification, making it more difficult for many marine organisms to build protective shells and skeletons.

Great Barrier Reef in Australia
The U.S. has committed to contributing tens of millions of dollars per year to reef conservation activities via a re-authorization of the Tropical Forest Conservation Act.

Coral reefs — often termed the rainforests of the sea — are among the world's most biodiverse marine ecosystems. Beyond supporting traditional livelihoods and tourism, reefs buffer coastlines from erosion and storm surge.

Source: http://news.mongabay.com/2008/1023-reefs.html

HARIBON

If we want to protect our environment, we must take action. Haribon is an example of an organization that protects environment.


The Haribon Foundation for the Conservation of Natural Resources is a membership organization dedicated to the conservation of Philippine biodiversity. It aims to build a constituency for environmental issues that will call for prioritizing conservation actions on habitats and sites, based on solid scientific and socio-economic research.

HARIBON'S NICHE

Biodiversity is the wealth of life forms found on earth: the millions of different plants, animals and micro-organisms, the genes they contain, and the intricate ecosystems that they form.

VISION

Haribon takes the lead in caring for nature with the people – for the people.

MISSION

Haribon is a membership organization committed to nature conservation through community empowerment and scientific excellence.


Simply put, biodiversity IS life. Haribon’s work in biodiversity conservation seeks to protect that life through four core strategies: Saving Sites, Saving Species, Working with People, and Advocacy.

The line “Protecting Nature, Preserving Life” establishes the character of the organization.

Visit their website for more info. and if you're interested to join, copy and paste this url http://www.haribon.org.ph/?q=taxonomy/page/and/9

Source: http://www.haribon.org.ph/?q=

Michael Jackson - Earth Song

Jackson: "I remember writing Earth Song when I was in Austria, in a hotel. And I was feeling so much pain and so much suffering of the plight of the Planet Earth. And for me, this is Earth's Song, because I think nature is trying so hard to compensate for man's mismanagement of the Earth. And with the ecological unbalance going on, and a lot of the problems in the environment, I think earth feels the pain, and she has wounds, and it's about some of the joys of the planet as well. But this is my chance to pretty much let people hear the voice of the planet. And this is "Earth Song." And that's what inspired it. And it just suddenly dropped into my lap when I was on tour in Austria."

Sources:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E4Hcd60VoRM&feature=related
http://www.songfacts.com/detail.php?id=5203