Cynical Activities - P
|
PACEMAKERS
If you have a pacemaker and get a staph infection, deadly pathogens can hide in the device and be impossible to detect. (So how did the researchers find out they were in there?) |
PACIFIERS
Pacifiers are meant to shut the kids up, right? Think again. Heavy use of pacifiers can increase the risk of ear infections among infants, and some children may be allergic to the latex of which many pacifiers are made and we all know how quiet a sick baby can be. |
PACKAGE HOLIDAYS
Cheap package holidays have been Warned for an increase in skirt cancers, as more people have been able to seek the perfect tan. If you travel on a package holiday, you're more likely to get sick than people who travel independently. You're also more likely to be surrounded by perky people with too many teeth tying to get you to join in sing-alongs. |
PACKAGING
You know those packages that tell you cheerfully to "tear along the dotted line," so you fight with them for half an hour and then give up and slice them open with a knife? Doing that sends sixty thousand people a year to hospitals in the U.K. |
PAIN
Suffering from widespread body pain adversely affects the immune system and kidney function, and may also mean you're more likely to die later on from cancer. Rumor has it that your local S&M club will soon be carrying Surgeon General's warnings ("THIS APPLIANCE CAN BE HAZARDOUS TO YOUR HEALTH"). |
PAINTER, BEING A
Painters who work with hydrocarbon solvents are at risk of developing Parkinson's disease. If only Hitler had stuck to his day job for just a little longer... |
PARENTS
As Philip Larkin says, "They f ** you up, your mum and dad." Through genetic transmission and maladroit child-raising, parents can increase their children's risk of being emotionally incompetent in dealing with the world, underachieving intellectually, being generally unhealthy, contracting lymphoma, leukemia, and cancers of the prostate, ovaries, lung, breast, thyroid, colon, or skin, and having bad eyesight. If you suffer from depression or anxiety disorders, your children are at high risk of emotional and behavioral difficulties. Children of parents suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) may themselves show the low cortisol levels characteristic of people with PTSD and react to trauma with extreme distress. Insecure mothers can produce toddlers with infantile anorexia. Fathers with birthdefects are considerably more likely to have children with birth defects, though usually not the same as their own. Preschool children with fat or depressed mothers watch more television than other children . Next time your teenaged daughter accuses you of ruining her life, keep in mind that she may have a point. |
PEACE
Suicide rates, which decrease during wartime, go back up when peace is restored. During wartime, you can probably count on someone else to do the job for you. |
PEANUTS
If you're allergic to peanuts or peanut by-products (which are found in foods ranging from baked goods to chili and spaghetti sauces), they can give you reactions ranging from hives to ana-phylactic shock, which can cause breathing difficulties, vomiting, diarrhea, and even cardiac arrest. Eating peanuts contaminated by aflatoxin molds can cause liver cancer. Working for peanuts is also bad for you. |
PENCIL SHARPENERS
Ninety-one office workers in the U.K. were injured by pencil sharpeners during the year 2000. We want to know if these were the same ninety-one who were injured by correction fluid, and if so, what the hell they were doing on office time. |
|
|
