Don”t waste
Two dermatologists (Dr. Casey Carlos of UC San Diego and Dr. Ranella Hirsch of Cambridge, Mass.) recently reported that during the winter it may be unhealthy for most people to shower every day. The soap used during showering removes oil from the skin, and this can cause dryness, which can lead to other problems. They recommend that most people should shower every second or third day. If a person has body odor problems when not showering daily they suggest that they wash off the odorous body areas using washcloths.
Most people know that California and other south western states are coping with a severe drought, and so we must conserve water. It is commonly known that one way of conserving water is to flush toilets only when they contain solid waste. If many of us would also follow the recommendations of these two dermatologists regarding the frequency of showering, it would help us to reduce water wastage considerably.
Charles S. Nicoll, Lucerne
Prolapse
Because one percent of the world”s population is thought to be schizophrenic, it was judged that schizophrenia must have some survival value; and this was found indeed to be so. The schizophrenic was found to be more able than the mentally sound person to survive burns.
I believe mitral valve prolapse could be found far more probably to have a like value for it has been found that approximately seventy percent of the population of North America is thought to have prolapse of the mitral valve of the heart. If this condition has survived in man to such an extent, it must have evolved as a safety valve to prevent force of the blood pushed from the left ventricle into the arteries from being too great during moments of great physical stress. If, for example, a human had to run from an animal or an enemy until nearly exhausted and then had to hide and be extremely quiet to avoid detection, which must have been a fairly common experience for man during his evolution, the force of the heartbeat would be very, very strong for awhile. It is for this reason that athletes need to “walk it off” after a race.
If the mitral valve lets a little blood back into the left atrium, a great deal of pressure is taken off the arteries, thereby reducing the danger of stroke.
Dean Sparks, Lucerne
Mount Rushmore
No one in their right mind would believe that the faces carved into Mount Rushmore National Monument in South Dakota just came about by random processes, chance and time. Why then do people believe that the actual presidents themselves were the results of such things?
Stacey Salvadori, Hidden Valley Lake
