By James Leavey
In a few billion years, our home galaxy, the Milky Way, will collide
with the Andromeda Galaxy, with catastrophic results. And there's
nothing we can do about it, even if we humans, as a race, survive that
long.
So given the bleak, long-term future of the Earth, why are some this
planet's country leaders still fanning the flames of war? Get your
heads out of the ashtray, I say, and watch where the smoke rises. Then
maybe you'd realize there's a sky up there too, and that we all live
under it.
That's enough of the 'Lessons of the Week'. Talking about war
and armies - the latter of which marches on its stomach - actually
the Israeli army seems to be marching over the stomachs and dead bodies
of the Palestinians, but that's another, bloodier story - US army
scientists have come up with a super sandwich capable of surviving a
10,000ft airdrop, freezing Arctic battlefields, scorching desert
manoeuvres, bacteria and moisture.
It will also stay fresh for up to three years, but God only knows
what it would taste like.
Some say they got the idea from McDonald's Big Mac (well the
packaging it comes in, anyway), or perhaps it was the old, green and
curly British Rail cheese sandwich. At present, we don't know if the
US army intends to feed their soldiers with them, or use these
invulnerable sandwiches to bomb the Taliban.
Talking about returning unwanted goods, an EU law has just been
passed making manufacturers responsible for recycling electrical and
battery-operated equipment in specially-built plants. Under the same law,
EU householders also face fines for throwing away unwanted electrical
goods.
So what, I wonder, will happen to all those unexploded missiles and
mines dumped by the US, the Brits and other countries. Will they be
carefully dug up, packed in a straw-filled box, and labelled with the
sticker, 'Return to Sender'?
But the best news, for suicidal smokers, is the fact that the UK's
National Institute for Clinical Excellence (sic!) has officially
recommended that anti-smoking treatments, including the controversial
drug Zyban, should be available on Britain's National Health Service.
Zyban, or buproprion, has been available on prescription in Britain
since it was launched here two years ago. The tablet, which acts on the
brain to quash the craving for nicotine, was originally hailed as a
"wonder-drug". However, there have since been almost 7,000
reports of adverse reaction to Zyban among around 500,000 users in
Britain, who were conned into taking it. And, not least, 57 patients
have died of it.
Indeed, in February, the European Medicines Evaluation Agency
announced a review into Zyban after a three-fold increase in the number
of deaths of British patients who took it, although the Agency stresses
that no link between the drugs and the deaths has been proven, and that
other factors relating to its use, i.e. nicotine withdrawal or
underlying illnesses, may have played a part.
So that's alright then. Must rush out and get a box today. It might
come in useful when I've had enough of all the doom and gloom. On
second thoughts, sod it! I'd rather die with a Havana in my hand, not
of some poxy tablet.
