Risks of allergic reactions don’t outweigh benefits of HPV vaccine, study says

*How many times do I have to say this??? STAY AWAY FROM THIS VACCINE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The propaganda machine will continue to churn out disinformation…*

The controversial vaccine for cervical cancer that will be offered to schoolgirls in all Canadian provinces this fall triggers more severe allergic reactions than other vaccines, but the risk is still so tiny that HPV inoculation remains worthwhile, says a new Australian study.

The peer-reviewed paper, which was released Monday by the Canadian Medical Association Journal, was initiated after reports of severe allergic reaction, or anaphylaxis, in a school vaccination drive in New South Wales.

The study found that the estimated rate of anaphylaxis incidence was five to 20 times higher with the HPV vaccine than other vaccines. However, the research was done on a small number of incidents, limiting its statistical clout.

“All we’re doing is sounding a note of caution,” one of the authors, Peter McIntyre, head of Australia’s National Centre for Immunization Research, said in an interview from Sydney. “It’s still a rare occurrence [to have anaphylaxis].”

Also, earlier this year, the Medical Journal of Australia reported the case of a 26-year-old woman who suffered pancreatitis four days after her first dose of HPV vaccine. “A coincidental illness causing pancreatitis cannot be ruled out, but neither can HPV vaccination be excluded as a potential cause,” the authors wrote.

Despite the cautious tone of the Australian researchers, their findings may add fuel to the debate in Canada over HPV immunization.

With this fall’s return to school, HPV vaccine shots will be available to schoolgirls in all 10 provinces, following in the footsteps of Ontario and the Atlantic provinces, which began a year ago. But skepticism is high: In Ontario, for example, only half of eligible girls agreed to receive the vaccine last year.

The program is the most expensive vaccination campaign in Canadian history. A Merck Frosst product, the Gardasil vaccine protects against strains of human papillomavirus (HPV) responsible for 70 per cent of cervical cancers. Gardasil is costly, at $400 for the three required shots.

But some experts remain unconvinced, saying policy makers rushed into a pricey immunization program when there is no epidemic of cervical cancer, which can already be screened through regular Pap smears.

In a Canadian Medical Association Journal article last year, four researchers led by epidemiologist Abby Lippman of McGill University urged a more prudent course.

The New England Journal of Medicine echoed similar feelings in an editorial two weeks ago. “With so many essential questions still unanswered, there is good reason to be cautious about introducing large-scale vaccination programs,” it said.

The Australian study adds some reassurance, but there are still a lot of unanswered questions about the pertinence of HPV vaccine programs, Dr. Lippman said in an interview.

She noted that there was no clear data about the length of the immunity Gardasil confers and whether booster shots are needed. Also, she said, the program was approved amid intense marketing and political lobbying by Merck Frosst.

“The lobbying has been consistent and aggressive,” added Anne Rochon Ford, co-ordinator of the watchdog group Women and Health Protection, in a reference to Ken Boessenkool, a registered lobbyist for Merck Frosst in Ottawa who was a former senior policy adviser to Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

By June 30, 2008, more than half a million doses of HPV vaccine had been distributed in Canada.

There have been no confirmed cases of anaphylaxis in Canada, but 220 less severe “adverse” events have been reported, the Public Health Agency of Canada said.

Gardasil is “safe and effective,” the agency said in a statement, adding that the new study is inconclusive.

In the study, researchers confirmed seven cases out of 269,680 injections. This worked out to a rate of 2.6 incidents per 100,000 shots, compared for example with a 0.12 rate for a similar school inoculation for meningococcal C-conjugate in New South Wales.

However, because the sample size for the Gardasil study was small, its so-called confidence interval was broader, with a 95-per-cent possibility that the rate of anaphylaxis could be somewhere between 1.04 and 5.35. (Studies with large sample size result in a tighter interval).

The authors said the higher rate of reported incidents might stem not just from the vaccine’s components but also from the enhanced surveillance during school injections, and the fact that Gardasil was injected into young women, who, from mid-adolescence, have higher rates of anaphylaxis than men.

“Anaphylaxis following HPV vaccination is a rare event … and it should not curtail population-based HPV vaccination programs,” the study says.

In the same issue, the CMA journal also ran an editorial saying that the Australian study contributed to the public discourse about the vaccine while providing evidence that it was “remarkably safe.”

“There’s still many missing pieces of the jigsaw puzzle,” said Alan Cassels, a drug-policy researcher at the University of Victoria.

“This one is so new and the track record is so untested and the disease takes years to develop and is usually detectable with a Pap smear. There’s lots of reasons why you would hesitate.”

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20080901.wHPVstudy0901/BNStory/National/home

Credit crunch brings big rise in supermarket offers on sugary foods

*It’s not even sugary. It’s HIGH FRUCTOSE CORN SYRUP, which is FAR worse for you!!!!!!!!!!*

Supermarkets have dramatically increased cut-price promotions of cheap sugary and fatty food as the credit crunch bites, a consumer watchdog says today.

Incentives including “buy one get one free” offers could directly influence people’s eating habits, according to a report by the government-funded National Consumer Council (NCC).

It says money-saving opportunities are particularly important for lower-income families who are likely to be feeling the pinch more than most, and these deals are making it more attractive for consumers to choose more foods that contribute to an unhealthy diet.

The NCC conducted a spot-check on branches of the top eight English chains in Sheffield before Easter, with Easter-related promotions not counted.

It found more than 4,300 promotions – a sixth more than in the last snapshot survey in 2006. Previous checks conducted by the NCC have been at branches around England.

More than half the promotions – 54% – related to foods high in fat and sugar, despite Food Standards Agency (FSA) advice that these foods should make up just 7% of diets. Only one in eight promotions featured fruit and vegetables.

Lucy Yates, author of the report, entitled “Cut-price, What Cost?”, said the volume of promotions for fatty and sugary foods was “staggering”. She added: “We expected to see evidence of big improvements since our last investigation, but we’ve been sadly disappointed. With so many of us buying our foods at these supermarkets, their collective behaviour can heavily influence the nation’s eating habits. Despite their claims, the supermarkets all still have a long way to go to help customers choose and enjoy a healthy diet.”

The NCC ranks supermarkets according to four health indicators, which cover nutritional content of own-labelled processed food, labelling information and customer advice, as well as promotions. Overall, Sainsbury’s came top for the second time in a row, with the Co-op second, Waitrose third, Marks & Spencer fourth, Asda and Tesco joint fifth, Somerfield seventh and Morrisons last for the fourth time in a row.

The report says at least a third of price promotions should be for fruit and vegetables, with fewer involving fatty and sugary foods. Stores should move faster to reduce salt, sugar and fat levels in their brands. It commends the Co-op, Tesco and Waitrose for not having sweets at the checkouts.

Sainsbury’s, the Co-op and M&S had taken on previous recommendations, the report said. “These retailers have shown a real commitment to more responsible retailing and making their customers’ health a priority, although more work needs to be done across the sector to curb unhealthy food promotion.”

However, the British Retail Consortium rubbished the report, saying the “one-off snap shot … in one English city last March” used “misleading comparisons to unfairly criticise retailers’ records on encouraging healthier food choices”.

It said promotions were balanced across the year. “Customers will have seen for themselves the current high-profile price war centred on fruit and vegetables.”

Tesco questioned the NCC’s method of judging nutrition labelling, saying its bias towards one colour-coded system recommended by the FSA clouded the facts.

Morrisons also rejected the findings, saying: “It’s six months out of date, contains a number of inaccuracies and is a largely subjective assessment.”

But a spokeswoman for the NCC discounted the seasonal argument. “We include frozen and tinned fruit and vegetables. Supermarkets could discount what is there and we did not find they were doing so. A spot-check like this is totally fair. We set out to replicate what it is like for a normal shopper.”

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2008/sep/01/supermarkets.fooddrinks

Floodwalls stuffed with newspaper?

“It blows my mind.”
Those are the words St. Bernard parish president Craig Taffaro used to watch videotape Eyewitness News showed him, of floodwalls built to protect his parish.

“That should be criminal,” Taffaro continues.

What he’s talking about was witnessed by a St. Bernard Parish resident who didn’t want to be identified, but did have sharp criticism of the work done by a contractor hired by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

“It’s like putting a Band-Aid on the hole of a gas tank of an airplane,” the resident said.

Instead of an airplane, it’s a floodwall, and instead of a Band-Aid, the witness says two years ago, he saw the contractor filling the expansion joint or opening between the floodwalls with newspaper.

“The whole length of the wall was stuffed with newspaper.”

And when he confronted the contractor, the contractor blamed Washington for the substandard work.

“He basically told me when Congress sent down the money, it would be repaired the proper way.”

But during a recent trip to the area, two years later, it was apparent that didn’t happen. Much of the newspaper had deteriorated or been eaten by bugs, but some still remained. In fact WWL cameras even captured the date May 21, 2006, on a page of the Parade magazine from the Times-Picayune.

Eyewitness News asked local engineer Subhash Kulkarni to investigate the findings at the floodwall.

“They should have done a better job than what you see here.”

Kulkarni is a member of the American Society of Civil Engineers. The ASCE named him outstanding civil engineer in Louisiana back in 2003.

“I cannot even comprehend that somebody would stuff some newspaper in there.”

Engineers tell Eyewitness News an expansion joint has three lines of defense. The first is an elastic strip that helps keep water out. In the middle is the most important part, a waterstop, which is in fact included in the St. Bernard floodwall. However what is missing is a rubber joint that goes in between and helps keep foreign objects out.

The witness who talked to Eyewitness News says the contractor used the newspaper in place of the rubber joint. Kulkarni says it’s not a short term risk, but over time that missing rubber joint could weaken that waterstop.

“It could be very serious,” Kulkarni said. “It doesn’t take a lot of stress to cause the failure of these floodwalls. We don’t know after two or three years how the main joint will perform. This is the first line of defense.”

But the Army Corps of Engineers says it is confident the floodwall will sufficiently defend residents of St. Bernard and the Ninth Ward.

“If you look at the repairs we made to the joints, there’s not really a safety issue with the joints at all,” said Kevin Wagner with the Army Corps of Engineers.

The Corps also says it’s satisfied with the quality of work done by its contractor. When asked by WWL if there was any shoddy work involved, Wagner said, “I don’t think so at all.”

But days before that interview, after a request by Eyewitness News , another Corps employee e-mailed the Corps’ standards for expansion joint construction and in that e-mail, the Corps employee describes the specific materials needed as “sponge rubber” that goes next to the waterstop. That’s the same spot where a witness saw a contractor stuffing newspaper back in 2006.

When asked if the absence of material behind the waterstop was what was called for in the contract, Corps spokesman Kevin Wagner called the project an emergency repair.

“If we would have built a new floodwall that would not have been the case. We would have the waterstop, some joint filler material in between and then we would put an elastic sealer over the top of it,” Wagner said. “In this case we tried to do the repairs as quick as possible to protect the water stop before the start of hurricane season.”

But according to the contract obtained by Eyewitness News, that may not be the case. The contract calls for Ercon Corporation, based in Lafayette, Louisiana, to do the almost $2 million of work to raise and repair the floodwall under the Paris Road bridge.

In the contract, WWL found at least four mentions of field molded sealants. Kulkarni says that is the sponge rubber material to fill the cavity in the expansion joint. And he says the contract shows the rubber material was contractually required to be installed.

“I would say they have not met their obligation to install the joint correctly. They haven’t installed it at all,” Kulkarni said.

Eyewitness News contacted the president of Ercon Corporation by phone and e-mail. He didn’t respond to our repeated requests for a comment on this story. Further, our investigation revealed Ercon Corporation is not even licensed by the state’s board for contractors. The Corps of Engineers says as long as the federal government pays for the work, it does not prevent them from hiring an unlicensed Louisiana company.

“If you’re telling me this is an out of town contractor who drives back to wherever they’re from and puts their head on the pillow at night, does it really matter to them that this particular part of the project fails?” St. Bernard president Craig Taffaro asks.

Taffaro calls the response from the Corps and Contractor unacceptable.

“Would they let a contractor put Play-Doh in the place of mortar when they put bricks on their house? No, I don’t think so,” Taffaro said.

He says while newspaper doesn’t define the entire levee system, it does have him concerned about the oversight of all work being done in southeast Louisiana.

“It’s an indictment against the quality of work being done,” Taffaro says. “Let’s hope that same standard wasn’t being used in constructing the floodwall in constructing the levees.”

http://www.wwltv.com/local/stories/wwl042408tpleveepaper.98095b74.html

Great Lakes Danger…WHAT THEY DO NOT WANT YOU TO KNOW!!!!!!

For more than seven months, the nation’s top public health agency has blocked the publication of an exhaustive federal study of environmental hazards in the eight Great Lakes states, reportedly because it contains such potentially “alarming information” as evidence of elevated infant mortality and cancer rates.

The 400-plus-page study, Public Health Implications of Hazardous Substances in the Twenty-Six U.S. Great Lakes Areas of Concern, was undertaken by a division of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention at the request of the International Joint Commission, an independent bilateral organization that advises the U.S. and Canadian governments on the use and quality of boundary waters between the two countries. The study was originally scheduled for release in July 2007 by the IJC and the CDC’s Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR).

The Center for Public Integrity has obtained the study, which warns that more than nine million people who live in the more than two dozen “areas of concern”—including such major metropolitan areas as Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, and Milwaukee—may face elevated health risks from being exposed to dioxin, PCBs, pesticides, lead, mercury, or six other hazardous pollutants.

In many of the geographic areas studied, researchers found low birth weights, elevated rates of infant mortality and premature births, and elevated death rates from breast cancer, colon cancer, and lung cancer.

Since 2004, dozens of experts have reviewed various drafts of the study, including senior scientists at the CDC, Environmental Protection Agency, and other federal agencies, as well as scientists from universities and state governments, according to sources familiar with the history of the project.

“It raises very important questions,” Dr. Peter Orris, a professor at the University of Illinois School of Public Health in Chicago and one of three experts who reviewed the study for ATSDR, told the Center. While Orris acknowledged that the study does not determine cause and effect—a point the study itself emphasizes—its release, he said, is crucial to pointing the way for further esearch. “Communities could demand that those questions be answered in a more systematic way,” he said. “Not to release it is putting your head under the sand.”

In a December 2007 letter to ATSDR in which he called for the release of the study, Orris wrote: “This report, which has taken years in production, was subjected to independent expert review by the IJC’s Health Professionals Task Force and other boards, over 20 EPA scientists, state agency scientists from New York and Minnesota, three academics (including myself), and multiple reviews within ATSDR. As such, this is perhaps the most extensively critiqued report, internally and externally, that I have heard of.”

Last July, several days before the study was to be released, ATSDR suddenly withdrew it, saying that it needed further review. In a letter to Christopher De Rosa, then the director of the agency’s division of toxicology and environmental medicine, Dr. Howard Frumkin, ATSDR’s chief, wrote that the quality of the study was “well below expectations.” When the Center contacted Frumkin’s office, a spokesman said that he was not available for comment and that the study was “still under review.”

De Rosa, who oversaw the study and has pressed for its release, referred the Center’s requests for an interview to ATSDR’s public affairs office, which, over a period of two weeks, has declined to make him available for comment. In an e-mail obtained by the Center, De Rosa wrote to Frumkin that the delay in publishing the study has had “the appearance of censorship of science and distribution of factual information regarding the health status of vulnerable communities.”

Some members of Congress seem to agree. In a February 6, 2008, letter to CDC director Dr. Julie Gerberding, who’s also administrator of ATSDR, a trio of powerful congressional Democrats—including Representative Bart Gordon of Tennessee, chairman of the Committee on Science and Technology—complained about the delay in releasing the report. The Center for Public Integrity obtained a copy of the letter to Gerberding, which notes that the full committee is reviewing “disturbing allegations about interference with the work of government scientists” at ATSDR. “You and Dr. Frumkin were made aware of the Committee’s concerns on this matter last December,” the letter adds, “but we have still not heard any explanation for the decision to cancel the release of the report.”

Canadian biologist Michael Gilbertson, a former IJC staffer and another of the three peer reviewers, told the Center that the study has been suppressed because it suggests that vulnerable populations have been harmed by industrial pollutants. “It’s not good because it’s inconvenient,” Gilbertson said. “The whole problem with all this kind of work is wrapped up in that word ‘injury.’ If you have injury, that implies liability. Liability, of course, implies damages, legal processes, and costs of remedial action. The governments, frankly, in both countries are so heavily aligned with, particularly, the chemical industry, that the word amongst the bureaucracies is that they really do not want any evidence of effect or injury to be allowed out there.”

The IJC requested the study in 2001. Researchers selected by the ATSDR not only reviewed data from hazardous waste sites, toxic releases, and discharges of pollutants but also, for the first time, mapped the locations of schools, hospitals, and other facilities to assess the proximity of vulnerable populations to the sources of environmental contaminants. In March 2004, an official of the IJC wrote to De Rosa to thank him for his role in the study, saying that he was “enthusiastic about sharing this information with Great Lakes Basin stakeholders and governments,” and adding, “You are to be
commended for your extraordinary efforts.”

Unlike his Canadian counterpart, however, the ATSDR’s Frumkin seems anything but thankful. De Rosa, a highly respected scientist with a strong international reputation from his 15 years in charge of ATSDR’s division of toxicology and environmental medicine, was demoted after he pushed Frumkin to publish the Great Lakes report and other studies. De Rosa is seeking reinstatement to his former position, claiming that Frumkin illegally retaliated against him. Phone calls to ATSDR seeking comment about the pending personnel dispute were not returned.

“I think this is really pretty outrageous, both to Chris personally and to the report,” Dr. David Carpenter, a professor of public health at the State University of New York at Albany and another of ATSDR’s peer reviewers, told the Center for Public Integrity.

Some members of Congress have also taken De Rosa’s side. That same February 6 letter to Gerberding, which was co-signed by Representative Brad Miller of North Carolina, chairman of the Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight of the Science and Technology Committee, and Representative Nick Lampson of Texas, chairman of the Subcommittee on Energy and Environment, expressed concern that “management may have retaliated against” De Rosa for blowing the whistle on ATSDR’s conduct related to this investigation and another involving work on formaldehyde in trailers supplied by the Federal Emergency Management Agency to victims of hurricanes Katrina and Rita. “The public is well served by federal employees willing to speak up when federal agencies act improperly, and Congress depends upon whistle blowers for effective oversight,” the letter states. “We will not tolerate retaliation against any whistle blowers.”

Barry Johnson, a retired rear admiral in the U.S. Public Health Service and a former assistant administrator of ATSDR, told the Center that before he left in 1999 he recommended that the agency investigate the dangers that chemical contaminants might pose to residents of the Great Lakes states.

“This research is quite important to the public health of people who reside in that area,” Johnson said of the study. “It was done with the full knowledge and support of IJC, and many local health departments went through this in various reviews. I don’t understand why this work has not been released; it should be and it must be released. In 37 years of public service, I’ve never run into a situation like this.”

http://www.publicintegrity.org/projects/entry/359/

Open letter to God

Dear God,

The other night, James Dobson’s organization asked all believers to pray for a storm on Thursday night so that the Obama acceptance speech outdoors in Denver would have to be canceled.

I see that You have answered Dr. Dobson’s prayers — except the storm You have sent to earth is not over Denver, but on its way to New Orleans! In fact, You have scheduled it to hit Louisiana at exactly the moment that George W. Bush is to deliver his speech at the Republican National Convention.

Now, heavenly Father, we all know You have a great sense of humor and impeccable timing. To send a hurricane on the third anniversary of the Katrina disaster AND right at the beginning of the Republican Convention was, at first blush, a stroke of divine irony. I don’t blame You, I know You’re angry that the Republicans tried to blame YOU for Katrina by calling it an “Act of God” — when the truth was that the hurricane itself caused few casualties in New Orleans. Over a thousand people died because of the mistakes and neglect caused by humans, not You.

Some of us tried to help after Katrina hit, while Bush ate cake with McCain and twiddled his thumbs. I closed my office in New York and sent my entire staff down to New Orleans to help. I asked people on my website to contribute to the relief effort I organized — and I ended up sending over two million dollars in donations, food, water, and supplies (collected from thousands of fans) to New Orleans while Bush’s FEMA ice trucks were still driving around Maine three weeks later.

But this past Thursday night, the Washington Post reported that the Republicans had begun making plans to possibly postpone the convention. The AP had reported that there were no shelters set up in New Orleans for this storm, and that the levee repairs have not been adequate. In other words, as the great Ronald Reagan would say, “There you go again!”

So the last thing John McCain and the Republicans needed was to have a split-screen on TVs across America: one side with Bush and McCain partying in St. Paul, and on the other side of the screen, live footage of their Republican administration screwing up once again while New Orleans drowns.

So, yes, You have scared the Jesus, Mary and Joseph out of them, and more than a few million of your followers tip their hats to You.

But now it appears that You haven’t been having just a little fun with Bush & Co. It appears that Hurricane Gustav is truly heading to New Orleans and the Gulf coast. We hear You, O Lord, loud and clear, just as we did when Rev. Falwell said You made 9/11 happen because of all those gays and abortions. We beseech You, O Merciful One, not to punish us again as Pat Robertson said You did by giving us Katrina because of America’s “wholesale slaughter of unborn children.” His sentiments were echoed by other Republicans in 2005.

So this is my plea to you: Don’t do this to Louisiana again. The Republicans got your message. They are scrambling and doing the best they can to get planes, trains and buses to New Orleans so that everyone can get out. They haven’t sent the entire Louisiana National Guard to Iraq this time — they are already patrolling the city streets. And, in a nod to I don’t know what, Bush’s head of FEMA has named a man to help manage the federal government’s response. His name is W. Michael Moore. I kid you not, heavenly Father. They have sent a man with both my name AND W’s to help save the Gulf Coast.

So please God, let the storm die out at sea. It’s done enough damage already. If you do this one favor for me, I promise not to invoke your name again. I’ll leave that to the followers of Dr. Dobson and to those gathering this week in St. Paul.

Your faithful servant and former seminarian,

Michael Moore

Disappearing fireflies??

*I see this happening in North America, I used to love seeing them!*

BAN LOMTUAN, Thailand – Preecha Jiabyu used to take tourists on a rowboat to see the banks of the Mae Klong River aglow with thousands of fireflies.

These days, all he sees are the fluorescent lights of hotels, restaurants and highway overpasses. He says he’d have to row a good two miles to see trees lit up with the magical creatures of his younger days.

“The firefly populations have dropped 70 percent, in the past three years,” said Preecha, 58, a former teacher who started providing dozens of row boats to compete with polluting motor boats. “It’s sad. They were a symbol of our city.”

The fate of the insects drew more than 100 entomologists and biologists to Thailand’s northern city of Chiang Mai last week for an international symposium on the “Diversity and Conservation of Fireflies.”

They then traveled Friday to Ban Lomtuan, an hour outside of Bangkok, to see the synchronous firefly Pteroptyx malaccae — known for its rapid, pulsating flashing that look like Christmas lights.

Yet another much-loved species imperiled by humankind? The evidence is entirely anecdotal, but there are anecdotes galore.

From backyards in Tennessee to riverbanks in Southeast Asia, researchers said they have seen fireflies — also called glowworms or lightning bugs — dwindling in number.

No single factor is blamed, but researchers in the United States and Europe mostly cite urban sprawl and industrial pollution that destroy insect habitat. The spread of artificial lights also could be a culprit, disrupting the intricate mating behavior that depends on a male winning over a female with its flashing backside.

“It is quite clear they are declining,” said Stefan Ineichen, a researcher who studies fireflies in Switzerland and runs a Web site to gather information on firefly sightings.

“When you talk to old people about fireflies, it is always the same,” he said. “They saw so many when they were young and now they are lucky now if they see one.”

Fredric Vencl, a researcher at Stonybrook University in New York, discovered a new species two years ago only to learn its mountain habitat in Panama was threatened by logging.

Lynn Faust spent a decade researching fireflies on her 40-acre farm in Knoxville, Tenn., but gave up on one species because she stopped seeing them.

“I know of populations that have disappeared on my farm because of development and light pollution,” said Faust. “It’s these McMansions with their floodlights. One house has 32 lights. Why do you need so many lights?”

But Faust and other experts said they still need scientific data, which has been difficult to come by with so few monitoring programs in place.

There are some 2,000 species and researchers are constantly discovering new ones. Many have never been studied, leaving scientists in the dark about the potential threats and the meaning of their Morse code-like flashes that signal everything from love to danger.

“It is like a mystery insect,” said Anchana Thancharoen, who was part of a team that discovered a new species Luciola aquatilis two years ago in Thailand.

The problem is, a nocturnal insect as small as a human fingertip can’t be tagged and tracked like bears or even butterflies, and counting is difficult when some females spend most of their time on the ground or don’t flash.

And the firefly’s adult life span of just one to three weeks makes counting even harder.

European researchers have tried taking a wooden frame and measuring the numbers that appear over a given time. Scientists at the Forest Research Institute Malaysia have been photographing fireflies populations monthly along the Selangor River.

But with little money and manpower to study the problem, experts are turning to volunteers for help. Web sites like the Citizen Science Firefly Survey in Boston, which started this year, encourages enthusiasts to report changes in their neighborhood firefly populations.

“Researchers hope this would allow us to track firefly populations over many years to determine if they are remaining stable or disappearing,” said Christopher Cratsley, a firefly expert at Fitchburg State College in Massachusetts who served as a consultant on the site run by the Boston Museum of Science.

Scientists acknowledge the urgency to assess fireflies may not match that of polar bears or Siberian tigers. But they insist fireflies are a “canary in a coal mine” in terms of understanding the health of an ecosystem.

Preecha, the teacher turned boatman, couldn’t agree more. He has seen the pristine river of his childhood become polluted and fish populations disappear. Now, he fears the fireflies could be gone within a year.

“I feel like our way of life is being destroyed,” Preecha said.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080830/ap_on_re_as/fading_fireflies_1