Gregory's ServerIn my professional life, I've wandered into a research project on modeling famines and starvation physiology. Which means I'm reading scientific literature on starvation physiology. I'm in a place of safety and resilience, but I can tell that even short term immersion in this material does have an effect on me, especially with where the world is right now.
|
11 comments
A large amount of our data on the human body's response to starvation comes from one single study https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minnesota_Starvation_Experiment "The experiment was planned in cooperation with the Civilian Public Service (CPS) and the Selective Service System, using volunteers selected from the ranks of conscientious objectors who had been inducted into public wartime service. Ancel Keys obtained approval from the War Department to select participants from the CPS." Block quote from the article of Milejkowski's words: When I think about the 1940s literature on starvation, and then I read pieces like this recent one from NPR about medical volunteers in Rafa https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2024/05/10/1250490688/rafa-hospital-gaza-israel-war-middle-east (CW: graphic text and images), all I can think about is how it's exactly the same fucking thing. Once again, innocent people have been starved to the point where their bodies are literally falling apart. The geopolitics is of course complicated. It always is. But in the mean time, innocent people are starving. One thing I'm learning, spending time with people who have dedicated their careers to research on humanitarian crises, is that there's been a shift in how and when famines occur. 40 years ago, people talked about famines as a result of droughts. The famines we're having today are the direct result of warfare. The notion of of famine as occurring in remote areas is being challenged. Cities are being hit now as well. Not just in Gaza, either. Urban populations have also been affected in South Sudan. I've heard that conditions in Haiti are worse than they've been in decades. It's not *new* for urban areas to experience famine, but the last time this was at all common was during the World Wars. I'm not sure what it is about these shifts that makes these situations hit harder. I imagine that part of it is that knowing that the people affected had a similar lifestyle to my own makes it more relatable. But also the fact that this is all about conflict means that this is all the result of human decisions. I guess that's applied to more famines in more remote areas as well. Perhaps better news coverage is another factor here. Meanwhile, I'm over here reading about starvation physiology. From the 1940s Minnesota Starvation study: Keys, A. (1948). CALORIC UNDERNUTRITION AND STARVATION, WITH NOTES ON PROTEIN DEFICIENCY. Journal of the American Medical Association, 138(7), 500. https://doi.org/10.1001/jama.1948.62900070006007 Another quote from Keys (1948): |
It turns out that the bulk of the scientific literature on starvation physiology comes from the 1940s. You can fucking guess why.
It turns out that people in the United States and other members of the Alliies were extremely interested in how to care for chronically starved populations starting around 1944.