What the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge is all about...The Ice Bucket Challenge has raised a lot of money...

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Editor-in-Chief Managing Editor Kevin Kunzmann Erica Avery [email protected] [email protected] OPINION Hello, fellow Profs, and welcome back to another year of science updates with yours truly! If you’re new to my col- umn, I am a junior biochemis- try major, as well as managing editor of the Whit, and hope to inform everyone – not just fellow scientists – about what makes me passionate about the sciences. If you haven’t seen the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge videos all over TV, Twitter, or your Facebook newsfeeds, you must have been living under a rock. To raise awareness for the disease, all our friends and favorite celebrities have been dumping ice and water on their heads and challenging others to either do the same in 24 hours or donate — or both. I’m not going to get into my opinion on the challenge and how it became a fad that swept the nation, but since it’s the latest buzz, I’d like to share with you the facts behind Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) and other deadly dis- eases we donate to and raise awareness for. ALS, also called Lou Geh- rig’s disease, is a neurodegen- erative disease that affects nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord. Over time, the disease specifically degrades motor neurons, which control muscle movement, until the patient dies. Because the mo- tor neurons die, the brain is no longer able to control mus- cle movement and in the later stages of the disease, paralysis occurs. The disease is commonly referred to as Lou Gehrig’s dis- ease because Lou Gehrig was a famous baseball player in the ‘20s and ‘30s who died from the disease. Stephen Hawk- ing, the famous physicist who is completely paralyzed and only able to communicate through a speech generating device, has a disease related to ALS. By breaking down the term “Amyotrophic Lat- eral Sclerosis,” it might bet- ter help one understand the disease, as explained by Alsa. org. “A” means without, “myo” refers to muscle and “trophic” means nourishment. Muscles aren’t receiving nourishment or exercise due to paralysis, and without nourishment, a muscle “atrophies” or degener- ates. “Lateral” describes where in the spinal cord the nerve degeneration is taking place, and “sclerosis” refers to scar- ring or plaque on the nerves. Some of these terms might be familiar to you, especially if you’ve taken an anatomy and physiology course. Since the motor neurons aren’t success- fully sending signals to the muscles, the muscles weaken and whither. What the world has done to raise money for ALS is as- tounding and I am very proud of our society for this accom- plishment. However, I also wish to shed light on the fact that the top diseases that kill citizens in our country are not the top diseases that receive the most monetary donations. ALS was ranked as the eighth leading killer in the country in 2011 according to Vox.com with data from the Centers for Disease Control and Pre- vention, ranking below causes that included HIV/AIDS, sui- cide and diabetes. The top three killers were heart dis- ease, chronic obstructive pul- monary disease (COPD) and diabetes while the top three highest donations made in- cluded the diseases breast can- cer, prostate cancer and heart disease. Analyzing the data from causes of death compared to money raised for each cause, there is a lot of disproportion- ality. I encourage others to bring true awareness to all of these diseases through knowl- edge and dedication to a cause. The Ice Bucket Challenge has raised a lot of money — over $100 million, according to the latest reports from The New Yorker — and those donations made an incredible difference in funds for ALS, but the goal was also to bring awareness. I’m not sure everyone on Face- book whose videos appeared on your newsfeed could ex- plain exactly what the disease is. Maybe some friends did it just because they were dared or maybe some read about ALS and talked about it in their videos. The point is, it’s im- portant to not just raise mon- ey, but to stay informed with an open mind and an open heart. That’s what “bringing awareness” is all about: empa- thy and understanding. For comments/questions about this story, email editor@ thewhitonline.com or tweet @ thewhitonline. Erica Avery Columnist What the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge is all about College tuition: $22,000 annually. Mortgage payments: $2,000 per month. Elections: Priceless. This past Monday, Senate Democrats and several Repub- lican Senators came together to advance a constitutional amendment that would allow Congress and the states larger influence in the regulation of campaign financing. Biparti- san support for the amend- ment is speculated to be a ploy to stop the Senate from discussing several other is- sues including gender equity and minimum wage, according to a Politico article. The issue comes at a prime time with mid-term elections coming up in November. Campaign financing is cru- cial in United States elections. Candidates spent $7 billion in the 2012 election alone. Barack Obama and Mitt Romney spent approximately $3 billion each, according to the Federal Elec- tion Commission. If every person on the planet donated $1 to the combined campaign funds, it would still not reach that total. A majority of the money ac- crued from campaign funding goes to all those “he-said-she- said” political advertisements, as well as paying for and man- aging a staff of campaign or- ganizers, rallies, fact checkers and polling. At the end of the day, these services — which are necessary to win elections — do cost a lot of money. The issue isn’t the amount of mon- ey spent on the actual elec- tions, it’s how the money is be- ing amassed in elections. Before a crucial Supreme Court ruling in 2010, cam- paigns gained most of their money through Political Action Committees (PACs). According to Michael Beckel, of the Cen- ter for Responsive Politics, a non-profit and non-partisan organization that tracks mon- ey in politics, PACs have a limit of $5,000 that they can donate to a particular party or candi- date. Typically, PACs represent special interest groups such as labor unions and other organi- zations like the National Rifle Association. PACs cannot give more than $15,000 each year to a national party (Republi- can or Democrat). Individual donations are capped at $5,000 per person. Since 1940, these guidelines have helped to keep the election process as uncor- rupt as they could. With a 5-4 majority ruling in Citizens United v. The Fed- Ethan Stoetzer Columnist The excess of campaign funds ALS was ranked as the eighth leading killer in the country in 2011 ... ranking below causes that included HIV/AIDS, suicide and diabetes. See Politics, Pg. 6

Transcript of What the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge is all about...The Ice Bucket Challenge has raised a lot of money...

Page 1: What the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge is all about...The Ice Bucket Challenge has raised a lot of money — over $100 million, according to the latest reports from The New Yorker — and

Editor-in-Chief Managing EditorKevin Kunzmann Erica [email protected] [email protected]

Hello, fellow Profs, and welcome back to another year of science updates with yours truly! If you’re new to my col-umn, I am a junior biochemis-try major, as well as managing editor of the Whit, and hope to inform everyone – not just fellow scientists – about what makes me passionate about the sciences.

If you haven’t seen the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge videos all over TV, Twitter, or your Facebook newsfeeds, you must have been living under a rock. To raise awareness for the disease, all our friends and favorite celebrities have been dumping ice and water on their heads and challenging others to either do the same in 24 hours or donate — or both.

I’m not going to get into my opinion on the challenge and how it became a fad that swept the nation, but since it’s the latest buzz, I’d like to share with you the facts behind Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) and other deadly dis-eases we donate to and raise awareness for.

ALS, also called Lou Geh-rig’s disease, is a neurodegen-erative disease that affects nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord. Over time, the disease specifically degrades motor neurons, which control muscle movement, until the

patient dies. Because the mo-tor neurons die, the brain is no longer able to control mus-cle movement and in the later stages of the disease, paralysis occurs.

The disease is commonly referred to as Lou Gehrig’s dis-ease because Lou Gehrig was a famous baseball player in the ‘20s and ‘30s who died from the disease. Stephen Hawk-ing, the famous physicist who is completely paralyzed and only able to communicate through a speech generating device, has a disease related to ALS. By breaking down the term “Amyotrophic Lat-eral Sclerosis,” it might bet-ter help one understand the disease, as explained by Alsa.org. “A” means without, “myo” refers to muscle and “trophic” means nourishment. Muscles aren’t receiving nourishment or exercise due to paralysis, and without nourishment, a muscle “atrophies” or degener-ates. “Lateral” describes where in the spinal cord the nerve degeneration is taking place, and “sclerosis” refers to scar-ring or plaque on the nerves. Some of these terms might be

familiar to you, especially if you’ve taken an anatomy and physiology course. Since the motor neurons aren’t success-fully sending signals to the muscles, the muscles weaken

and whither.What the world has done

to raise money for ALS is as-tounding and I am very proud of our society for this accom-plishment. However, I also wish to shed light on the fact that the top diseases that kill citizens in our country are not the top diseases that receive the most monetary donations. ALS was ranked as the eighth leading killer in the country in 2011 according to Vox.com with data from the Centers for Disease Control and Pre-vention, ranking below causes that included HIV/AIDS, sui-cide and diabetes. The top three killers were heart dis-ease, chronic obstructive pul-monary disease (COPD) and diabetes while the top three highest donations made in-cluded the diseases breast can-cer, prostate cancer and heart disease.

Analyzing the data from causes of death compared to

money raised for each cause, there is a lot of disproportion-ality. I encourage others to bring true awareness to all of these diseases through knowl-edge and dedication to a cause.

The Ice Bucket Challenge has raised a lot of money — over $100 million, according to the latest reports from The New Yorker — and those donations made an incredible difference in funds for ALS, but the goal

was also to bring awareness. I’m not sure everyone on Face-book whose videos appeared on your newsfeed could ex-plain exactly what the disease is. Maybe some friends did it just because they were dared or maybe some read about ALS and talked about it in their videos. The point is, it’s im-portant to not just raise mon-ey, but to stay informed with an open mind and an open heart. That’s what “bringing awareness” is all about: empa-thy and understanding.

For comments/questions about this story, email editor@

thewhitonline.com or tweet @thewhitonline.

Erica AveryColumnist

What the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge is all about

College tuition: $22,000 annually. Mortgage payments: $2,000 per month. Elections: Priceless.

This past Monday, Senate Democrats and several Repub-lican Senators came together to advance a constitutional amendment that would allow Congress and the states larger influence in the regulation of campaign financing. Biparti-san support for the amend-

ment is speculated to be a ploy to stop the Senate from discussing several other is-sues including gender equity and minimum wage, according to a Politico article. The issue comes at a prime time with mid-term elections coming up in November.

Campaign financing is cru-cial in United States elections. Candidates spent $7 billion in the 2012 election alone. Barack Obama and Mitt Romney spent approximately $3 billion each, according to the Federal Elec-

tion Commission. If every person on the planet donated $1 to the combined campaign funds, it would still not reach that total.

A majority of the money ac-crued from campaign funding goes to all those “he-said-she-said” political advertisements, as well as paying for and man-aging a staff of campaign or-ganizers, rallies, fact checkers and polling. At the end of the day, these services — which are necessary to win elections — do cost a lot of money. The

issue isn’t the amount of mon-ey spent on the actual elec-tions, it’s how the money is be-ing amassed in elections.

Before a crucial Supreme Court ruling in 2010, cam-paigns gained most of their money through Political Action Committees (PACs). According to Michael Beckel, of the Cen-ter for Responsive Politics, a non-profit and non-partisan organization that tracks mon-ey in politics, PACs have a limit of $5,000 that they can donate to a particular party or candi-

date. Typically, PACs represent special interest groups such as labor unions and other organi-zations like the National Rifle Association. PACs cannot give more than $15,000 each year to a national party (Republi-can or Democrat). Individual donations are capped at $5,000 per person. Since 1940, these guidelines have helped to keep the election process as uncor-rupt as they could.

With a 5-4 majority ruling in Citizens United v. The Fed-

Ethan Stoetzer Columnist

The excess of campaign funds

ALS was ranked as the eighth leading killer in the country in 2011 ... ranking below causes that included

HIV/AIDS, suicide and diabetes.

See Politics, Pg. 6