Things We Wish We Didn't Know

Do you know that right now, at this second, hundreds of follicle mites are living beneath the hair of your eyelashes? They're a little like fleas, only they're microscopic and they don't jump as high. Aren't you glad you know now? There's nothing you can do about it, either.

Insects can be a lot of fun. There's so much that people don't know! For instance, did you know that common houseflies have taste buds in their feet? If they land on something that has a high sugar content, they simply extend their mouth parts and regurgitate to liquefy the food so it can be absorbed. Isn't that great? Did you ever think of that while you were shooing a fly off your hot dog roll?

There are all kinds of things people would probably rather not know. Take that hot dog. If it's like most hot dogs, it contains residues of more than 100 pesticides--many of them carcinogens and mutagens and neurotoxins and agents of liver failure. Based on a standard government formula for assessing risks, it is estimated that 1032 of the 43 million Americans who regularly eat hot dogs will develop cancer from the pesticides in this food alone.

We have a way of overlooking certain facts that don't conform to our idealized images. After all, if the all-American hot dog is actually bad for us, what other foundation stones might be loose? Truth is, the truth can be hard to take sometimes. Perhaps we can let discrepancies among a few of our historical and cultural icons slide. So what if the Pilgrims didn't really land at Plymouth Rock; and who cares if George Washington never threw a dollar across the Potomac? But when it comes to the natural world we live in, it's hard to face the facts. For instance: For 100 days each year, you can't even see across the venerable Grand Canyon because the air above it is so polluted.

When it comes to water pollution, Toronto photography student Jeremy Lynch tries to make the best of things. He has successfully developed photographic film in the chemical-laden waters of Lake Ontario, the Hudson River and Love Canal. (Surprised?) You shouldn't be. After all, a single gallon of spilled gasoline can contaminate up to 750,000 gallons of groundwater.

And then, there's solid waste disposal. On an average day, the U.S. egg industry discards 550,000 live male chicks. (What do they do with them?)

In 1990, one out of every $11 spend on food in the United States paid for packaging---more than the net income of the farmers who produced the food! Think about the volume of orange-juice containers used up in New York City every morning. It would save several tons of packaging if all those people squeezed their own juice from fresh oranges--but then again, the peels--in just one day would weigh about 107,000 tons! And what would they do with that?

Humans have a strange fascination for other animals. (Perhaps because we differ from apes in one only one percent of out genetic makeup.) It's such a fine line that the Enviromental Protection Agency has determined certain acceptable levels of insect parts and animal waste in our food--an average of two maggots per 17.5 ounce can of tomatoes, say, or 35 fruit fly eggs per ounce of golden raisins. You can have one live insect in each of two containers of green coffee beans or two dead bugs in five containers. Or one rodent hair in 100 grams of chocolate. You know what the best part is? You've already eaten it!

To be fair, insects actually add protein and other nutritional value to the food in which ther happen to appear. The same insects that make Americans blanch are crunchy delicacies in other countries. Some etomologists have pointed out that if the EPA would just relax and double the limits, farmers could drastically reduce their use of pesticides.

Finally, we come nearly full circle, back to mites. Not follicle mites, but dust mites. Millions of them, microscopic and right in your own home. Think about it when you go to bed. Close your eyes, and know that as many as 250,000 of them can fly around in one gram of house dust, filling the air with their tiny, dust-mite fecal pellets.

Breathe deeply. Sleep well.