From Vitamin D to my gut... 10 ways science has benefited me
Friends and family always ask what I’ve learned during filming and every year I pick up a few nuggets of knowledge that I incorporate into my life. Here are a few I’ve amassed in the last decade of 10 Things…
Thanks to a deep dive episode on the immune system, I now take a daily Vitamin D pill.
Vitamin D is essential for a functioning immune system, but 47% of people in Ireland aged 18-39 are deficient. Since I generally stay out of the sun, I’m unlikely to produce enough myself.
A story about indoor air quality prompted me to replace my gas cooker with an induction hob and electric oven.
Gas cooking releases nitrogen dioxide (NO2) and small particulate matter indoors which, without sufficient ventilation, can aggravate the respiratory health of everyone in the house.
Particulate matter are ultra-tiny bits of solid or liquid that float in the air. Once inhaled, they can travel deep into the lungs and even enter the bloodstream.
Multiple studies have shown an association between gas cooking emissions and respiratory symptoms and conditions such as asthma in children. We have one asthmatic in our household so when I had to replace my old gas cooker, I took the opportunity to switch to electric induction cooking and find it fantastic.
Again, we are just a sample size of four, but I think we experienced fewer coughs last winter since we changed to electric cooking.
The importance of our guts has been appreciated for centuries. It’s why we ‘trust our guts’, ‘bust a gut’, or ‘hate someone’s guts’, but in the last two decades, scientific evidence has been mounting about how exactly the gut plays a crucial role in a healthy body and mind.
I’ve covered multiple stories about the microbiome in our body - even providing a stool sample for analysis in the name of science!
To encourage myself to eat a variety of veg, I get a box of locally grown produce from the Cork Rooftop Farm every fortnight to help keep my microbiome in tip top condition.
Cardiovascular Disease, Type 2 Diabetes, Obesity, Osteoporosis, Arthritis, Cancer, Depression, Dementia or High Blood Pressure; name the medical condition and I’ll point you to the scientific literature that shows exercise either reduces the risk of developing the condition or alleviates the symptoms of it.
If exercise came in pill form, it would be a trillion-dollar industry. For adults, at least 30 minutes a day of moderate intensity activity (puffed but able to chat), five days a week, or 150 minutes a week, is key to getting healthy and staying healthy.
Plastic pollution is a topic I’ve been covering regularly since 2015 when I first had a track-and-zoom moment of realisation of the scale of the microplastic problem.
At the time, scientists were concerned about how much plastic was going into our oceans.
At this point, microplastics have been found in every part of the planet, including some of the most remote and extreme environments - deep ocean trenches, Arctic and Antarctic ice, even in the atmosphere, transported by wind.
Over the years, I’ve tried to reduce my family’s exposure to microplastics, swapping wooden chopping boards, glass food storage, stainless steel lunch boxes, and water bottles instead of the plastic versions.
This year, we have a whole episode of 10 Things To Know About on plastic-associated chemicals such as phthalates and PFAS - so-called forever chemicals - and I have gotten rid of all the non-stick cookware in my kitchen as a result of that research. (I’ll have a column on the topic in a few weeks).
These efforts are possibly entirely futile when the entire world is tainted by plastic and forever chemicals, but it helps me sleep a little easier at night!
10 Things… has taught me that we have the solutions to build a society that doesn’t wreck the planet.
I have covered stories about the vast amounts of renewable electricity that could be harnessed off our coasts with floating offshore wind platforms. About district heating systems that take the excess heat from businesses to heat public buildings and private homes, helping reduce Ireland’s reliance on fossil fuels and reduce heating costs.
Another stand-out solution was the UCC-based project that used a plant to clean up wastewater.
Scientists can recycle nutrients in the wastewater from dairy farms to grow duckweed, which produces a protein-rich feed for animals, creating a closed-loop rural feed industry that could also help produce more environmentally friendly bioplastics!
And there have been so many more stories like this. We have the tools to create a sustainable future - we just need to use them!
Tune into the latest series of 10 Things To Know About starting next Monday, November 4, at 8.30pm on RTÉ1, to find out about more solutions like these!
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