Strange News – Page 10 – Chester Press

The costs of fads – Pokemon Go

With fads such as “Pokemon Go” hitting smart-device screens, social researchers at Wisconsin Society Administration have evaluated the indirect costs. The figures are alarming.

“If we take the first level of indirection – lower productivity – we see that this, in the Wisconsin area alone, comes to an average of just under 30 minutes per working day lost to ‘screen time’. This comes out to the order of over 15 million dollars per day in lost productivity,” says Sarah Erstman, fellow at the WSA, “That it alarming by itself. We deliberately ignored time off for accidents caused by looking inattention, since the causality for this would be too hard to associate with our study, yet you can consider this figure to rise if we included it.”

She goes on to say that there are many knock-on effects, such as a drop in the quality of work, unsafe workplaces resulting in higher rates of liability and time off for employees. She says to expect higher incidents of food poisoning along with neck, hand and eye complaints, rises in personal liability premiums and telecommunication bottlenecks.

“The figure (of 15 million per day) is conservative. If we include level two factors, the cost can be estimated at somewhere between 40 to 50 million. This is a significant loss and the effects will be felt for years to come,” she says, “We are still waiting on the official results from our sister study, based upon traffic flow, but the current consensus is that trains and busses are being delayed, traffic is more congested. I would expect to double that figure for tertiary effects.”

Radiation Link Crystal Clear

The wealthy who have more crystal glasses, pitchers and chandeliers in their house are less affected by background radiation and therefore have fewer health problems, says Doctor Merkel Van Der Gerber of Trondheim Medical Research Centre.

In a study involving data from over two hundred households, his team demonstrated that those houses with more lead crystal had consistently lower readings of Beta and Gamma radiation. In some cases, those households without crystal could have as much as 700% higher readings than those with.

“It is surprising to me. I would not have thought that such a correlation would be so apparent. We have seen previous studies that look at the air-conditioning units and how those with higher air-flow have more heavy elements, leading to higher levels of background radiation, but simply having the presence of crystal seems to be a significant factor,” he says, adding a warning, “But this is no substitute for clean living. We still advocate dusting regularly to remove dust-borne metals, and to keep air-conditioner use at a minimum.”

The type of crystal is significant, he adds. Higher lead content has a better blocking capacity. Glass with heavy metals like Uranium glass also contribute. The lower radiation reveals a lower rate of radiation related illnesses among the inhabitants.

“You can imagine that your crystal acts like a kind of sponge, soaking up high energy particles and isolating them. As a result of this study, I will certainly be investing in a crystal cabinet not only for looks but for my health as well.”