The Bay of Plenty Times welcomes letters and comments from readers. Below you can read the letters we have published in your newspaper today.
TODAY'S LETTERS:
What have we learnt in past five centuries?
Eddie Orsulich (Your View, June 1) is perfectly correct, albeit unwittingly, to associate indulge/indulgence with renewable forms of energy, and thus "Global Warming".
From the 11th century the church sold Indulgences, more properly Papal Bulls of Indulgence, to wealthy sinners to absolve them of their earthly sins. The church profited and the sinners continued sinning. The practice reached its corrupt height in the 13th and 14th centuries, prior to the arrival of Martin Luther and the Reformation.
Such obvious rorts, lacking in worth, merit and consequence, would find no place in the modern world?
And yet, here we have similar "Indulgences" flogged off to the faithful and avaricious, in the form of "save the planet bonds" or "Carbon credits" under the ETS, most rabidly sponsored by the corrupt IPCC and its backer, the United Nations.
Has mankind learnt nothing in the intervening five centuries?
Dave Finney, Matua
Happy hundred
Time for Kerry Brown (Cedar Manor) to have a roll-call because it appears he/she has misplaced a 101-year-old somewhere! Hazel Bryce - who, despite living at Cedar Manor and being 102 in August, was absent from the article on centenarians, not to mention her sister Queenie, who is 103.
Hazel was probably gadding about the town somewhere playing bowls or having lunch with her grandchildren.
She wasn't at my house making preserves with my wife, or out digging my vegetable garden this year, as she has done up until recently, as her eyesight has deteriorated, but if it wasn't for that she would be out there sharing her infinite knowledge and experience with me.
She must have been home though, because Holly, her granddaughter, called her to ask her for a recipe, which Hazel duly recited from memory.
Holly is not in the need of talking books yet, but frequently consults her very own "talking recipe book!"
Hazel didn't make it to the jazz festival this year due to a prior engagement, but last year she came and sat next to the stage to make sure she got as close to the action as possible.
When Hazel was 91 she came to the pub to watch my band and held the pool table in the lounge bar for five games, much to the dismay of the regulars.
Graham Clark, Lower Kaimai
Caution needed
It would pay to consider the hype on resveratrol with caution, given that it is promoted alongside an addictive carcinogen.
In particular, people should be advised that research has generally been focused on short-term effects and has been done in mainly laboratory studies on animals, and not on humans.
Not a lot is known about the absorption, metabolism and liver effects of resveratrol.
There is also some concern that resveratrol may be a potentiator of breast cancer, so consuming red wine may in fact be promoting cancer by two different mechanisms.
Recommending increased consumption of red wine could certainly do more harm than good as concentrations of this antioxidant vary considerably among different wines.
While taking resveratrol pills is certainly safer than heavy wine consumption, supplementing with clinically unproven substances is generally unwise.
At this point, occasional use of red wine seems far more prudent.
Tony Farrell, Tauranga
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