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Club Announcements:
Beginning October 13, The Rotary Club of North Jackson recommenced in-person meetings at The Rickhouse. The meetings continue to be available via Zoom. Please let Admin. Secretary-Treasurer Don Roberts know if you will be attending the in-person meeting.
Zoom meeting invites with the link and password will be sent to all club members on Mondays. The Zoom meetings will continue to start at noon on Tuesdays with club member fellowship with the meeting starting at 12:15 p.m. If you have any issues connecting to the Zoom meeting or would like the link sent to you, please email Past President Greg Campbell at gregcampbell2@comcast.net.
We reserve the first 15 minutes for fellowship and give our speakers nearly 30 minutes for their presentations.
Birthdays
David Nicholas Nov. 13
Kevin Russell Nov. 13
Wedding Anniversaries:
Cooper & Frances Morrison Nov. 14
Membership Anniversaries
None
Prayer. As we celebrate Veteran's Day this week, we remember somberly those who served faithfully in military service. And for men and women now serving, we offer a prayer for their well-being and for their families.
Bless this meeting today that it may contribute to the causes to which we are committed as Rotarians. Draw us always together as we share in breaking bread and in fellowship. Amen.
Marcus Ginn, Donor Relations Manager, Canopy Children’s Solutions, spoke to the Rotary Club of North Jackson at the club’s November 3, 2020 meeting. The subject of his presentation was “Mental Health." Ginn is an alumnus of the University of Mississippi and is the Treasurer of the National Association of Mental Illness (NAMI).
Canopy was founded in 1912 as the Mississippi Children’s Home Society with the mission of placing orphaned children into permanent, loving homes.
In 2016, the name of the organization was changed to Canopy Children’s Solutions which more accurately reflects the current mission of the organization. That mission is to help children thrive and families overcome extraordinary challenges by providing a continuum of behavioral health, educational, and social service solutions.
Canopy employs a diverse group of mission-driven employees committed to honoring the voice of Mississippi children and families. We work to keep these voices heard by our state and national leaders. Its employees are published academics and research journalists in behavioral health and social service issues.
Ginn gave a brief history of the organization and its current status. He said that today Canopy has 18 locations in Mississippi ranging from
two Cares Schools, one in Jackson and one in Hattiesburg,
two Child Advocacy Centers, one is Pascagoula and one in Gulfport,
Community offices throughout the state,
an emergency shelter in Vicksburg,
a residential center in Jackson, and
corporate offices in Jackson.
Per Ginn, one in 54 children are diagnosed with being on the Autism spectrum, and one in five children in Mississippi, or 131,000, have behavioral health challenges. Eighty percent of these do not get the needed care. Mental health is not treated as a “real” disease. We need to shine the light on mental health.
To increase the attention on mental health, Canopy is sponsoring “Share Hope” November 13 - 15 at Highland Village in Jackson. This is a weekend of outdoor activities focusing on mental and physical wellness. The CSpire Foundation is the primary sponsor of the weekend’s activity. Ginn encouraged people to “be congruent”, “Be realistic”, and Be Nimble” with respect to mental health. Being congruent is to put things in the proper order, being realistic is to accept the facts, and being nimble is to adapt to a changing environment.
We thank Ginn for his presentation and for what he is doing to help improve mental health. He is shown the following photo during his presentation.
The following is a link to the November 3 Club meeting, including Ginn’s complete presentation: https://vimeo.com/475517579.
North Jackson Rotarians packed food boxes for distribution to needy families at the Mississippi Food Network on Friday, October 30. The following photos are from the event. Shown are Club Service Director Lori Greer, Public Relations Director Bill Osborne, and Past President Greg Campbell.
Brendan Quinn, Outreach and Social Media Manager for the Center for Responsive Politics spoke to the Rotary Club of North Jackson at the Club's October 27 meeting. The subject of Mr. Quinn's presentation was "following the money in politics." He used the Center's website, OpenSecrets.org as the basis for his presentation. Per Quinn, presidential candidates have raised $3.7 billion, with Biden outraising Trump $1.3 billion to $0.9 billion. The remaining $1 billion was raised by lesser-known candidates and candidates in the preliminary races. Quinn said that the current election cycle will be the most expensive ever. He differentiated between official candidate committees, outside funding, and "dark" money. Both Biden and trump have substantial funds raided by their committees, outside money, and dark money. We thank Quinn for his very interesting and informative presentation. The following photo is from the OpenSecrets.org website.
You can view the entire meeting including Quinn's presentation at the following website:
The Rotary Club of North Jackson celebrated World Polio Day at its October 20 meeting with three speakers focused on the celebration. Those speakers were: Floyd Lancia, Director, Rotary International, Skip Nolan M.D., Professor Emeritus, University of Mississippi Medical Center, Nelson Atehortua, M.D., Ph.D., Asst. Professor, Dept. of Behavioral and Environmental Health of School of Public Health at Jackson State University and Dist.6820 Polio Plus Chair.
The subject of Lancia’s presentation was the Current Status of Polio eradication under Rotary International, Why are we stuck in Pakistan and Afghanistan?, What is the next big thing after Polio for Rotary?
Lancia said that polio is preventable, but it is not curable. The work of Rotary and its partners has reduced the number of global cases annually from 350,000 in 1985 to about 77 this year, a reduction of 99.9%. Currently, polio is present only in Pakistan and Afghanistan. It is present along the Pakistan-Afganistan border where some 50,000 people cross between the two countries daily. Africa is polio-free. Nigeria, the last country in Africa to have polio was declared polio-free in August 2020. Lancia noted that due to the reduction in the number of polio cases, an estimated 18 million children have not contracted polio. Lancia said that if Rotary stopped its polio work now, there would be 200,000 cases annually in ten years.
The subject of Nolan’s presentation was Polio and Covid 19, What are the differences? Where are we now with Covid 19? His perspective about the future.
Per Dr. Nolan, Polio and COVID are both viruses. Other commonly know viruses are Flu, Ebola, Herpes, HIV, the cold. He said that there are no specific treatments for most viruses.
Polio is transmitted via fecal-oral trajectories. It attacks nerve cells and there are no specific treatments. It is incurable but is preventable with immunization. COVID 19 is spread by coughing, sneezing, exposure to contaminated surfaces. It leads to respiratory infections and pneumonia. It is treated with corticosteroids, convalescent plasma, and redeliver. COVID 19 can be prevented by social distancing, facemasks, and good hand sanitation. COVID-19 is medically termed “Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2; SARS COV2. It is a novel (new) virus first detected in Wuhan, China in December 2019. It is similar to a virus found in bats. Good science is lacking on COVID 19 and clinical studies take time and are expensive, but are being conducted. Much of the information on social media is either unproven or untrue. Politicization and disinformation prevented a well-organized national response n the US.
With COVID 19, Mortality is highest in the elderly, but it does kill young healthy people. The virus can be transmitted by people without symptoms’ i.e., asymptomatic. With respect to the severity of the illness, Dr. Nolan commented that:
80% of the cases are mild
14%are more serious
5% are critical illnesses
10% require hospitalization (10 % of those require the ICU and mechanical ventilation)
Transmission is person-to-person via close-range contact by respiratory droplets when an infected person talks, coughs, or sneezes. The virus attacks mucous membranes (mouth, nose, throat, eyes). The risk of infection increases with the closeness of contact and the duration of the exposure. A person may be infected if their hands become contaminated and touch the eyes, mouth, or nose. Close contact implies a distance of fewer than 6 feet as the droplets normally drop at a distance of 6 feet. Infected people can transmit the virus for 2 days before symptoms and 7 days after being symptomatic.
COVID 19 can be prevented by hand hygiene, respiratory hygiene (masks), avoiding touching your face, cleaning and disinfecting items, avoiding crowded, poorly ventilated indoor spaces, maintaining social distances, and implementing a 14-day self-quarantine following exposure to the virus. The wearing of masks prevents transmission by the wearer to other individuals. Dr. Nolan said it is not a sign of weakness but is an “Act of Christian Charity.”
Atehortua spoke about his experiences as a polio survivor and the future. He said that we are not done with polio: we are close, but not done. We shouldn’t drop the ball until we are done.
We thank Lancia, Dr. Nolan, and Dr. A for their presentations. They are shown in the following photos. The photo of Dr. Nolan (Center) is with Club President Lee Carney and Club Vice President Dr. Suman Das who served as master of ceremonies for our celebration.
Floyd Lancia
President Lee Carney, Dr. Nolan, Vice President Dr. Das
Randy Hare, a nationally recognized dog trainer and the owner of Alpha Canine Training Center with facilities in Jackson, MS, and Nashville, TN, and with over 40-years’ experience working with dogs and their handlers spoke to the Rotary Club of North Jackson at the club’s October 13meeting.
Today, Hare is living his lifelong dream of training family dogs so they can peacefully exist at home with their families. Experience and talent in dog training have landed him spots on regional television, in various K-9 Magazine articles, and on national television. In 1987, Hare appeared on “Late Night with David Letterman” to perform a complicated trick he had taught his (then) six-year-old German Shepherd. Hare’s real start, in the late 1970s, was with training hunting dogs. Then, in the early 1980’s he attended a Professional Dog Trainers School where he gained a solid foundation for training dogs in Obedience, Protection, Police Dog Training, and Tracking.
Hare opened his first training center in Monroe, Louisiana, where he trained Obedience, Protection, Police Dogs, and Narcotics Detection Dogs. His very first police dog, trained for the Monroe City Marshall’s Office, finished 15th in the nation from a field of 140 dogs at the United States Police Canine Association (USPCA) National Police Dog Trials in Detroit, Michigan.
While still training dogs for private citizens, Hare trained and competed against other handlers and trainers with his personally trained police dogs while competing successfully in Schutzhund competitions. The word schutzhund translates from German as protection dog.
In his first National Police Dog Trial, Hare finished 7th out of 150 top dogs in that year’s national event held in St. Cloud, Minnesota. This began a 5-year span of over 30 competitions where he won or finished in the top percentile in 96% of the competitions: those competitions were Police Dog Trials, Schutzhund Trials, and Narcotics Detection Dog Trials and involved four different personally-trained dogs. During Hare’s twelve years in Law Enforcement, he attended every major seminar (within reach) conducted by world-class trainers from the United States and Europe. He learns what each trainer has to offer, combines the best of their styles and techniques with his own, and now he shares his method. Each dog he trains benefits from his experience and knowledge. Few trainers can match his EXPERIENCE, TALENT, and LOVE for training dogs, as shown by his “Recognition and Achievements” through national police K-9 organizations such as the National Police Canine Association and the United States Police Canine Association where he served as a judge for both organizations. Hare is now the proud owner of the Alpha Canine Training Center located in Jackson Mississippi and Nashville, Tennessee.
Hare’s comments to the Rotary Club were focused primarily on the psychology of dogs and the training methods he uses. His key point was that dogs live in the moment. He repeated this point several times. In response to a question, he commented that mixed breed dogs appear to be easier to train. He also commented that he loves what he does. From his comments, it appears that dog owners may need to be retrained more often than the dogs themselves.
We thank him for his very interesting talk and for his service training dogs and their owners. The following is a link to the video of the meeting of the Rotary Club of North Jackson, including Hare’s presentation: https://vimeo.com/468293436. The following photo is of Hare during his presentation:
One of Rotary’s key humanitarian goals is to eliminate polio from the face of the earth. Polio, or poliomyelitis, is a disabling and life-threatening disease caused by the poliovirus. Poliomyelitis is a paralytic disease and is still active in 2 countries, Pakistan and Afghanistan. Thanks to Rotary International it is 99.9 % eradicated. The virus usually affects 5 years old and younger, usually transmitted through the gastrointestinal tract, and in some cases can affect the spinal cord causing paralysis. The first vaccine was invented by Dr. Jonas Salk in 1954, which was a killed virus given intra-muscularly. The second vaccine was invented by Dr. Albert Sabin, which is an attenuated virus (live) and given by mouth. This vaccine was commercially used in 1961. The iron lung was used to help polio patients with paralysis to breathe.
When our club first started to observe World Polio Day in 2018, there were three countries, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Nigeria with cases of Wild Paralytic Polio. Today only Pakistan and Afghanistan are the two countries left with active cases of Polio. Nigeria has been declared Polio Free (WPV) by WHO on August 25, 2020. In the last 10 years, Rotary International has spent $15 billion in Nigeria to eradicate Polio. GPEI (Global Polio Eradication Initiative} was formed in 1988 for the worldwide eradication of polio. CDC, Rotary International, WHO, UNICEF, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation are some of the major partners of this initiative. There were 350,000 cases of Paralytic Polio worldwide in 1985 that number was reduced by 99.9 percent in 2016. For every dollar Rotary contributes to Polio, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation gives $2 making it a 2:1 match. However, our fight is not over until every country is declared polio-free and has the resources to effectively vaccinate its children. The United States is fortunate that polio is now only a distant memory when once it had infected our commander-in-chief, President Roosevelt who was able to successfully hide it.
