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Beyond Maria: Coming Together to Help Rebuild Puerto Rico

Luis Mendez and Waleska Sallaberry, the publishers of Natural Awakenings Puerto Rico (PR) edition for the past 15 years, have a simple request: “Please help us rebuild.”

Mendez and Sallabery are remarkable community leaders, having not only launched what is now PR’s number one health and wellness publication, but also having originated and managed the most important annual health and wellness expo in PR and the Caribbean, created a natural health network of discounted services with more than 1,000 providers and 250,000 members and founded an alternative eco-school to serve PR’s western coast.

They have been inspirational to their readers and clients, but also to other publishers in the Natural Awakenings family, who have benefited from their guidance, leadership and vision for the magazine. Publishers have created a GoFundMe account to support their efforts to rebuild PR’s holistic health and wellness community at a time when healing services are so desperately needed.

Mendez and Sallaberry will be trustees of this fund and will disseminate the proceeds to the people and organizations in PR at their discretion. Donations will help not just one family, but an entire networked family of businesses and organizations that are part of the backbone of PR.

“I’m inspired by the ways different publishers are responding to this need in our publishing family,” says Natural Awakenings Publishing Corporation CEO Sharon Bruckman. “This campaign allows us to reach out to our readers, as well, and offer them a way to directly affect the natural health community in Puerto Rico, allowing for continued sustenance even after Puerto Rico cycles out of the news in the weeks and months to come.”

For more information and to make a donation, visit GoFundMe.com/NaturalAwakeningsPRfundraiser

News Briefs
Tick Talk

Spring officially sprung on March 21. We have turned our clocks ahead. We are looking forward to warm winds, sunny skies and the smell of fresh cut grass. The daffodils and tulips have recently bloomed and we are just starting with the yard work that comes with the warmer weather.  Sadly, another season has started ramping up.  Tick season.

•             The best form of protection is prevention. Educating oneself about tick activity and how our behaviors overlap with tick habitats is the first step.

•             According to the NJ DOH, in 2022 Hunterdon County led the state with a Lyme disease incidence rate of 426 cases per 100,000 people. The fact is ticks spend approximately 90% of their lives not on a host but aggressively searching for one, molting to their next stage or over-wintering. This is why a tick remediation program should be implemented on school grounds where NJ DOH deems high risk for tick exposure and subsequent attachment to human hosts.

•             Governor Murphy has signed a bill that mandates tick education in NJ public schools. See this for the details.  Tick education must now be incorporated into K-12 school curriculum. See link:

https://www.nj.gov/education/broadcasts/2023/sept/27/TicksandTick-BorneIllnessEducation.pdf

•             May is a great month to remind the public that tick activity is in full swing. In New Jersey, there are many tickborne diseases that affect residents, including Anaplasmosis, Babesiosis, Ehrlichiosis, Lyme disease, Powassan, and Spotted Fever Group Rickettsiosis.

•             For years, the focus has mainly been about protecting ourselves from Lyme disease. But other tick-borne diseases are on the rise in Central Jersey. An increase of incidence of Babesia and Anaplasma are sidelining people too. These two pathogens are scary because they effect our blood cells. Babesia affects the red blood cells and Anaplasma effects the white blood cells.

•             Ticks can be infected with more than one pathogen. When you contract Lyme it is possible to contract more than just that one disease. This is called a co-infection. It is super important to pay attention to your symptoms. See link.

https://twp.freehold.nj.us/480/Disease-Co-Infection

A good resource from the State:

https://www.nj.gov/health/cd/topics/tickborne.shtml

 

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