Global Warming Makes Poison Ivy Worse

Ronald Bailey | May 30, 2006

Greenland and Antarctica melting, Manhattan and Florida under water, ski resorts going out of business, hurricanes increasing, temperatures rising and now THIS! A new study by Duke University finds that the extra carbon dioxide pumped into the air by burning fossil fuels will make poison ivy grow faster and even become itchiier. Doomsday must truly be upon us.

Comments

|5.30.06 @ 5:54PM|#

Ronald Bailey,

Are you sure you aren't in cahoots with the calamine lotion industry? :)

|5.30.06 @ 6:10PM|#

I apparently got in some poison ivy last week and I am paying the price now. Feels a little like Doomsday.

|5.30.06 @ 6:11PM|#

Fire Ants! Killer bees! Kudzu! Oh my!

|5.30.06 @ 6:35PM|#

Duke Sucks.

|5.30.06 @ 6:37PM|#

I thought Alyssa Milano did a good job at making Poison Ivy worse on her own.

|5.30.06 @ 7:04PM|#

as one who has personally had the worst cases of poison ivy i've ever seen or heard of, let me share with ya'll the best remedy i've ever found: household bleach dabbed directly on rashy areas with a cloth or tissue, no rinsing. this works better than shots of cortisone directly in the ass, or the million other remedys i tried in my first 20 years, and doesn't hurt in the least.

|5.30.06 @ 7:19PM|#

News flash! Plants given fertilizer/nutrients/CO2 in higher concentrations grow faster! In other news people given more to eat grow fatter. Do I get a government grant too?

|5.30.06 @ 7:19PM|#

Hopefully global warming will cause the plants that benefit us, such as wheat and rice, to grow faster too.

|5.30.06 @ 7:20PM|#

Sweet Jesus! Global warming causes bad movies?? And it's all Bush's fault for not signing Kyoto???

|5.30.06 @ 7:24PM|#

Move over, Easterbrook,we're all gonna die!

Raising sea level 200 meters won't even put a dent in the PI

Taylor|5.30.06 @ 7:29PM|#

Worked at a summer camp for a while.. lots of kids with PI. Guess the first place little boys itch?

|5.30.06 @ 7:36PM|#

Russell,

you are probably exagerating, but the most the sea level can rise over today's level is 80m...and not soon...if at all.

|5.30.06 @ 7:57PM|#

Immediate cessation of use of fossil fuels will not be enough to stop the itchy horrors of anthropogenic global warming.

We must immediately stop the production and consumption of any and all fermented beverages, the creation of which unnecessarily produces THOUSANDS of TONS of CO2 every year.

|5.30.06 @ 9:04PM|#

Gee, guys, thanks for confirming one of my worst nightmares. Last year, for the first time in my life, I got a horrible case of poison ivy from clearing a flower bed in my back yard. Didn't even see that damn stuff. I had to miss work I hurt so bad, and the oozing sores grossed everyone in my office out so bad they made me leave.

The worst dilemma I can imagine is finding out that fire ants eat poison ivy, or that poison ivy kills fire ants. Either way, one of the two most detestable forms of carbon-based life has a USE. Really, mass starvation and death from a new ice age would be a small price to pay for the extinction of both things.

|5.30.06 @ 10:13PM|#

Either way, one of the two most detestable forms of carbon-based life has a USE.

When I see that sentence, I think of Benny Hinn and Sylvia Browne.

|5.30.06 @ 10:18PM|#

Two words: poison oak.

Poison ivy never bothered me too much; mild irritation. But poison oak, dear god that was awful.

|5.30.06 @ 10:37PM|#

If you ever feel compelled to burn poison ivy or oak to get rid of it, don't breathe the smoke or let it get on your skin or clothes.

|5.30.06 @ 11:34PM|#

former PI,

Being a fellow sufferer of really nasty cases of poison oak, (here on the west coast we don't have poison "ivy":-)) I've used your method of applying bleach. It works "OK". Nothing, howerver, can beat a nice, potent injection of steroids (cortizone or better). Oh yeah!

This was all when I was a kid and thought I was Indiana Jones or Tarzan. An ounce of prevention is indeed worth a pound of cure.

|5.30.06 @ 11:53PM|#

Fuck, learn what the damn shit looks like and don't get into it. It's really easy to avoid once you learn to recognize it and learn where it likes to grow and so on and so forth.

Oh, and poison ivy, poison oak, and poison sumac all have the same icky chemical - a sticky oil called urishol(sp?). I'm pretty sure they do, anyway. It's too late to look things like that up.

|5.31.06 @ 12:13AM|#

the other Mark,

You've got it. I can spot that shit from a mile away.

|5.31.06 @ 12:26AM|#

Also,
The rash resulting from exposure to posion oak/ivy/sumac is an allergic reaction, NOT a fucking communicable disease!

|5.31.06 @ 1:44AM|#

I'd say something about poison oak, but apparently it wouldn't be polite for me to do so, so I will abstain. ;)

|5.31.06 @ 12:02PM|#

"Hopefully global warming will cause the plants that benefit us, such as wheat and rice, to grow faster too."

Carbon Dioxide. They call it a pollutant. We call it life. The weeds call it steroids.

We'll figure out a way to eat poison ivy and kudzu. Don't worry, keep emitting!

M. Simon|5.31.06 @ 7:18PM|#

I used to get poison ivy as a kid.

As an adult I rubbed some all over my arms and nothing happened.