An IV for the Middle East?

Dear Editor,

President Eisenhower's Secretary of Agriculture, Ezra Taft Benson, once said "yesterday's meal is not enough to sustain today's needs."

Bashar Assad of Syria has created a situation where the people in that country are severly malnourished in regard to their basic human rights and personal freedom. Other countries in the Middle East, such as Iraq, Afghanistan, Egypt and Iran, are suffering from the same type of affliction.

Throughout history, there have been problems not only resulting from the malnutrition of the human body, but also of the well being of people's very souls.

Back in 1939, Dr. John Crandon, a second year surgical resident of Boston City Hospital, investigated the results of a diet without vitamin C. For 180 days, he ate a diet that did not have any foods containing vitamin C. On the 55th day of his experiment, his systolic blood pressure dropped.

After three to four months, he developed extreme fatigue. On the 134th day, there were problems with his skin. There was bleeding under his skin on the 162nd day. He collapsed briefly and lost consciousness momentarily on the 180th day.

Dr. Crandon recovered after he received vitamin C intravenously for a period of time. Middle East nations have suffered from a prolonged period in which they have lacked democracy and civil rights, and personal freedom from oppression.

It appears that they also will require an intravenous source of political and democratic nourishment to survive.

Helen Ruth Arnold,

Trenton, Nebraska