Defense Articles

“We have worked with Cam Lock to develop the best possible protective ensemble for the Navy aviators,” said Barry Shope, President of Simula’s SEI Division. “Although the contract is a smaller component of our revenue base, we see it as critical in solidifying a partnership with our UK partner and, ultimately, our Navy customer who uses our flotation collars and emergency bailout parachutes.”

Cam Lock Ltd. is the prime contractor to the U.S. Navy for the aircrew CBR ensemble. To date, Cam Lock has delivered over 5,000 CBR ensembles incorporating Simula’s components.

Cam Lock Ltd. is a division of Camberley Rubber Mouldings Ltd. (CRM). Since its formation Cam Lock has developed technical capabilities in Nuclear, Biological and Chemical (NBC) respiratory protection equipment for military aviators. Cam Lock products are used by the UK MOD, Canadian Forces, the U.S. Marine Corps, and the U.S. Government. Equipment developed by Cam Lock has seen active service in various conflicts including Desert Storm.

Simula designs and makes systems and devices that save human lives. Its core markets are military aviation safety, military personnel safety, and land vehicle safety. Simula’s core technologies include inflatable restraints, energy-absorbing seating systems, advanced polymer materials, lightweight transparent and opaque armor products, personnel protective equipment, and emergency bailout parachutes. For more information, go to www.simula.com.

Safe Harbor statement under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995: This news release contains forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties that may cause the Company’s actual experience to differ materially from that which is anticipated. These forward-looking statements include statements about expected possible future orders. Risks to its business include those described herein and in the Company’s registration statements and periodic reports filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The Company undertakes no obligation to update any forward-looking statements to reflect unanticipated events or events or circumstances occurring after the date on which such statements are made.

Whenever Bill Clinton has gotten in trouble as President, he has returned to the ideas and devices that worked in his campaign. In trouble over the emphasis on gays in the military during his first weeks in office, he suddenly started talking about welfare reform, though he had no proposal on that issue and still doesn’t. He has lately started talking it up again. Heading to Tokyo for a G-7 summit that might have made him look like the globetrotting George Bush, neglecting the economic plight of Mr. and Mrs. America, he stopped in San Francisco to call for a worldwide jobs summit in the United States. Once in Tokyo, Mr. Clinton and his lieutenants missed no chance to say that the whole meeting was about jobs in America. Back in Washington, with the House-Senate conference on his economic plan getting under way, he reconstituted the “war room” that helped direct his campaign, this time to run the offensive for his budget. Mr. Clinton is widely viewed in Washington as a man who learns quickly from his successes and failures, and those of others. But his campaign has repeatedly gotten him in trouble as President, and returning to campaign mode will almost certainly do so again.

There has been much speculation about why Mr. Clinton never had the customary honeymoon with the Washington media. Some have blamed it on supposedly hard-boiled regulars in the White House press corps seeking to prove they could be just as rough on a Democrat as they had been on George Bush. Another theory has it that the newcomers to the White House press room who got there via covering Mr. Clinton’s campaign were determined to prove that they, too, could be tough. There has even been some outraged finger-pointing from liberals who have now determined that the press corps they cheered on during the previous 12 years has become a cynical lot hopelessly preoccupied with such trivial matters as travel-office firings and presidential haircuts.

Some have even argued that the President’s personal aloofness toward reporters and the high-handedness of his spokesmen, who closed off the press secretary’s office, infuriated the pampered press, which then took out its anger on Mr. Clinton. This stuff is fun to talk about, but it has little to do with the reality of what happened to Mr. Clinton in his early months in office.

Mr. Clinton came to power burdened by far more, and more specific, promises than any President in recent memory. He found it necessary to start breaking them even before he took office. He reversed himself on Haitian refugees, on a middle-class tax cut, and on cutting the deficit by half in his first term. These were not pledges buried in the small print of position papers. These were major commitments, made repeatedly and with scathing accompanying criticism of the Bush Administration.

Mr. Clinton made it worse by trying in some instances to claim he hadn’t made the promises, or that they weren’t important. Confronted, for example, by his abandonment of the middle-class tax cut, he said on January 15, “From New Hampshire forward, for reasons that absolutely mystify me, the press thought the most important issue in the race was the middle-class tax cut.” Well, one reason reporters - not to mention voters - might have thought that was the New Hampshire TV ad that showed him describing his economic plan. His first words: “It begins with a middle-class tax cut.” Not even the most sympathetic reporter could get around that. The result was a spate of merciless stories, all against a backdrop of questions about Mr. Clinton’s character left over from the campaign. The most prominent of these was the sordid Gennifer Flowers matter, which many journalists thought should not have become an issue. But they also thought that once it did, Mr. Clinton lied about it.

In his first weeks in office, he immediately plunged into controversy over a promise he did try to keep - to lift outright the ban on gays in the military, something he simply lacked the political leverage to pull off. One might think that the lesson of all this would be clear: that one should be careful with promises because they can come due when you can’t pay up.

The hiring of onetime Reaganite David Gergen as a senior advisor was widely hailed as a sign Mr. Clinton was learning from his mistakes. But Mr. Gergen is not known as the Sultan of Spin, as Vanity Fair called him, for nothing. At the Tokyo summit, Gergen presided over a sales blitz for the President and his achievements that was stupendous, even by the high standards of summit puffery set by previous Presidents. Reporters hardly dared leave their seats in the briefing room lest they miss any of the unending parade of officials who came to tell them how swimmingly it was all going. On July 9, the summit’s final day, Gergen and his briefers turned up three times in the afternoon and evening. In addition, Mr. Clinton himself held a full-dress news conference that night and was interviewed by each of the four TV networks. Some of what Gergen disclosed was useful detail, but much of it was such stuff as, “The President came back to the hotel just a short while ago, and I think it’s fair to say he’s in high spirits. He feels that the talks have been going extremely well.” According to Gergen, the President’s reaction to the summit economic declaration was, “I like it a lot.”

If you want more people to die behind a dashboard, then pause “Great Hockey Fights, Vol. 8″ and join me in some time travel. We’ll spin the dial back to the days when men were men and the young ones were often drunk, car keys in hand.

Indeed, if you lived near me during a stretch of the 1970s and ’80s, I could have killed you. We forget that people were lackadaisical back then about drinking and driving, and I was no exception. For someone in his late teens or early 20s, and hence legally able to buy alcohol at the time, it was just what you did. We’d down enough beers to have a certain brewer name a Clydesdale in our honor, then jump in our cars for a dash to the next party. Never did we feel our astonishing automotive skills had been impaired. Of course, there were a few times my fellow Einsteins razzed me for Evel Knievel maneuvers. And one of us did roll his van. But, hey.

That attitude, of course, would be changed in the years to come by lawyers, cops and the real spark plug, Mothers Against Drunk Driving. Their gung-ho efforts often pitted them against the industry, which saw its bar sales sink like a Tequila Sunrise being drained through a straw. But the trade complied and adjusted, contributing to a society-wide effort. Alcohol-related deaths fell.

You would think a celebratory truce might have been called in the years since. But no such luck. The industry’s gadflies are still at it, crusading against restaurants in hopes people will drink less before climbing into a driver’s seat. And the business responds in form, lobbing back accusations that the anti-drinking forces are really neo-temperance fanatics promoting their cause with unfounded facts and photos of dead children. Meanwhile, as the forces clash, about 17,000 people die per year from drunken driving.

Given that number, can you really blame MADD and its allies for keeping up the pressure’?

Yeah, actually, you could, or at least for exerting the same old sort of pressure. Proponents of measures like lowering the blood-alcohol content level at which a driver is considered legally intoxicated are stuck in a bygone era. They’re applying 1980s remedies to the much different world of 2005. The legal drinking age has been raised. Two-for-one restaurant deals are more likely to involve entrees than margaritas. Many parents complain that they get more guff about drinking from their children than they did during their teens from Mom and Dad. The days of cavalierly drinking and driving ended with the eight-track.

Yet two things haven’t changed: The annual tally of alcohol-related road deaths, which has hovered around 17,000 for a decade, and the strategies for bringing that figure down. We’ll go out on a limb here and suggest the two are interrelated.

The stalemate is the result of a time warp. Proponents of sober driving keep pushing for stricter laws and harsher penalties, as if the objective still was curbing the excesses of scofflaws like my friends and me. But the real killers on the road today are the drinkers who violate the regulations already on the books.

According to figures from the National Highway Safety Commission, 31 percent of fatal car crashes involve a driver with a BAC above the legal limit of 0.08. In 19 percent of the instances, the BAC tops 0.16. Anti-drinking proponents are pushing for a measure, currently before Congress, that intends to resolve the problem by stiffening the penalties for persons caught driving with a BAC above 0.15. That’s like trying to curb horrific crimes by raising the death penalty to two lethal injections.

Sanctions aren’t working. Nor is obligating restaurants to thwart criminals hell-bent on drinking. These culprits are hardly over-exuberant partiers who don’t know when to say no. New, truly innovative interventions have to be brainstormed. It’s a shame that groups like MADD don’t try to make that happen by working in concert with all the other stakeholders in the matter, friend or foe.

But the industry isn’t off the hook, either. Officials cite a new drinking rite for young people called 21 at 21. At 12:01 a.m. on the day someone turns 21 years old, friends take the newly legal drinker to a bar to down 21 shots, sometimes in a mere hour. Even if the person doesn’t get behind a wheel, that’s a dangerous amount of alcohol to consume. The industry could help itself by relegating the practice to flagpole sitting and similar fads. Collaboration with enforcement officials or parents’ sobriety groups could make the task easier.

Tougher for the industry would be working with its usual opponents to establish some form of identification as the proof-of-age standard and thereby combat underage drinking. Already, some areas are looking at overkill measures to combat counterfeit IDs, like requiring multiple documents that state the bearer’s age. If the trade wants a feasible solution, it needs to work with the other forces, even if that means cooperating with longstanding adversaries.

Too few gun shops have a good selection of well-designed holsters suitable for all-day concealment wear. Even fewer have a good assortment of suitable ammo pouches. A double-flap magazine pouch designed for a uniformed officer will not conceal under a sport coat, let alone an un-tucked shirt.

There are several excellent inside-the-waistband magazine pouches available for your customers. However, unless the customer is wearing pants with extra room in the waistband, they’re uncomfortable. This is especially true if your customers are already carrying a holstered pistol.

An excellent solution is a single-cell, quick-access magazine pouch that rides between the belt and trousers without intruding inside the waistband itself. I recommend the Kydex unit sold by Blade-Tech. It will not work well for customers who have, shall we say, a roll of heaviness above their waists, but your slender- and medium-built customers will find it functions very well.

The Blade-Tech unit is actually a “tuckable” pouch, so it can also be placed inside the waistband and hidden under a tucked-in shirt. In this original and intended application, it works for anyone of any shape so long as they have room for it inside their waistband.

Today’s Gun Clothes

For generations, retail firearm dealers have found hunting clothes and other outdoor garb to he a profitable sideline. Today’s gun clothing has been augmented by garments expressly designed to discreetly conceal defensive handguns. Brands I recommend include Concealed Carry Clothiers (vests) and Blackie Collins’ Toters (jeans).

Another impressive line is the 5.11 Tactical Series from Royal Robbins. Long the supplier of BDU shirts and cargo pants to trainers at the FBI Academy, Royal Robbins is going public with their products in a big way. Their blitz of heavy-duty advertising in gun magazines creates a ready-made market for their garments, especially their excellent gun-concealment vest.

The vest includes inside gun pockets and outside pockets for up to three pistol magazines. Superb workmanship and top-quality fabric assure long life and excellent service. They also sell at a remarkably affordable price.

America, a division of Konami Digital Entertainment, Inc., today shipped Metal Gear Solid(R)3: Snake Eater(TM) for the PlayStation(R)2 computer entertainment system to retail stores nationwide. The newest installment in the tactical espionage series that defined the stealth genre takes gamers on an all-new action-packed adventure through the jungles of the Soviet Union during the height of the Cold War era. Players will assume the role of Snake, a US-sent agent, embarking on a dangerous solo mission to uncover and destroy a newly created weapon of mass destruction. Renowned developer, Hideo Kojima, has created yet again a masterpiece of epic proportions combining unique and intense gameplay with an inspiring soundtrack, a captivating storyline, and stunning visuals that push the graphical limits of the PlayStation 2 to new heights.

“Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater is the pinnacle of the MGS series,” said Jason Enos, Product Manager for Konami Digital Entertainment - America. “The game contains all the amazing tactical espionage elements fans have come to expect from an MGS game, plus it incorporates new in-depth gameplay features such as close quarters combat (CQC), camo index, food capturing and the cure system, which once again redefines the entire stealth video game genre.”

Set in the 1960s, Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater is the definitive stealth action experience with extraordinary depth and new gameplay mechanics. Moving beyond the series’ signature radar control, the game thrusts players into a fully interactive and immersive jungle environment. Gamers must rely on elements such as the “camouflage index” to blend into the environments to sneak past enemies undetected or use the game’s unique and in-depth hand-to-hand combat “CQC” system to take down their foes. Utilizing the new camouflage index, players can change the patterns on Snake’s clothes as well as his face paint in order to blend into the surroundings, allowing him to avoid enemy detection or sneak up on his enemies. Players will be able to acquire different camouflage patterns throughout the game as well as download new camo designs online.

Adding incredible realism and depth to the game, Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater incorporates a “cure system,” where players will be able to heal Snake when he is injured during battle. Untreated wounds will affect the player’s health, and thus, affect the outcome of their mission. Furthermore, players will need to feed on animals, flora and fauna to survive in the jungle. Through the “food capturing” system, Snake can hunt for food and store the items in his inventory. Taking the realism of the game a step further, food will rot if gamers hold onto uneaten items for long periods of time. Players will need to carefully monitor Snake’s stamina and health by eating and also treating injuries in order to properly move through the game.

Unleashing a game on par with a major film production, Kojima has tapped a pool of Hollywood talent including, renowned director Kyle Cooper (Seven, Spider-Man and Mission: Impossible) to create an interactive opening sequence, as well as famed musical composer Harry Gregson-Williams (Shrek, The Rock, The Replacement Killers and Enemy of the State) to create the blockbuster musical score for the game.

The Metal Gear(R) franchise is in its 17th year, with the first Metal Gear(R) release debuting in Japan in 1987. The series centered on the adventures of secret agent Solid Snake and was consistently recognized for its new and original game design combined with a story full of plot twists and intricate human drama. In 1998, Konami introduced Metal Gear Solid(R) for the Sony PlayStation(R) game console, which was instantly noted for its stunning graphics, original narrative style and superlative gameplay. Metal Gear Solid(R) earned widespread critical acclaim and defined a benchmark of quality in the action genre. Building on the precedent set by the top-selling original title, Metal Gear Solid(R)2: Sons of Liberty(TM) was released in 2001 for the Sony PlayStation(R)2 with overwhelming praise from gamers and industry pundits worldwide, selling over 2 million units in the U.S. and over 5 million units worldwide. In 2002, Konami released, Metal Gear Solid(R)2: Substance(TM), the expanded edition of Metal Gear Solid(R)2: Sons of Liberty(TM), for the Xbox(TM) video game system from Microsoft, PlayStation(R)2 and PC DVD-ROM with much fan fare. In 2003, the amazing storyline and world of Metal Gear Solid(R) combined with the graphics and gameplay of Metal Gear Solid(R)2 to create Metal Gear Solid(R) The Twin Snakes(TM) for Nintendo GameCube(TM). In 2004, Hideo Kojima takes the tactical espionage action genre that the Metal Gear(R) series defined to a completely new direction in Metal Gear Solid(R)3: Snake Eater(TM) for the Sony PlayStation(R)2.

When I saw the price tag on the Pedia-Pak, I gasped: $65.95 seems pretty steep for a portable first-aid kit.

After looking through it, I think it’s a steal.

The red, white and blue pack has a number of compartments, each packed not only with the items a parent needs when a child is injured (think elastic bandage, alcohol pads, iodine pads, bee- sting relief pads and bandages), but also everyday items that every parent should have on hand.

That includes children’s Tylenol and Motrin, the generic equivalent of Benadryl, electrolyte mix and a bundle of various creams for everything from problem diaper rashes to antibiotic ointment, Hydrocortisone and aloe vera for sunburns.

One of the best items in this kit, however, is the book, “Emergency Medical Treatment: Infants, Children and Adults,” by David Manhoff and Dr. Stephen Vogel. It slips neatly into the outer pouch and has tabs to make it easy to find the instructions you need and drawings to make it even easier to understand.

The kit also contains instruments, from standard tweezers to a

medicine dropper, an instant cold pack, scissors, a digital thermometer for either oral or rectal use and more. Camping families will appreciate the tick tweezers and handy identification guide.

The retail value of the items, all of them actually useful to parents, easily exceeds the cost of the kit.

Mostly, though, I like the superb portability. It’s lightweight and compact, so you can throw it in the trunk when you head for an outing or put it on a handy shelf at home. It’s nowhere near as big as a diaper bag or a standard woman’s purse.

And it brings everything together. There’s no searching through cupboards for that one medicine or ointment — it’s all laid out in the pockets in easy-grab form.

There’s an interesting story behind the development of this product. B.J. Hilles was in the process of adopting a child from China. She was concerned about the trip home with a child who may not have had adequate medical care, although she knew her skills as a nurse would see her through.

But because she is a nurse, she also had plenty of material for her imagination to fret over during the waiting period of the adoption, while she was trying to get things ready.

She set out to buy a first-aid kit but couldn’t find one designed with children in mind.

Hilles and her pediatrician talked about what such a bag should contain. And because she did not know, at that time, exactly how old her daughter-to-be, Olivia, was, she expanded it to make a kit suitable for a child of any age.

Sir: In the feature “The ten best travel first-aid kits” (24 July), all the “remedies” in the Helios Homeopathy Travellers’ kit are in the 30C dilution. Therefore, they contain no trace of the substance on the label. You pay pounds 38.95 for sugar pills. To get even one molecule, you would have to swallow a sphere with a diameter equal to the distance from the Earth to the sun. That is hard to swallow. Helios was one of the companies pilloried by the News-night programme when their representative recommended homeopathic prevention of malaria. That was condemned even by some homeopaths as dangerous and irresponsible. It is simple. This “medicine” contains no medicine.

The recent terrorist attacks in the United States of America and the widespread fears of anthrax poisoning and spreading of smallpox that followed, raise the question of how New Zealand health professionals might respond to the casualties were similar events to occur here. The matter has often been raised before, but now the new Director of the Ministry of Civil Defence and Emergency Management is determined to have it addressed. As a start, this paper draws on international expertise and local experience to outline the kind of psychological first-aid service that should be made available to disaster casualties. In clinical justification it holds middle ground on the efficacy of such intervention between the advocates and the critics, lists the particular topics about which interveners should be informed, sketches the essentials of their involvement, and asserts that some conditions will require specialist treatment. It accepts that the implementation of the proposal would require further discussion with the relevant professional societies, voluntary agencies, and the statutory bureaucracies that have responsibility for dealing with other aspects of trauma and social disruption.
The events in New York and Washington on 11 September 2001 left around 3 000 dead on the sites where the three planes crashed and many thousands of people in stages of grief and shock throughout the country. Teams of crisis responders swung swiftly into action, locating themselves conveniently in available spaces, alerting their networks to the problems to be addressed, and calling for `restraint, patience, preparation, and professionalism’ (September 11 Updates, 2002). In short time leading educationalists, clinical practitioners, public authorities, and trauma relief organisations updated websites, and some mounted a series of one-day transitional courses to upgrade the knowledge of recent recruits.
Several official and unofficial agencies were involved with the counselling response, and the full weight of their commitment has yet to be known. But in the first eight weeks after the event throughout America, the Red Cross alone had 135,800 mental health and grief contacts. Soon more detailed information should be available about the kind of problems presented around the impact and the recoil stages of the attacks. On the organisational side, trained mental health volunteers on the sites worked long hours, and in their state of marginal fatigue they did not receive kindly the reminder of a sceptic that they were accountable, scientifically and clinically, for their work - especially when the media took up the issue. Nor did they appreciate the spontaneous offers of help from unknown clinicians whom they described disparagingly as `trauma tourists’ for being in a heightened state of arousal and displaying the wellknown signs of the convergence phenomenon with an uncontrollable impulse to be at `ground zero’.

For their part the trained reinforcements brought in from neighbouring States were annoyed to find that even in such an emergency their professional credentials had to be checked before they could lend a hand. Others en route were frustrated by the unavoidable air transport delays caused by the fears of further terrorist attacks, and by the typical ‘hurry up and wait’ orders they received. But on reflection some realised that they had a useful role to fill at home without being at the epicentre of the disaster. They came to see that their existing clients might be dependent on them for help in dealing with the ramifications of the terrorist attack on the nation, and that new clients might be referred to them for grief, anxiety and depressive reactions associated vicariously with the event.

For those on site, questions arose as to what kind of agency intervention model they were better to adopt - either that of American Red Cross, or Critical Incident Stress Management, or Green Cross, or an amalgam - and what kind of debriefing system should be provided, and how soon after the event. Then came the kind of help the debriefers themselves would need to recalibrate their experiences daily before re-entering the fray. In their normal practice the health professionals were familiar with the long-term effects of burnout (Wilson & Lindy, 1994), but not all appreciated that the intense pressure from emergency work also produced adverse emotional and physical effects - called compassion fatigue, countertransference, secondary traumatic stress, or vicarious traumatisation.

Anyone with children has seen his or her share of injuries, ranging from a standard boo-boo to “Let’s get this kid to the ER right now!” Most injuries, fortunately, fall into the first category, and can be safely treated at home. In order to handle the inevitable childhood cuts and bruises, however, every family should keep a well-stocked first-aid kit in their home.

Many stores carry ready made first-aid kits stocked with the basics, but they are often lacking in some important areas. Parents who take the time to put together their own, custom-made first-aid kit will know they’re prepared for just about anything. And it doesn’t need to be confined to the home. When on vacation, far from regular medical care personnel, most parents will be more comfortable knowing they have their own medical supplies with them in case of the unexpected.

Here’s what you need to put together a customized first-aid kit:

A Tackle Box These come in several sizes, and they have all those neat little nooks and crannies which are perfect for storing various necessary items.

Sunburn Lotion The kind with lidocaine, which is a topical anesthetic, is most effective. It really stops the pain. Many also contain aloe, which will also cool off the burn. This is good for treating poison ivy as well–the lidocaine helps with the itching. Don’t use it on open wounds or broken skin.

Sting Stop This stuff is great. It contains a topical anesthetic that quickly stops the pain and itching of a sting. It really helps. Remember, if the sting was delivered by a honey bee, the stinger will need to be removed. It’s best not to use tweezers for this, as squeezing the stinger while it’s still in the skin will only serve to release any remaining venom into the victim. Better to use a credit card, scraping sharply over the sting to pop the stinger out.

Antibiotic Ointment Always put it directly on the sterile surface of the bandage rather than on the finger to keep both the bandage and the rest of the ointment inside the tube sterile. Remember, the best way to prevent infection of a wound is to wash it well with soap and water.

Chigger Rid of Clear Nail Polish Chiggers are tiny mites which hang out in tall grass just waiting to climb on a person and start burrowing under the skin, causing miserable itching. When brushed over the chigger’s tunnels, it kills them. Good stuff.

Over-the-counter Antihistamine Take immediately after an insect sting, to prevent secondary, longer-term reactions. This is obviously not for the person with serious allergies to bee stings. If you have a family member with severe alleries to insect stings, you should have an EpiPen in your first aid kit. And make sure it hasn’t passed its expiration date.

Over-the-counter Pain And Fever Reducers Aspirin, acetaminophen (Tylenol, Panadol, etc.) or ibuprofen (Motrin, Nupren, etc.) are the three over-the-counter drugs in this category. The generic brands work fine. Be sure to read directions and precautions carefully. (Aspirin and ibuprofen should not be used on patients with influenza symptoms or chicken pox as these medications can cause serious complications such as Reyes Syndrome in these patients, especially in children.) Also include over-the-counter medicines for coughing, heartburn, diarrhea, and gas. Remember to buy both children’s and adult’s. (Note: A single aspirin given at the beginning of symptoms can sometimes save a life when someone is having a heart attack.)

Bandages, Band-Aids You should have assorted sizes and shapes for assorted injuries.

Maxi Pads In case of a serious cut resulting in heavy bleeding, maxi pads are very good for pressing over a wound while getting medical help for the person.

Medical Latex Gloves If someone is bleeding heavily, it’s a good idea these days to avoid contact with their blood. So take the time to put on gloves before helping.

A Tooth Container A small container, such as the plastic ones film comes in, half full of powdered milk. Should someone have a tooth knocked out with the roots still attached, there’s a chance the tooth can be saved. Mix the powdered milk with water to re-constitute it, and drop in the tooth. Avoid touching the root end of the tooth.The milk will keep the root alive while the victim and the tooth are transported to the nearest emergency room.

Instant Ice-Pack These work by squeezing the bag, releasing chemicals which, when mixed together, become very cold. This is handy for sprains and sore muscles.

Saline Eye Drops These work well for chlorine overdose or allergy itchiness. These also come in handy if someone gets something in his eye which cannot be easily removed. Be careful. If the foreign object is too difficult to remove, a doctor should look at it.

Diaper Rash Ointment This, and over-the-counter yeast infection ointment, offer a lot of relief for rashes and infections in sensitive places.

A Few Essential Tools Remember to add a good tweezers and a needle, for removing splinters and ticks, and matches for sterilizing the needle. Also handy are a thermometer, nail clippers for removing hangnails, and a good pair of scissors for cutting bandages.

Accidents happen.

Occasionally they’re serious enough to warrant a trip to the emergency room, but most of the time, minor mishaps or aches and pains can be treated at home–provided you’re prepared for them. Along with bandages and gauze (to dress a wound), tweezers (for removing stingers or splinters) and alcohol (for sterilization), an herbal first-aid kit should be stocked with a variety of powders, capsules, tinctures and essential oils. These natural items are ready to use, fast-acting, highly versatile and generally inexpensive. On top of that, they have a long shelf life and can fit into a case that’s small enough to store in a cabinet at home or stash in your luggage when you travel.

Situation                   Herb             Function

While cutting up            Cayenne          Stops bleeding in
vegetables, you nicked      powder           minutes, reduces pain,
your finger, which is                        encourages scab
now bleeding                                 formation

Mosquito and/or ant         Lavender         Reduces bite-related
bites have you scratch-     essential oil    itching and swelling
ing like crazy

You tripped and             St. John’s       Relieves pain, reduces
strained an ankle           wort oil         swelling and heals
tissues  quickly

You stayed out in the sun   Aloe vera gel    Soothes pain and speeds
too long and now you’re                      healing from first-
as red as a tomato                           degree burns.

A nature hike left you      A combination    Stops discomfort and
covered with poison ivy,    of peppermint    the spread of the rash
oak or sumac                and lavender
essential oils

You’ve gone sailing with    Ginger           Halts nausea fast
friends, but each time
the boat tosses, so does
your stomach

You’ve developed a          Clove            Works as an anesthetic
throbbing toothache or      essential oil    and antiseptic to
inflamed gums                                reduce pain and prevent
infection

An annoying itching         Tea tree oil     Fights fungal
signals a vaginal yeast                      infections and relieves
infection                                    discomfort

Pain and/or difficulty      Uva ursi         Kills bacteria that
urinating indicates a                        cause infection in
urinary tract infection                      urinary tract

You ate the whole thing,    Peppermint       Relieves gas,
and now you’ve got a                         indigestion and
killer bellyache                             heartburn

Situation                   Dosage(*)

While cutting up            Sprinkle cayenne directly on
vegetables, you nicked      the cut and apply pressure.
your finger, which is       For profuse bleeding, swallow
now bleeding                two 00-size capsules of pow-
dered cayenne

Mosquito and/or ant         Mix a teaspoon of lavender oil
bites have you scratch-     with a tablespoon of vegetable
ing like crazy              oil and store in small, light-
resistant glass vial. Apply
directly to bites as needed

You tripped and             Massage into affected area
strained an ankle           until pain subsides

You stayed out in the sun   Apply topically as needed
too long and now you’re
as red as a tomato

A nature hike left you      Add 4 drops of each oil to 4
covered with poison ivy,    cups of colloidal oatmeal and
oak or sumac                1 cup Epsom salt and pour into
lukewarm or cool bath water.
Soak for 15 to 30 minutes

You’ve gone sailing with    Eat 1 to 2 cubes of crystallized
friends, but each time      (candied) ginger or take 1 to 2
the boat tosses, so does    qrams of ginger capsules a
your stomach                day (in divided doses)

You’ve developed a          Dip a cotton swab in the oil
throbbing toothache or      and apply directly to sore
inflamed gums               teeth or gums

An annoying itching         Soak a tampon in a solution
signals a vaginal yeast     that’s 4 parts tea tree oil and 6
infection                   parts water. Insert into vagina
and leave in overnight.
Repeat as needed

Pain and/or difficulty      Take 10 grams a day in
urinating indicates a       capsule form
urinary tract infection

You ate the whole thing,    15 to 30 drops of tincture,
and now you’ve got a        3 times a day
killer bellyache

Situation                   Warning

While cutting up            Cayenne burns slightly. Once
vegetables, you nicked      bleeding stops, wash and disin-
your finger, which is       fect cut with 2 drops of lavender
now bleeding                oil in 1/4 cup water. Dab 1 drop of
oil on cut before bandaging

Mosquito and/or ant         None
bites have you scratch-
ing like crazy

You tripped and             None
strained an ankle

You stayed out in the sun   Preparations that contain less
too long and now you re     than 98 percent aloe vera may
as red as a tomato          not be effective

A nature hike left you      None
covered with poison ivy,
oak or sumac

You’ve gone sailing with    None
friends, but each time
the boat tosses, so does
your stomach

You’ve developed a          Clove oil can irritate, so use
throbbing toothache or      sparingly
inflamed gums

An annoying itching         Change tampons regularly to
signals a vaginal yeast     prevent more serious problems,
infection                   such as the infection toxic
shock syndrome

Pain and/or difficulty      Uva ursi only works if urine is
urinating indicates a       alkaline, so don’t mix it with
urinary tract infection     cranberry juice or vitamin C sup-
plements, which acidify urine