Past the Expiration Date? Maybe No Problem!

Although it’s always a good practice to check the expiration dates of foods before you use them, it is still usually safe to use certain foods that have “expired.” The printed expiration dates on many foods are conservative, and the food may still be as edible as it was the day before.

Dry or low moisture products such as rice, dry beans or dry pasta last long past their expiration date if stored in a cool, dry place in their original packages. Canned goods are safe for up to four years after their expiration date, as long as the can is undamaged. Highly acidic foods and those that contain a lot of sugar or have been heat treated are similarly safe beyond the printed expiration date on the label. Acid, sugar and heat inhibit the growth of microorganisms that spoil foods.

Unopened jam is fine half a year past the expiration date because of its high sugar content; store the jam in the refrigerator once the lid has been opened. Unopened mayonnaise is also safe for 6 months due to its high acidity.

The pasteurization of dairy milk allows continued use a week or so past the printed expiration data. But any off odor or change in color or clumps indicate that the milk is no longer going to taste right. Unopened shelf-stable plant-based milks will generally be safe if kept cool and dry; their ultra-high pasteurization temperature and sterile packaging ensure long palatability.

Many foods are actually still totally safe to eat after their expiration date, although the quality of flavor and texture may degrade over time. For instance, older dried beans will take longer to cook. So when you do a pantry inventory, don’t automatically throw out items that are past their expiration date. 

Will Deleting Emails Save Water? Let’s Do the Math

Much of Britain was suffering drought conditions last spring. So were other parts of the world. The UK’s National Drought Group, after noting the extensive and increasing use of water by data centers, asked the British public to delete old photos and emails from their personal computers. Will this help the drought situation?

We can think about this by doing a little math.

Data centers typically use water to cool the rooms in which their chips operate. Using GPT-4 to create one 100-word email uses about 0.5 liter (500 milliliters) of water.

Storing one 75 KB email message for a month uses about 0.001 milliliter of water. A simple division problem shows that you would be required to delete 500 emails to make up for creating one!

Perhaps there are wiser ways to save water.

What about those leaky toilets? Leak rates range from about 110 to over 15,000 liters each day. At the lowest leak rate, you would need to delete over 5 million emails a day to keep up with the water lost to the leak!

It’s probably wiser to fix the toilet leak. That will save a LOT more water than deleting old emails. 

Wear Red in February

February is Heart Month. Not just because of Valentine Day, but also it’s a good time to raise awareness about cardiovascular disease, which is the leading cause of death worldwide. Cardiovascular diseases cause about 18 million deaths annually, making it a major global health burden. The number of cases is increasing due to the growth and aging of the population.

Cardiovascular disease includes many conditions of the heart and blood vessels. Heart problems include heart attack, stroke, heart failure, arrhythmia, and heart valve problems.

Blood vessel conditions include atherosclerosis, peripheralarterial disease, aortic aneurysm, cerebral vascular disease, varicose veins, and deep vein thrombosis.

About 80% of cardiovascular disease is caused by knownmodifiable risk factors. These include high systolic blood pressure, poor diet, high LDL cholesterol, smoking, and sedentary lifestyles. The worldwide increases in obesity and diabetes are major contributors to the growth of this health problem.

To learn ways to take proper care of your cardiovascular system and how to prevent or deal with specific heart conditions, please visit this month’s Healthinfo Island poster sets.

https://blog.virtualability.org/2026/02/displays-and-exhibits-for-healthinfo.html

 

Spots? Dots? Measles!

Measles is a highly contagious disease caused by a virus. It is recognized by its characteristic rash that starts on the face and spreads down the body. Like many viral diseases, there is no treatment. Complications, although rare, can be severe, such as pneumonia, neurologic damage, blindness, even death.

Measles used to be a common childhood disease. Almost everyone caught it before the end of the teen years. Each year, about 48,000 people were hospitalized in the US for measles complications, and there were 400-500 measles deaths annually. Once you’d survived measles, you were thought to be immune for the rest of your life.

With the creation of an effective, safe vaccine, themeasles story changed for the better. The measles vaccine is administered in a combination injection along with vaccines against mumps and rubella, termed MMR. Two spaced doses of the MMR vaccine provide 97% protection against measles. Measles is now considered a preventable disease.

The World Health Organization (WHO) will declare acountry or world region to be measles-free when there is no sustained, endemic transmission for at least 12 months. (Cases may still occur due to international travel). The US was declared measles-free in 2000, thanks to widespread childhood vaccination. Maintaining this status requires both a 95% vaccination rate and vigilance to quarantine new cases.

Vaccination programs worldwide are saving the lives of children everywhere. The US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) has helped other countries strengthen vaccination programs and surveillance systems to detect outbreaks.

In 2025 in the US and around the world, the number of measles cases increased alarmingly. There were linked outbreaks of measles in Texas, Arizona, and South Carolina. The final US yearly count for 2025 was 2,267 confirmed cases. In 2024, the annual count was 285 cases.

By February 5, 2026, the CDC confirmed 773 US measles cases. That’s probably an undercount. As of January 30, the CDC had reported 467 confirmed cases in South Carolina, but state officials reported 847 cases. The trend is alarming.

Will the US lose its measles-elimination designation? Canada lost theirs in November 2025. The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) Regional Monitoring and Re-Verification Commission for Measles, Rubella, and Congenital Rubella Syndrome (RVC) will conduct areview on April 13th this year.

To learn more about measles, please check out the Measles poster set on Healthinfo Island during February. Here is the SLURL: 

http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Healthinfo%20Island/195/158/22