2011
This is a collection of news article which, for various reasons, had a personal impact or interest to me. Dec 17
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Nanotechnology is a cutting-edge advancement within science and engineering. It is not a single field but an intense collaboration between disciplines to manipulate materials on the atomic and molecular level. When this technology is applied to medicine, the results are especially exciting, and can better our lives in drastic new ways. Its inventive and interdisciplinary nature constantly surprises me, as do the men and women behind these projects. Each breakthrough in nanotechology solves a problem that many thought could not be overcome.
The Smallest Revolution: 5 Recent Breakthroughs in Nanomedicine | Guest Blog
CDC Highlights 10 Notable Health Achievements of Last 10 Years | All Sites Nursing News
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has named 10 noteworthy public health achievements of the first decade of the 21st century. “Americans are living longer, healthier, and more productive lives than ever before thanks in part to extraordinary achievements in public health over the past decade,” said CDC Director Thomas R.US citizens of all political persuasions are still reeling from images of unparallelled police brutality in a coordinated crackdown against peaceful OWS protesters in cities across the nation this past week . An elderly woman was pepper-sprayed in the face; the scene of unresisting, supine students at UC Davis being pepper-sprayed by phalanxes of riot police went viral online; images proliferated of young women – targeted seemingly for their gender – screaming, dragged by the hair by police in riot gear; and the pictures of a young man, stunned and bleeding profusely from the head, emerged in the record of the middle-of-the-night clearing of Zuccotti Park. But just when Americans thought we had the picture – was this crazy police and mayoral overkill, on a municipal level, in many different cities?
The shocking truth about the crackdown on Occupy | Naomi Wolf | Comment is free
Norman Corwin, American radio’s ‘poet laureate,’ dies at 101
In an era when radio was a dominant news and entertainment medium, Mr. Corwin was considered a visionary in the business. He wrote more than a dozen books and plays and received an Academy Award nomination for his literate screenplay of “Lust for Life” (1956), starring Kirk Douglas as tortured artist Vincent Van Gogh. Mr. Corwin was the writer of the legendary 1938 radio program “The Plot to Overthrow Christmas,” and his honors included two Peabody Awards.
When I heard the “We Are the 99%” slogan, I worried. I am movement-skittish. I don't like being spoken for.
The Livestream Ended: How I Got Off My Computer And Onto The Street At Occupy Oakland
At a press briefing Tuesday afternoon, Melody Barnes, director of the Domestic Policy Council, said the president would use his executive authority to expand the existing income-based repayment program with a “Pay as You Earn” option that would allow graduates to pay 10 percent of their discretionary income for 20 years and have the rest of their federal debt forgiven. That plan would start next year. Most of the 450,000 low-income student-loan borrowers currently enrolled in income-based payment must pay 15 percent of their discretionary income for 25 years before having their debt forgiven, although terms are easier for those in public service. The lower caps of the new program were scheduled to go into effect for new borrowers in 2014, but, Ms. Barnes said, “because we know the frustration of crushing loan burdens, we have to act now.” Ms.
President to Ease Student-Loan Burden for Low-Income Graduates
A third or more of all the honey consumed in the U.S. is likely to have been smuggled in from China and may be tainted with illegal antibiotics and heavy metals. A Food Safety News investigation has documented that millions of pounds of honey banned as unsafe in dozens of countries are being imported and sold here in record quantities. And the flow of Chinese honey continues despite assurances from the Food and Drug Administration and other federal officials that the hundreds of millions of pounds reaching store shelves were authentic and safe following the widespread arrests and convictions of major smugglers over the last two years. Experts interviewed by Food Safety News say some of the largest and most long-established U.S. honey packers are knowingly buying mislabeled, transshipped or possibly altered honey so they can sell it cheaper than those companies who demand safety, quality and rigorously inspected honey.
Asian Honey, Banned in Europe, Is Flooding U.S. Grocery Shelves
The CIA's impunity on 'torture tapes' | Glenn Greenwald | Comment is free
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged 9/11 mastermind, was waterboarded 183 times in one month; after the 9/11 Commission ordered release of videotaped interrogation sessions, the CIA destroyed them. Photograph: AP Lee Hamilton and Tom Kean – the co-chairmen of the 9/11 Commission – are the prototypical Wise Old Men of Washington. These are the types chosen to head blue-ribbon panels whenever the US government needs a respectable, trans-partisan, serious face to show the public in the wake of a mammoth political failure. Wise Old Men of Washington are entrusted with this mission because, by definition, they are loyal, devoted members of the political establishment and will criticise political institutions and leaders only in the most respectful and restrained manner.
Tests Show Most Store Honey Isn't Honey
More than three-fourths of the honey sold in U.S. grocery stores isn’t exactly what the bees produce, according to testing done exclusively for Food Safety News . The results show that the pollen frequently has been filtered out of products labeled “honey.” The removal of these microscopic particles from deep within a flower would make the nectar flunk the quality standards set by most of the world’s food safety agencies. The food safety divisions of the World Health Organization, the European Commission and dozens of others also have ruled that without pollen there is no way to determine whether the honey came from legitimate and safe sources. In the U.S., the Food and Drug Administration says that any product that’s been ultra-filtered and no longer contains pollen isn’t honey.The Shame of College Sports - Magazine
A litany of scandals in recent years have made the corruption of college sports constant front-page news. We profess outrage each time we learn that yet another student-athlete has been taking money under the table. But the real scandal is the very structure of college sports, wherein student-athletes generate billions of dollars for universities and private companies while earning nothing for themselves. Here, a leading civil-rights historian makes the case for paying college athletes—and reveals how a spate of lawsuits working their way through the courts could destroy the NCAA. Evan Kafka “I ’m not hiding,” Sonny Vaccaro told a closed hearing at the Willard Hotel in Washington, D.C., in 2001.
The Shortage of Essential Chemotherapy Drugs in the United States
For the first time in the United States, some essential chemotherapy drugs are in short supply. Most are generic drugs that have been used for years in childhood leukemia and curable cancers — vincristine, methotrexate, leucovorin, cytarabine, doxorubicin, bleomycin, and paclitaxel. 1 The shortages have caused serious concerns about safety, cost, and availability of lifesaving treatments. In a survey from the Institute for Safe Medication Practices, 25% of clinicians indicated that an error had occurred at their site because of drug shortages. Many of these errors were attributed to inexperience with alternative products — for instance, incorrect administration of levoleucovorin (Fusilev) when used as a substitute for leucovorin or use of a 1000-mg vial of cytarabine instead of the usual 500-mg one, resulting in an overdose.Flacking for Big Pharma: an article by Harriet Washington | The American Scholar
Article - Summer 2011 Print Drugmakers don’t just compromise doctors; they also undermine top medical journals and skew medical research By Harriet Washington “Drug Makers Cut Out Goodies for Doctors” and “Drugmakers Pulling Plug on Free Pens, Mugs & Pads” read headlines in The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal Health Blog at the end of 2008 after, in a very public act of contrition, 38 members of the pharmaceutical industry vowed to cease bestowing on prescribing physicians goodies such as pens, mugs, and other tchotchkes branded with their names.What's diagnosed as PTSD may sometimes be more accurately called a moral injury. (Illustration by David Senior) John Fisher got his soul back when he visited a cemetery in Greece.