Tag Archives | Health Care

What’s Your Hobby? Knitted Breasts Created By 91-Year-Old

By on March 19, 2011 in News 12

KnittingVia Newslite:

You might expect your granny to knit you a woolly jumper, but one pensioner has been defying expectations by using her needles to craft amazing knitted breasts.

Coral Charles-Dunne, 91, from Birmingham, has knitted dozens of the unusual educational tools as part of a project to inform expectant and new mums about breastfeeding.

She says spends about two hours creating each of the woolly boobs and makes them in a range of sizes, knitting for up to six hours per day.

The knitted breasts are then used by expectant moms to learn techniques for breast feeding … their partners probably use them to create an unusual game of football.

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Justin Bieber Speaks On American Health Care

By on February 17, 2011 in News 40

rolling stone bieberI believe this requires discussion not because the young celebrity is publicly discussing politics, but the implications it would have on the impressionable youth of the nation and the movement towards national health care. Excerpt taken from Rolling Stone:

The Canadian-born Bieber never plans on becoming an American citizen. “You guys are evil,” he jokes. “Canada’s the best country in the world.” He adds, “We go to the doctor and we don’t need to worry about paying him, but here, your whole life, you’re broke because of medical bills. My bodyguard’s baby was premature, and now he has to pay for it. In Canada, if your baby’s premature, he stays in the hospital as long as he needs to, and then you go home.

For the rare disinfo reader who is a Bieber fan, here’s some video from the RS shoot:

Article continues at Rolling Stone.

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How Congress Created Socialized Medicine — In 1798

By on February 11, 2011 in News 35

02-john-adams-12644Is Obamacare a communism-flavored slap-in-the-face to our Founding Fathers? No, it isn’t — Forbes points out that the wigged ones were closet socialists. In 1798, Congress created the first taxpayer-funded, government-run hospital, and mandated health insurance for all sailors — moves that seemed to predict health care in Europe and Canada today:

In July of 1798, Congress passed – and President John Adams signed – “An Act for the Relief of Sick and Disabled Seamen.” The law authorized the creation of a government operated marine hospital service and mandated that privately employed sailors be required to purchase health care insurance.

Keep in mind that the 5th Congress did not really need to struggle over the intentions of the drafters of the Constitutions in creating this Act as many of its members were the drafters of the Constitution.

And when the Bill came to the desk of President John Adams for signature, I think it’s safe to assume that the man in that chair had a pretty good grasp on what the framers had in mind.

… Read the rest

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Brazil To Provide Free Diabetes and High Blood Pressure Medications

By on February 7, 2011 in News 8

President Rousseff Photo: Roberto Stuckert Filho/Presidência da República

President Rousseff Photo: Roberto Stuckert Filho/Presidência da República

BBC News reports:

Brazil is to provide free medicines for everyone suffering from high blood pressure or diabetes.

The drugs will be distributed through a nationwide network of budget pharmacies, where many medicines are already heavily subsidised.

President Dilma Rousseff said the measure was part of her campaign to end extreme poverty in Brazil.

About 33 million Brazilians have high blood pressure, and more than seven million have diabetes.

The free medicines will be available to all Brazilians who have a doctor’s prescription, but the authorities say they expect the offer to be taken up mainly by poorer people who use the public health system.

They will be distributed through 15,000 chemist shops that belong to the “Popular Pharmacies” network, where many drugs are already sold at a 90% discount.

[Continues at BBC News]… Read the rest

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Smoking The Cause Of Low U.S. Life Expectancy

By on January 26, 2011 in News 35

smokingWhy does the U.S. spend more on health care than any other nation while its population has a life expectancy lower than in many other developed countries? According to a new government report: smoking. From WebMD:

Life expectancies in the U.S. are now lower than for many other industrialized countries, and the nation’s past love affair with tobacco is largely to blame, government officials say.

In a report released Tuesday, a panel commissioned by the National Research Council sought to explain why the U.S. spends more on health care than any other nation, yet Americans are dying younger than some of their counterparts in other high-income countries.

Over the past two and a half decades, life expectancies continued to rise in the U.S., but at a slower pace than those seen in Australia, Canada, Japan, Great Britain, and other high-income European countries.

The average live expectancy for men in the U.S.

… Read the rest

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The Market May Want You To Die

By on January 21, 2011 in News 12

Aaron Cynic writes at Diatribe Media:

The Republicans who now control the U.S. House of Representatives made demolishing the Obama healthcare bill their top priority during their campaign and will fight their hardest to make that demolition a reality now that they hold office. We all know the reasons: tea partiers want the government out of their Medicaid; seasoned republicans know they just need to trumpet their hatred of “big government” to stay seated; and most in both camps believe that the “market” is gospel and should dictate who should get health coverage.

The Department of Health and Human Services released a study showing that between 50 and 129 million Americans have some kind of pre-existing health condition. As plenty of Americans know, a preexisting condition can allow insurance companies to deny some or even all coverage. Should an insurance company decide to change their criteria defining “pre-existing condition,” it’s possible for a patient to lose coverage as well.

… Read the rest

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More Than A Quarter Of U.S. Children Are On Prescription Drugs

By on January 6, 2011 in News 10

ritalinHigh blood pressure, high cholesterol, diabetes, trouble sleeping, depression, hyperactivity: it’s hard being a kid. Over a quarter of our country’s children are now on long-term prescription drug regimens, and the percentage will only continue to increase. The Wall Street Journal reports:

Gage Martindale, who is 8 years old, has been taking a blood-pressure drug since he was a toddler. “I want to be healthy, and I don’t want things in my heart to go wrong,” he says.

And, of course, his mom is always there to check Gage’s blood pressure regularly with a home monitor, and to make sure the second-grader doesn’t skip a dose of his once-a-day enalapril.

These days, the medicine cabinet is truly a family affair. More than a quarter of U.S. kids and teens are taking a medication on a chronic basis, according to Medco Health Solutions Inc., the biggest U.S. pharmacy-benefit manager with around 65 million members.

… Read the rest

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America in Decline: Why Germans Think We’re Insane

By on December 28, 2010 in News 66

Tea PartyDemocrats Ramshield writes in Alternet:

As an American expat living in the European Union, I’ve started to see America from a different perspective.

The European Union has a larger economy and more people than America does. Though it spends less — right around 9 percent of GNP on medical, whereas we in the U.S. spend close to between 15 to 16 percent of GNP on medical — the EU pretty much insures 100 percent of its population.

The U.S. has 59 million people medically uninsured; 132 million without dental insurance; 60 million without paid sick leave; 40 million on food stamps. Everybody in the European Union has cradle-to-grave access to universal medical and a dental plan by law. The law also requires paid sick leave; paid annual leave; paid maternity leave. When you realize all of that, it becomes easy to understand why many Europeans think America has gone insane.

… Read the rest

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Chamber of Commerce Betrays America Again: Opposes 9/11 Responders Healthcare Bill

By on December 19, 2010 in News 16

USCoCIt seems that the Chamber of Commerce lobbied against the bill to give specialized healthcare to 9/11 rescuers which would have been fully paid for by closing a $7.4 billion dollar tax loophole that benefited FOREIGN corporations.

The very misnomered “U.S.” Chamber of Commerce is best known for throwing gobs of money into the last election at the idiotic Supreme Court’s urging, attempting to get a flood of corporate hacks masquerading as populists elected to Congress, and also for it’s fearless “leader”, Tom Donohue, who famously claimed he’d make any candidate who even dared MENTION helping the poor, bleed and cry.

Yeah. A real prince among men. And that is the real spirit of that organization. A giant eff you to anyone who isn’t a billionaire, that claims to work for small businesses, but doesn’t. Nathan Diebenow writes in RAW Story:

The US Chamber of Commerce lobbied to kill a bill that would have helped cover medical expenses and compensation for first responders and survivors of the Sept.

… Read the rest

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