Gary Secondino: Medical/Health

Healthy dose of history: upholding FDA's role

Sun, 06 Apr 2003 14:13:13 GMT

Boston Globe - Philip J. Hilts's absorbing history of the Food and Drug Administration explores the intersection of business and morality, clarifies the relationship between government and commerce, and forcefully reaffirms the ...
Impotency drug must stand up to scrutiny Independent
House Rebukes FDA's Tactics Newsday

Justices Uphold Law Forcing HMOs To Open Doctor Network

Wed, 02 Apr 2003 21:58:16 GMT

Quicken - In a unanimous ruling Wednesday, the US Supreme Court said states can force health-maintenance organizations to let "any willing provider" into a company's medical-care network.
Justices Rule H.M.O.'s Can Be Forced to Open Networks New York Times
Justices: States can force HMOs to open networks CNN

4 more people die of mystery illnesses in Asia

Wed, 19 Mar 2003 16:19:17 GMT

4 more die in mystery illnesses in Asia. International Herald Tribune - HONG KONG Four more deaths were confirmed Wednesday three in Hong Kong and one in Vietnam as health authorities around the world continued to report new cases of a mysterious kind of pneumonia.
Possible Breakthrough on Mystery Pneumonia Voice of America
Three more travellers found with symptoms The Age

Short Thighs Linked To Greater Likelihood Of Diabetes

Tue, 11 Mar 2003 06:52:08 GMT

Science Daily - People with short upper legs are more likely to have glucose intolerance or diabetes, researchers reported today at the American Heart Association's 43rd Annual Conference on Cardiovascular Disease Epidemiology and Prevention.
Short thighs linked to diabetes CNN Europe
Study links short thighs to higher risk of diabetes Arizona Republic

Hospitals Take Robots for a Spin

Sat, 08 Mar 2003 11:35:16 GMT

With skyrocketing health-care costs and a growing nursing shortage, some hospitals are looking to robots to pick up the slack. These virtual orderlies may one day perform tasks like wheeling patients to dinner and taking blood. [Wired News]

NIH plans to sequence cow genome

Wed, 05 Mar 2003 03:44:52 GMT

The National Institutes of Health revealed Tuesday it plans to begin sequencing the genome or the layout of the genes of the cow as early as September, a project officials said could lead to a better understanding of the genetic basis for human health and disease.

"By comparing the human genome with the genomes of different organisms, we can better understand the structure and function of human genes and thereby develop new strategies in the battle against human disease," National Human Genome Research Institute Director Dr. Francis S. Collins said in a written statement.

Project to sequence cow genes OKd MSNBC
Baylor has a cow in genome project

US warns Iraq against using mass destruction weapons

Wed, 11 Dec 2002 11:07:35 GMT

Times of India - WASHINGTON: The United States warned Iraq and other potential foes Tuesday not to use any weapons of mass destruction (WMD) against US troops in the event of war, vowing to retaliate with ...
US Warns It Would Use N-Arms Salt Lake Tribune
US will use Nuclear Weapons in response to attack from WMD Hindustan Times
The Tallahassee Democrat - News Journal - Tyler Morning Telegraph - CNN - and 36 related »
Google World News

Seeking Solace, Openly or Quietly, When Ill

Mon, 09 Dec 2002 16:26:54 GMT

If you are fighting cancer (or any serious disease), people who have been there say, you need to decide which you need more privacy or support. By Lisa Belkin.
New York Times: Business

"Clear Skies Initiative" Results in More Pollution

Mon, 02 Dec 2002 16:54:49 GMT

Environmental News Network - BRUNSWICK The Atlantic Salmon Federation (ASF), like the rest of New England, is outraged by the Environmental Protection Agency s (EPA) announcement on Friday of regulatory changes to the Clean Air Act that will allow thousands ...
Policy change marks new era of environmental degradation Seattle Post Intelligencer
Excuse Pollution Always Palm Beach Post
Salon - Middletown Times Herald Record - Conconrd Monitor - Baltimore Business Journal - and 13 related »
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Big Brother's Big Win

Thu, 21 Nov 2002 14:55:49 GMT

By Eric Boehlert
Attorney General John Ashcroft scored a major legal victory on Monday when a secret appeals court ruled that his Justice Department can spy on Americans -- by wiretapping, searching their homes and reading their e-mail, among other measures -- without first obtaining a warrant showing probable cause for criminal activity. The decision emboldens the government's war on terror at home but also raises fresh concerns about privacy and due process.

Refuting 'Big Brother' Charge

Thu, 21 Nov 2002 14:30:40 GMT

Newsday - Washington - Seeking to allay concerns of government spying on citizens, a Pentagon official yesterday said technology being developed to identify terrorists by mining millions of private and public records will be subject to ...
Massive database dragnet explored San Jose Mercury News
US defends plan for search of data Boston Globe
Seattle Post Intelligencer - CNN - NewsMax.com - Defenselink.mil - and 61 related »
Google US News

I don't mind sharing my personal information for a cause or reason that I support. I'm a patriotic citizen, the security of America and the safety of it's people is a cause I support. But I object to the way this administration is dissolving my control over personal information without consent. This administration operates behind a wall of secrecy and now they plan to grab all of my personal information and do what with it, and give who access to it? The simple fact is I don't believe the words, but I do trust the actions. Unless whom ever must ask me with a reason each time they want to view my personal information and I have absolute veto power over the request I think this is wrong and a very bad law.

Vaccine called near for cervical cancer

Thu, 21 Nov 2002 14:00:34 GMT

Boston Globe - esearchers have developed an experimental vaccine that gives women complete protection against a virus that causes most cases of cervical cancer, according to a new study that suggests widespread ...
Vaccine blocks cancer-causing virus in study San Francisco Chronicle
Vaccine Fights Precursor To Cancer Hartford Courant
New York Times - Washington Post - Newark Star Ledger - St. Petersburg Times - and 47 related »
Google US News

Your Government in Action

Thu, 14 Nov 2002 14:11:29 GMT

iSay - It's after the election and so the remaking of America starts with a convicted felon, John Poindexter from the Iran-Contra days, unleashing an Orwellian plan to surveil and compile data on all Americans day to day activities in a grand unified database system known as Total Information Awareness. The Homeland Security Act if passed as it stands will allow this snooping and huge loss of personal privacy. Once this bureaucracy is created and funded there is no chance of going back.

Every purchase you make with a credit card, every magazine subscription you buy and medical prescription you fill, every Web site you visit and e-mail you send or receive, every academic grade you receive, every bank deposit you make, every trip you book and every event you attend [~] all these transactions and communications will go into what the Defense Department describes as "a virtual, centralized grand database." To this computerized dossier on your private life from commercial sources, add every piece of information that government has about you [~] passport application, driver's license and bridge toll records, judicial and divorce records, complaints from nosy neighbors to the F.B.I., your lifetime paper trail plus the latest hidden camera surveillance [~] and you have the supersnoop's dream: a "Total Information Awareness" about every U.S. citizen.

Chief Takes Over New Agency to Thwart Attacks on U.S.

By John Markoff
Feb. 13, 2002

John M. Poindexter, the retired Navy admiral who was President Ronald Reagan's national security adviser, has returned to the Pentagon to direct a new agency that is developing technologies to give federal officials instant access to vast new surveillance and information- analysis systems.

Air Security Focusing on Flier Screening

By Robert O'Harrow Jr.
Sep. 4, 2002

From the moment the Transportation Security Administration was formed, agency officials have been consumed by the idea of a vast network of supercomputers that would instantly probe every passenger's background

Pentagon Plans a Computer System That Would Peek at Personal Data of Americans

By John Markoff
Nov. 9, 2002

The Pentagon is constructing a computer system that could create a vast electronic dragnet, searching for personal information as part of the hunt for terrorists around the globe [~] including the United States. As the director of the effort, Vice Adm. John M. Poindexter, has described the system in Pentagon documents and in speeches, it will provide intelligence analysts and law enforcement officials with instant access to information from Internet mail and calling records to credit card and banking transactions and travel documents, without a search warrant

U.S. Hopes to Check Computers Globally

By Robert O'Harrow Jr.
Nov. 9, 2002

"We can develop the best technology in the world and unless there is public acceptance and understanding of the necessity, it will never be implemented," Poindexter said. "We're just as concerned as the next person with protecting privacy." Getting the Defense Department job is something of a comeback for Poindexter. The Reagan administration national security adviser was convicted in 1990 of five felony counts of lying to Congress, destroying official documents and obstructing congressional inquiries into the Iran-contra affair, which involved the secret sale of arms to Iran in the mid-1980s and diversion of profits to help the contra rebels in Nicaragua.

You Are a Suspect

By William Safire
Nov. 14, 2002

Political awareness can overcome "Total Information Awareness," the combined force of commercial and government snooping. In a similar overreach, Attorney General Ashcroft tried his Terrorism Information and Prevention System (TIPS), but public outrage at the use of gossips and postal workers as snoops caused the House to shoot it down. The Senate should now do the same to this other exploitation of fear. The Latin motto over Poindexter"s new Pentagon office reads "Scientia Est Potentia" [~] "knowledge is power." Exactly: the government's infinite knowledge about you is its power over you. "We're just as concerned as the next person with protecting privacy," this brilliant mind blandly assured The Post. A jury found he spoke falsely before.

Norwegian Woody

Tue, 12 Nov 2002 23:40:53 GMT

Norwegian penis ring can replace Viagra. Are we talking about a buzz toy for men? I just had to go with Norwegian Woody for this title. What else could it be called?

Aspirin eases heart bypass risk

Thu, 24 Oct 2002 14:06:38 GMT

San Francisco Chronicle - In a finding likely to change how heart surgeries are conducted throughout the world, researchers have discovered that aspirin, given hours after coronary bypass surgery, can cut post-operative deaths by two-thirds and sharply reduce a variety ...
Aspirin cuts deaths after heart attack Boston Globe
Aspirin saves lives after heart surgery MSNBC
Miami Herald - New York Times - Billings Gazette - Charlotte Observer - and 52 related »
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Ethics Standards Overhaul Urged for Hospital Buying Groups

Thu, 24 Oct 2002 11:54:23 GMT

A specialist in corporate ethics urged that companies involved in helping the nation's hospitals buy supplies adopt sweeping policy changes to avoid conflicts of interest. By Barry Meier.
New York Times: Business

Debt Rising for Retirees

Wed, 16 Oct 2002 12:58:05 GMT

Groceries, prescription drugs, and low interest rates on investments contribute to the problem.
The Motley Fool

Number of Americans Without Health Insurance Swells

Mon, 30 Sep 2002 13:48:20 GMT

Salt Lake Tribune - The number of Americans who lack health insurance rose to 41.2 million in 2001, due mainly to a recession-fueled decrease in the number of workers with coverage from employers, the Census Bureau reported today.
Lack of health coverage rose in 2001 Boston Globe
Number without health insurance rises in US Minneapolis Star Tribune
New York Times - Washington Post - Democrat and Chronicle - USA Today - and 18 related »
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Last gasp for workplace smoking?

Thu, 26 Sep 2002 03:51:52 GMT

International Herald Tribune - A proposed ban on smoking in all Boston workplaces, including restaurants and bars, got a lift as Mayor Thomas Menino announced his support for a policy he said would protect city workers from the health hazards of secondhand smoke.
Menino pushes smoking ban in bars, workplaces Boston Herald
Menino backs new smoking ban Boston Globe
WCVB-TV - Framingham Metro West Daily News - Austin American Statesman - Anchorage Daily News - and 26 related »
Google US News

Artificially High Drug Prices

Thu, 30 May 2002 10:20:56 GMT

Last evening I watched a special report from Tom Brokaw about the high prices of brand name drugs in the US. I kept thinking, thank God I'm healthy. The drug companies are reaping huge amounts of profit from US citizens. On the surface, it's a capitalist society so where is the problem? That question along with a smarmy attitude was projected by some of the industry people interviewed. I think it's different in this circumstance as people often aren't given a choice. Why? Because the companies make superfluous small changes to existing drugs and re-patenting them over and over creating a very effective monopoly. The industry only talks about huge amounts of research dollars it spends (prove it) yet the US Government annually spends Billions of tax payers dollars on drug research which directly benefits the drug manufacturers. The drug companies need to change their ways and bring the retail prices down. All it will take is one company to turn this around. That company will gain the moral high ground and subsequent increased market share that goes with it. I found another report on high prescription drug prices in the US here. The AARP is joining a law suit against drug manufacturers saying the companies kept prices artificially high and thwarted competition from lower-priced generic drugs in violation of federal antitrust laws. If it turns out that in the US there is a drug manufacturing and distribution cartel then they deserve to be punished. Not the companies, the people who run the companies need the punishment. Read the story.

Sat, 26 Jan 2002 16:42:12 GMT

Scientists develop cloning alternative. US scientists claim to have found an way to use gene cloning to develop new treatments for diseases such as Alzheimer's without using human embryos. [BBC News: sci/tech] iSay - Another step in a good direction. Cloning scares the hell out of me. Maybe I'm a product of scary sci/fi movies like The Blob, so what. This cloning, especially human cloning just smells bad. There are way to many negatives to the human race (new sicknesses, undesirable mutations, racial extinction, etc.) when this starts to be commercialized. We should stop all human cloning now.

Sat, 26 Jan 2002 16:18:12 GMT

Blair: Problems With Health System. Britain's National Health Service provides excellent care to the majority of its patients despite instances of poor treatment and unacceptably long waiting times for some patients, Prime Minister Tony Blair said. [AP World News]

Sat, 19 Jan 2002 00:28:20 GMT

Panel: Ban human cloning. Procedure unsafe for mother, child. [USA Today : Front Page]

Fri, 18 Jan 2002 13:14:14 GMT

Technology: New scan sees brain's nerve pathways. 03:32 ET - Ananova [NewsBlip.com]

Fri, 18 Jan 2002 12:30:14 GMT

Games 'could stop travel sickness'. Virtual reality computer games may help people overcome travel sickness, say scientists. [BBC News: sci/tech]