Wed Jul 29, 2009 3:27pm EDT
ATLANTA (Reuters) - Expert U.S. advisers accepted recommendations on Wednesday to put pregnant women at the front of the line for vaccines against the new H1N1 pandemic influenza virus, with relatives and caregivers for infants second.
The Advisory Panel on Immunization Practices nearly unanimously accepted advice from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to first protect pregnant women, infants and healthcare workers against the virus.
Healthcare workers and children at risk of serious complications should follow -- and then healthy young adults aged 19 to 24, the panel said.
Members of the panel said young adults should be a priority because they are more likely to become infected, and because they may spread the virus through society.
(Reporting by Maggie Fox, editing by Gerald E. McCormick)
---http://davidsradiotv2000.blogspot.com
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Saturday, July 25, 2009
Waiters left out of latest minimum wage rise
Fri Jul 24, 2009 12:13pm EDT
NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. service sector employees who receive tips have been excluded from the latest hike in the federal minimum wage that kicked in on Friday, leaving the public to cover the cost of their healthcare, according to economists and advocates.
The federal minimum wage on Friday rose to $7.25 from $6.55. But only seven states guarantee tipped workers the minimum wage, according to a report by the National Employment Law Project, a New York-based advocacy group for low-income workers.
The minimum wage for so-called "tipped" workers has been frozen at $2.13 an hour since 1991, the report found.
Waitresses and waiters, who comprise the majority of tip-receiving workers, have nearly three times the poverty rate of the nation's workforce, it said.
Wait staff are twice as likely to go without health insurance, partly because few employers help them pay for a health plan.
James Parrott, the chief economist of the New York-based Fiscal Policy Institute, said the public often pays for some of these low-income employees' healthcare.
"Low-wage workers without health insurance can cost taxpayers $3,000-$6,000 a year if covered by Medicaid, or, if they receive uncompensated care, they cost employers or individuals who have private health insurance an average of $2,500 per uninsured person receiving compensated care," he said by e-mail.
The Fiscal Policy Institute, a nonpartisan think tank, in a report estimated that at the new federal rate, a full-time worker would earn $15,080 a year.
"Research has shown that workers benefiting from minimum wage increases in New York are disproportionately women, and minimum wage earners on average contribute most of their family's earnings," the institute's Michele Mattingly said in the report.
"Contrary to stereotype, large numbers of affected workers -- often the majority -- are adults aged 20 and older," she said
Covering healthcare could prove difficult for many recession-stricken U.S. states that are slicing spending on Medicaid, the federal-state health plan for the poor, disabled and elderly, which consumes about 22 percent of an average state's budget.
With U.S. Senate leaders delaying action on President Barack Obama' s health plan until autumn, 18 states have already cut spending on public health programs.
(Reporting by Joan Gralla, and Lambert in Washington; editing by Mohammad Zargham)
--http://davidsradiotv2000.blogspot.com
NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. service sector employees who receive tips have been excluded from the latest hike in the federal minimum wage that kicked in on Friday, leaving the public to cover the cost of their healthcare, according to economists and advocates.
The federal minimum wage on Friday rose to $7.25 from $6.55. But only seven states guarantee tipped workers the minimum wage, according to a report by the National Employment Law Project, a New York-based advocacy group for low-income workers.
The minimum wage for so-called "tipped" workers has been frozen at $2.13 an hour since 1991, the report found.
Waitresses and waiters, who comprise the majority of tip-receiving workers, have nearly three times the poverty rate of the nation's workforce, it said.
Wait staff are twice as likely to go without health insurance, partly because few employers help them pay for a health plan.
James Parrott, the chief economist of the New York-based Fiscal Policy Institute, said the public often pays for some of these low-income employees' healthcare.
"Low-wage workers without health insurance can cost taxpayers $3,000-$6,000 a year if covered by Medicaid, or, if they receive uncompensated care, they cost employers or individuals who have private health insurance an average of $2,500 per uninsured person receiving compensated care," he said by e-mail.
The Fiscal Policy Institute, a nonpartisan think tank, in a report estimated that at the new federal rate, a full-time worker would earn $15,080 a year.
"Research has shown that workers benefiting from minimum wage increases in New York are disproportionately women, and minimum wage earners on average contribute most of their family's earnings," the institute's Michele Mattingly said in the report.
"Contrary to stereotype, large numbers of affected workers -- often the majority -- are adults aged 20 and older," she said
Covering healthcare could prove difficult for many recession-stricken U.S. states that are slicing spending on Medicaid, the federal-state health plan for the poor, disabled and elderly, which consumes about 22 percent of an average state's budget.
With U.S. Senate leaders delaying action on President Barack Obama' s health plan until autumn, 18 states have already cut spending on public health programs.
(Reporting by Joan Gralla, and Lambert in Washington; editing by Mohammad Zargham)
--http://davidsradiotv2000.blogspot.com
Thursday, July 23, 2009
Judge Rules Against Applebee’s Lease in Harlem Building
By Jennifer 8. Lee
National Black Theater The National Black Theater and its founder, Barbara Ann Teer, now deceased, won a ruling that prevented Applebee’s from moving into its building.
A franchise of the Applebee’s restaurant chain will not be allowed to move into the Harlem building owned in part by the National Black Theater, a State Supreme Court justice ruled on Wednesday afternoon in a case that was marked by the passing of the main plaintiff, Barbara Ann Teer.
In a tangled real estate dispute, Ms. Teer sued last year to prevent Applebee’s from taking on a lease in the building she owned with Nubian Partners on Fifth Avenue between 125th and 126th Streets.
Nubian Partners signed a lease in April 2008 with Apple-Metro, an Applebee’s franchisee, but Ms. Teer argued that the Applebee’s was not consistent with the cultural integrity and mission of the theater group. It was a condition she included in the contract when she entered into the real estate partnership with Nubian in 2002 after she was confronted with foreclosure.
Ms. Teer, who bought the property in the 1960s, sold 49 percent of the property to Nubian Partners, which operates several retail outlets in the building. The building has a monthly mortgage payment of $44,975, with a $5.2 million balloon payment due in 2012. In honor of Ms. Teer’s work, West 126th Street was dedicated as National Black Theater Way.
Justice Walter B. Tolub ruled that Applebee’s lease violated the contract between the parent company of the National Black Theater and Nubian Partners.
Raymond Hannigan, a lawyer at Herrick, Feinstein who represented the National Black Theater in the lawsuit, said, “I think Barbara Ann Teer would be pleased to see this decision and see that this landmark location remained dedicated to African-American arts.”
---http://davidsradiotv2000.blogspot.com/------times N.Y./Region
National Black Theater The National Black Theater and its founder, Barbara Ann Teer, now deceased, won a ruling that prevented Applebee’s from moving into its building.
A franchise of the Applebee’s restaurant chain will not be allowed to move into the Harlem building owned in part by the National Black Theater, a State Supreme Court justice ruled on Wednesday afternoon in a case that was marked by the passing of the main plaintiff, Barbara Ann Teer.
In a tangled real estate dispute, Ms. Teer sued last year to prevent Applebee’s from taking on a lease in the building she owned with Nubian Partners on Fifth Avenue between 125th and 126th Streets.
Nubian Partners signed a lease in April 2008 with Apple-Metro, an Applebee’s franchisee, but Ms. Teer argued that the Applebee’s was not consistent with the cultural integrity and mission of the theater group. It was a condition she included in the contract when she entered into the real estate partnership with Nubian in 2002 after she was confronted with foreclosure.
Ms. Teer, who bought the property in the 1960s, sold 49 percent of the property to Nubian Partners, which operates several retail outlets in the building. The building has a monthly mortgage payment of $44,975, with a $5.2 million balloon payment due in 2012. In honor of Ms. Teer’s work, West 126th Street was dedicated as National Black Theater Way.
Justice Walter B. Tolub ruled that Applebee’s lease violated the contract between the parent company of the National Black Theater and Nubian Partners.
Raymond Hannigan, a lawyer at Herrick, Feinstein who represented the National Black Theater in the lawsuit, said, “I think Barbara Ann Teer would be pleased to see this decision and see that this landmark location remained dedicated to African-American arts.”
---http://davidsradiotv2000.blogspot.com/------times N.Y./Region
Monday, July 20, 2009
GOP Liars on Health Costs
Peter Dreier
Peter Dreier is E.P. Clapp Distinguished Professor of Politics at Occidental College
Posted: July 20, 2009 09:00 PM
Democrats' government-run plan will make health care more costly than ever," Ohio Representative John Boehner, the House Republican leader, told the Wall Street Journal last Friday. Two days later, on "Meet the Press," Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky), the Senate minority leader, said, "Pretty soon the doctors and the hospitals will all be working for the government."
Let's be clear. The Republicans are liars and hypocrites when it comes to controlling costs as part of health care reform. That's because they are in the pockets of the drug companies, the insurance lobby, the for-profit hospitals, and the American Medical Association. As a result, the GOP leaders in Congress have resisted efforts by the Democrats to limit what the drug and insurance corporations can charge.
President Obama and the Democratic leaders in Congress have twin goals of expanding insurance coverage and reducing per-capita costs. They do not want to "socialize" health care, as the Republicans and their lunatic allies in the right-wing echo chamber (Limbaugh, Hannity, Beck, etc) keep repeating.
In fact, under the Democrats' plan, doctors and other providers, hospitals, drug companies, and medical suppliers will remain private, as they are now. But it would add a "public option" - through which the federal government would provide the insurance for those who don't get it from employers or can't afford private premiums - similar to the current Medicare program for seniors.
The Republicans have been warning that the "public option" plan will be too costly, yet another example of wasteful "big government." But it is the Republicans who are working overtime to kill the Democrats' plans to keep a lid on medical costs.
As a highly-placed Congressional staffperson recently told me, the health industry lobbyists and their friends in Congress "will not allow us to tie the payment rates to providers to Medicare rates. That's where all the savings happen. Even more so if you mandate that all providers have to participate [in the public option plan] if they want to participate in Medicare."
Unfortunately, the drug, insurance, and hospitals' lobby groups have also rented a few centrist Democrats in the Senate -- including Max Baucus (Montana), Dianne Feinstein (Calif.), Kent Conrad (N.D.), Blanche Lincoln (Arkansas), Mary Landrieu (La.) and Kay Hagan (N.C.) -- who share their corporate benefactors' opposition to cost controls. Health care reformers are mounting a grassroots campaign to push these centrists off the fence.
For the most part, the mainstream media have missed this story, failing to report how the health care lobby and conservative Republicans are the key political forces that oppose lean, efficient government. For example, in his article on the health care battle in Monday's New York Times, reporter John Harwood wrote that Democratic leaders in Congress "have lavished more attention on expanding coverage to the more than 45 million Americans now uninsured than on controlling medical costs." Cost control has gotten relatively short shrift so far," Harwood noted, in part because "Democrats bend naturally toward larger rather than smaller government services." Harwood makes it seem that the Democrats are Johnnys-Come-Lately to the cost-control issue, reacting to Republicans' crusade for streamlining health care costs.
We've been here before. In 2003 the drug companies and their trade associations deployed nearly 700 lobbyists to stamp out a proposal to permit the federal government to negotiate the cost of drugs for Medicare recipients. Instead, the Bush administration and the GOP-controlled Congress added a drug benefit to Medicare, but prohibited Medicare officials from negotiating prices with drug manufacturers. It also guaranteed that private insurance companies, not Medicare, administer the drug benefit program. This dramatically increased Medicare costs for taxpayers. Seniors, meanwhile, wound up paying much more in out-of-pocket expenses for prescription drugs.
The U.S. now spends about twice per capita on health care (about $8,000), and a much higher proportion of our GDP (17%), than Canada and many European nations. Despite this, we still have many people who lack insurance, the highest infant mortality rate and the shortest life expectancy. For many Americans who have health insurance, the cost of premiums, and the cost for medicines and services not covered under their insurance plans, is untenable. Medical expenses is the biggest cause of bankruptcy. Administrative costs consume about three to six times that of Western European nations and Canada.
The high cost of U.S. health care is due in large measure to the outrageous greed and costly inefficiencies of the insurance and drug industries. It is the insurance industry that requires so much paperwork that its bloated administrative costs push up the cost of premiums, compared with the much lower administrative costs of Medicare, the government-run insurance program for seniors. Likewise, the drug companies don't want a public option, which would expose how they inflate the cost of medicine that contributes to our expensive and inefficient health system. Drug prices in the US are much higher than in Canada and other countries that regulate costs.
There are many ways to control health care costs, including putting more focus on preventive care, improving Americans' diet and exercise regimen, and improving how we deal with chronic diseases. But no plan to reduce costs will work without reigning in the huge profits and inefficiencies of the drug companies, insurance companies, and hospitals. To move further in that direction, President Obama has proposed legislation to give the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC) full discretion over Medicare reimbursement policy. MedPAC is comprised of medical and economic experts who advise Congress on Medicare reimbursements.
To thwart any meaningful cost controls, the insurance and drug lobbies are flooding Congress with campaign contributions. During the 2008 election cycle, the insurance industry contributed $36.4 million to candidates for Congress, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Drug companies donated $12 million. Health professions added $73.1 million to campaign coffers and hospitals and nursing homes threw in another $18 million.
This American version of legalized bribery has escalated as the health reform battle heats up. The Washington Post recently reported that private insurance corporations, drug companies, hospitals, and their lobbyists spent more than $126 million on lobbying in the first quarter of this year - equal to about $1.4 million a day. These health industry lobby groups also hired more than 350 former government staff members and retired members of Congress to lobby for them, including two former chiefs of staff for Sen. Max Baucus, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, who is a key player in writing the health reform bill.
Most employers, workers, and consumers have a stake in America joining the rest of the economically affluent nations in having decent, affordable health insurance for all, one that limits costs and profiteering. Together, they add up to a much bigger political force that the lobby groups for drug companies, insurance corporations, for-profit hospitals, and the AMA.
It would be useful if the media went beyond the rhetoric over cost controls and looked at what the health industry lobbyists and their allies in Congress are actually doing in shaping the legislation. When it comes to controlling health costs, all the Republicans - and a handful of centrist Democrats -- talk the talk, but they don't walk the walk.
Peter Dreier is professor of politics, and director of the Urban & Environmental Policy Program, at Occidental College.
Sunday, July 19, 2009
CIT Is Near Deal for $3 Billion Loan to Avert Bankruptcy
By MICHAEL J. de la MERCED
Published: July 19, 2009
The CIT Group, one of the nation’s leading lenders to small and midsize businesses across the country, was close to a deal Sunday afternoon with some of its major bondholders to help it avert a bankruptcy filing through a $3 billion emergency loan, according to people briefed on the matter.
The company spent the last week appealing unsuccessfully to Washington regulators for more financial help while scrambling to try to raise as much as $3 billion from investors. Still, ratings agencies slashed its debt and its stock was in a virtual free fall. If CIT does not reach a deal by Monday morning, it plans to file for Chapter 11 protection as soon as Monday afternoon, people briefed on the situation said.
Under the terms of the proposal, CIT would receive $3 billion from some of its main bondholders. The money is meant to give the company several weeks to set up an exchange of bondholders’ debt for equity, alleviating some of the pressure from billions of dollars in obligations.
CIT’s board is scheduled to discuss the proposal at a meeting Sunday evening.
The plan was formed after days of round-the-clock negotiations between CIT, its financial and legal advisers and a group of large bondholders over recent days. Jeffrey Peek, CIT’s chief executive and the architect of the 101-year-old company’s aggressive yet ill-timed push into subprime mortgages and student loans, was actively involved in the financing talks, according to people briefed on the matter.
It is unclear whether the long-sought-after lifeline will be enough to give CIT room to make crucial changes to its business at a time when it is unable to get financing from the capital markets.
The scope and breadth of the fallout of a CIT collapse also remain unclear. Hundreds of thousands of businesses across the country depend on the firm to provide financing for their businesses.
CIT has relied on money that it borrows in the capital markets to make loans to its customers. Once the credit markets froze over, the company was in peril.
It is also uncertain how much — if any — of the $2.33 billion in taxpayer money that CIT received late last year will be recouped.
If the plan does not succeed, CIT, with $75 billion in assets, could be the biggest failure of a financial institution since the collapse of Lehman Brothers last fall. Since then, federal regulators have been pumping billions of dollars into numerous banks across the country to prop them up and create some stability in the nation’s financial system.
Last December, when the markets were in turmoil, the Bush administration rushed through CIT’s application to become a bank holding company and gave it $2.33 billion through the Troubled Asset Relief Program.
This time, however, when CIT asked regulators for another round of financial help, it found itself the flashpoint in a wide-ranging debate in Washington and on Wall Street over whether CIT had, in fact, a viable business model. Some officials contended that it did not represent enough risk to the broad financial system to warrant relief especially as the markets appear to now be on firmer footing.
A third front of the debate was whether, after throwing large sums of money to some of the nation’s largest banks, the Obama administration was doing enough to brace up institutions that lend money to smaller businesses. Many of those same banks, including JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, Citigroup and Bank of America, reported either record or substantially improved results last week.
In the end, the government opted not to provide CIT access to a program through the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation that has allowed Goldman Sachs and other banks to issue their debt cheaply with the backing of the agency.
But Sheila C. Bair, the chairwoman of the F.D.I.C., does not view the program as a bailout solution for banks and financial institutions, according to a government official briefed on the situation.
When that door closed last week, CIT executives still held out hope that they would receive approval from regulators to transfer some assets to a Utah-based bank that CIT controls that has about $3 billion in deposits.
Published: July 19, 2009
The CIT Group, one of the nation’s leading lenders to small and midsize businesses across the country, was close to a deal Sunday afternoon with some of its major bondholders to help it avert a bankruptcy filing through a $3 billion emergency loan, according to people briefed on the matter.
The company spent the last week appealing unsuccessfully to Washington regulators for more financial help while scrambling to try to raise as much as $3 billion from investors. Still, ratings agencies slashed its debt and its stock was in a virtual free fall. If CIT does not reach a deal by Monday morning, it plans to file for Chapter 11 protection as soon as Monday afternoon, people briefed on the situation said.
Under the terms of the proposal, CIT would receive $3 billion from some of its main bondholders. The money is meant to give the company several weeks to set up an exchange of bondholders’ debt for equity, alleviating some of the pressure from billions of dollars in obligations.
CIT’s board is scheduled to discuss the proposal at a meeting Sunday evening.
The plan was formed after days of round-the-clock negotiations between CIT, its financial and legal advisers and a group of large bondholders over recent days. Jeffrey Peek, CIT’s chief executive and the architect of the 101-year-old company’s aggressive yet ill-timed push into subprime mortgages and student loans, was actively involved in the financing talks, according to people briefed on the matter.
It is unclear whether the long-sought-after lifeline will be enough to give CIT room to make crucial changes to its business at a time when it is unable to get financing from the capital markets.
The scope and breadth of the fallout of a CIT collapse also remain unclear. Hundreds of thousands of businesses across the country depend on the firm to provide financing for their businesses.
CIT has relied on money that it borrows in the capital markets to make loans to its customers. Once the credit markets froze over, the company was in peril.
It is also uncertain how much — if any — of the $2.33 billion in taxpayer money that CIT received late last year will be recouped.
If the plan does not succeed, CIT, with $75 billion in assets, could be the biggest failure of a financial institution since the collapse of Lehman Brothers last fall. Since then, federal regulators have been pumping billions of dollars into numerous banks across the country to prop them up and create some stability in the nation’s financial system.
Last December, when the markets were in turmoil, the Bush administration rushed through CIT’s application to become a bank holding company and gave it $2.33 billion through the Troubled Asset Relief Program.
This time, however, when CIT asked regulators for another round of financial help, it found itself the flashpoint in a wide-ranging debate in Washington and on Wall Street over whether CIT had, in fact, a viable business model. Some officials contended that it did not represent enough risk to the broad financial system to warrant relief especially as the markets appear to now be on firmer footing.
A third front of the debate was whether, after throwing large sums of money to some of the nation’s largest banks, the Obama administration was doing enough to brace up institutions that lend money to smaller businesses. Many of those same banks, including JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, Citigroup and Bank of America, reported either record or substantially improved results last week.
In the end, the government opted not to provide CIT access to a program through the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation that has allowed Goldman Sachs and other banks to issue their debt cheaply with the backing of the agency.
But Sheila C. Bair, the chairwoman of the F.D.I.C., does not view the program as a bailout solution for banks and financial institutions, according to a government official briefed on the situation.
When that door closed last week, CIT executives still held out hope that they would receive approval from regulators to transfer some assets to a Utah-based bank that CIT controls that has about $3 billion in deposits.
Monday, July 13, 2009
Obama Names Alabama Doctor Regina Benjamin as Surgeon General
By Jonathan D. Salant and Kate Andersen
July 13 (Bloomberg) -- Regina Benjamin, a specialist in rural health care who founded a clinic to serve the poor along Alabama’s Gulf Coast, was named by President Barack Obama as his choice for U.S. surgeon general.
Obama, making the announcement today at the White House, called her an “outstanding candidate to be America’s leading spokesperson on issues of public health.”
Benjamin has focused on health-care delivery in areas that are underserved by medical facilities, according to a biography on the Web site of the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthurFoundation, which awarded her a $500,000 fellowship grant in 2008.
She is the founder and chief executive officer of the Bayou La Batre Rural Health Clinic, according to the MacArthur Foundation. The clinic and the town of Bayou La Batre, Alabama, were ravaged by both Hurricanes Georges in 1998 and Katrina in 2005. Benjamin worked in emergency rooms and nursing homes to earn extra money to keep the clinic running.
“She has been proven as a leader for this community,” said Stan Wright, Bayou La Batre’s mayor and a board member at Benjamin’s clinic. “She’s been proven through the toughest economic times and through disasters like Hurricane Katrina. I think this is the best choice that President Obama could ever have made.”
Mud-Caked Truck
Benjamin has made a mission of treating Bayou La Batre’s poor and immigrant communities, traveling in a mud-caked Toyota pickup truck to visit her stranded patients after Hurricane Katrina, Wright said in a telephone interview. When her neighbors in the town couldn’t pay, Benjamin has taken bags of oysters or a pound of crabmeat, Wright said.
“Doctor Benjamin never cared about money,” he said. “She made sure you got the best care and money was not the object.”
Benjamin will make a priority of ensuring “nobody will be turned away,” Wright said. “She’ll come up with some health- care policy to include every human being.”
Douglas Henley, chief executive officer of the American Academy of Family Physicians, said he expects Benjamin will take a wide view of her duties as surgeon general.
“She would call attention to disparities in health care, and to the need for health reform to focus on extending coverage to all Americans,” Henley said in a telephone interview. “I would expect this to be her broad focus, rather than past surgeons general who have called attention to a single issue like smoking or obesity.”
Benjamin grew up in Daphne, Alabama, according to the University of Alabama at Birmingham, where she received her medical degree in 1984. She was the first woman and first black to serve as president of the state’s medical association. She also was the first black woman elected to serve on the board of trustees of the American Medical Association.
Last year she was named by U.S. News and World Report as among America’s best leaders.
The position of surgeon general was created in 1870 to serve as the supervising surgeon for the U.S. hospital system and later as the administrator for the federal public-health system. The surgeon general’s role has evolved into that of a leading educator about public-health issues.
Sanjay Gupta, the television journalist and physician, was Obama’s original pick for surgeon general. Gupta withdrew from consideration in March, saying he wanted devote time to his family and his practice as a neurosurgeon while maintaining his broadcast career on CNN.
To contact the reporter on this story: Jonathan D. Salant in Washington at jsalant@bloomberg.net; Kate Andersen in Washington at kandersen7@bloomberg.net Last Updated: July 13, 2009 12:01 EDT
July 13 (Bloomberg) -- Regina Benjamin, a specialist in rural health care who founded a clinic to serve the poor along Alabama’s Gulf Coast, was named by President Barack Obama as his choice for U.S. surgeon general.
Obama, making the announcement today at the White House, called her an “outstanding candidate to be America’s leading spokesperson on issues of public health.”
Benjamin has focused on health-care delivery in areas that are underserved by medical facilities, according to a biography on the Web site of the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthurFoundation, which awarded her a $500,000 fellowship grant in 2008.
She is the founder and chief executive officer of the Bayou La Batre Rural Health Clinic, according to the MacArthur Foundation. The clinic and the town of Bayou La Batre, Alabama, were ravaged by both Hurricanes Georges in 1998 and Katrina in 2005. Benjamin worked in emergency rooms and nursing homes to earn extra money to keep the clinic running.
“She has been proven as a leader for this community,” said Stan Wright, Bayou La Batre’s mayor and a board member at Benjamin’s clinic. “She’s been proven through the toughest economic times and through disasters like Hurricane Katrina. I think this is the best choice that President Obama could ever have made.”
Mud-Caked Truck
Benjamin has made a mission of treating Bayou La Batre’s poor and immigrant communities, traveling in a mud-caked Toyota pickup truck to visit her stranded patients after Hurricane Katrina, Wright said in a telephone interview. When her neighbors in the town couldn’t pay, Benjamin has taken bags of oysters or a pound of crabmeat, Wright said.
“Doctor Benjamin never cared about money,” he said. “She made sure you got the best care and money was not the object.”
Benjamin will make a priority of ensuring “nobody will be turned away,” Wright said. “She’ll come up with some health- care policy to include every human being.”
Douglas Henley, chief executive officer of the American Academy of Family Physicians, said he expects Benjamin will take a wide view of her duties as surgeon general.
“She would call attention to disparities in health care, and to the need for health reform to focus on extending coverage to all Americans,” Henley said in a telephone interview. “I would expect this to be her broad focus, rather than past surgeons general who have called attention to a single issue like smoking or obesity.”
Benjamin grew up in Daphne, Alabama, according to the University of Alabama at Birmingham, where she received her medical degree in 1984. She was the first woman and first black to serve as president of the state’s medical association. She also was the first black woman elected to serve on the board of trustees of the American Medical Association.
Last year she was named by U.S. News and World Report as among America’s best leaders.
The position of surgeon general was created in 1870 to serve as the supervising surgeon for the U.S. hospital system and later as the administrator for the federal public-health system. The surgeon general’s role has evolved into that of a leading educator about public-health issues.
Sanjay Gupta, the television journalist and physician, was Obama’s original pick for surgeon general. Gupta withdrew from consideration in March, saying he wanted devote time to his family and his practice as a neurosurgeon while maintaining his broadcast career on CNN.
To contact the reporter on this story: Jonathan D. Salant in Washington at jsalant@bloomberg.net; Kate Andersen in Washington at kandersen7@bloomberg.net Last Updated: July 13, 2009 12:01 EDT
Friday, July 10, 2009
Obama Arrives in Ghana
By VOA News 10 July 2000
U.S. President Barack Obama has arrived in Ghana, on his first trip to sub-Saharan Africa as president.
The U.S. president arrived in the West African country late Friday, following a three-day summit in Italy of the Group of Eight nations.
Mr. Obama says he chose Ghana as his first destination in the region because of what he considers to be its strong democratic system.
Excitement over the visit has been mounting in the Ghanaian capital, Accra. Many Ghanaians took to the streets Friday to celebrate and there was a parade featuring a mock figure of the first African-American U.S. president.
Huge billboards also can be seen across the city, featuring the images of Ghanaian President John Atta Mills and Mr. Obama with the caption "Partnership for Change" and the phrase "Akwaaba," which means "Welcome home" in the local Akan language.
Mr. Obama's father was from Kenya. President Mills says many people in Ghana and neighboring countries want to see President Obama because they regard him as a hero.
While in Ghana, Mr. Obama is scheduled to meet with President Mills on Saturday as well as former Ghanaian leaders John Kufuor and Jerry Rawlings.
President Mills took office in January after a narrow election victory that saw the ruling party concede defeat peacefully.
In an interview with VOA, the Ghanaian leader said he believes President Obama wants to highlight Ghana's peaceful transition of power and democratic credentials as an example for Africa.
President Obama also will address Ghana's parliament and tour a former slave trading center, Cape Coast Castle, where African slaves were shipped across the Atlantic for almost 300 years. He is due to return to Washington at the end of the visit.
Ghanaian authorities say 10,000 police officers are providing security for the visit.
By----http://davidsradiotv2000.blogspot.com
U.S. President Barack Obama has arrived in Ghana, on his first trip to sub-Saharan Africa as president.
The U.S. president arrived in the West African country late Friday, following a three-day summit in Italy of the Group of Eight nations.
Mr. Obama says he chose Ghana as his first destination in the region because of what he considers to be its strong democratic system.
Excitement over the visit has been mounting in the Ghanaian capital, Accra. Many Ghanaians took to the streets Friday to celebrate and there was a parade featuring a mock figure of the first African-American U.S. president.
Huge billboards also can be seen across the city, featuring the images of Ghanaian President John Atta Mills and Mr. Obama with the caption "Partnership for Change" and the phrase "Akwaaba," which means "Welcome home" in the local Akan language.
Mr. Obama's father was from Kenya. President Mills says many people in Ghana and neighboring countries want to see President Obama because they regard him as a hero.
While in Ghana, Mr. Obama is scheduled to meet with President Mills on Saturday as well as former Ghanaian leaders John Kufuor and Jerry Rawlings.
President Mills took office in January after a narrow election victory that saw the ruling party concede defeat peacefully.
In an interview with VOA, the Ghanaian leader said he believes President Obama wants to highlight Ghana's peaceful transition of power and democratic credentials as an example for Africa.
President Obama also will address Ghana's parliament and tour a former slave trading center, Cape Coast Castle, where African slaves were shipped across the Atlantic for almost 300 years. He is due to return to Washington at the end of the visit.
Ghanaian authorities say 10,000 police officers are providing security for the visit.
By----http://davidsradiotv2000.blogspot.com
Thursday, July 9, 2009
Scientists Make Sperm From Stem Cells, See No ‘Human in a Dish’
By Trista Kelley
July 8 (Bloomberg) -- Scientists created human sperm from stem cells for the first time in a bid to better understand the causes of male infertility.
The researchers, led by Karim Nayernia from England’s Newcastle University, developed a technique to turn stem cells with male chromosomes from human embryos into reproductive cells, known as germline, and prompt them to divide, they said in a study published in the journal Stem Cells and Development today. The divided cells produced functional sperm, the scientists said.
The new technique “will allow researchers to study in detail how sperm forms and lead to a better understanding of infertility in men,” Professor Nayernia said in a statement released with the study. “This understanding could help us develop new ways to help couples suffering infertility so they can have a child which is genetically their own.”
The research may also help scientists understand how genetic diseases are passed on, according to the statement.
The lab-created sperm won’t be used for “fertilization of human eggs and implantation of embryos,” the researchers said. “While we can understand that some people may have concerns, this does not mean that humans can be produced ‘in a dish’ and we have no intention of doing this,” they wrote.
Stem cells, which have the power to become any type of cell in the body, are controversial when research involves human embryos, which are killed when the cells are harvested.
In another medical journal last week, more than 40 scientists, bio-ethicists, lawyers and science journal editors called on their colleagues and policy makers to develop guidelines for the research and reproductive use of stem cell- derived eggs and sperm.
To contact the reporter on this story: Trista Kelley in London at tkelley2@bloomberg.net
July 8 (Bloomberg) -- Scientists created human sperm from stem cells for the first time in a bid to better understand the causes of male infertility.
The researchers, led by Karim Nayernia from England’s Newcastle University, developed a technique to turn stem cells with male chromosomes from human embryos into reproductive cells, known as germline, and prompt them to divide, they said in a study published in the journal Stem Cells and Development today. The divided cells produced functional sperm, the scientists said.
The new technique “will allow researchers to study in detail how sperm forms and lead to a better understanding of infertility in men,” Professor Nayernia said in a statement released with the study. “This understanding could help us develop new ways to help couples suffering infertility so they can have a child which is genetically their own.”
The research may also help scientists understand how genetic diseases are passed on, according to the statement.
The lab-created sperm won’t be used for “fertilization of human eggs and implantation of embryos,” the researchers said. “While we can understand that some people may have concerns, this does not mean that humans can be produced ‘in a dish’ and we have no intention of doing this,” they wrote.
Stem cells, which have the power to become any type of cell in the body, are controversial when research involves human embryos, which are killed when the cells are harvested.
In another medical journal last week, more than 40 scientists, bio-ethicists, lawyers and science journal editors called on their colleagues and policy makers to develop guidelines for the research and reproductive use of stem cell- derived eggs and sperm.
To contact the reporter on this story: Trista Kelley in London at tkelley2@bloomberg.net
Saturday, July 4, 2009
Serena Williams Cruises to Wimbledon Victory
By LIZ ROBBINS
Published: July 4, 2009
The Williams family dream, developed about 20 years ago on the courts of Compton, Calif., littered with broken-glass, has played out on every major championship surface since. On the Fourth of July, Serena and Venus Williams, the American superstars and the only real standard bearers of women’s tennis, slugged it out on the hallowed grass of Wimbledon’s All England Lawn Tennis Club.
Enlarge This Image
After all the anguished cries and pummeled forehands between the pair, their 21st meeting and their fourth meeting in the Wimbledon final, ended with but a muted celebration. Serena Williams, the younger sister by 15 months, steamrolled big sister Venus 7-6 (3), 6-2 to win her third Wimbledon championship.
She smiled and dropped to the grass, but was not gloating with Venus on the other side of the net in resigned defeat. Venus’s final backhand sailed plaintively into the net, as Serena captured her 11th major championship title with unrelenting force. It was her first Wimbledon championship since 2003.
A five-time Wimbledon champion, Venus had not dropped a set during these Wimbledon championships, but suddenly Serena won the first set tiebreaker with an off-balance topspin lob that left Venus flat-footed at the net.
Serena, 27, was pumping her fist, her body language and her racket all screaming for victory. Venus, 29, usually the more quiet and contemplative of the pair, only seemed to retreat further within herself. Serena never stopped in the second set, breaking the all-time sister tie.
“She had an answer for everything. She played the best tennis today, so congratulations,” Venus said in the trophy presentation.
“I don’t think the loss has set in yet, because I’m still smiling.”
Published: July 4, 2009
The Williams family dream, developed about 20 years ago on the courts of Compton, Calif., littered with broken-glass, has played out on every major championship surface since. On the Fourth of July, Serena and Venus Williams, the American superstars and the only real standard bearers of women’s tennis, slugged it out on the hallowed grass of Wimbledon’s All England Lawn Tennis Club.
Enlarge This Image
After all the anguished cries and pummeled forehands between the pair, their 21st meeting and their fourth meeting in the Wimbledon final, ended with but a muted celebration. Serena Williams, the younger sister by 15 months, steamrolled big sister Venus 7-6 (3), 6-2 to win her third Wimbledon championship.
She smiled and dropped to the grass, but was not gloating with Venus on the other side of the net in resigned defeat. Venus’s final backhand sailed plaintively into the net, as Serena captured her 11th major championship title with unrelenting force. It was her first Wimbledon championship since 2003.
A five-time Wimbledon champion, Venus had not dropped a set during these Wimbledon championships, but suddenly Serena won the first set tiebreaker with an off-balance topspin lob that left Venus flat-footed at the net.
Serena, 27, was pumping her fist, her body language and her racket all screaming for victory. Venus, 29, usually the more quiet and contemplative of the pair, only seemed to retreat further within herself. Serena never stopped in the second set, breaking the all-time sister tie.
“She had an answer for everything. She played the best tennis today, so congratulations,” Venus said in the trophy presentation.
“I don’t think the loss has set in yet, because I’m still smiling.”
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