Pimping The Obvious

WaPo:

The nation’s opioid epidemic is changing the way law enforcement does its job, with police officers acting as drug counselors and medical workers and shifting from law-and-order tactics to approaches more akin to social work.

Departments accustomed to arresting drug abusers are spearheading programs to get them into treatment, convinced that their old strategies weren’t working. They’re administering medication that reverses overdoses, allowing users to turn in drugs in exchange for treatment, and partnering with hospitals to intervene before abuse turns fatal.

“A lot of the officers are resistant to what we call social work. They want to go out and fight crime, put people in jail,” said Capt. Ron Meyers of the police department in Chillicothe, Ohio, a 21-year veteran who is convinced that punitive tactics no longer work against drugs. “We need to make sure the officers understand this is what is going to stop the epidemic.”

Officers are finding children who were barricaded in rooms while their parents got high, and they are responding to the same homes for the same problems. Feelings of exasperation course through some departments in which officers are interacting with the same drug users over and over again, sometimes saving their lives repeatedly with naloxone, a drug that reverses an opiate overdose.

How much more are we going to expect the cops to do? I like it better that they're helping people instead of shooting them, but we can't just keep piling more tasks on them because we're not willing to be inconvenienced by it all.

Anyway, isn't it amazing how "the drug problem" can move so suddenly from, "government handouts and mollycoddling won't make up for the moral deficiency of those people", to something more like, "maybe we should start looking at this as a public health issue".

And gee - it couldn't possibly have anything to do with the enormously powerful circle jerk of Coin-Operated Politicians, and their buddies in the Rent-a-Prison bidness, and the DEA as an organization of Confiscation For Fun and Profit with guns and permission to fuck you out of everything you own.

The truly obvious though, is simply that the drug thing really hasn't mattered as long as it was "an urban problem", and we were just fucking over the brown people. Now that it's come to the great American Cracker Barrel, we should try something that might be a better approach? Something we could've been doing this whole time? Because it works better? And we've always known that?

Two things:

1. I wonder how many well-connected leeches will suddenly discover their life-long passion for providing Re-Hab services - as a proper Market-Based solution, you understand -  and of course financed by taxpayers.
2. This is another one of those things the hippies have been trying to get the cement heads to understand for a very long time.

And you can color me un-fucking-surprised.

Trae Crowder

The Big And The Small

Run It Like A Business

A smart guy told us back in the 90s that the 21st century would be about privacy.

I hate the notion of "prophesy fulfilled" and so I'll just ignore it because it's inconvenient, but damn, son - kinda looks like that's what's happening.

Sharon Begley at STAT

A little-noticed bill moving through Congress would allow companies to require employees to undergo genetic testing or risk paying a penalty of thousands of dollars, and would let employers see that genetic and other health information.

Giving employers such power is now prohibited by legislation including the 2008 genetic privacy and nondiscrimination law known as GINA. The new bill gets around that landmark law by stating explicitly that GINA and other protections do not apply when genetic tests are part of a “workplace wellness” program.

The bill, HR 1313, was approved by a House committee on Wednesday, with all 22 Republicans supporting it and all 17 Democrats opposed. It has been overshadowed by the debate over the House GOP proposal to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, but the genetic testing bill is expected to be folded into a second ACA-related measure containing a grab-bag of provisions that do not affect federal spending, as the main bill does.

- and -

Rigorous studies by researchers not tied to the $8 billion wellness industry have shown that the programs improve employee health little if at all. An industry group recently concluded that they save so little on medical costs that, on average, the programs lose money. But employers continue to embrace them, partly as a way to shift more health care costs to workers, including by penalizing them financially.

So what's it actually about? It has great potential to be about shenanigans and fuckery.

But in the context of the 4th amendment, it's about none of your goddamned business.

Amendment 4:
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Today's Tweet

Rubber, meet Road
Road, this is Rubber

My dad starts chemo Monday. Here's just ONE prescription he needs. It's really very simple: without Obamacare, within 8 months he'd be dead. pic.twitter.com/VpW3zgPYli

— Megh Wright (@megh_wright) January 14, 2017

Science Monday

I'm putting this up the day before Denver loses it's record 6th Super Bowl - actually, I'm  trying to put up a lotta stuff in advance, because if my Donkeys pull it off, I'm prob'ly gonna be drunk for several days.

So here's some great stuff from The Thinking Atheist:

Medical Neglect In The Name Of God

Just Stop Being Poor

The Daily Show
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,The Daily Show on Facebook,Daily Show Video Archive

The Week (re: King v Burwell):

Americans are a woefully ignorant people. A third of us can't name even one of three branches of the U.S. government. Two-fifths don't even know which party controls the House or Senate. Millions even think that after the Supreme Court rules on a case, it's sent to Congress for lawmakers' consideration. And so it goes.

If we don't even know these very basics, just imagine how confusing King v. Burwell — a legal challenge to the Affordable Care Act (aka ObamaCare) — must be. But why let ignorance get in the way of opinion? Supporters and haters of the law simply see it — as they do just about everything — through their prisms of pre-conceived beliefs. This has led to misunderstandings and myths about what the case is all about and ObamaCare in general.

Obamacare doesn't fix a lot of what's wrong about Healthcare in USAmerica Inc.  What it does fix (partly) is the accessibility problem.  At least now, we all have a shot at getting covered by an insurance plan that we can actually afford, which was kinda the whole fucking point of The Affordable Care Act.

ahem

And from FactCheck in 2013:

Claim: 8.2 million Americans can’t find full-time work partly due to Obamacare.

FactCheck.org says: False.

Claim: The law is a job-killer.
FactCheck.org says: Overblown.

Claim: Premiums are going up because of the law. Premiums are going down because of the law.
FactCheck.org says: It depends.

Claim: All of the uninsured will pay less on the exchanges than they could now on the individual market, even without federal subsidies.
FactCheck.org says: False.

Claim: 8.5 million Americans will receive rebates this year averaging about $100 each because of the health care law.
FactCheck.org says: Misleading.

Claim: You won’t be able to choose your own doctor.
Claim: The government will be between you and your doctor.
FactCheck.org says: False.

Claim: If you like your plan, you can keep your plan. If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor.
FactCheck.org: Misleading.

Claim: Those applying for federal subsidies can lie about their income without facing verification.
FactCheck.org says: False.

Claim: Congress is exempt from the law.
FactCheck.org says: False.

And we don't really need to talk about Death Panels do we?

The Vaxxer Thing

There's no "other side" of the vaccination thing.  

It's kinda like: "eating pancakes doesn't make you gay".  Nobody is on the other side of that one either.  Cuz there's no other side to be on.

We're Gettin' There

Try not to get too nutso, but using GMO Viruses against different types of cancer seems to be a pretty amazing thing.  

What is this virus treatment?

The researchers at the Mayo Clinic in the US, led by Dr Stephen Russell, are using an approach called ‘oncolytic virus therapy’, which is generating a lot of excitement in the cancer research community around the world. In fact, we’ve written about some of our work in this area a couple of times already.

Briefly, it involves treating patients with viruses that have been genetically engineered to specifically infect cancer cells, rather than causing the particular illness that they usually bring. When injected into the body, the viruses seek out and destroy the tumour cells, multiplying inside them to create even more cancer-killing viruses. At least, that’s the theory.

To date, researchers have created oncolytic viruses from a number of different types of modified virus, including the herpes virus (which causes cold sores), pox viruses and adenovirus (common cold). But while tests in cancer cells grown in the lab and animals have been remarkably successful, this promise unfortunately hasn’t yet translated into success in clinical trials with actual cancer patients.

Now if we could just get a certain bunch of politicians to turn loose on the purse strings and get some of these docs the bucks they need to finish the thing, we might just have a chance.  (translated: Stop voting for assholes who stand in the way of research and development.)

"One" More Time

I can almost say that some of this Anti-Vax bullshit is getting to be kinda fun.

As it turns out, in a "free society", we've made it pretty hard to mandate certain health-related issues.  There're loopholes in some of the laws (I know - surprising, ain't it?) and creative ways of using other laws that make it all but impossible to enforce any kind of Anti-Dumb-Fuck Policy like "get your stoopid ass vaccinated because I don't need a smug and disease-carrying-fart-smellin'-over-confident-and-under-thinkin' twat waffle like you fuckin' up my little part of the world".

So, anyway - we have to go on trying to talk sense to these jag-offs, but we should also take a shot at moving them by way of social pressure.  Simply put, we take some of the bullying tactics that so many overprivileged yahoos get away with, and turn it around on them.

hat tip = Democratic Underground

Un-Vaccinated = Unclean

Keep your uwashed filth away from my kids

You see yourself as a Libertarian Hero -

the rest of us see you as that Pigpen kid in the Charlie Brown cartoons.

Your right to refuse vaccination gives me the right to chain you down in the basement, feed you chicken scraps, and throw shit at your head for fun.

Dearest Anti-Vaxxers

Today's Debunkment

Did ya hear the one about the guy who didn't take the meds prescribed by his Homeopath for 3 days?  He died of an overdose.

What do they call Alternative Medicine or Homeopathic Medicine that's been studied and tested and proven out?

They call it Medicine.

This is part of a longer (and wider-angle) look at reason and rationality called The Enemies Of Reason:



I hate thinking I have reason to believe Healthcare is driven mostly by Rent-Seekers demanding a fat profit at the expense of sick and dying humans.  So it follows that I'd hate it even more whenever I think about those same Rentiers manipulating people into a belief in Folklore-Over-Fact just because it gets harder and harder to take anybody's word for anything.

The profit-takers are playing both sides, just like always. Only this one's the perfect parlay.

American Capitalism has degenerated into a proposition of delivering less for about the same money and then pretending we're getting quite the rare deal (thank you, Milton Hershey eg).  In "traditional" healthcare, it means the family doc throws freebie drug samples at us at the end of ever-shortening office visits; and if we ever manage to get admitted to the local hospital, they send us home as early as possible - generally sicker and weaker than ever before - hoping we'll be OK on our own for the first few days/weeks/whatever.

Well, Homeopathy and Alt Med both fit that model perfectly, so why would any right-thinking Corporate Slag not promote the fuck outa diluting everything in sight until we get to the point where we're delivering tap water at Dom Perignon prices?

I dunno - makes my head hurt.

How To Obamacare

healthcare.gov



If guys like Chuck Todd were real journalists and not just Press Poodles, we'd all know this stuff already.

The Cost Of Doing Nothing

My youngest was recently recruited for a study being done at UVa's Behavioral Sciences Dept - what the hell; somebody's gotta be able to figure this joker out - anyway, while I was there yesterday signing the waivers and various other forms, pretending to be a responsible adult who's able to understand the 5 pages of disclaimers and willing to abdicate any and all rights to any and all recourse if anything goes "wrong", what I remember most about the visit was getting the feeling that we were at some cut-rate "Med School" in the Caribbean or some such.  The offices weren't dirty and dingy, but they weren't spiffy and newly painted either.  And the furniture would have to be upgraded three or four levels to qualify for the discount section at the Goodwill Thrift Store.

And I remember thinking this is another in the string of daily reminders that we're getting dragged down by what I consider our National Allergy To Paying For The Shit That Matters.

And then this pops up at HuffPo, talking about what's happening to most of our once-great research infrastructure:

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. -- On the first floor of Jordan Hall at the University of Virginia School of Medicine is a 12-by-8 room that, at first glance, looks like a rundown storage space. The floor is a mix of white, teal and purple tiles, in a pattern reminiscent of the 1970s. Trash cans are without tops and half filled. There are rust stains on the tiles, and a loose air vent dangles a bit from the ceiling.

--and--

You wouldn't know from his giddy, optimistic tone that Dutta is currently navigating the biggest obstacle of his career. Five years after he received a $1.3 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to undertake this microRNA project, he's nearly out of cash. His proposal was placed in the 2nd percentile of all grants reviewed by NIH in 2007, meaning that it was deemed more promising than 98 percent of the proposed projects.

When he asked for the same amount of money in 2012, his proposal was scored in the 18th percentile. In years past that score may have been good enough, but in the age of sequestration, NIH is supporting a much smaller pool of applicants. Late last month he was told that there would be no funding. UVA has stepped in to help, but Dutta estimates that 40 of his colleagues are in the same boat.

"I am living off of fumes," he says.

A feeling of despair has taken hold within research communities like Dutta's, Top officials at academic and medical institutions have grown convinced that years of stagnant budgets and recent cuts have ushered in the dark ages of science in America.

--and--

For-profit companies can play a role too. But they are much more likely to support projects with a clear return on investment, leaving explorative research like that being done by Dr. William Jackson at the Medical College of Wisconsin in the lurch.

Since 2007, Jackson has studied how viruses create a pool of membranes inside a cell. He hypothesized that viruses went into these "acidic vessels" in order to turn the cell into a factory for other viruses, meaning that if he could stop the development of these membrane pools, he could stop the spread of the virus itself. Most promisingly, he found that chloroquine, which is used to fight malaria, could be used to disrupt this process.

Despite the potential ramifications of such a finding -- everything from the common cold to foot-and-mouth disease is thought to follow this pattern -- the private sector won't fund the work. "There is no money to be made from chloroquine," Jackson said. "Only if the drug companies found something they could copyright or patent would they do it."

Here's a guy named JJ Thompson:

In the 1890s, Thompson was first in proposing the existence of subatomic particles, and the first to show real evidence of what he called a 'corpuscle', which soon would become known as the electron - which was nothing but the birth of The Electronic Age which is exactly how I can post this shit here on my blog (and how you can read this shit here on my blog).

Oh yeah - the guy was on the royal payroll at the time - in fact he spent pretty much his entire career as a gubmint worker - and his research was funded by the British taxpayer.

So go ahead and build your simpleton's ideology around some stoopid precept like "Starve The Beast", but try to remember that the beast you're so busy starving might be the one leaving all these golden eggs all over the joint.

C'Mon, Michelle

Please just sit down and shut the fuck up, before you do any more real harm.

A Quick Reminder

...from truthout.com about something that needs to stay near the top of our priorities list:

The problem, of course, is our health care system – although “system” seems like a flattering word for this greed-driven, anarchic three-ring circus. Our health care system – guess we’ll need to call it that for lack of an alternativer – is the worst in the developed world. It costs far more, provides much less, and has worse outcomes than any system that’s even remotely comparable.

--and--

If we spent the same on health as the average developed country (as a percentage of GDP) that would inject more than a trillion dollars per year into other parts of the economy.

The "clear-eyed, pragmatic grownups" (mostly Repubs calling themselves conservative) are full o' shit.

Healthy People

A pretty good point (from Wonkette):

Here is a lesson on capitalism and profitability courtesy four companies that refuse — REFUSE — to make sure that their employees are not handling your food with their tubercular hands.

Maybe next time you call ahead for a reservation, you should ask if all the chefs and wait-staffers have seen a doctor lately and if the owner of the joint is willing to guaranty you won't be infected because the pot washer working 29 hours a week at 8 bucks an hour couldn't afford to get a flu shot this year.

This whole stupid argument over Obamacare coming from some of these "conservatives" is just another great example of having people in charge of businesses who really don't understand the first fuckin' thing about business.

And this is what the first thing is:  If you don't take care of the people who take care of your customers, you won't have those customers for very long. (and I can't believe anybody would actually have to say that out loud - fuck)

Here There And Everywhere

Repubs never seem to understand that information has become really really portable.  Actually, it seems they've confused the portability of facts with the pretense that reality is fungible; but then again, the difficulty of "conservatives" even to recognize facts as facts is getting to be a very old story.  So maybe, because they understand that facts are pretty much immutable, they have to work as hard as they do to convince people otherwise.

Anyway, here's a pretty good one (kinda dated, but this silliness apparently must be repeated and revisited because, well - see the paragraph above).

via Addicting Info:

In 2009, Michael Steele, then chairman of the Republican National Committee (RNC,) called President Barack Obama’s plan to overhaul health care “socialism,” at a National Press Club event.

Mr. Steele obviously was not aware of the fact that his very own party- the GOP helped Iraqi lawmakers to draft and pass their constitution with a single-payer guaranteed healthcare system for all Iraqis, in 2005.

Everybody Pays

Here's WIllard talking with DumFux Cavuto about having just signed the Romneycare bill into law in 2006.

Highlites = 2:00, 4:00, 5:30.

"We already have universal healthcare..."



When it comes to Obamacare, it's not hard to accept the notion that "conservatives" aren't against the policy - they're against Obama.  That makes a kind of weird political sense to me here in 2012.  What I really don't get is that so many people are so adamantly opposed to something that brings a solid benefit to them, and fits with the "stand on your own feet" approach (Individual Mandate), AND which fits the Competitive Markets model.

Fire With Fire

From Dayton Daily News:

Before getting a prescription for Viagra or other erectile dysfunction drugs, men would have to see a sex therapist, receive a cardiac stress test and get a notarized affidavit signed by a sexual partner affirming impotency, if state Sen. Nina Turner has her way.

I've lost count of the times some good smart Dems have stepped up and put themselves on the line over these issues, and I hope we can look forward to a lot more.

(hat tip = Democratic Underground)