“Parents who frequently move house put children’s health at risk,” according to the Daily Mail. The newspaper said that research found moving several times can affect children’s health and psychological state, and also increases the likelihood that a child may use illegal drugs.
This Scottish research, which looked at potential links between moving house in childhood and adult health, produced far more mixed results than the Mail implied. However, the press release accompanying the research did not always clearly reflect the findings of the study, which found very few significant links between moving frequently and poor health.
In fact, once the researchers accounted for factors such as social deprivation and moving schools, moving house was only significantly linked to a higher chance of using drugs in later life. Adults who had moved frequently showed no greater risk of being overweight, having high blood pressure, long-term illness, psychological distress, drinking or smoking later in life.
While researchers say the risk of having certain measures of poor health was “elevated” in people who moved house more frequently as a child, the increase in risk was not statistically significant, which means it could have happened by chance.
Where did the story come from?
The study was carried out by researchers from the Medical Research Council, the University of Stirling, Queen’s University and Scotland’s Chief Scientist Office. It was funded by the Chief Scientist Office of the Scottish Government Health Directorate. The study was published in the peer-reviewed Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health.
The study’s findings were overstated by the Daily Mail. The newspaper reported that there were “negative health effects” from frequent moves, whereas the study found that frequent moving was only significantly linked to an increased chance of drug use. This finding on drug use was independent of other variables.
Moving during childhood was not significantly associated with adult measures of physical health, such as weight and blood pressure. The Mail only touched on these elements towards the end of its report.
It’s worth noting that in the press release that accompanied publication of the study, only the penultimate paragraph stated that only illegal drug use was independently associated with frequent moves.
What kind of research was this?
This research was part of a large cohort study from the west of Scotland, which has taken place over 20 years. It compared the health of people who had been “residentially stable” during childhood with those who had moved house, using a range of health measures.
The authors say previous research suggests that frequent childhood moves may be associated with poorer health outcomes and behaviour in adolescence. The researchers say their present study brings together a wider range of health outcomes than has previously been considered, and also looked at the extent to which associations between childhood mobility and health in adolescence last into adulthood.
What did the research involve?
The study was based on a cohort of 1,515 participants who were 15 when it started in 1987 and who were followed up for 20 years. Data from this cohort were collected at five points in time, the final time when the participants were 36. The final sample analysed in the study was 850 participants, so 665 original participants (44% were not included in the final analysis because they had left the study.
Researchers collected their data through face-to-face interviews conducted by nurses. A parental questionnaire was completed at the start of the study.
The researchers got information about moving house from the number of addresses people had lived at between birth and 18 (they excluded recent moves out of the family home . They collected information on a range of health measures including:
- Physical health measures - these were all taken by nurses and included body mass index, waist-to-hip ratio, lung function and blood pressure.
- Overall health - people were asked to report whether they had limiting long-term illness (answering yes or no and to give their own assessment of their general health, as rated on a four-point scale.
- Psychological distress - this was assessed using a standard 12-item questionnaire (with a cut-off score of 3 points taken to indicate psychological distress . Whether people had thought about suicide was also examined, with people asked at certain points whether they had thought about taking a drug overdose or deliberate self-injury. The third measure of psychological distress was anxiety, as measured on a standard scale.
- Health behaviours - the behaviours examined were heavy drinking (defined as exceeding maximum weekly safe limits , illegal drug use and smoking.
Importantly, the researchers also looked at participants’ family and household circumstances based on information provided by the children’s parents at the start. They also looked at other factors such as social deprivation (calculated by postcode and using recognised deprivation categories , housing status (home-owner or not , social class, family structure (intact or not and number of siblings. Also included were data on school mobility, derived from the number of primary and secondary schools attended. The researchers also looked at participants’ social class, education and marital status in adulthood.
The researchers then analysed the relationship between number of house moves in childhood and health at the ages of 18 and 36. They adjusted their findings for possible confounders, such as social class, deprivation and family circumstances.
What were the basic results?
The researchers found that approximately one in five people did not move address throughout childhood. Three in ten moved once or twice, and a further one in five had moved at least three times. They also found that children in single-parent households and those with two or three siblings were significantly more likely to have moved home (while those with at least four siblings were more likely to have stayed put .
After they adjusted their findings for both socioeconomic circumstances and the number of school moves, the researchers found that, when the participants were 18:
- People who had moved at least three times were significantly more likely to have used illegal drugs than those who had never moved ( odds ratio [OR] 2.44, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.45 to 4.10 .
- Those who moved at least once had a significantly higher chance of scoring 3 or more (indicating distress on the questionnaire for psychological distress than those who had not moved at all (OR 1.62, 95% CI 1.11 to 2.35 .
- The risk of several outcomes (having a long-term illness, having suicidal thoughts for those who had moved at least once, and heavy drinking and smoking for those who had moved at least three times were “elevated” compared to those who had not moved at all, but the increased risks were not significant.
- There was no association between childhood mobility and physical health measures such as blood pressure and weight.
When the participants were aged 36, the researchers found that:
- Frequent moving in childhood was independently associated with illegal drug use (OR 1.92, 95% CI 1.00 to 3.69 .
- The odds of poor health across other measures remained “elevated” but not statistically significant.
- There was no association between moving address during childhood and physical health measures such as blood pressure and weight.
How did the researchers interpret the results?
The researchers concluded that increased residential mobility in childhood is associated with an elevated risk of poor health in adulthood, across a range of measures. This is explained in part, they say, by both social and economic circumstances and the frequency of school moves.
The relationship between childhood residential mobility and poorer health appeared to be stronger in adolescence than adulthood, possibly because people’s own socioeconomic circumstances lessened the effects over time.
Conclusion
This study looked at the effect of multiple address moves during childhood on people’s physical and psychological health at the ages of 18 and 36.
The way the authors interpreted the results of their study is confusing. They say that a higher risk of poor health outcomes is associated with frequent moves of home in childhood. However, the only significantly higher risk, once the results were adjusted for various confounders, was illegal drug use. This is important because it means that the other increases in risk identified are more likely to have occurred by chance.
The study examined an important issue, and one strength is the length of time of it covered. Another is its detailed collection of data, which might help explain why frequent moves of house could have an association with poorer health outcomes. For example, this could be because of frequent school moves, family break-up and deprivation.
However, the study has a number of limitations. Its high drop-out rate (around 43% raises the question of reliability and it is possible that those who dropped out or were lost to follow-up also had the most mobile childhoods. The study’s reliance on the parents to report outcomes, such as overall health, is another limitation as their reports may be subjective or difficult to appraise.
Families move home for a range of different reasons, including improved schooling and employment opportunities, change in financial circumstances or family break-up, and the study did not assess the reasons for the family moves. It seems obvious that children are more likely to be negatively affected when disruption or financial problems cause a family to move, rather than when the motive is to seek better schools or a better job.
The way children’s wellbeing is affected by frequent moving is an important issue, but it is also a complex one which needs to be examined further.
Links To The Headlines
Parents who frequently move house 'put children's health at risk'. Daily Mail, February 9 2012
Links To Science
Brown D, Benzeval M, Gayle V et al. Childhood residential mobility and health in late adolescence and adulthood: findings from the West of Scotland Twenty-07 Study. Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, 6 February 2012 (published online first
“Children born to women undergoing cancer drug treatment show normal results in physical and mental development tests” The Guardian has reported.
The news is based on research that examined the health of 70 children who were exposed to chemotherapy in the womb during the final two-thirds of pregnancy. Between the ages of 18 months and 18 years of age the children were given examinations of their general health, brain and heart function and hearing. Their cognitive function, hearing, heart function, growth and development were all comparable with the general population. However, being born prematurely was associated with lower cognitive scores, leading the researchers to recommend against doctors inducing early delivery in women requiring chemotherapy. The researchers also say their results do not support delaying chemotherapy in pregnant women.
During pregnancy treatment decisions have to be made that are in the best interest of the mother’s health, while trying to avoid the risk of harm to the fetus. Unfortunately though, this relatively small dataset cannot provide conclusive proof that chemotherapy poses no risk at all to the unborn child. The researchers say that their study is currently gathering longer-term data on wider numbers of children to help explore the issue further.
Where did the story come from?
The study was carried out by researchers from Leuven Cancer Institute and Katholieke Universiteit Leuven in Belgium, and other institutions in Czech Republic, the Netherlands and Canada. The study was funded by a number of European medical research and technology funds and the Belgian Ministry of Health. The study was published in the peer-reviewed medical journal The Lancet.
In general the news provided balanced coverage of this study. The Daily Mail’s headline declared that pregnant women with breast cancer can have chemotherapy and surgery and “still give birth safely”. However, this is slightly confusing as the focus of this study was not women with breast cancer, and the study looked at children’s long-term development rather than the safety of their delivery. The researchers’ main finding was actually that premaurity was associated with lower IQ scores, meaning that planned premature delivery may not be the best option.
What kind of research was this?
This was a cohort study looking at how foetal exposure to maternal cancer and treatment, including chemotherapy, affected the physical and cognitive development of child at various points through their childhood.
While it is known that exposure to chemotherapy during the first 12 weeks of pregnancy can increase the risk of congenital defects in the baby, there is uncertainty over whether exposure during later stages of pregnancy can also affect heart and brain development. The researchers say that up until now, limited data has been available on the longer-term outcomes of children exposed to chemotherapy in the uterus. With this in mind they intended to record the general health, cardiac function, and brain development in children who were exposed to chemotherapy in the uterus.
Cohort studies such as this are the best way of assessing harms from chemotherapy in pregnancy, as it is generally believed to be potentially harmful to the baby, but is sometimes unavoidable in clinical practice. Setting up a trial randomising pregnant women with cancer to receive cancer treatment or not in order to assess developmental effects on the offspring would be unethical, both for the mother (who may be denied the treatment she needs and baby (who may put at unnecessary risk of harm . Therefore a cohort study is likely to be the most appropriate way of exploring the issue.
What did the research involve?
From 2005 onwards researchers began gathering study subjects from cancer referral centres in Belgium, the Netherlands and the Czech Republic. This included both pregnant women receiving chemotherapy at the time, and children and mothers who had been exposed to chemotherapy several years prior to the study. Dependent on the age of the child the researchers carried out assessments at ages of 18 months, 5–6 years, 8–9 years, 11–12 years, 14–15 years, or 18 years. The study is ongoing, and in time these children will be given further examinations.
The researchers carried out neurological examinations, tests of cognitive function (using recognised child development tests or IQ tests , heart examinations (electrocardiography and echocardiography , and administered a questionnaire on general health and development. Children who were over five years of age also received hearing tests in addition the Child Behavior Checklist, a questionnaire that screens for behavioural and emotional problems.
The researchers compared their findings with available norms such as national data for height, weight, head circumference, as well as national and international reference data for neurodevelopmental tests, and heart examination tests.
What were the basic results?
The current analysis of this ongoing study looked at the participating children’s development until March 2011. The researchers assessed 70 children (27 born between 1991 and 2004, and 43 born after 2004 from 68 pregnancies (two of the women had given birth to twins . All women had received chemotherapy; some were also given radiotherapy, surgery or both. Across the group, 19 different chemotherapy regimens had been given, in which 236 cycles of chemotherapy were administered.
On average the babies were born at a pregnancy duration of 35.7 weeks (i.e. most were premature ; only 23 babies (33% of the cohort were born at full term (37 weeks or over . The average period of follow-up for each child was 22.3 months.
The children’s behavior, general health, hearing, growth, and heart function were comparable to the general population. Most children were recorded as having normal cognitive development, with most children with scores below the normal range having been born prematurely. After the researchers adjusted for age, sex, and country, they found an 11.6 point increase in IQ score for each additional month of pregnancy that the baby was carried for. The researchers found that both members of one of the twin pregnancies had severe neurodevelopmental delay, and could not be assessed with the complete set of cognitive tests.
How did the researchers interpret the results?
The researchers conclude that children exposed to chemotherapy in the uterus do not have increased likelihood of neurological, cardiac, hearing or general health and growth impairments compared with the general population.
However, prematurity was common and was associated with impaired cognitive development; therefore, planned premature delivery should be avoided where possible.
Conclusion
During pregnancy difficult treatment decisions have to be made bearing in mind the best interests of both a mother and her unborn child. This valuable cohort study provides follow-up data on children who were exposed to chemotherapy while in the uterus, from young childhood through to adolescence and beyond.
Its findings are reassuring and suggest that a child’s exposure to chemotherapy during later stage pregnancy (beyond the first 12 weeks is not associated with brain, heart or other developmental complications in the child. As the researchers note, their findings do not support the practice of delaying chemotherapy or performing planned premature delivery in order to administer chemotherapy to the mother after birth (the study suggests that premature birth may carry greater risk of adverse cognitive outcome than chemotherapy exposure itself .
However, though it does provide some reassurance, unfortunately this relatively small dataset cannot provide conclusive proof that chemotherapy poses no risk at all to the unborn child:
- As the researchers acknowledge, two children born to a twin pregnancy had important neurodevelopmental delay and they cannot exclude the possibility that exposure to chemotherapy during a critical time of brain development was the cause. However, the researchers considered that the broad nature of the problems in one of the twins suggested that chemotherapy was less likely to be the cause.
- Also, though the general neurodevelopmental assessments for the cohort were within the normal range expected among the general population, the researchers noted that a sample of children had some discrepancy between verbal performance and IQ values on intelligence tests, while a sample of others had raised problem scores on a child behavior checklist. The researchers say that these findings show that it is possible that chemotherapy has more subtle effects on neurodevelopment.
- Additionally, other longer-term effects that this study has not looked at need to be assessed, including risks of cancer in the offspring themselves or fertility effects.
- It is important to note that all chemotherapy in this study was given after the first 12 weeks of pregnancy: chemotherapy in the first trimester is associated with increased risk of congenital malformations, and this study does not assess or refute this.
- The study lacked a direct comparison group of children not exposed to chemotherapy in the uterus. Though the researchers did compare to national averages, the ideal comparison method would have been performing the same range of tests in children who were born at the same pregnancy gestation but who had not been exposed to chemotherapy.
- The researchers say that their Cancer in Pregnancy initiative will need to continue to gather longer-term follow-up on much wider numbers of children exposed to chemotherapy in pregnancy.
Links To The Headlines
Chemo in pregnancy does not necessarily harm baby, says study. The Guardian, February 10 2012
Pregnant women with breast cancer can have chemotherapy and surgery and still give birth safely. Daily Mail, February 10 2012
Chemotherapy is 'safe during pregnancy'. The Independent, February 10 2012
Pregnant women can be treated for cancer 'without harming baby'. Daily Telegraph, February 10 2012
I wanted to live but I also wanted to keep my baby: mother Caroline Swain. The Daily Telegraph, February 10 2012
Links To Science
Amant F, Van Calsteren F, Halaska MJ et al. Long-term cognitive and cardiac outcomes after prenatal exposure to chemotherapy in children aged 18 months or older: an observational study. The Lancet Oncology, Published Online February 10 2012
John Cassidy, who holds Guinness World Records for several balloon-related tricks, performs a balloon act for first lady Michelle Obama in the Diplomatic Reception Room. White House photo by Chuck Kennedy.
Michelle Obama may be spending her time these days
dancing with Ellen and racing
Jimmy Fallon through the White House, but all the fun began with a much more serious moment: "My pediatrician pointed out some changes in my kids' body mass index that he just sort of checked us on."
As the first lady told Jim Lehrer two years ago when her signature
"Let's Move!" campaign launched, the typical American lifestyle got the best of the Obama family in their pre-White House days. "It was a life that most working parents are dealing with, where you're juggling jobs and trying to get kids to and from and you're trying to make life easier."
That's why the mother who once allowed her family to indulge in too much television and junk food became the national spokeswoman for nutrition and exercise: She knows how easy it is to lose control and what it takes for an entire family to get back on track. Two years after she launched a campaign against childhood obesity, it's time to take stock of the progress in implementing those same principles on a national scale.
But first, it's worth a look back to the very beginning. Watch Jim Lehrer's full interview here:
By many markers, Mrs. Obama's simple goal "to shine a spotlight on this issue in a way that I couldn't do as a regular mom on the South Side of Chicago" has far exceeded expectations.
National legislation has changed the face of school lunches for 32 million children. Walgreens, Wal-Mart and a number of other chains have agreed to build 1,500 stores in food deserts in the coming years, bringing 9.5 million more Americans better access to fresh and healthy foods. More than 5,700 groups have partnered with the USDA to spread the word about
the new MyPlate food-selection diagram and get simple nutritional information to families across the country.
In a recent
survey by The Washington Post and the Kaiser Family Foundation, more than eight out of 10 Americans say they have heard of "Let's Move!" Thirty five percent say they've heard a lot about it.
But the backlash has been plentiful, too. Some say "Let's Move!" is just another excuse for the Obama administration to meddle in the everyday decisions of Americans. Others criticize the links to Wal-Mart or worry that the emphasis on obesity could damage the self-esteem of American youth.
But some of the strongest resistance is coming from American children and adolescents themselves. When Brandi Thompson's Mississippi high school removed the deep-fried chicken and pork chops from the lunch menu and replaced them with potatoes that are baked instead of cooked in fat, the move didn't sit well.
"I understand the part about us being healthy, but the food they cook, we don't eat, because everybody can't cooked baked food the same. And it just don't taste right," she told health correspondent Betty Ann Bowser shortly after the initiative started.
Blogger Eddie Gehman Kohan has covered every twist, turn and shake of Let's Move! for the past two years on her
Obama Foodorama blog. She's currently traveling with the first lady on a national tour to celebrate the anniversary. But she separated from the press pack for a few moments to answer our top questions on this massive program and its efforts to slim down America's youth.
Gehman Kohan: Well broadly, for any first lady who has had a "first lady campaign," she is the only one to have such huge private-sector commitments. It's really an astonishing series of commitments that she's gotten from the private sector, where they're really serious and largely scaled and can impact millions of people. There's a commitment from Darden Restaurants -- which owns chains like Olive Garden and Red Lobster -- to revamp their children's menus and some other menu items for the campaign. Of course, there are large-scale commitments from Wal-Mart and Walgreens, which have both agreed to build or revamp stores in what USDA identifies as "food deserts" -- places where fresh and healthy foods, primarily produce, are not necessarily available.
And there are a huge number of other private-sector commitments, like from childcare facilities, including YMCA and Bright Horizons. These facilities can help implement early childhood interventions that will help prevent obesity right at the get-go. Mrs. Obama has also made progress with "
Let's Move Faith and Communities," a subcomponent that brings in religious groups and community groups to participate in "Let's Move! activities. And the
Healthier U.S. Schools Challenge, which is a USDA program that rewards schools for best-case scenarios in nutrition and fitness activities.
How much actual progress has been made so far? Are kids actually getting healthier?
Gehman Kohan: After two years, it's too early to point to any kind of statistical analysis in a childhood obesity reduction. Kids who are running around and moving and eating better can't help but be healthier. But most of what has been accomplished is a huge paradigm shift in the public's awareness of the relationship between food and health. And the coordination has been significant: All of these groups that existed before are now coordinated and mobilized and led by the White House while still operating independently. Clearly, there were plenty of food, gardening, health and physical fitness activities in the U.S. before this. But Mrs. Obama's efforts with the "Let's Move!" campaign has really given these groups a focal point while also bringing high-profile attention to the subject as crucially important.
You've written in your blog that "observers seem to misunderstand the scope and focus of Let's Move!" What exactly do you mean by that?
Gehman Kohan: This initiative is generational. It was designed with the intent that children who born in 2010 -- when this was launched -- will grow up in a very different food culture and a very different physical fitness culture. Take for example one of the long-term components -- the school lunch legislation. It is taking a couple of years to roll out, but when children born in 2010 are in kindergarten five years from now, the theory is they'll be walking into a school fitness and food environment that is profoundly different than the environment experienced by kindergartners today. They will have completely different school lunch standards and hopefully their schools will be focusing on more physical activity. And so the crucial importance of starting children out young is they won't grow up already suffering from obesity and all the related diseases.
Let's talk more about school lunches. How is this initiative actually changing policy?
Gehman Kohan: Federal law requires that certain things need to be served or cannot be served in the cafeterias. That's through the National School Lunch Program and the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act. Every few years, Congress has to pass what's called "child nutrition reauthorization," and so the version that came along during the Let's Move! campaign, the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010, is what changed school lunches in the U.S. It's the first significant change to menus in 15 years, and it's the first time in about 30 years the government is giving more for the federal reimbursement rate -- the amount they pay schools to serve the lunches. It also doubles the amount of fruits and vegetables that will be served on a weekly basis, it requires that water be served, that all milk be low- or nonfat, and that all grains are whole grain. And it sets high and low limits for calories, so portion sizes are controlled, depending on the age of the students being served. These changes impact 32 million children.
Are we seeing that kind of change in terms of school gym programs, in getting kids to actually move in school?
Gehman Kohan: Well the schools that participate in the Healthier U.S. Schools Challenge have improved gym components and physical activity. But generally, physical activity in schools has fallen a lot to the wayside for multiple reasons. Many don't have the staff to watch the kids on the playground, some have needed to reduce or eliminate PE because they've needed the students to study for standardized tests tied to state funding. So this recently passed legislation has a wellness policy but it doesn't mandate physical activity. More generally, every major sports association has joined in some high-profile way. They're working in their communities, encouraging after-school programs.
Let's turn to some of the criticism. Not everyone's completely happy with the campaign, right?
Gehman Kohan: By far, the Wal-Mart partnership has caused the most criticism. Wal-Mart is a flashpoint for controversy. It has this reputation for putting local businesses out of business when it moves into communities. Some people say Wal-Mart is using the first lady, that the company isn't serious about its commitment and is just aligning with the first lady because they're trying to build more stores. Labor didn't like the Wal-Mart partnership either because it's a non-union company. Even when Michael Pollan named Mrs. Obama the "Most Powerful Foodie in the World" in Forbes magazine, he said he was worried she was being duped by Wal-Mart and that the company's pledge to focus on "better-for-you processed foods" was really not what should be going on within the rubric of the campaign - that it should be a total focus on fresh, unprocessed foods.
Has there been much criticism of the broader message?
Gehman Kohan: Let's Move! has been pointed to by a lot of critics as an example of big government intervening and the Obama administration wanting to expand the role of government to the point that it controls what American citizens eat. For its part, the campaign says it's about giving people choice and educating them about food and nutrition and physical activity and allowing them to have access to a wide range of choices. There's also been the concern from a lot of people that focusing on childhood obesity would make children hyper-conscious of their body weight. Mrs. Obama always says, "It's not about how you look, it's about how you feel," which is the ultimate message. But that brings up a tricky subject -- there's no way to end an obesity epidemic if people aren't losing weight. So this is one of those murky areas of the campaign that is not much discussed.
If the president isn't re-elected in the fall and this all ends within a year, what's the implication for that?
Gehman Kohan: Well this three-day trip will actually be the last grand tour if the president doesn't get re-elected. But Partnership for a Healthier America - a separate nonprofit that was launched in conjunction with the campaign - was founded to ensure that "Let's Move!" continues on long after Mrs. Obama is not in the White House, whether it's next year or five years from now. Regardless, she's so passionate about this subject that I think she'll continue to work on this issue in some capacity for the rest of her life.
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RAY SUAREZ: And to the battle over contraception coverage.
It's been nearly three weeks since the Obama administration announced new regulations, but the stakes are higher, as both sides harden their positions.
From the Capitol to the White House, the political heat has been rising all week over a new federal mandate on birth control. Under the rule, religious schools and hospitals will have to offer insurance policies that include contraceptive services for employees free of charge. Roman Catholic officials in particular say the rule would force them to violate church teachings.
And Republicans in Congress, like New Hampshire Sen, Kelly Ayotte, have raised their voices.
SEN. KELLY AYOTTE, R-N.H.: This is not a women's rights issue. This is a religious liberty issue. And it can apply to all faiths.
RAY SUAREZ: In a floor speech Wednesday, House Speaker John Boehner threatened legislative action, but it was unclear today what form that would take.
REP. JOHN BOEHNER, R-Ohio: I think the House is going to work, again, through the regular order with real deliberations, about how we protect the religious freedom of the American people. That's the issue. And we're -- and we're keenly focused on it.
RAY SUAREZ: Women rights groups and many Democrats, like California Senator Barbara Boxer, are now coming to the administration's defense.
SEN. BARBARA BOXER, D-Calif.: Women in this country are tired of being treated like a political football by Republicans in Congress, who have tried continually and are continuing to try to take away their benefits, to take away their rights.
RAY SUAREZ: White House officials, seeking to defuse the issue, suggest a still-undefined compromise is possible.
Tuesday, on the NewsHour, the president's senior campaign strategist, David Axelrod, pointed out that 28 states already have similar rules.
DAVID AXELROD, senior Obama campaign strategist: We're going to have a year's period of time in which to transition to this. And that will give us a chance to look at what these others -- how this is implemented elsewhere, how we can implement it here in the best and fairest way, but certainly advancing the principle that women deserve access to contraception.
RAY SUAREZ: The mandate is based on recommendations from the U.S. Institute of Medicine study that showed reproductive health services without co-pays leads to better women's health.
It was the second major birth control decision in recent weeks. In December, the administration barred selling the Plan B contraceptive to girls 16 and younger without a prescription.
We debate the Department of Health and Human Services decision now with Anthony Picarello, general counsel for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, and Jill Warren, executive director of the Methodist Federation for Social Action. It's not an official United Methodist Church body.
Guests, just a short time before tonight's program, the vice president of the United States, Joe Biden, said the White House is trying hard to address the concerns of the church -- quote -- "I'm determined to see that this gets worked out, and I believe we can work it out."
Given the position of the church, Anthony Picarello, and the current state of the ruling from the Obama administration, is there a middle ground? Can a compromise position be found that leaves both sides getting most, but not all of what they want?
ANTHONY PICARELLO, general counsel, U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops: Well, the president and vice president, the executive branch, is entirely within -- has this decision entirely within their control.
So they can do what it is that we have been urging them to do from the outset, which is to remove these items from the mandate, so that people are not forced against their consciences to subsidize them, to sponsor them in health plans.
They could also dramatically increase the breadth of what is an extremely narrow religious exemption that they proposed in the first instance, which covers really only individual churches and basically a very small perimeter around that. So it leaves out charities. It leaves out hospitals. It leaves out schools.
So they have the power entirely within their hands to expand that. We have been hearing lots of talk for a long time about a desire to accommodate, but we haven't seen any action. And so I think we're going to wait until we see action before we . . .
RAY SUAREZ: But I'm trying to figure out what a broadened -- to use your term . . .
ANTHONY PICARELLO: Sure.
RAY SUAREZ: . . . a broadened ruling might look like . . .
ANTHONY PICARELLO: Sure.
RAY SUAREZ: . . . since the two positions are mutually contradictory.
ANTHONY PICARELLO: Well, I don't know that there's so much of a contradiction.
I think, again, what we're looking for in terms of breadth is to protect the religious liberty interests and consciences of all of those who would be affected by the mandate. So that means employers -- religious employers, yes, but also employers with religious people running them or other people of conviction who are running them.
It means religious insurers. And they do exist. Under this mandate, they're required to include in their policies that they write things that they don't agree with as a matter of religious conviction, and individuals as well who have to pay for it through their premiums.
So all of those entities are the folks whose conscience rights are affected. And the bishops are concerned with all of them, and they have advocated for all of them.
RAY SUAREZ: It sounds like you want something even broader, not just for the colleges and universities and hospitals, but even Catholic employers.
ANTHONY PICARELLO: Well, yes, because the principle here is that of religious liberty. And it's not only religious employers that are entitled to religious liberty under the Constitution.
So all of those should be protected. They should not be put in this situation in the first place. They shouldn't be required by the government to provide, through sponsorship and subsidy, benefits that are offensive to their moral beliefs.
RAY SUAREZ: Jill Warren, is there a middle ground? Is there a position that you can contemplate that gets Mr. Picarello more of what he wants, without giving away something that you view as essential?
JILL WARREN, executive director, Methodist Federation for Social Action: Well, first let me say how much I appreciate being able to be here on the show with you, Ray, and with Anthony.
The issue for me is that it's not about a religious exemption or creating some sort of compromise position. It's a position of health care and health care policy. And that is different than religion.
And even though I am part of a religious nonprofit, the United Methodist Church and the Methodist Federation for Social Action, we don't see this in any way as a religious issue. So, for me, in answer to your question, the compromise that might be sought by the Roman Catholic tradition isn't one that is of the best public good for all of us that would be covered by this policy.
RAY SUAREZ: Where does -- when you hear Mr. Picarello talk about conscience . . .
JILL WARREN: Yes.
RAY SUAREZ: . . . where does conscience attach at the nexus of three different entities, insurers, employers and the ensured, who all may want different things?
JILL WARREN: That's right. Yes, that's right.
I think that one of the points that I would like to make in our conversation is that we have a choice about what insurance we choose, whether we choose a sectarian plan or we choose a public plan, or whether we choose no plan at all, or even have access to health care as an insurance option in the first place.
So, as an individual, I can choose what health plan I might most benefit from. I think, in this case, there are insurers, as Anthony has mentioned, and there are hospitals, but they are -- there are already exemptions for conscience clauses. And there are sectarian organizations who don't have to provide these services in the first place.
RAY SUAREZ: So, Catholic insured could invoke different options when given a list of possible insurers?
ANTHONY PICARELLO: Well, I wish that were so. I mean, that's precisely the problem, is that what we have is a situation where the federal government has come in and mandated that certain things be included in all health insurance plans nationwide.
This is private plans offered by religious institutions. This isn't governments-only plan. This isn't plans that are offered by people who happen to be government-funded. It's everybody. And so that freedom to which she was referring is exactly the freedom that we're urging. It's not something that's extreme.
It's only what we have currently, which is, when a religious entity wants to purchase a health insurance policy, it goes to an insurance company. It says, I want these things and not these things. And, you know, the heavens have not fallen in the situation where we provide that.
For example, right now, even under the current pre-mandate environment, nine out of 10 employer-sponsored health insurance plans include contraception. So, there's no scarcity of this coverage available. People can simply -- they're not forced to work for the church.
If they value that benefit so much, they can just choose a different employer. And if they work for the church . . .
RAY SUAREZ: Well, let me jump in there . . .
ANTHONY PICARELLO: Sure.
RAY SUAREZ: . . . because you noted that the heavens haven't fallen.
ANTHONY PICARELLO: Right.
RAY SUAREZ: And I don't know if they've fallen in the more than two dozen states where these mandates already exist.
What have Catholic institutions done to comply in places that already have similar strictures to the one just announced by the Obama administration?
ANTHONY PICARELLO: Ray, I'm glad you asked that question because it's coming up a lot.
There are 28 states that have some kind of contraceptive mandate. None of them are as broad as the one that the federal government has imposed. For example, all but -- the federal government mandate includes a mandate to provide sterilization. Only Vermont does that among those 28 states.
On top of that, most of those states have religious exemptions. And of those, all but three are broader than the one that HHS has chosen. So, basically, there's a lot more accommodation for religious exercise at the state level. And on top of that, states don't even -- you don't even need to take advantage of the religious exemption in order to avoid it in other ways, for example, by self-insurance.
Even in the restrictive states, many Catholic entities are able to avoid this by self-insurance.
RAY SUAREZ: Jill Warren, you heard Sen. Kelly Ayotte say that this is not a women's rights issue, not a health issue. This is a religious liberty issue.
What about the health interests that a lot of people on your side of the argument are talking about?
JILL WARREN: Well, it's -- obviously, I have a difference of opinion, because it is a health issue. It's a basic health issue.
Contraception, controlling whether you can plan your family, whether you can space your children, whether you want to have children, is a basic health issue. It's a biological fact that women can be impregnated, and against our will, I might add. So it absolutely is a health issue.
Barriers to education, barriers to the work force all center around whether you can control your own reproductive health. And in this case, I don't see it at all as a religious issue because there are already religious exemptions and people who can follow their conscience in making their choices.
So, for me, the policy is just good public policy for the common good.
RAY SUAREZ: Jill Warren and Anthony Picarello, thanks for joining me.
ANTHONY PICARELLO: Thank you.
JILL WARREN: My pleasure. Thank you.
A skin cancer drug can improve Alzheimer-like symptoms in mice engineered to mimic the condition, it has been widely reported.
Many national newspapers have covered the news, which is based on aninal tests involving the drug bexarotene (brand name Targretin , which is currently only used to treat a rare form of skin cancer. This drug was given to mice that had been genetically engineered to develop a condition similar to Alzheimer’s, and in a short space of time the mice showed lowered brain levels of a key protein called beta-amyloid. Beta-amyloid is the substance that forms the protein plaques in the brain that are characteristic of Alzheimer’s. The researchers also observed post-treatment improvements in the brain function of the mice – for example, they were better able to build nests and remember the way through a maze.
Although this research is in animals and there is limited direct application to humans at the current time, these early findings do show some potential for further research. Notably, the drug had a rapid effect on amyloid plaques that are characteristic of Alzheimer’s, and the fact that drug is currently licensed means it will have undergone safety regulations for its current use. That said, there are no guarantees it will prove as safe or effective in people with Alzheimer’s.
At the current time no tests have been carried out in humans with Alzheimer’s, only an animal model of the disease. The research will undoubtedly be of interest to researchers, doctors, and patients and their families, but it is far too early to suggest that this could be a cure for Alzheimer’s.
Where did the story come from?
The study was carried out by researchers from Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine, Cleveland, and other institutions in the US. The study was supported by a number of research funding foundations, including the Blanchette Hooker Rockefeller Foundation, Thome Foundation, and the Roby and Taft Funds for Alzheimer’s.
The study was published in the peer-reviewed journal Sciencexpress.
BBC News gives accurate coverage of this study. The Sun, Daily Mail and The Daily Telegraph featured slightly optimistic headlines, but their articles generally do make it clear that this was a study in mice and give good accounts of the research.
What kind of research was this?
This was animal research aiming to investigate the effects of a drug called bexarotene on a mouse model of Alzheimer’s disease.
Bexarotene activates a receptor on the surface of cells that is known to be involved in triggering the production of a protein called ‘apolipoprotein E’ (ApoE . The ApoE protein is involved in the breakdown of soluble beta-amyloid, a protein that builds up to form the characteristic insoluble plaques seen in the brains of people with Alzheimer’s.
All humans carry a gene containing the code for producing the ApoE protein, but some people carry a particular variant of the ApoE gene known as the ApoE e4 allele. People carrying this variant are known to be at increased risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease, and carrying this variant seems to be associated with the build-up of beta-amyloid plaques in the brain. Therefore the researchers were interested whether a drug that increases production of ApoE could potentially have an effect on the build-up of beta-amyloid in the brain. To explore this possibility they decided to test the drug in mice with Alzheimer’s-like symptoms, looking at whether it could reduce their their beta-amyloid levels and improve their cognitive performance.
What did the research involve?
The researchers used various different genetically engineered mouse models of Alzheimer’s in their experiments. The researchers carried out a number of tests to assess the effects of bexarotene on soluble beta-amyloid in the fluid surrounding the brain, insoluble beta-amyloid plaques in the brain, and cognitive performance of these mice.
The mice were administered oral bexarotene for three, seven, nine, 14, 20 or 90 days. These mice were compared with similar mice that did not receive bexarotene. The researchers looked at mice of three different ages: two months, six months and 11 months in order to look at the effects of the drug when given to mice at different stages of their Alzheimer’s-like condition – the older mice having more beta-amyloid protein build-up.
The mice in models of Alzheimer’s display impairments in their performance in several tasks: navigating a water maze (an indicator of cognition ; nest construction (an indicator of social behaviour ; fear response to placement in a shock chamber; and sense of smell. In a sample of mice the researchers tested performance in these four areas after administering the drug.
After the treatment periods the mice’s brains were examined to look for any changes.
What were the basic results?
The researchers found that administering a single dose of bexarotene gave a rapid reduction in levels of soluble beta-amyloid in the fluid surrounding the mice’s brains. There was a 25% reduction within 24 hours and this reduction was retained for over 70 hours. Up to 84 hours after treatment there was a return to pre-treatment levels of soluble beta-amyloid.
In six-month-old mice treated with bexarotene, insoluble beta-amyloid levels in the brain were reduced by 40% after 72 hours. When bexarotene was given to mice for longer periods of time they found a sustained reduction in beta-amyloid throughout the treatment period. They found comparable effects of the drug when testing in older, 11-month-old mice with greater beta-amyloid build-up.
The drug also improved the cognitive, social and sensory deficits of the mice:
- both six-month and 11-month-old mice treated for seven days showed improvements in fear conditioning; the six-month old mice also showed improvements in fear conditioning with 90 days of treatment
- performance in the water maze improved after 20- and 90-day treatment periods
- nest construction behaviour was restored after 72 hours of treatment
- ability to sense odours was restored by three days of treatment
How did the researchers interpret the results?
The researchers conclude that activation of the receptor involved (the retinoid X receptor through use of bexarotene helps to clear beta-amyloid build-up in mouse models of Alzheimer’s and gives a rapid reversal of the associated cognitive and neurological deficits.
Conclusion
This animal research has demonstrated that bexarotene can have a positive effect in clearing the build-up of the characteristic beta-amyloid protein plaques and improving cognitive impairments in mouse models of Alzheimer’s. Bexarotene (brand name Targretin is an anti-cancer drug that is currently licensed specifically for the treatment of a rare type of skin cancer called advanced cutaneous T-cell lymphoma.
Although this research is in animals, and therefore has a limited direct application to humans at present, these early findings do present some genuine potential that needs further research. There is bound to be great interest in the finding that the drug seemed to have an early effect on the amyloid plaques characteristic of Alzheimer’s, particularly as the study involved a drug that is already licensed for use in a specific, rare type of cancer (advanced cutaneous T cell lymphoma . Given its existing use, there may be the possibility of earlier testing in humans than there would be if this were a completely new chemical in development, which would have completely unknown health and safety effects.Nevertheless, this drug has not yet been tested in humans with Alzheimer’s, and results from such studies will be needed before we know for certain whether it is also helpful in humans.
Better treatments for Alzheimer’s in humans are needed, and research such as this is is an important early step towards achieving this goal. While it is far too early to say whether this drug could be a cure for Alzheimer’s, at least in the context of this early research the drug has marked itself out as a clear candidate for further exploration.
Links To The Headlines
Alzheimer's brain plaques 'rapidly cleared' in mice. BBC News, February 10 2012
Skin cancer drug 'reverses Alzheimer's'. The Daily Telegraph, February 10 2012
Skin cancer drug 'clears Alzheimer's protein from the brain'. Daily Mail, February 10 2012
Does skin cancer drug offer Alzheimer's hope? Channel 4 News, February 10 2012
Links To Science
Cramer PE, Cirrito JR, Wesson DW, et al. ApoE-Directed Therapeutics Rapidly Clear ?-Amyloid and Reverse Deficits in AD Mouse Models Science. Published online February 9 2012
Reaction to President Obama's new accommodations for religiously affiliated non-profit institutions in the new birth control rules is generally positive, including some Catholic organizations. Most significantly, the
Catholic Health Association the trade group representing Catholic hospitals which had fought agains the rule, supports the change. The president of the association is "pleased with the revised rule."
"The framework developed has responded to the issues we identified that needed to be fixed," Sister Carol Keehan said in a statement.Likewise, Catholics United
supports the change and urges the Conference of Bishops to accept it.
“Catholics United has been calling on both sides of this heated debate to work towards today's win-win solution,” said James Salt, executive director of Catholics United. “President Obama has shown us that he is willing to rise above the partisan fray to deliver an actual policy solution that both meets the health care needs of all employees and respects the religious liberty of Catholic institutions."Women's organizations are thus far supportive, since the policy retains the key element—no cost contraceptive coverage for women. Planned Parenthood's Cecile Richards
Today's announcement will also be a test for the Catholic bishops, who have indicated that they are opposed to compromise.
“I am eager to see the response of the Catholic bishops, and I hope and pray in their wisdom they see the value of finding a solution,” Salt said. “If the bishops are unwilling to recognize the value of compromise, I suspect their opposition is more about playing politics than serving the needs of the people.”
says:
“In the face of a misleading and outrageous assault on women’s health, the Obama administration has reaffirmed its commitment to ensuring all women will have access to birth control coverage, with no costly co-pays, no additional hurdles, and no matter where they work."Emily's list
supports the policy.
Emily's List: "We∙re reassured that it appears that no woman, no matter where she works, will lose birth control coverage"—
@samsteinhp via
TweetDeck
The Conference of Catholic Bishops has yet to weigh in on the change.
8:54 AM PT:
Terry O'Neill, president of the National Organization for Women
says:
“The president is making a statement that women are entitled to have birth control,” O’Neill says. “Birth control is an essential part of health care for women, and the president is standing strong for that policy.“
Category: Health News
Created: 2/8/2012 2:06:00 PM
Last Editorial Review: 2/9/2012
Category: Health News
Created: 2/9/2012 2:06:00 PM
Last Editorial Review: 2/10/2012
Category: Health News
Created: 2/8/2012 2:06:00 PM
Last Editorial Review: 2/9/2012
At the end of January, Google's social network Google Plus quietly opened the doors to minors ages 13 and over. This is something that anyone managing a Google+ Page already suspected, based on the choices when creating the page to make it 18 and over. What users didn't expect was that Google+ would open its gates so soon, with so many issues still left to address.
Google+ moved fast before the announcement to implement a variety of
security features to protect the new demographic. This post will go over these features, then list some of the outstanding issues that the network has yet to address.
Protections for Minors
Anyone using Google+ has the ability to select with whom each individual post they create will be shared. When choosing a post to go Public, however, underage users are prompted to remember that this means the post will be shared with the entire internet and that strangers may be able to comment (if they have changed their settings to allow this .
Prompt minors see when posting Public.
Changing settings can enable any user to specify who can see their profile, what specific parts of their profile are visible to whom, and who can contact them through the network. The profiles of minors are defaulted to allow only notifications and comments from people in their immediate circles.
The options given to users in Google+ settings.
In Hangouts, Google+ enables users to have live video chat sessions with a maximum of 10 other users at a time. Hangouts can be shared publicly or limited to Circles (pre-selected groups of people . Like certain house parties, Hangouts do not necessarily belong to the user who created them, so even if someone shares a Hangout with only a limited group, if someone in that group shares the Hangout publicly, anyone who sees it in their stream can join in.
To lend a hand with the issues that may result from a stranger crashing a Hangout where a minor is present, Google+ has added a feature that immediately stops minors' video and audio, so they can't be seen or heard. Immediately, a prompt pops up notifying minors about the newcomer and asks them whether they'd like to continue video chatting or exit the Hangout.
Prompt minors see when a stranger joins their Hangout.
Despite these strides in protection, several issues remain in need of address, both to protect the new demographic and to ensure that the adults already using the network can continue to share as they have thus far enjoyed.
Control
There currently exists no way for users posting about adult topics to do so in a way that prevents the underage crowd (or someone at work from seeing these updates. Posting to a specific Circle can be useful in this regard, but that requires a user to Circle all the people that they think are interested in receiving this sort of content. That can work if one only engages with people whose content they enjoy equally, but presents a problem when people who are interested in this type of content add no value to a user's stream. Google+, it might also be mentioned, only allows people to Circle 5,000 other people, and for active users who have more followers than that, explaining that you can't add someone back because you're capped -- or having to remove someone because you need to add people whose content is more relevant to your online experience can be quite uncomfortable.
The solution I found was to create an 18 and over Google+ Page to share the content I think is unsuitable for minors. However, not all users are going to see the management of yet another digital space as convenient, raising concerns about a response from the network that promotes censorship over freedom of expression. To date, there is no word on whether Google will be developing this function, though when I
posted asking for this capability, Yonatan Zunger, Chief Architect at Google+, responded in agreement that this would be a useful feature.
Notifications
While Google+ enables users to select who can send them notifications, the network does not distinguish among the types of notifications. As a result, if you want to allow the public or even Extended Circles (which works like Facebook's Friends of Friends to send you private messages, strangers end up with both the ability to send you private messages and to tag you in photographs.
Because I write about relationships, I understand that some people may not feel comfortable talking about their partners in a public comment thread, so I allow private messages from Extended Circles. The downside is that anyone who is in a circle of someone I have circled can tag me in a photo. This seemed harmless enough until I woke up one morning, flooded with notifications from Google+ asking whether I wanted to accept the tags in photos of various men.
"Look at me!" photo tags.
It's an effective way to make someone stop what they're doing and look at you. But it's very inconvenient. And while Google+ has features in place to enable users to quickly flag inappropriate content, users are sometimes too fast for the network, enabling one to see herself tagged in sexually suggestive photos. I take it as a reassuring sign that despite 500,000 followers this has only occurred to me three times. Usually, by the time I get there, the image has been removed. I still would like the ability to change my settings so that while I receive private messages from Extended Circles, only people in my Circles (or even one specific Circle can tag me in photos.
Pseudonyms
In the beginning, Google+ made it clear that it would be a place where everyone used their real names, the logic being that people are more civil when their real life reputation is attached to their comments. Problems quickly arose, however, as the algorithms and people involved in policing this "real name" rule began suspending profiles of not only pseudonymous users, but anyone with an "unreal"-looking name, such as tech commentator Violet Blue (whose legal name, in case you don't know, really is Violet Blue .
When my account was suspended for using a psuedonym, I lobbied that the policy was depriving the network of the voices of people who, for a variety of valid reasons (such as political dissenters who must protect themselves against retaliation, scientists whose lives are threatened by extremists who believe for whatever reason that their work is unethical, victims of domestic violence and hate crimes,
etc. , choose not to use their real names.
My situation received enough media attention that my profile was quickly reinstated, but unfortunately, this was not
the experience of a lot of other users. Eventually, in the face of mounting evidence, Zunger
conceded:
We thought this was going to be a huge deal: that people would behave very differently when they were and weren't going by their real names. After watching the system for a while, we realized that this was not, in fact, the case. (And in particular, bastards are still bastards under their own names. We're focusing right now on identifying bad behaviors themselves, rather than on using names as a proxy for behavior.
In an effort to address the backlash, Bradley Horowitz, Vice President of Product at Google+
stated last week that Google+ was planning to move toward a more inclusive naming policy on the network, adding support for nicknames, maiden names, and names in scripts other than the Roman alphabet -- all of which will now appear alongside already established "common" names. The message also stated the network would be allowing "established" pseudonyms.
There is no way to establish a pseudonym at registration. Usually, a user must wait until a profile is flagged before they can appeal to establish themselves. Horowitz also wrote that users who had started out using the network with their real names could apply to change their names to pseudonyms. He said:
If we flag the name you intend to use, you can provide us with information to help confirm your established identity. This might include:
- References to an established identity offline in print media, news articles, etc
- Scanned official documentation, such as a driver’s license
- Proof of an established identity online with a meaningful following
We'll review the information and typically get back to you within a few days. We may also ask for further information, such as proof that you control a website you reference. While a name change is under review, your old name will continue to be displayed. For new accounts without an old name, your profile will be in a non-public, read-only state during the review. Either way, you'll be able to see the status of your review by going to your profile.
The
Google+ Profiles name policy elaborates on the things users can bring to the attention of the network to prove the name or pseudonym given merits acceptance:
If we challenge the name you intend to use, you will be asked to submit proof that this is an established identity with a meaningful following. You can do so by providing links to other social networking sites, news articles, or official documents in which you are referred to by this name. Note that this name and your profile must represent you, and not an avatar or other secondary online identity. Profane or offensive names are not allowed.
The policy remains confusing, however. While Horowitz told users to apply for a name change in his post, a Google spokeperson
told Violet Blue that users who wanted to employ a pseudonym needed to apply for a new Google+ account altogether. This makes sense, as changing one's name to a pseudonym as Horowitz suggests will not change the name that appears on your previous posts. According to the spokeperson with whom Blue spoke (emphasis mine :
The original name tied to their Google+ profile will still be visibly retained. When you change your name, old posts and comments that were made with the old name continue to use that name.
Pseudonymous users who have repeatedly pointed out that other users with pseudonymous but "real"-looking names were still being allowed to exist on the network were unsurprised when
further discussion with members of the Google+ team revealed that pseudonyms are acceptable if they
look "real." While grossly unfair to brilliant commentators who operate under "unreal"-looking pseudonyms (especially those deemed to not have a “meaningful” following , this is good news for newcomers and minors, who may want to share somewhat publicly, but who don't want to be immediately identifiable.
Censorship
Google+ has always been very hard on nudity. Due to the lack of features that enable a user to mark a post NSFW (not safe for work , the fact that minors were poised to eventually be allowed, and possibly the way Google Search would eventually begin
integrating Google+ updates in their results, the social network adopted a draconian position on content early on.
When Google+ censored the work of
Paul Roustan, whose marvelous, intricate paintings use the human body as a canvas, many users joined together
in protest against censorship. Eventually, Roustan's images were
reinstated and Google+ changed its
content policy to allow for posts and images that are "artistic, educational, or [have] documentary considerations, or when there are other substantial benefits to the public from not taking action" (i.e., censoring the post .
Previously, users were not notified when a post or image had been censored. Users would see some activity on a post or image and suddenly, despite ongoing conversation, the post would cease receiving notifications. Because the post or image was still visible to a user, it was hard to tell immediately that its view status had been changed from what the user selected (e.g., Public, Circles, Extended Circles to Limited. This has become slightly less confusing -- going to one's photos tab within the network now shows a graphic that enables a user to locate images that have been deemed to be in violation of Google+'s content policy.
Attention graphic in photo section.
Notification that an image does not comply with content policies.
The policy, which is slightly more liberal, is not evenly applied, however. Profile images, for example, are subject to more intense scrutiny, as TechCrunch columnist MG Siegler
found out when he uploaded a profile image showing his middle finger.
When Google+ photo manager Brian Rose was questioned about the withdrawal of an image I had uploaded for the 18 and over page I created on the network (which shows the middle section of a woman's nude body , Rose responded: "Profile photos are held to a stricter standard than photos shared in the stream, I believe because they may also show up on Google.com search result pages, other Google services, etc."
Censorship will continue on the network until a function is created to shield those who do not want to be exposed to mature or controversial content -- however educational or artistic -- and until controls are created to enable users to decide whether they want their pages to appear in Google Search, as profiles currently allow.
Response to Abuse
Last year, atheist and anti-censorship activist Brandon Campeaux
quit Google+ despite his network of over 250,000 followers due to the number of death threats he had received for voicing his controversial views on the social network. Despite calling attention to the issue several times using Google+'s feedback feature, none of the accounts threatening Campeaux were suspended. The network eventually reached out to Campeaux and he returned, but to date no user that threatened him has been suspended.
What's more, Campeaux’s interaction with Google+ employees on the network about this problem eventually led Google developer advocate Chris Chabot to
block Campeaux. According to Champeaux, Google+ community manager Natalie Villalobos blocked him as well after he criticized her for not taking down child pornography quickly enough.
This response is worrisome, though to be fair, my own has been markedly different: I find members of the Google+ team responsive and attentive to suggestions made by users. Zunger is very active with activists fighting for full pseudonym support, for example. Rose is quick to address questions about flagged images and bring issues to the attention of the photo review team. Villalobos has exceled in a handful of conversations about what constitutes a violation of community guidelines. In general, my own experience with people who are working at Google+ suggests that the people behind the network care about its users in a way that other networks simply do not, regardless of the missteps Google+ has made.
They illustrate a statement made six months ago by Google site reliability engineer Trey Harris:
I keep seeing people on comment threads about Google+ policy saying something along the lines of: ‘the service belongs to Google, they get to make the decision, if you don’t like it, use something else.’ … This argument -- if you can dignify calling it that -- is obvious, it’s facile, and it’s unhelpful. It amounts to telling the people you disagree with to just shut up. It isn’t a way to forward a constructive discussion.
Google+ cares about being the best social network out there and they should. There is a lot at stake for Google, which has positioned itself to bring together all the user-generated data from its services, including Google+, to improve targeting for advertisers. The question now is whether Google+ will adapt quickly enough to keep the users it has gained while attracting this new demographic of individuals aged 13 and up.
AV Flox is the section editor of Love & Sex and Health on BlogHer. You can connect with her on Twitter
@avflox, Google Plus
+AV Flox, or e-mail her directly at av.flox AT BlogHer.com
There are cranes everywhere. Hard hats and a sense that if we get this right, everything will change for the better
Alfred Dickens, the novelist's brother, wrote a General Board of Health report on the area soon to be occupied by the Olympic athletes, recording that "the cholera raged" and there was "neither drainage nor paving" – "in winter the streets were impassable". More recently it was a site of old warehouses and weedy dereliction. It smelled of the oil and paint and chemical effluent that had leached for years into the land around the Hackney Marshes.
Today the soil has been cleaned in giant machines like twin-tubs, to neutralise the toxic elements left behind by 200 years of industrial adventure. Never, in the fields of leisure and national prestige, has so much dirt been scrubbed so expensively and with so much hope invested in the particles. You could almost eat the soil now.
The first time I saw London was in 1981, just after the wedding of Charles and Diana. I came to Stratford for two weeks to stay with my uncle. It smelled funny – like our ICI-dominated conurbation back home – and it surprised me that a city so full of telegenic hats and pristine flags could also smell of wet coal. But when I went back to Stratford the other day that smell had gone, to be replaced by the ambition of London 2012, which wafts from every corner and every drained compartment of the site.
When you step out at Pudding Mill Lane Station, you enter a vast, animated anxiety about timing: as I write, there are 183 days, 12 hours, 7 minutes and 35 seconds left until the opening ceremony and the entrance to the site still looks like Alexanderplatz a year after the Berlin Wall came down. There are cranes everywhere. Hard hats. And a wobbly sense that, if we get this right, everything will change for the better: the climate, the character, the ethos of the country.
My guide takes me around the Olympic park with the kind of enthusiasm associated with new mothers and estate agents. She checks my ID and we drive to Security. There are scanners and x-rays; every car is swept for bombs; every visitor's credentials minutely examined – by four different people in our case, even though my guide has worked here since 2006: maybe Prince Charles is expected. Set free at last, we make our way through the park, arriving first at the Aquatics Centre designed by Zaha Hadid – a giant wave sustained by its own motion. On either side of the wave there are temporary boxes for rows of spectators' seating which will be taken down once the Games are over. We crane our necks to see the top of the building, whose vinyl skin appears to ripple in the breeze. The shape of the Aquatics Centre will largely be hidden by the seating during the Games and its full effect will not be evident until afterwards. They say the design borrows from the 2002 ramp Hadid built for a ski jump near Innsbruck, and it's clear from photos of her work that she has a fondness for a sweep of silver.
The car swings round and we approach a towering crimson corkscrew that turns out to be Anish Kapoor's Orbit. This structure was paid for by the mega-rich Indian steel firm ArcelorMittal with a lot of me-too backing from Boris Johnson. It's a sculpture, but also a 115-metre high observation platform: a kinder thing to look from than at, but the cameras will like it and it will have a short but meaningful life, putting a postmodern smile on the face of an area known for its post-industrial frown. In that sense it is a good symbol for these Olympics, a festival of temporary measures.
The London Olympics are already the most financially successful Games there have ever been. More tickets have been sold more quickly for both the main Games and the Paralympics. We pass the water polo venue, a temporary structure that will be taken down after the summer, but then nothing here looks like a building in the sense that the Wellcome Institute is a building, and the park itself seems to owe more to Disneyland than to Kensington Gardens. When I ask the public relations officer how the tens of thousands of visitors will be fed, she doesn't use the words "canteen" or "restaurant" but the modern-day equivalent, "concessions": the big-name fast-food outlets will soon take up their rightful places. As we talk, the diggers and bulldozers are chugging past. Two hundred buildings, many of them old yards and factories stuffed with asbestos, were demolished during the construction. How did the local community like having a building site on their doorstep for six years? "We had a huge community relations team," my guide says.
Monica Bonvicini has made a giant LED sculpture of the word RUN that will stand near the handball arena. The attempt to connect sport to art during the Olympics has a long history, you could say, but in today's world of high justification, it also represents an attempt at explaining away huge costs. As I make my way around the site, and look at things both wonderful and gaudy, inspiring and mad, I can't empty my head of the fact that the 2012 Games will cost the taxpayer at least ?12bn, with the more likely final figure close to ?20bn. That's double the original budget. I gather from my guide that it's all to do with Legacy. A vast amount of money – beginning at ?300m to fund the Olympic Park Legacy Company – is being spent on resolving the question of what will happen to this place and these buildings once the caravan moves on.
Some previous Olympic cities have velodromes sitting in the middle of nowhere with nettles growing on the track and vines over the scoreboard. I expect a priority here will be the issue of recycling: some architects are taking an interest in Rem Koolhaas's notion of reusable art, and much of London's Olympic stuff may end up in Rio in 2016. The biggest building on the site is the media centre, a giant white hangar that will house more than 20,000 accredited journalists. It looks like the Pompidou Centre in Paris, with exposed cooling pipes wrapping the building and, inside, a multitude of studios and production facilities. I ask my friend if any of the media organisations are paying for this. "No, that's provided by us," she says. Journalists will also get free parking spaces, the only parking provision in the whole park. "They have a lot of kit to carry," she explains with an understanding smile.
We pass the pink and blue Riverbank Arena, the hockey venue – hockey was one of the fastest selling sports – which has an acoustic wall for Paralympians, who'll play five-a-side football there with a ball that has a bell inside. We reach the parkland to the north of the site: trees and walkways and benches, mounds and dips, all wrapped around one of the old waterways that used to be clogged with chemical sludge. It's now like a patch of wetland, back to what it was before Stratford was Stratford. When you look at old maps you can see the wholesale reinvention that has taken place. Whatever the Games turn out to be like, the effort has been magnificent: everywhere you look as you spin from one end of this cartoon world to another you are confronted with the ingenuity that has gone into inventing it.
Most of all, I love the velodrome – already nicknamed "The Pringle" – and would like to have it in my kitchen. I might have to move the table back a bit, juggle a few spoons and plates and rethink the fridge, but I want it badly. It's like a cyclist's helmet made of conker-brown wood; or, maybe, like the Aquatics Centre, it represents the movement it will soon contain. There's something Japanese about this sort of thing: the wave caught at the apex of its journey or the trees bent and frozen by the wind's motion. The designer of the 6000-seat velodrome is Mike Taylor of the British firm Hopkins Architects. The wood-clad building cost ?93m and used 34.8 miles (56km of timber, which its 26 carpenters fastened down with 350,000 nails. It may well turn out to be the most loved of all the buildings.
You can panic seeing all the diggers, but the people working on the site are certain everything will come in on time. Some of the 70,000 volunteers who will be working on the site in the summer are already involved in test events. The flats and townhouses in the Olympic Village look a bit like a 1970s housing project – rather nicely so, I thought. They will house 17,000 athletes. "There are more than 3,000 flats," a spokesman tells me, "and they've already been sold. We had a commitment that half would be affordable housing." Affordable? That could be a theme all of its own. The Olympic Games must be the most extravagant advertisement for national wellbeing ever devised.
This is an edited extract from an article in the current London Review of Books,
www.lrb.co.uk
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Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand appeared on MSNBC today to voice her full throated support of the president's decision on contraception. She told
Andrea Mitchell Reports
substitute Luke Russert that, overwhelmingly, American women would have the president's back on this decision.
"Ninety-eight, ninety-nine percent of women have taken contraception in their lifetime. This is common health care for women, and they should not told by their bosses what medicines they are allowed to take."Indeed.
Saying she spoke with the president yesterday,
"He shares our values, he shares our goals, he's committed to making sure that all women in American have access to affordable birth control."Earlier the senator's office released this press release, saying: “We Will Not Stand for This Massive Overreach To Undermine The Ability of Women to Make Their Own Decisions”
Washington D.C. – U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY released the following statement today after aIt's bizarre how women's choice has turned to a place where we're debating contraception.
USA Today story today revealed the extent to which opponents of women’s access to the full range of preventive health services, including contraception want a “religious exemption” to go. Anthony Picarello, general counsel for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops argued any business or corporation owned by Catholics should be excluded when he cited the problem that would be created for, "good Catholic business people who can't in good conscience cooperate with this." He went as far to say, "If I quit this job and opened a Taco Bell, I'd be covered by the mandate.”
“I am dumbfounded that in the year 2012 we still have to fight over birth control. It is sad that we have to stand here yet again to fight back against another overreach and intrusion into women’s lives.
“This is what it is – a political overreach to roll back access to birth control – not a religious issue. The fact they want to exempt all businesses from providing contraceptive care is just outrageous.
“The power to decide whether or not each individual woman uses contraception should be with that woman – not her boss. We will not stand for these attempts to undermine the ability of women to make their own decisions.
“If my Republican colleagues want to continue to take this issue head on, we stand ready to oppose any attacks launched against women's rights and women's health.
Category: Health News
Created: 2/9/2012 4:06:00 PM
Last Editorial Review: 2/10/2012
A senior doctor at Launceston's General Hospital says health budget cuts are increasing the pressure on the city's general practitioners.
Category: Health News
Created: 2/9/2012 4:06:00 PM
Last Editorial Review: 2/10/2012
There are countless reasons why leaving the country that purports to own you has advantages. For one, whenever I return to my personal home country of Canada - never for pleasure, only for business – I will usually run across a typically socialist Canadian who will take great offence to my worldview and will tell me, “If you don’t like it, leave!”
Nothing makes me happier than to tell them, “I did… and I’m so much happier now.”
No one ever has a comeback for that… except for the odd, “well, good….”.
You see, almost everyone in the western world, if not the entire world, has been trained to think in terms of their own geographic region. As soon as you go beyond that most can’t even understand.
As example, in 2003, after I left Canada I lived for a year in Santa Monica (L.A. , California. It was the worst year of my life living in the place where souls come to die. But the best part of it was when I’d get caught speeding at regularly upwards of 120 miles per hour (sometimes as high as 200 mph in my Dodge Viper.
I’d get pulled over by the all watchful eye of the state and they’d ask me for my driver’s license. I’d give them my Canadian license. The dimwitted costumed thugs would look at my license for minutes at a time… even resorting to squinting as though that would translate what they saw.
“You are 180 feet tall?” they’d ask.
“Uh, that’s centimeters,” I’d respond. The funny part is that in Canada not one person in a thousand would describe their height in metric… but thanks to the radical socialist Pierre Trudeau, the government imposed the metric system upon the residents of the terrritorial monopoly known as Canada.
They’d then try again.
“You weigh 49 pounds?” (that was before I started putting on some weight!
“That’s kilograms,” I’d respond. Again, no one in Canada describes weight in kilograms…
At that point the cops would look at their ticket and wouldn’t be able to compute how to translate the two, hand me back my license, and tell me to “slow down”. Even if they did give me a ticket, I’d crumple it up in front of them and throw it onto the street as I sped off. And now, I do the same worldwide with my Dominican Republic license.
But the point is, still, to this day, governments aren’t set-up to enslave the global population (as much as they'd like to - one world government . They still mostly enjoy oppressing the 99.7% of the population, who like serfs of old rarely go 10 miles from their birthplace. (618,134 US taxpayers filed a Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts Report (FBAR in 2011 – or 0.3% of the population has begun to move its assets outside of the control of the US
And so, recently, when the FBI denoted “domestic sovereign citizens” as being the new terrorist risk, I took great pleasure. They actually all but copied our mission statement from The Dollar Vigilante website. They said, “
extremists who disregard their U.S. Citizenship, do not pay taxes and blatantly ignore authority,” are the new threat to law enforcement.
Well, we long ago stopped describing ourselves in slave terms. I’m not Canadian, or American, I’m a homo sapien, from Planet Earth. So, we are excluded from their definition. We don’t, nor will we ever pay taxes, as we choose to live under the three flag theory, originally encapsulated by Harry Schultz, which states that we are a citizen of a country that does not tax outside of its jurisdiction, who has their business(es in jurisdictions of low or no taxes and who has their home in a place where they are welcomed and considered as a tourist. Also known as the Permanent Tourist or Previous Taxpayer (P.T. theory.
But, other than not being a “US citizen”, we almost exactly qualify as the latest threat to law enforcement according to the FBI.
Perhaps the funniest part about this new FBI wild goose chase is that they call the new threat “sovereign citizens”. That’s an oxymoron if there ever was one. You might as well call them free slaves. Sovereign is free, “citizen” is a slave.
We wonder, are un-domesticated extremists a risk to law enforcement? If we are not American or have given up our western passports and live outside of the US, but still do not pay taxes and still ignore authority, are we a risk? Apparently not.
Where we live, whether it be Mexico, Thailand, anywhere in South America or most of Asia, we are just considered people.
The paradigms are all changing. Dozens of countries are in all out revolt, including Italy,
as we broke prior to mainstream media (which still hasn’t mentioned it – oops right here at TDV. Nation states are in a state of collapse. Doug Casey has been a big proponent of
phyles. The world has become smaller thanks to air travel and telecommunications. Because of this, likeminded people can easily find each other and group together. It only makes sense. Certainly, where I was born, other than enjoying the gladiator sport of hockey or donuts at a place called Tim Horton’s, I had nothing in common with most of the people who lived around me.
"Generally, one simply must internationalize one's assets. The biggest danger investors face, by far, is not market risk - huge as that will be - but political risk. The only way to insulate yourself from such risk is to diversify yourself politically and geographically." - Doug Casey
Today, I live in Acapulco, Mexico and have my own libertarian enclave (AcaCondos
http://acacondos.com down here where numerous people are buying beach condos and hanging out together. As a backup plan, because Mexico is a little uncomfortably close to the US (although Acapulco is in the very south , I have also purchased a lot in
Doug Casey’s Galt’s Gultch in northern Argentina… a place where they will have a communal clubhouse filled with books by Ludwig von Mises, Hayek, Rothbard and many other libertarian and Austrian greats.
We continue to help readers and subscribers live Harry Schultz’s “
three flag theory”, and help people to get out of their home country (or at least their assets , become citizen of a country that does not tax outside of its jurisdiction (like the
Dominican Republic and live in places that are more hospitable than the western world, of which we’ve covered more than a dozen countries in our newsletter.
We invite you to join our growing community of dollar collapse survivors and find ways of internationalizing yourself or your wealth to survive the coming Age of Turmoil. We have our own private group where like-minded people can trade information and ideas from over 50 countries around the world.
Subscribe to The Dollar Vigilante to get more actionable info and more in depth research and analysis. In fact, we feel like we may be the only people out here trying to help the little people (the non-political and financial elite whether it be from our report to help investors retain their shares (http://tdv.bulletproofshares.com when their broker becomes bankrupt or through our numerous other reports or articles helping people escape the oppression and theft of their own government. Your government registered financial advisor isn’t telling you any of this, is he?
Category: Health News
Created: 2/9/2012 11:01:00 AM
Last Editorial Review: 2/9/2012
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