Tag Archives: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

May 12, 2013 · 7:29 AM

Guns in the home proving deadly for kids

Guns

USA Today

While efforts at gun control are still being fought, children’s advocates are urging parents and communities to take their own steps to protect kids.

He didn’t know the gun was loaded.

The 14-year-old Massachusetts boy had recently found his mother’s handgun, which she kept hidden under her mattress for protection.

“Promise me you’ll never touch it,” his mother, a single mom, had asked him.

But the lure of the gun was irresistible. He decided to show it off to his neighbor, 12-year-old Brian Crowell.

“He was going, ‘Click, click, click,’” pretending to shoot the gun, says Brian’s mother, Ann Marie Crowell, who spoke to the child and his mother after the incident. “But there was one last bullet. It went into Brian’s neck.”

And just like that, Crowell’s son was gone.

Nearly 800 children under 14 were killed in gun accidents from 1999 to 2010, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Nearly one in five injury-related deaths in children and adolescents involve firearms.

Although mass shootings get more attention, children are far more likely to be killed at home.

Through homicide, suicide and accidents, guns cause twice as many deaths in young people as cancer, five times as many as heart disease and 15 times as many as infections, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Continue reading here…

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July 9, 2012 · 4:33 PM

Deadly Tuberculosis Outbreak In Florida Covered Up By GOP Governor Rick Scott

I have to ask: What were Florida voters thinking when they elected that Bat-Boy look-alike to the Governorship?  Everything about his demeanor, history of Medicaid Fraud and his actions since becoming Governor of Florida has been an unmitigated disaster.

Addicting Info

When the Center for Disease Control issues a warning about a large outbreak of Tuberculosis(TB), the rational person would prepare to address the issue. Perhaps notify the local hospitals or shelters. If the area had a top-notch treatment center, notifying them would likely be at the top of ones to-do list as governor I would suspect.

Instead, Governor Rick Scott of Florida ordered the shutdown of the states only TB treatment facility, the A G Holley State Hospital in Lantana, Florida. Part of a larger Department of Health budget cut signed just nine days before the state was notified of the problem, the shutdown was accelerated after the notice was given, and the facility shut down 6 months ahead of schedule back in June. The reason given; austerity, in order to fund the tax cuts for the rich.

Of course, the cost to treat a TB patient early is typically $500, however if prolonged, drug resistant TB strains which do develop can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. And once those appear, the diseases contagious nature make it sure to spread rapidly, especially in areas effected by the layoffsfor water treatment plants. So much for austerity.

And, as the Palm Beach Post reported, it appeared that the Governor had been actively hiding the CDC report from lawmakers just before they ordered the closing of the state’s sole TB treatment center. Despite the confirmed deaths by TB and thousands exposed to the disease, the Governor felt that saving a few hundred dollars per patient was worth the looming crisis in the state. Now it appears that containment of the disease is no longer an option, and with TB being incredibly contagious, called “Consumption” for those who recall the works of Charles Dickens, the danger to the state looms large.

The truly despicable piece of this story, however, is that the information was actively hid by the Governors office. Under Florida’s Sunshine Laws, reports such as the CDC warning are to be kept in the public domain for ease of access. Instead, it took months for the Palm Beach Post to break the story, and by then the damage had been done, the treatment facility closed, and thousands of Florida citizens have been exposed to the deadly disease. Governor Scott’s Objectivist driven ideology has landed his state into a severe crisis, one in which his corporate masters can never hope to address.

But hey, he’s working hard to make sure that 92-year-old WWII veterans can’t vote, it must have slipped his mind.

For our readers in Florida, if you begin to show any of the signs of Tuberculosis do not wait. Get yourself tested and treated immediately.

*Correction* An error in the timeline of cancellation where the bill to authorize the shutdown was signed after the CDC notice. It should have said nine days before the notice was delivered.

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April 10, 2012 · 5:41 PM

Teen Pregnancies Highest In States With Abstinence-Only Policies

Duh!  Tell a teen NOT to do something and you can bet your last dollar he/she will do it!

Think Progress

The number of teen births in the U.S. dropped again in 2010, according to a government report, with nearly every state seeing a decrease. Nationally, the rate fell 9 percent to about 34 per 1,000 girls ages 15 through 19, and the drop was seen among all racial and ethnic groups. Mississippicontinues to have the highest teen birth rate, with 55 births per 1,000 girls. New Hampshire has the lowest rate at just under 16 percent.

This is the lowest national rate for teen birthssince the Centers for Disease Control began tracking it in 1940, and CDC officials attributed the decline to pregnancy prevention efforts. Other reports show that teenagers are having less sex and using contraception more often. Studies have backed this up. Researchers at the University of Washington in Seattle found that teenagers who received some type of comprehensive sex education were 60 percent less likely to get pregnant or get someone else pregnant. And in 2007, a federal report showed that abstinence-only programs had “no impacts on rates of sexual abstinence.”

But 37 states require sex education that includes abstinence, 26 of which require that abstinence be stressed as the best method. Additionally, research shows that abstinence-only strategies could deter contraceptive use among teenagers, thus increasing their risk of unintended pregnancy.

For example, take the states with the highest and lowest teen pregnancy rates. Mississippidoes not require sex education in schools, but when it is taught, abstinence-only education is the state standard. New Mexico, which has the second highest teen birth rate, does not require sex ed and has no requirements on what should be included when it is taught. New Hampshire, on the other hand, requires comprehensive sex education in schools that includes abstinence and information about condoms and contraception.

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October 1, 2011 · 4:02 PM

Politics goes to the movies: Contagion

The Rachel Maddow Blog

So I saw Contagion recently, and I can’t get it out of my head — and not just in terms of the increased frequency of my hand sanitizer usage. If you haven’t seen it (and if you haven’t, you should — it’s a taut thriller that moves as quickly and efficiently as its viral subject), here’s the main thing I keep circling back to: basically, it’s about how the federal government saves the day. Faced with “MEV-1,” a hyper-contagious virus that becomes a global pandemic, the Centers for Disease Control isolate the bug, study it, and develop a vaccine. FEMA and the Department of Homeland Security distribute it. The picture’s primary heroes are the CDC’s “Epidemic Intelligence Service Officer” and its Level-4 Biosafety Lab tech; one gives her life in battling the virus, the other risks hers, selflessly and modestly, to test the vaccine.

That Scott Z. Burns’s screenplay creates a giant problem that is solved by a giant government is, on the face, nothing revolutionary; within the context of the film, it’s the narrative arc that makes the most sense. But Contagion’s decidedly positive portrait of government is also something of a rebuke to the notion that government is the problem and the private sector, the free market, and “individual liberties” are the solution — even to natural disasters, which Tea Party favorites like Ron Paul insist warrant no response at the federal level.

For that matter, Contagion’s only portrayal of state government (the Minnesota Department of Health) is that of an organization that serves entirely as an obstruction to the CDC — fretting over economic damage from a possible panic, pinching pennies over an emergency triage center (“Is this coming out of your budget or ours?”).

The pandemic portrayed in Contagion is one that it takes giant organizations to contain: the World Health Organization, the Red Cross, FEMA, Homeland Security, the CDC. Contrary to the bogeyman theatrics of Ronald Reagan, in this story, the words “I’m from the government and I’m here to help” are not “terrifying”; they are literally a lifesaver. You can walk away from Contagion with a lot of interpretations, but not that a virus like “MEV-1″ could have been wiped out by the private sector.

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September 16, 2011 · 1:06 AM

Cooper Tears Into Bachmann

The Huffington Post

Anderson Cooper highlighted what he said were the “dangerous falsehoods” that Michele Bachmann has been pushing on the campaign trail.

Cooper has often used Bachmann as a target for his daily “Keeping Them Honest” segment, debunking her statements about everything from American history to the cost of President Obama’s foreign tripsto her denials that her clinic runs so-called “ex-gay” therapy services.

On Thursday, he turned to her recent crusade against rival presidential candidate Rick Perry, whom she has attacked repeatedly for mandating that young girls be given the HPV vaccine. Cooper playedfootage of Bachmann on the “Today” show, where the Minnesota Republican said that a woman told her the HPV vaccine gave her daughter “mental retardation.” He didn’t mince words when describing what he thought of Bachmann’s decision to relay that story, calling it “incredibly irresponsible.”

As Cooper (and many others) pointed out, the Centers for Disease Control has found that there is absolutely no evidence that the vaccine causes any kind of mental disability.

“Bachmann is spreading all-out falsehood here,” Cooper said. “A dangerous falsehood at that. And it is not the first time she’s done this by any stretch of the imagination.” He then played a series of clips of what he called “just flat-out factually incorrect statements.” After the clips played, he wondered if the misstatements would have any effect on her campaign.

“Do voters care about the truth?” Cooper asked.

See video here…

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June 3, 2011 · 5:36 PM

Fla. Gov. Scott cuts vaccinations for postpartum women on Medicaid

For a liberal like myself, this is extremely disheartening…

The American Independent

Add another cut to the already long list of health care services that Gov. Rick Scott vetoed last week: $1.8 million dollars in vaccinations for postpartum women on Medicaid. #


According to the recently released Florida “End of Session Report,” a provision in the Agency for Health Care Administration budget would have provided funding for Tdap vaccinations for women who just gave birth and are enrolled in Medicaid. However, this line of the budget was vetoed, along with other health services for mostly low-income women and children. #


In a 2008 press release from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the agency recommended the use of this vaccination for the “prevention of Pertussis, Tetanus, and Diphtheria among pregnant and postpartum and women and their infants.” #


Scott’s cut is just another in a growing list of health services for women that were eliminated from the already-slim state budget. Among more than $2 million in services that were cut was also a pilot program that would provide specialized care to at-risk first-time mothers. #


Scott has called programs he cut “special interest waste” and “short-sighted, frivolous spending programs.” #

 
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November 10, 2010 · 3:33 AM

Number of Uninsured American Adults Hits Record High

So, let me get this straight: 

The incoming GOP majority led congress wants to repeal healthcare reform. 

They would also like to conduct seven  hearings a week  on the Obama administration for the entire 40 week session of the 112th congress which begins Jan. 2, 2011.  (See “B” below.)

They also want to give the highest tax cuts to the richest 2 per cent and they have not uttered one word about JOBS! 

Someone once said (paraphrased): “You get the congress you deserve”.  The country voted in those clowns who’s sole interest is to cater to big business (corporate) interests and in order to pay for the tax cuts they propose, they want to privatize medicare and social security.

Someone also said these:

The modern conservative is engaged in one of man’s oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness. ~John Kenneth Gailbraith

Everything the right-wing does is designed to accomplish one of two things, either:
(a) transfer wealth from everyone else to the rich, or,
(b) distract everyone else from the fact that (a) is occurring. ~ Jack Clark

U.S. News – Health

Nearly 50 million Americans have gone without health insurance for at least part of the past year — up from 46 million people in 2008, federal health officials reported Tuesday.

Those people included not only those Americans living in poverty, but an increasing number of middle-income people, according to a report from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“The bottom line is that uninsurance of young and middle-class adults increased by 4 million people from 2008 to the first quarter of 2010,” CDC Director Dr. Thomas R. Frieden said during a news conference Tuesday.

What’s more, the number of people without insurance for a year or more increased from 27.5 million in 2008 to 30.4 million in the first quarter of 2010, Frieden said. “That’s an increase of 3 million of chronically uninsured adults.”

These findings debunk two myths about health insurance, Frieden said. “The first myth is that it’s only the poor who are uninsured. In fact, half of the uninsured are over the poverty level,” he said.

“The second myth is that it’s only healthy people who are uninsured and that young healthy people make a choice not to have health insurance. In fact, more than two out of five individuals who are uninsured at some point during the past year had one or more chronic diseases,” he said.   Continue reading…

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