Stephan: This is an account of the just released study by the Commonwealth Fund -- click
here for the meticulous methodology of this study. What its says validates everything I have been writing about in SR, Explore, HuffPo. We don't have a healthcare system, we have an illness profit system. This entire debate is not about health as the first priority it is about how stakeholders can secure and expand their profits. How can you possible talk about pushing 22 or more million people out of the system, and describe it as healthcare?
We know what works, single payer is the norm, we are the outlier. Why? Because American society has profit as its only social priority. Every other developed nation to varying degrees recognizes that wellbeing is important
The United States spends far more on health care than other high-income countries, with spending levels that rose continuously over the past three decades (Exhibit 1). Yet the U.S. population has poorer health than other countries. Life expectancy, after improving for several decades, worsened in recent years for some populations, aggravated by the opioid crisis. In addition, as the baby boom population ages, more people in the U.S.—and all over the world—are living with age-related disabilities and chronic disease, placing pressure on health care systems to respond.Timely and accessible health care could mitigate many of these challenges, but the U.S. health care system falls short, failing to deliver indicated services reliably to all who could benefit. In particular, poor access to primary care has contributed to inadequate prevention and management of chronic diseases, delayed diagnoses, incomplete adherence to treatments, wasteful overuse of drugs and technologies, and coordination and safety problems.This report uses recent data to compare health care system performance in the U.S. with that of 10 other high-income countries and considers the different approaches to health […]
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Saturday, July 15th, 2017
Robert Faturechi and Danielle Ivory, - ProPublica/The New York Times
Stephan: The nature of government in the United States is undergoing fundamental change. Here is that trend in action.
Credit: Der Spiegel/DPA
President Trump entered office pledging to cut red tape, and within weeks, he ordered his administration to assemble teams to aggressively scale back government regulations.
But the effort — a signature theme in Trump’s populist campaign for the White House — is being conducted in large part out of public view and often by political appointees with deep industry ties and potential conflicts.
Most government agencies have declined to disclose information about their deregulation teams. But ProPublica and The New York Times identified 71 appointees, including 28 with potential conflicts, through interviews, public records and documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act.
Some appointees are reviewing rules their previous employers sought to weaken or kill, and at least two may be positioned to profit if certain regulations are undone.
The appointees include lawyers who have represented businesses in cases against government regulators, staff members of political dark money groups, employees of industry-funded organizations opposed to environmental rules and at least three people who were registered to lobby the agencies they now work […]
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PAUL A. EISENSTEIN, - NBC News
Stephan: I have done a number of stories on the growing trend in other countries describing their choices which are leading to the end of the carbon energy era. In this report the vehicle aspect is compiled so that you can see how much is going on, as well as how little the Trump administration and the Republican congress are doing. This difference has all sorts of implications, not least the negative impact it is going to have on the American automobile industry and, by extension, the employment of tens of thousands of American workers.
World leaders at the recent G-20 meetings
If France’s Environment Minister has his way, the country could join a small but growing list of countries that plan to ban vehicles running on gasoline, diesel or other fossil fuels.
The proposal was announced late last week by Minister Nicolas Hulot and appeared timed to coincide with the G20 meeting in Germany where many European leaders, including new French President Emmanuel Macron, challenged U.S. President Donald Trump over his decision to walk away from the Paris Climate Accord.
Several countries have already laid out ambitious plans to eliminate fossil fuel-powered automobiles. Environment Minister Hulot said it won’t be easy for France, either. “It’s a very difficult objective. But the solutions are there.” And, as the world’s sixth-largest economy, and with one of the world’s largest automotive markets, the proposed ban on the internal combustion engine could have significant impact far beyond France’s borders.
Going Mainly Electric Within Six Years?
France has two major automakers based in Paris, both of which have made electrification key objectives. PSA […]
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Akshat Rathi, Reporter - Quartz
Stephan: Sweden is a country that is a manifestation of the Theorem of Wellbeing, the function of Swedish society is to foster wellbeing as its first priority. Profit is fine, but wellbeing must come first. As a result the social outcome data on Sweden in almost all categories, healthcare, violence, education, elder care, child care, etc., etc., is superior to that of the United States. And comparatively it is much cheaper to implement than U.S. policies. Imagine what the U.S. would be like if it had the same policies as Sweden.
Algae from the Baltic Sea are trapped in Algoland’s carbon-capture contraption.
Credit: Quartz/Akshat Rathi
DEGERHAMN, SWEDEN — As far as the eye can see, the only thing polluting our pristine environment is the gas-guzzling car I’m riding in.
It’s a chilly April morning in Kalmar county in southern Sweden, and as we drive past pastel-colored wooden houses separated by acres of farmland, Martin Olofsson, a researcher at Linnaeus University, tells me that only 5% of the electricity Swedes consume comes from burning fossil fuels. That’s nothing compared to, say, the US, where two thirds of electricity are fossil-fuel derived.
But for Sweden, even that’s not good enough. In February, the country’s green party introduced a bill that would commit the country to reaching net-zero emissions of greenhouse gases by 2045. On June 15, the bill became the Climate Act and the Scandinavian country is now legally bound to deliver on that goal.
We’re driving to one of last places in Sweden to catch up with the country’s green ambitions to reduce emissions. I know we’ve […]
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