In
The Art of Distraction on the Opinion Pages this weekend, Hanif Kureishi — a successful playwright, screenwriter, filmmaker, novelist and short-story writer — admits to being, as his title suggests, distracted. His son, too, suffers (or doesn’t, as you’ll gather from reading the whole of his piece) from a lack of focus — but, Mr. Kureishi argues, there is nothing “wrong” with his son. Or with him. Distraction, he suggests, is a gift, and focus overrated. From that point of view, he offers this indictment of Ritalin and other drugs designed to help those who can’t find it:
Ritalin and other forms of enforcement and psychological policing are the contemporary equivalent of the old practice of tying up children’s hands in bed, so they won’t touch their genitals. The parent stupefies the child for the parent’s good. There is more to this than keeping out the interesting: there is the fantasy and terror that someone here will become pleasure’s victim, disappearing into a spiral of enjoyment from which he or she will not return.
MaineCare cuts would bring state in line with U.S. average
1:00 AM
Much of the debate for cutting funding to the state's Medicaid program focuses on its high cost compared to other states'.
By CLARKE CANFIELD/The Associated Press
PORTLAND — In his relentless demands for steep
Medicaidcuts, Gov. Paul LePage has said Maine spends far more per capita than other states on Medicaid and is high above the national average.
Whether you support or oppose LePage's cost-cutting proposals, he's right.
Maine had the nation's fifth-highest
Medicaid coverage rate in fiscal year 2009, 27.8 percent, behind California, New Mexico, Louisiana and Vermont, according to the latest statistics for Maine from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. The national rate for the same period was 21 percent.
http://www.pressherald.com/news/cuts-would-bring-state-in-line-with-u_s_-average_2012-02-21.html
By CLARKE CANFIELD, The Associated Press
Posted Feb. 20, 2012, at 11:37 a.m.
PORTLAND, Maine — In his relentless demands for steep Medicaid cuts, Gov. Paul LePage has said Maine spends far more per capita than other states on Medicaid and is high above the national average.
Whether you support or oppose LePage’s cost-cutting proposals, he’s right.
Maine had the nation’s fifth-highest Medicaid coverage rate in fiscal year 2009, 27.8 percent, behind California, New Mexico, Louisiana and Vermont, according to the latest statistics for Maine from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. The national rate for the same period was 21 percent.
Maine’s Medicaid expenses for that year amounted to $1,890 per resident.
That’s 61 percent higher than the national average of $1,173 per person, according to CMMS statistics.
Seniors Need To Reevaluate Their Needs For Popular Medical Treatments: The KHN Interview
By JUDITH GRAHAM
FEB 21, 2012
This story was produced in collaboration with 
Nortin Hadler, a professor of medicine and microbiology/immunology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, has been warning for years about the lack of evidence supporting many popular medical treatments and tests.
February 21, 2012
A Real ‘Doc Fix’
In last week’s flurry of budget deals, Congress patched together yet another temporary fix for a flawed formula used to calculate the fees paid to doctors by
Medicare. It will hold payments flat for the next 10 months instead of cutting them by 27 percent as the formula required, and the $18 billion to pay for it will be taken from other health care programs. But the fix only lasts until the end of the year. On Jan. 1, doctors will face another big cut unless Congress again steps in.
Congress now needs to devise a real fix that would be fair to doctors and make a serious effort to slow the rise of Medicare spending. In the near term, some doctors — highly paid specialists — should be required to accept some reduction in fees. That won’t be enough. Congress should also use this moment to wean doctors away from fee-for-service billing, a root cause of escalating costs, into better and cheaper forms of care.
February 20, 2012
Catholic Hospitals Expand, Religious Strings Attached
As Roman Catholic leaders and government officials clash over the proper role of religion and reproductive health, shifts in health care economics are magnifying the tension. Financially stronger Catholic-sponsored medical centers are increasingly joining with smaller secular hospitals, in some cases limiting access to treatments like
contraception,
abortion and sterilization.
In Seattle, Swedish Health Services has offered elective abortions for decades. But the hospital
agreed to stop when it joined forces this month with Providence Health & Services, one of the nation’s largest Catholic systems.
In late December, Gov. Steve Beshear of Kentucky turned down a bid by Catholic Health Initiatives, another large system, to merge with a public hospital in Louisville, in part because of concern that some women would have less access to contraceptive services.
And in Rockford, Ill., there is resistance to a plan by OSF HealthCare, run by the Sisters of the Third Order of St. Francis, to buy a hospital because of new restrictions that would require women to go elsewhere if they wanted a
tubal ligation after a
Caesarean section.
Universal: Medicare for all - Editorials - The Charleston Gazette - West Virginia News and Sports -
February 21, 2012
CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- Various Republicans are pressing the U.S. Supreme Court to rule the 2010 Affordable Care Act unconstitutional because it requires millions of "working poor" Americans to buy health insurance from commercial carriers.
Surprisingly, a crusading liberal Charleston reformer and activist has joined a Supreme Court brief demanding exactly the same thing.
http://wvgazette.com/Opinion/Editorials/201202210112
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