Suchergebnisse

Advocates universal & comprehensive health insurance (1) to cover the 16% of Americans who now have no public or private coverage; (2) to help hospitals pressured to end the cross-subsidies that previously enabled them to care for the uninsured; (3) to protect the jobs &, thus, the communities of health care workers; & (4) to improve the care received by the currently underinsured. It is allowed, however, that the US nonparliamentary political system all but precludes the enactment of the sort of ambitious, cohesive plan needed to repair the health care system. Thus, even though an incremental approach tends to politically weaken those it does not directly help, several smaller steps for improving the organization & financing of care are suggested: (A) slowing the shift of not-for-profit providers to the for-profit sector, possibly through the power of the states' attorneys general; (B) regulating & demanding greater accountability from health maintenance organizations; & (C) strengthening & improving Medicare. E. Blackwell

The design of a health care reform program requires contributions from many disciplines. While we know that all disciplines are equal, we are also aware that some are more equal than others. I believe the record would show that, at this time and in this nation, economics is one of the fields of study that is "more equal" than others. Why are economists so important? What impact does the presence of these economists have on the development of health reform legislation? What price—if any—do all of us pay for the under-representation of various other disciplines? Some of the answers to these and other questions can be found in the accompanying essays by persons whose knowledge and experience lies in the field of political science. I propose to try to address these matters from the vantage of the discipline in which I was educated—political economy, as it was known at Johns Hopkins when I studied there.It is not difficult to list some of the various factors that have propelled economists to the center of America's health care debate. Certainly it is the case that many of the issues raised by the health crisis and by proposals for health reform impinge on the economist's domain. Even without taking account of the imperialistic tendency of economists to view all of human behavior as that of rational economic actors and thus to lay claim to the study of virtually all human interactions, numerous matters do legitimately fall within the scope of economics and are of long-standing concern to economists.

"Methamphetamine: A Love Story presents an insider's view into the lived experience of immersion in the world of methamphetamine. In-depth interviews were conducted with 33 adults formerly immersed in using, dealing, and manufacturing. Detailed accounts bring insight into the intoxicating aspects of the lifestyle including sex, money, power, and the ability to create methamphetamine. Social networks and environment play an important role in shaping and influencing drug-related decisions. The transformation of the lifestyle from one that is intoxicating to one that becomes risky and ultimately dark explains the unsustainability and the challenges exiting the life"--Provided by publisher.

Examines reasons for the growth of health maintenance organizations and managed care, the problems engendered, and why they continue despite dissatisfaction among key participants.

Abhimanyu Unnuth is a contemporary poet, playwright, novelist, and public intellectual in Mauritius. His poetry, written in Hindi, attempts to recover the religious identity of the Bihari indentured servant community of the nineteenth century in the service of a re-membrance, in the Thiong'oian sense, of a post-independence Mauritian Hindu identity. In his best work, Kaiktus ke Dant, he inhabits the character of an ancestor working the sugar cane fields and understanding that work through his tenuous connection to his left-behind Hindu society through the Ramcaritmanas of Tulsidas. This protagonist is contrasted with the shadow subject: himself, as a post-colonial, post-independence, postlabour Hindu on the island. The myths of his ancestors connect him to narratives, but not to the sense of the place that contextualizes the epic's stories. Only by understanding, and being able to embody, the pain that his ancestors endured on the field by invoking mythic figures, can he come to be a Mauritian Hindu. This paper assesses his linguistic choices and the effect they have on the tone of his work.