I’ll be in Las Vegas this week for the American Planning Association’s 2008 Conference so no new postings for a while.
Archive for April, 2008
27
Apr
08
vegan in vegas
26
Apr
08
the three stooges
American politics reached a new low (didn’t think that was possible) on Monday when the three front runners for the President of the United States appeared on WWE’s Monday Night Raw. Here’s the Daily Show’s take on the debacle.
Nothing fell into my lap this week so I’ll fall back on Comedy Central.
The burning of fossil fuels, deforestation, methane emissions from massive factory farms, etc. are causing global warming. As the temperature rises, snow and ice that reflected much of the sun’s energy, melt, revealing land and water that absorb the sun’s energy and raises the Earth’s temperature even more. Another result of the increasing temperatures is the thawing of permafrost, which releases methane, further contributing to global warming. However, as the Earth heats up, massive glaciers all around the world melt, depositing enormous amounts of fresh water into the oceans. Scientists speculate that this influx of fresh water could disrupt the global conveyor belt, which affects climates throughout the world. If this conveyor belt were to slow or shut down, the Earth could plunge into another ice age.
Occurring at the same time, however, is the slowdown of the sun’s solar energy output. When this cyclical event happens, the Earth’s temperature drops considerably. The last time this happened, about 200 years ago, the decades long cold spell caused widespread crop losses, food riots, famine, and disease.
Sounds like we’re in a big mess, right? Maybe not. If the solar slowdown occurs first, dropping global temperature say 4 degrees Fahrenheit, permafrost will stop thawing, no longer releasing methane; the large areas of snow and ice that have been melting under global warming will remain and reflect the sun’s energy; and all of these factors combined will stop the glaciers from melting and pouring fresh water into the ocean, preventing the shutdown of the global conveyor belt and the start of a new ice age. So all we have to do is find a way of speeding up the sun’s solar energy slowdown and we all live happily ever after, if just a little bit colder. No problem, eh? We’ll just send Bruce Willis and Ben Affleck to the sun to detonate a nuclear warhead and save the world. Oy vey. My head hurts.
22
Apr
08
listen to what the man said
McCartney urges vegetarianism to fight climate ills
Mon Apr 21, 2008 12:01am EDT
NEW YORK, April 21 (Reuters) – Former Beatle Paul McCartney is urging the world to go vegetarian in a bid to fight global warming and is surprised more green groups don’t promote it.
In an interview with the animal rights group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), McCartney said the global meat industry was a major contributor to global warming. A transcript of the PETA interview was given to Reuters.
“The biggest change anyone could make in their own lifestyle would be to become vegetarian,” McCartney, a longtime vegetarian and advocate of vegetarianism, said. “I would urge everyone to think about taking this simple step to help our precious environment and save it for the children of the future.”
McCartney says the amount of land and water used to maintain the meat industry makes it a major contributor to climate change and complains that most environmental groups do not list vegetarianism as one of their top priorities.
“It’s very surprising that most major environmental organizations are leaving the option of going vegetarian off their lists of top ways to curtail global warming,” he said.
A 2006 United Nations report found that cattle-rearing generated more greenhouse gases than transportation.
Click here for the interview.
Although the movie “The Day After Tomorrow” was over the top (putting it mildly), the possibility of the global conveyor belt slowing or shutting down that it portrays is very real. And scientists studying the oceans around Antarctica have discovered changes in the water’s composition that might portend such a slowdown or shutdown is not too far off. Does this mean Manhattan will be deluged with 50 foot swells and freeze over in a matter of minutes? Probably not. More than likely we will witness significant cooling of about 10 degrees Fahrenheit, which will wreak havoc on ecosystems, agriculture, and life in general. Scientists believe the Younger Dryas Period, or Big Freeze, which occurred approximately 12,000 years ago and returned the higher latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere to glacial conditions, resulted from the shutdown of the global conveyor belt.
Freshening of deep Antarctic waters worries experts
Reuters
April 18, 2008
SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Scientists studying the icy depths of the sea around Antarctica have detected changes in salinity that could have profound effects on the world’s climate and ocean currents.
The scientists returned to the southern Australian city of Hobart on Thursday after a one-month voyage studying the Southern Ocean to see how it is changing and what those changes might mean for global climate patterns.
Voyage leader Steve Rintoul said his team found that salty, dense water that sinks near the edge of Antarctica to the bottom of the ocean about 5 km (3 miles) down was becoming fresher and more buoyant.
So-called Antarctic bottom water helps power the great ocean conveyor belt, a system of currents spanning the Southern, Pacific, Indian and Atlantic Oceans that shifts heat around the globe.
“The main reason we’re paying attention to this is because it is one of the switches in the climate system and we need to know if we are about to flip that switch or not,” said Rintoul of Australia’s government-backed research arm the CSIRO.
“If that freshening trend continues for long enough, eventually the water near Antarctica would be too light, too buoyant to sink and that limb of the global-scale circulation would shut down,” he said on Friday.
Cold, salty water also sinks to the depths in the far north Atlantic Ocean near Greenland and, together with the vast amount of water that sinks off Antarctica, this drives the ocean conveyor belt.
This system brings warm water into the far north Atlantic, making Europe warmer than it would otherwise be, and also drives the large flow of upper ocean water from the tropical Pacific to the Indian Ocean through the Indonesia Archipelago.
If these currents were to slow or stop, the world’s climate would eventually be thrown into chaos.
“We don’t see any evidence yet that the amount of bottom water that’s sinking has declined. But by becoming fresher and less dense it’s moving in the direction of an ultimate shutdown.”
Rintoul said results of the bottom water samples in the Ross Sea directly south of New Zealand and off Antarctica’s Adelie Land further to the west, were a crucial finding.
“We didn’t know that before we left but it’s now clear that both of those regions are becoming fresher for some reason.”
GLOBAL WARMING TO BLAME?
During the voyage, scientists from Australia, Britain, France and the United States measured salinity, carbon dioxide and iron concentrations as well as currents between Antarctica and Australia.
Rintoul said his team are studying if faster melting of icesheets or sea ice is the source of the fresher water but he said it was too early to tell if global warming was to blame.
Over the coming months, his team will study oxygen isotopes collected from water samples.
“Oxygen isotopes act as a tracer of ice melt and that information should help pin down exactly what the cause of the freshening is in the deep ocean,” said Rintoul, of the Antarctic Climate and Ecosystems Cooperative Research Centre.
“The leading hypothesis at the moment for why it’s freshening is that the floating ice around Antarctica is melting more rapidly than in the past.”
He pointed to studies showing winds around Antarctica changing because of global warming and the ozone hole.
“The most likely scenario is that those changes in winds have changed the circulation of the ocean, in particular caused more upwelling of relatively warm water from below and that could have caused the increased melting of ice around Antarctica,” he said.
“The next challenge over the coming months and year will be to see just how well we can this pin down.”
18
Apr
08
one of the greatest voices
If you haven’t heard Regina Spektor yet, you are missing out. I can’t get enough of her voice. Soviet Kitsch has been in my head all day and I just had to share the wealth.
Fidelity
Us
18
Apr
08
friday funny: steve riks
Oy. I almost forgot about the Friday Funny. Check out a few of these impressions by Steve Riks. The Elvis Costello one kills me. Thanks Chris.
Paul McCartney
Neil Young
Elvis Costello
David Bowie
White Album Side 1
White Album Side 2
And for those of you who watched The Osbournes…
14
Apr
08
beware of tier 4
If you don’t know why the health plan of many Americans is ‘don’t get sick’, you may soon find out the hard way. Health insurance companies have a great new way of bleeding the patient called Tier 4. Instead of copayments of $5, $10, or $20 for prescription drugs, Tier 4 requires patients to pay a percentage, often 20-30%, of the medication’s cost. This doesn’t sound so bad for run of the mill prescriptions that cost under $100. But for life saving drugs treating cancer, multiple sclerosis, AIDS, etc., this can amount to hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars a month. And if you’re thinking you don’t have to worry about this atrocity because you work for a good company, think again. Even federal employees have been subjected to Tier 4. HR 676 anyone?
Co-Payments Soar for Drugs With High Prices
By GINA KOLATA, New York Times
April 14, 2008
Health insurance companies are rapidly adopting a new pricing system for very expensive drugs, asking patients to pay hundreds and even thousands of dollars for prescriptions for medications that may save their lives or slow the progress of serious diseases.
With the new pricing system, insurers abandoned the traditional arrangement that has patients pay a fixed amount, like $10, $20 or $30 for a prescription, no matter what the drug’s actual cost. Instead, they are charging patients a percentage of the cost of certain high-priced drugs, usually 20 to 33 percent, which can amount to thousands of dollars a month.
The system means that the burden of expensive health care can now affect insured people, too.
No one knows how many patients are affected, but hundreds of drugs are priced this new way. They are used to treat diseases that may be fairly common, including multiple sclerosis, rheumatoid arthritis, hemophilia, hepatitis C and some cancers. There are no cheaper equivalents for these drugs, so patients are forced to pay the price or do without.
Insurers say the new system keeps everyone’s premiums down at a time when some of the most innovative and promising new treatments for conditions like cancer and rheumatoid arthritis and multiple sclerosis can cost $100,000 and more a year.
But the result is that patients may have to spend more for a drug than they pay for their mortgages, more, in some cases, than their monthly incomes.
The system, often called Tier 4, began in earnest with Medicare drug plans and spread rapidly. It is now incorporated into 86 percent of those plans. Some have even higher co-payments for certain drugs, a Tier 5.
Now Tier 4 is also showing up in insurance that people buy on their own or acquire through employers, said Dan Mendelson of Avalere Health, a research organization in Washington. It is the fastest-growing segment in private insurance, Mr. Mendelson said. Five years ago it was virtually nonexistent in private plans, he said. Now 10 percent of them have Tier 4 drug categories.
Private insurers began offering Tier 4 plans in response to employers who were looking for ways to keep costs down, said Karen Ignagni, president of America’s Health Insurance Plans, which represents most of the nation’s health insurers. When people who need Tier 4 drugs pay more for them, other subscribers in the plan pay less for their coverage.
But the new system sticks seriously ill people with huge bills, said James Robinson, a health economist at the University of California, Berkeley. “It is very unfortunate social policy,” Dr. Robinson said. “The more the sick person pays, the less the healthy person pays.”
Traditionally, the idea of insurance was to spread the costs of paying for the sick.
“This is an erosion of the traditional concept of insurance,” Mr. Mendelson said. “Those beneficiaries who bear the burden of illness are also bearing the burden of cost.”
And often, patients say, they had no idea that they would be faced with such a situation.
It happened to Robin Steinwand, 53, who has multiple sclerosis.
In January, shortly after Ms. Steinwand renewed her insurance policy with Kaiser Permanente, she went to refill her prescription for Copaxone. She had been insured with Kaiser for 17 years through her husband, a federal employee, and had had no complaints about the coverage.
She had been taking Copaxone since multiple sclerosis was diagnosed in 2000, buying a 30 days’ supply at a time. And even though the drug costs $1,900 a month, Kaiser required only a $20 co-payment.
Not this time. When Ms. Steinwand went to pick up her prescription at a pharmacy near her home in Silver Spring, Md., the pharmacist handed her a bill for $325.
There must be a mistake, Ms. Steinwand said. So the pharmacist checked with her supervisor. The new price was correct. Kaiser’s policy had changed. Now Kaiser was charging 25 percent of the cost of the drug up to a maximum of $325 per prescription. Her annual cost would be $3,900 and unless her insurance changed or the drug dropped in price, it would go on for the rest of her life.
“I charged it, then got into my car and burst into tears,” Ms. Steinwand said.
She needed the drug, she said, because it can slow the course of her disease. And she knew she would just have to pay for it, but it would not be easy.
“It’s a tough economic time for everyone,” she said. “My son will start college in a year and a half. We are asking ourselves, can we afford a vacation? Can we continue to save for retirement and college?”
Although Kaiser advised patients of the new plan in its brochure that it sent out in the open enrollment period late last year, Ms. Steinwand did not notice it. And private insurers, Mr. Mendelson said, can legally change their coverage to one in which some drugs are Tier 4 with no advance notice.
Medicare drug plans have to notify patients but, Mr. Mendelson said, “that doesn’t mean the person will hear about it.” He added, “You don’t read all your mail.”
Some patients said they had no idea whether their plan changed or whether it always had a Tier 4. The new system came as a surprise when they found out that they needed an expensive drug.
That’s what happened to Robert W. Banning of Arlington, Va., when his doctor prescribed Sprycel for his chronic myelogenous leukemia. The drug can block the growth of cancer cells, extending lives. It is a tablet to be taken twice a day – no need for chemotherapy infusions.
Mr. Banning, 81, a retired owner of car dealerships, thought he had good insurance through AARP. But Sprycel, which he will have to take for the rest of his life, costs more than $13,500 for a 90-day supply, and Mr. Banning soon discovered that the AARP plan required him to pay more than $4,000.
Mr. Banning and his son, Robert Banning Jr., have accepted the situation. “We’re not trying to make anybody the heavy,” the father said.
So far, they have not purchased the drug. But if they do, they know that the expense would go on and on, his son said. “Somehow or other, myself and my family will do whatever it takes. You don’t put your parent on a scale.”
But Ms. Steinwand was not so sanguine. She immediately asked Kaiser why it had changed its plan.
The answer came in a letter from the federal Office of Personnel Management, which negotiates with health insurers in the plan her husband has as a federal employee. Kaiser classifies drugs like Copaxone as specialty drugs. They, the letter said, “are high-cost drugs used to treat relatively few people suffering from complex conditions like anemia, cancer, hemophilia, multiple sclerosis, rheumatoid arthritis and human growth hormone deficiency.”
And Kaiser, the agency added, had made a convincing argument that charging a percentage of the cost of these drugs “helped lower the rates for federal employees.”
Ms. Steinwand can change plans at the end of the year, choosing one that allows her to pay $20 for the Copaxone, but she worries about whether that will help. “I am a little nervous,” she said. “Will the next company follow suit next year?”
But it turns out that she won’t have to worry, at least for the rest of this year.
A Kaiser spokeswoman, Sandra R. Gregg, said on Friday that Kaiser had decided to suspend the change for the program involving federal employees in the mid-Atlantic region while it reviewed the new policy. The suspension will last for the rest of the year, she said. Ms. Steinwand and others who paid the new price for their drugs will be repaid the difference between the new price and the old co-payment.
Ms. Gregg explained that Kaiser had been discussing the new pricing plan with the Office of Personnel Management over the previous few days because patients had been raising questions about it. That led to the decision to suspend the changed pricing system.
“Letters will go out next week,” Ms. Gregg said.
But some with the new plans say they have no way out.
Julie Bass, who lives near Orlando, Fla., has metastatic breast cancer, lives on Social Security disability payments, and because she is disabled, is covered by insurance through a Medicare H.M.O. Ms. Bass, 52, said she had no alternatives to her H.M.O. She said she could not afford a regular Medicare plan, which has co-payments of 20 percent for such things as emergency care, outpatient surgery and scans. That left her with a choice of two Medicare H.M.O’s that operate in her region. But of the two H.M.O’s, her doctors accept only Wellcare.
Now, she said, one drug her doctor may prescribe to control her cancer is Tykerb. But her insurer, Wellcare, classifies it as Tier 4, and she knows she cannot afford it.
Wellcare declined to say what Tykerb might cost, but its list price according to a standard source, Red Book, is $3,480 for 150 tablets, which may last a patient 21 days. Wellcare requires patients to pay a third of the cost of its Tier 4 drugs.
“For everybody in my position with metastatic breast cancer, there are times when you are stable and can go off treatment,” Ms. Bass said. “But if we are progressing, we have to be on treatment, or we will die.”
“People’s eyes need to be opened,” she said. “They need to understand that these drugs are very costly, and there are a lot of people out there who are struggling with these costs.”
13
Apr
08
600 earthquakes in 10 days
Six-hundred earthquakes in 10 years doesn’t sound good, let alone 600 in 10 days. And about 15 days before this group of earthquakes, a 5.9 magnitude earthquake was detected 180 miles west of Port Orford, OR. See map below.
Swarm of Earthquakes Detected off Oregon
By Jeff Barnard
04/12/08
GRANTS PASS, Ore. (AP) – Scientists listening to underwater microphones have detected an unusual swarm of earthquakes off the central Oregon Coast.
Scientists don’t know what the earthquakes mean, but they could be the result of magma rumbling underneath the Juan de Fuca Plate – away from the recognized earthquake faults off Oregon, said geophysicist Robert Dziak of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and Oregon State University’s Hatfield Marine Science Center in Newport, Ore.
They hope to send out the OSU research ship, Wecoma, to take water samples, looking for evidence that sediment on the ocean bottom has been stirred up and chemicals in the water that would indicate magma is moving up through the crust, Dziak said.
There have been more than 600 quakes over the past 10 days in a basin 150 miles southwest of Newport. The biggest was magnitude 5.4 and two others were more than magnitude 5.0, OSU reported. They have not followed the typical pattern of a major shock followed by a series of diminishing aftershocks, and few have been strong enough to be felt on shore.
It looks like what happens before a volcanic eruption, except there are no volcanoes in the area, Dziak said.
The Earth’s crust is made up of plates that rest on molten rock, which are rubbing together side to side and up and down. When the molten rock, or magma, erupts through the crust it creates volcanoes. That can happen in the middle of a plate. When the plates lurch against each other, they create earthquakes along the edges of the plates.
In this case, the Juan de Fuca Plate is a small piece of crust being crushed between the Pacific Plate and North America, Dziak said.
On the hydrophones, the quakes sound like low rumbling thunder and are unlike anything scientists have heard in 17 years of listening, Dziak said. Some of the quakes have also been detected by earthquake instruments on land.
The hydrophones are leftover from a network the Navy used to listen for submarines during the Cold War. They routinely detect passing ships, earthquakes on the ocean bottom and whales calling to each other.
Link.
