Tag: Public Health
People with type 1 diabetes are dependent on insulin — but it doesn’t follow that we should be dependent on corporate insulin manufacturers. We need a new model of insulin manufacturing, one that puts lives before profits.
Source: Insulin Should Be Produced for Our Health, Not Their Profits
Falls in Australia due to accidents and/or lack of balance in the aged are also the greatest cause of death and quality of life deterioration in the elderly and are not attended to well enough by our public health system. We once helped the elderly crossroads, giving them a seat and generally offering assistance. However not anymore.
US health officials consider falls to be the leading cause of injury-related death for people who are 65 years of age or older. About 64 out of 100,000 elderly people die as a result of accidental falls, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Is vaccination enough? It will take more than high vaccination rates to prevent hospitalisations and deaths in Australia at levels that hurt the health system in future, Baxter said.
The US government’s chief medical adviser Dr Anthony Fauci warned on Sunday that time was running short to prevent a “dangerous” new surge of Covid-19 infections from overwhelming the upcoming holiday season. Coronavirus cases across the US are rising again for the first time in weeks, and approaching 100,000 per day. Experts fear that this week’s Thanksgiving holiday, for which tens of millions of Americans will travel for indoor celebrations with family and friends, will fuel a further surge.
Source: Fauci warns time running short to prevent ‘dangerous’ Covid surge in US | US news | The Guardian
Premier Daniel Andrews has urged Victorians to stay the course, saying “there is no other way” and vaccinations are “the only ticket out of the pandemic” as Melbourne teeters on the edge.
Source: ‘There’s no other way’: Daniel Andrews urges Victorians to stay the course
Epidemics are known for laying bare the hidden fault lines of societies. For many of us it may not come as much of a surprise that British colonial officers chose to let the Kumbh mela go ahead even at great cost to public health because it was politically convenient and sidestepped the possibility of having a rebellion on their hands. After three-quarters of a century of political independence, we see the democratically elected government of India, a country that prides itself on technological and financial progress, make a similarly crass political calculus, choosing to curry favor with Hindu nationalists at the expense of lives. Whether subjects or citizens, the public health of Indian people has too often been sacrificed for political gain.
Source: In India’s Covid Crisis, Echoes of a Colonial Past | Washington Monthly
Pharmaceutical giant CSL is one of Australia’s greatest corporate success stories, although its profits were forged on the sacrifice of the many thousands of Australians who gave their blood for free. In the 1980s, blood products manufactured by CSL infected thousands of Australians with Hepatitis C and HIV/Aids. Before the true extent of the medical disaster became clear, and just months before CSL’s privatisation, the then Labor government granted Commonwealth Serum Laboratories an indemnity from legal action arising from the contaminated blood. In this first part, Elizabeth Minter investigates CSL’s role. Part 2 will look at the role of the Red Cross.
Dr. Pernell: ‘Vaccines Don’t Save Lives, VaccinATIONS Save Lives’ | Crooks and Liars
Dr. Chris Pernell called on public health officials to partner with churches, barbershops, hairdressers and other trusted members of Black and Brown communities in order to provide more equitable distribution of COVID vaccines.
Dr. Pernell: ‘Vaccines Don’t Save Lives, VaccinATIONS Save Lives’ | Crooks and Liars
Public Good what’s Public Good? (ODT)
So will the COVID-19 vaccines also sell like the flu vaccine for $20 a shot—bankrupting poorer countries to protect their people? Or will we follow what Salk said about the polio vaccine—that it belongs to the people? The U.S. position is clear: vaccines belong to companies even if their research was publicly funded. And if other countries wish to compulsorily license a successful vaccine using the pandemic exception of WTO/TRIPS rules, the U.S. can still use USTR Special 301 and Super 301 sanctions against them as they are threatening to do with India. And as we know from the history of U.S. sanctions, the U.S. believes that it has a right to sanction any country in the world, even if such sanctions violate international humanitarian law.
via Public Health and Private Profits Under COVID-19 Pandemic – CounterPunch.org
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