Category: Health

Health of people related to Diagnostic & Statistical Manual (DSM) & psychology

Replace Medicare with “Premium Support” which congress gets? Good enough for congress why not you and me?

Medicare must change. Republican Paul Ryan’s 2012 budget offers reform of Medicare rooted in consumer choice and private competition rather than political control and bureaucratic rationing. By capping the Medicare subsidy seniors would pay for the marginal costs of their care, promoting competitive insurance. That will change how doctors and hospitals provide care, encouraging competition in price and quality.

Give seniors a flat amount and choice of various plans. Called “premium support” this is what our postal workers and congress get. If good enough for congress then it’s good enough for me. What about the people already in Medicare that want “premium care” instead.

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Vouchers of $16 K for each disabled person served under Lanterman?

DrCameronJackson@gmail.com

A woman recently wrote poignantly, Put my disabled son on Death’s Row in San Quintin and he will get three square meals, medical care and perhaps even a room with a view… The woman wrote in response to the proposed $568.6 million cut in money allocated for the 246,000 disabled in California served under the Lanterman Act.

The woman’s feelings are understandable given that it costs taxpayers $50 to 70 K per inmate in CA prison compared to the cost to care for each disabled person. Run the math ($4 billion in CA budget allocated last year divided by 246,000 disabled persons equals $16,260 spent per disabled person).

Maybe it’s time to put the family of each disabled person served by CA regional centers in the driver’s seat. Why not have vouchers that follow each disabled person — akin to school vouchers — that give families choice? That way people will become knowledgeable as what things cost and more empowered by making the choices they think best.

How vendors are selected and the amount they are paid has been of concern to the legislature in California. The government wants more transparency. Put the disabled person’s family in the driver’s seat so they know how much money there is to spend and there will be a huge increase in people’s knowledge about the costs of medical care. This will increase transparency in government.

What people have to pay for out of pocket they will watch closely.

Why not reduce the CA budget by 568.6 million and put in place a voucher program? Each disabled individual could receive a voucher $16, 260.

Today, 4-4-2011 Rush Linbaugh asked a UAW worker who called in what his beef was. The UAW worker said that his co-pay has gone up to $35 and prescriptions up also. Asked by Linbaugh what does it cost to go to his doctor the UAW worker did not know.

Then Linbaugh made his point — that the UAW worker has no clue what it actually costs to go to the doctor. During the break Linbaugh looked it up and then said that the average real cost to go to a physician is $400.

Then Linbaugh asked the UAW worker, if you had to pay the $400 out of your own pocket you would know how much, right? Yes, said the UAW worker.

The article by the woman concerned about the cuts in money for the disabled is below:

“I’m beginning to hope my son will be sent to prison – perhaps Death Row.

“Rob stands accused of no crime. And I am not an unloving mother. Let me explain: Rob has a developmental disability, and California is balancing its budget by gutting the services that keep him alive.

The situation is dire enough that I must wonder: Once Rob’s services are cut, will Death Is Death Row be a safer place for him?

I know that every program is getting cut. But the single largest budget cut

just signed into law by the governor – $568.6 million – is for services for people with developmental disabilities.For Rob, and 246,000 other Californians like him, that money went to get him to medical appointments, to manage his finances and – hopefully – to have someone look out for his safety after his father and I are no longer alive.

It is shameful that the most vulnerable citizens are receiving the largest share of the pain. Rob was born 31 years ago, legally blind, with cerebral palsy and intellectual disabilities. Today he is healthy, employed, living with a roommate and paying his taxes. The essential programs that made this possible are supposedly guaranteed by legislation signed by then-Gov. Ronald Reagan in 1969, the Lanterman Act. The law directs the state to provide people with disabilities like autism and Down syndrome with access to housing, health care and employment. For people with developmental disabilities, the Lanterman Act was equivalent to the Bill of Rights, except more important. Without its practical support, many could not survive outside of grim old-fashioned state institutions (which were vastly more expensive – and now mostly have closed).

It’s a particularly bitter irony that I could even consider prison – a far worse institution – as a potential safe haven. But the math is simple. That $568.6 million cut is approximately 20 percent of state funding for services for people with developmental disabilities. This comes after years of smaller cuts – plus cuts to other services they depend on, like Medi-Cal. The safety net was dismantled years ago. Now we are taking down the tightrope itself.

Meanwhile, prisons – protected by a court order – face only a 1 percent cut. Rob’s services are protected only by the Legislature and governor. What have our state’s leaders done for him lately?

In recent years, Rob lost his dental coverage, his physical therapy and his vision care – despite his difficulty walking and seeing. Now the state sees room for another half billion dollars in cuts. That’s why Death Row – with its steady funding and a decade of room and board – is looking better and better. (San Quentin State Prison even offers views of San Francisco Bay and is set to receive a new $356 million facility.)

So, how can you help? Contact the governor and protest the cuts to services for people with developmental disabilities. If that fails, then consider framing one of them for a capital offense. You’ll be guaranteeing them health care and three meals a day for 10 years or more – and possibly a room with a view.
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Here’s some information about the Regional Centers:
Silva Says…An Update On The 67th March, 2011 | Issue 52
Assemblyman Silva Introduces Regional Center Records Act
Assemblyman Jim Silva (R – Huntington Beach) introduced AB 862, the Regional Center Records Act. This measure will bring transparency to a major taxpayer-funded program in California.

“Taxpayers have a right to know how their money is being spent. Parents, vendors and the centers themselves will benefit from increased transparency,” Silva said.

Since the passage of the Lanterman Act in 1969, the 21 Regional Centers have been the conduit to provide services to the developmentally disabled. While they have done great things in accomplishing this mission, recent investigative reports have given cause for concern. A report by the California State Auditor has raised serious questions about how the regional centers choose and pay vendors for the services they provide as well as capital projects and administrative services. The state auditor has suggested that a more uniform, transparent process would improve the cost effectiveness of this program.

“We are proud to be the sponsor of this Act. Regional centers are vital to the community but they need to be more forthcoming with their information,” said Boyd Bradshaw, president of the ResCoalition, a coalition of residential care providers.

California appropriated over $4 billion in last year’s budget to provide for the developmentally disabled. AB 862 will require the 21 Regional Centers to make several important points of data available to the public to include fiscal and administrative information. It can be heard in its first committee as soon as 30 days from introduction.

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Which emergency room in Latin America or Middle East or Africa do you want to go for cardiac failure comopared to American emergency care?

Ask 10 friends who have needed emergency care in various countries and see how their experiences compare with U.S. visits to their local emergency rooms. Obama thinks based on the following study that our medical is terrible.

The Worst Study Ever?Scott W. Atlas — April 2011PrintPDF

The World Health Organization’s World Health Report 2000, which ranked the health-care systems of nearly 200 nations, stands as one of the most influential social-science studies in history. For the past decade, it has been the de facto basis for much of the discussion of the health-care system in the United States, routinely cited in public discourse by members of government and policy experts. Its most notorious finding—that the United States ranked a disastrous 37th out of the world’s 191 nations in “overall performance”—provided supporters of President Barack Obama’s transformative health-care legislation with a data-driven argument for swift and drastic reform, particularly in light of the fact that the U.S. spends more on health than any other nation.

In October 2008, candidate Obama used the study to claim that “29 other countries have a higher life expectancy and 38 other nations have lower infant mortality rates.” On June 15, 2009, as he was beginning to make the case for his health-care bill, the new president said: “As I think many of you are aware, for all of this spending, more of our citizens are uninsured, the quality of our care is often lower, and we aren’t any healthier. In fact, citizens in some countries that spend substantially less than we do are actually living longer than we do.” The perfect encapsulation of the study’s findings and assertions came in a September 9, 2009, editorial in Canada’s leading newspaper, the Globe and Mail: “With more than 40 million Americans lacking health insurance, another 25 million considered badly underinsured, and life expectancies and infant mortality rates significantly worse that those of most industrialized Western nations, the need for change seems obvious and pressing to some, especially when the United States is spending 16 percent of GDP on health care, roughly twice the average of other modern developed nations, all of which have some form of publicly funded system.”

In fact, World Health Report 2000 was an intellectual fraud of historic consequence—a profoundly deceptive document that is only marginally a measure of health-care performance at all. The report’s true achievement was to rank countries according to their alignment with a specific political and economic ideal—socialized medicine—and then claim it was an objective measure of “quality.”

WHO researchers divided aspects of health care into subjective categories and tailored the definitions to suit their political aims. They allowed fundamental flaws in methodology, large margins of error in data, and overt bias in data analysis, and then offered conclusions despite enormous gaps in the data they did have. The flaws in the report’s approach, flaws that thoroughly undermine the legitimacy of the WHO rankings, have been repeatedly exposed in peer-reviewed literature by academic experts who have examined the study in detail. Their analysis made clear that the study’s failings were plain from the outset and remain patently obvious today; but they went unnoticed, unmentioned, and unexamined by many because World Health Report 2000 was so politically useful. This object lesson in the ideological misuse of politicized statistics should serve as a cautionary tale for all policymakers and all lay people who are inclined to accept on faith the results reported in studies by prestigious international bodies.

Before WHO released the study, it was commonly accepted that health care in countries with socialized medicine was problematic. But the study showed that countries with nationally centralized health-care systems were the world’s best. As Vincente Navarro noted in 2000 in the highly respected Lancet, countries like Spain and Italy “rarely were considered models of efficiency or effectiveness before” the WHO report. Polls had shown, in fact, that Italy’s citizens were more displeased with their health care than were citizens of any other major European country; the second worst was Spain. But in World Health Report 2000, Italy and Spain were ranked #2 and #7 in the global list of best overall providers.

Most studies of global health care before it concentrated on health-care outcomes. But that was not the approach of the WHO report. It sought not to measure performance but something else. “In the past decade or so there has been a gradual shift of vision towards what WHO calls the ‘new universalism,’” WHO authors wrote, “respecting the ethical principle that it may be necessary and efficient to ration services.”

The report went on to argue, even insist, that “governments need to promote community rating (i.e. each member of the community pays the same premium), a common benefit package and portability of benefits among insurance schemes.” For “middle income countries,” the authors asserted, “the policy route to fair prepaid systems is through strengthening the often substantial, mandatory, income-based and risk-based insurance schemes.” It is a curious version of objective study design and data analysis to assume the validity of a concept like “the new universalism” and then to define policies that implement it as proof of that validity.

The nature of the enterprise came more fully into view with WHO’s introduction and explanation of the five weighted factors that made up its index. Those factors are “Health Level,” which made up 25 percent of “overall care”; “Health Distribution,” which made up another 25 percent; “Responsiveness,” accounting for 12.5 percent; “Responsiveness Distribution,” at 12.5 percent; and “Financial Fairness,” at 25 percent.

The definitions of each factor reveal the ways in which scientific objectivity was a secondary consideration at best. What is “Responsiveness,” for example? WHO defined it in part by calculating a nation’s “respect for persons.” How could it possibly quantify such a subjective notion? It did so through calculations of even more vague subconditions—“respect for dignity,” “confidentiality,” and “autonomy.”

And “respect for persons” constituted only 50 percent of a nation’s overall “responsiveness.” The other half came from calculating the country’s “client orientation.” That vague category was determined in turn by measurements of “prompt attention,” “quality of amenities,” “access to social support networks,” and “choice of provider.”

Scratch the surface a little and you find that “responsiveness” was largely a catchall phrase for the supposedly unequal distribution of health-care resources. “Since poor people may expect less than rich people, and be more satisfied with unresponsive services,” the authors wrote, “measures of responsiveness should correct for these differences.”

Correction, it turns out, was the goal. “The object is not to explain what each country or health system has attained,” the authors declared, “so much as to form an estimate of what should be possible.” They appointed themselves determinants of what “should” be possible “using information from many countries but with a specific value for each country.” This was not so much a matter of assessing care but of determining what care should be in a given country, based on WHO’s own priorities regarding the allocation of national resources. The WHO report went further and judged that “many countries are falling far short of their potential, and most are making inadequate efforts in terms of responsiveness and fairness.”

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Consider the discussion of Financial Fairness (which made up 25 percent of a nation’s score). “The way health care is financed is perfectly fair if,” the study declared, “the ratio of total health contribution to total non-food spending is identical for all households, independently of their income, their health status or their use of the health system.” In plain language, higher earners should pay more for health care, period. And people who become sick, even if that illness is due to high-risk behavior, should not pay more. According to WHO, “Financial fairness is best served by more, as well as by more progressive, prepayment in place of out-of-pocket expenditure. And the latter should be small not only in the aggregate but relative to households’ ability to pay.”

This matter-of-fact endorsement of wealth redistribution and centralized administration should have had nothing to do with WHO’s assessment of the actual quality of health care under different systems. But instead, it was used as the definition of quality. For the authors of the study, the policy recommendation preceded the research. Automatically, this pushed capitalist countries that rely more on market incentives to the bottom of the list and rewarded countries that finance health care by centralized government-controlled single-payer systems. In fact, two of the major index factors, Health Distribution and Responsiveness Distribution, did not even measure health care itself. They were both strictly measures of equal distribution of health and equal distribution of health-care delivery.

Perhaps what is most striking about the categories that make up the index is how WHO weighted them. Health Distribution, Responsiveness Distribution, and Financial Fairness added up to 62.5 percent of a country’s health-care score. Thus, almost two-thirds of the study was an assessment of equality. The actual health outcomes of a nation, which logic dictates should be of greatest importance in any health-care index, accounted for only 25 percent of the weighting. In other words, the WHO study was dominated by concerns outside the realm of health care.

Not content with penalizing free-market economies on the fairness front, the WHO study actually held a nation’s health-care system accountable for the behavior of its citizens. “Problems such as tobacco consumption, diet, and unsafe sexual activity must be included in an assessment of health system performance,” WHO declared. But the inclusion of such problems is impossible to justify scientifically. For example, WHO considered tobacco consumption equivalent, as an indicator of medical care, to the treatment of measles: “Avoidable deaths and illness from childbirth, measles, malaria or tobacco consumption can properly be laid” at a nation’s health-care door.”

From a political standpoint, of course, the inclusion of behaviors such as smoking is completely logical. As Samuel H. Preston and Jessica Ho of the University of Pennsylvania observed in a 2009 Population Studies Center working paper, a “health-care system could be performing exceptionally well in identifying and administering treatment for various diseases, but a country could still have poor measured health if personal health-care practices were unusually deleterious.” This takes on additional significance when one considers that the United States has “the highest level of cigarette consumption per capita in the developed world over a 50-year period ending in the mid-80s.”

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Aptos psychologist: the Green Movement makes green profits for some and harms many people worldwide?

Is Green Movement harming more people and hurting Mother Earth?

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Supposedly ‘good activities’ like save water, recycle, use bil-fuels added to gasoline, replace conventional light bulbs have multiple “bad consequences” …

Following is from the American Thinker:

“Germany has long been the titular and emotional leader of the “Green Movement” in Europe. No country has adopted more so-called environmental friendly policies. The German population has obediently gone along with environmental measures; in fact they have been the model people when it comes to green living.

“So it is doubly startling when Der Spiegel, the leading left-wing publication in Germany publishes an article entitled: “Is Environmentalism Really Working?” openly questioning the viability and cost of a myriad of green initiatives.

Some highlights:

Regarding biofuels:

Many haven’t yet fully realized that E10 [gasoline with 10% biofuel content] is an ecological swindle.

“Rainforests are being clear-cut in Brazil and Borneo to make room for sugar cane and palm oil cultivation. At the same time there is a shortage of arable land for food production, which is leading to the threat of famine in parts of the world.

A single full tank of bio-ethanol uses up as much grain as an adult can eat in a whole year.

Environmental groups say that across Europe, farming for bio-fuels would create up to 56 million tons of additional greenhouse gases-an environmental crime they say must be stopped immediately.

Regarding water conservation:

Germans are obsessed with saving water. You won’t find many countries north of the Sahara that are as water-conscious as Germany. They save water while washing dishes (a modern dishwashing machine uses only six liters per cycle, while going to the toilet (many toilets have a setting that allows only a brief flush) and even while washing their cars.

Yet Germany is one of the world’s most water-rich countries — it could consume five times more water than it does now.

And water conservation in Germany can be harmful — particularly when it comes to sewerage systems beneath German cities. The lack of waste water flowing through the canalization means that fat, feces and discarded food aren’t getting flushed out enough, and are corroding the walls. To compensate, utilities are forced to pump hundreds of thousands of liters of fresh water through the system to keep it operable.

The result, not surprisingly, are higher water bills. And consumers respond to those higher bills by saving more water. Paradoxically, the vicious cycle can only be broken if consumers start using more water.

Regarding garbage recycling:

When it comes to garbage, the Germans are a nation of gatherers and sorters.

Once the rubbish is collected, the sorting continues. Special machines with infrared sensors discern six different types of plastic. But then something strange happens — more than half the yogurt cups, plastic juice bottles and packing foils are incinerated. Under German law only 36% of plastic rubbish has to be recycled.

The remainder can be sold for a profit, for example to plants that burn rubbish to produce heating or power. Such facilities are everywhere in Germany. Municipalities across the country built them in response to a ban on storing garbage in landfills. Indeed, now there are far too many of them in Germany — and there is a shortage of burnable waste.

The result is that firms are buying up as much plastic waste-which burns well due to the high quality of oil in plastics-as they can get their hands on. Indeed, some companies have even resorted to importing plastic waste to burn-hardly a contribution to an environmental utopia.

Regarding light bulbs:

Most [Germans] didn’t see the need to scrap conventional light bulbs when the simplest way to save electricity was just to turn off the light.

As of Sept. 1, 2009, all 100 watt bulbs vanished from European Union store shelves. A year later, it was the turn of 75 watt bulbs. This year, 60 watt bulbs will go the way of the dodo bird.

Many people already miss them. The energy-saving bulbs that replaced them emit blue light and induce stress because they disrupt the body’s production of the sleep hormone melatonin. In addition, they contain mercury-to the point that consumers are advised not to use them in children’s room.

The energy-saving bulb is a pretty dirty affair if one takes a look at the production process. Eighty percent of the bulbs are made in China where safety standards are so lax many workers suffer from mercury poisoning. In Germany, the bulbs are classified as special waste and the poisonous substance they contain has to be dumped in underground sites.

Furthermore, the new bulbs don’t live up to their promise of energy efficiency either. When the magazine Okotest tested and array of the bulbs recently, half of them didn’t last longer than 6,000 hours, well below EU estimates of 10,000 hours.

The article concludes:

Not everything that looks green serves the environment. The ecological principle of proceeding with care doesn’t seem to apply to environmental policy. The more, the better, seems to be the principle. No one is calculating whether all the billions being invested in protecting the environment are actually being spent wisely. Ordinary citizens can’t judge it and many experts have no interest in shedding any light on this aspect because their livelihoods are at stake.

The frequency with which environmental policies backfire should give pause for thought.

The worst aspect: some major environmental policies aren’t just ineffective — they are counterproductive.

In the fight to protect the environment, it may be time to pause and ask oneself: what is really helping, and what isn’t? And to admit at times: sorry, we were wrong. But it doesn’t work like that. Environmentalism knows no doubt. The idea is never wrong, the problem is always in the implementation.

For Der Spiegel to publish an article like this is a monumental and watershed moment in the ongoing environmental follies forced upon the world and the United States. It was only a matter of time before reality and evidence would win out even among the most die-hard of countries committed to the “green” agenda.

Now it is time for the Republicans to force the EPA, Obama, the Democrats in Congress and the environmentalists in America to listen to their soul mates in Europe and give up their foolish agenda before any more damage in done here.

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Aptos, CA psychologist: In 1994, Sari Kovats had no credentials yet selected as lead researcher for IPCC on how climate change affects people.

Climate change real? Look at the lack of credentials of someone who made the first report. Was a governmental agency using someone to get a particular opinion?

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Sara Kovats cited as an authority on climate change years before Ph.D. credential

DrCameronJackson@gmail.com
March 19, 2011
IPCC guru was a student when writing ‘authoritative’ reports.

So what is Sari Kovats doing now in her profession having authored as an uncredentialed student authoritative reports on climate change? Is she a recognized leader in her field?

In 1994 was a governmental agency — the IPCC — using her to get a particular opinion?

As she had no Ph.D. or other credentials, Sari Kovats obviously was not a recognized “authority”. What about her research methods? Can anyone fault her on her methodology?

See Sari Kovats’s Vitae below:

Here is her Vitae:

Sari Kovats BA MSc PhD
Senior Lecturer in Environmental Epidemiology
Room 233, 15-17 Tavistock Place, London WC1H 9SH, UK
Tel: +44(0)20 7927 2962Get email addressvCard

London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Affiliated to: SEHR.
Disciplines: Epidemiology.

Research areas: Climate change, Environment, Public health, Risk.

Background
Sari Kovats is a Senior Lecturer in Environmental Epidemiology at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

Teaching
Sari organises the Module “Environment, Health and Sustainable Development” in Term 1, and is a tutor to students on the MSc Public Health.

Research
Sari has researched health issues related to climate change since 1994 and has published widely on the health impacts of weather and climate, including extreme weather events (heat waves) and associated public health responses.

She was a Lead Author in the Human Health chapter in the Fourth Assessment Report of the IPCC as well as contributing to the Second and Third Assessment Reports.

Sari is a member of Scientific Steering Committee of Global Environmental Change and Human Health Project of ESSP (Earth System Science Partnership), and is currently Chair of the Centre on Global Change and Health at LSHTM.

Selected publications
Kovats, R.S.; Ebi, K.L.; Heatwaves and public health in Europe. Eur J Public Health, 2006; 16(6):592-9
Hajat, S.; Kovats, R.S.; Lachowycz, K. Heat-related and cold-related deaths in England and Wales: who is at risk? Occupational and Environmental Medicine, 2007; 64(2):93-100
Kovats, R. S. Heat waves and health protection British Medical Journal, 2006; 333(7563):314-315
Kovats, R. S.; Campbell-Lendrum, D.; Matthies, F. Climate change and human health: Estimating avoidable deaths and disease Risk Analysis, 2005; 25(6):1409-1418
Ahern, M.; Kovats, R.S.; Wilkinson, P.; Few, R.; Matthies, F.; Global health impacts of floods: epidemiologic evidence. Epidemiol Rev, 2005; 27:36-46
Kovats, R.S.; Edwards, S.J.; Hajat, S.; Armstrong, B.G.; Ebi, K.L.; Menne, B.; The effect of temperature on food poisoning: a time-series analysis of salmonellosis in ten European countries. Epidemiol Infect, 2004; 132(3):443-53
Kovats, R.S.; Hajat, S.; Wilkinson, P.; Contrasting patterns of mortality and hospital admissions during hot weather and heat waves in Greater London, UK. Occup Environ Med, 2004; 61(11):893-8
Kovats, R. S.; Campbell-Lendrum, D. H.; McMichael, A. J.; Woodward, A.; Cox, J. S. Early effects of climate change: do they include changes in vector-borne disease? Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B: Biological Sciences, 2001; 356(1411):1057-68
Full publications listing (since 2001)

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“The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, whose reports have motivated governmental action to cut carbon emissions, relied on an uncredentialed student named Sari Kovats for writing and supervising its supposedly authoritative reports. Donna Laframboise of NOconsensus.org brings us the shocking news.
In 1994, Kovats was one of only 21 people in the entire world selected to work on the first IPCC chapter that examined how climate change might affect human health. She was 25 years old. Her first academic paper wouldn’t be published for another three years. It would be six years before she’d even begin her doctoral studies and 16 years before she’d graduate.

IPCC chairman Rajendra Pachauri says this about how IPCC authors are selected:

There is a very careful process of selection…These are people who have been chosen on the basis of their track record, on their record of publications, on the research that they have done…They are people who are at the top of their profession as far as research is concerned in a particular aspect of climate change…you can’t think of a better set of qualified people than what we have in the IPCC. [bold added]

Academically speaking, Kovats was invisible back in 1994. That anyone connected to the IPCC could have considered her a scientific expert is astonishing.

I’m sorry to say that that was just the beginning. When it came time to write the next version of the climate bible, Kovats received a promotion. She was selected to be a lead author, again for the health chapter – despite the fact that her doctoral studies wouldn’t begin until the year the IPCC report was published.

What do we suppose happened with the next edition of the climate bible – the one that appeared in 2007, still three full years before Kovats earned her doctorate? Was she selected once again to be a health chapter lead author? You betcha.

But by then the IPCC, in its wisdom, had decided she was a scientific expert in other areas, as well. Kovats served as a contributing author for three additional chapters in Working Group 2:

•Chapter 1 – Assessment of Observed Changes and Responses in Natural and Managed Systems
•Chapter 6 – Coastal Systems and Low-lying Areas
•Chapter 12 – Europe
She was also an IPCC expert reviewer.

So how does a neophyte suddenly beome the “top of [her] profession”? The great Andrew Bolt, of the Courier Mail/Herald Sun in Australia has a good answer:

Maybe she just has the right opinions.

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218 Claudius Drive, Aptos, CA to house 1,116 “unduplicated visitors” a year due to federal grant with no prior notice or input from public.

Why not a tent city rather than top dollar cost to rent a three bedroom house for $4 thousand a month to house only 8 persons at any one time in Aptos, CA.

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Cameron Jackson, Ph.D. DrCameronJackson@gmail.com

A peer-staffed crises residential program located in a three bedroom residence in a toney area of Aptos is slated to open March, 2011 to assit persons with major mental illness. These clients, without a high level of support, would require hospitalization.

The federal government dangles moeny and Santa Cruz County accepts — without prior consultation from the neighborhood or public at large and no imput by taxpayers who pay the bill.

Why did our local Santa Cruz County government representatives purchase 5 years of top of the market residential housing in one of the most expensive areas in Santa Cruz County ($3,900 for a 3 bedroom house with ocean view and two jacuzzis) to provide mental health housing for 1,116 visitors a year? (Someone should find out whether the 5 year lease agreement with the owner picks up the costs of utilities and taxes as well.)

Supervisor Pirie who represents Aptos states that she did not know. So who did decide?

How about some belt tightening by local Santa Cruz government? Did the results of the November, 2009 elections sink in here in Santa Cruz County — that the public wants to cut government costs?

Approximately 1,116 visitors at risk of psychiatric hospitalization due to symptoms of hallucinations (e.g., hearing voices or seeing things that aren’t there), delusions (false beliefs), agitation and impaired functional abilities will be housed at the proposed peer-staffed crises residential program.

At any one time, up to 8 persons will be at 218 Claudius with staff of 7.35 Full Time Equivalent (FTE). So there will be almost a one to one staff to patient ratio at 218 Claudius on a 24 hour 7 day a week basis.

Why 218 Claudius? Well, yes indeed, 218 Claudius in Aptos, CA has a magnificent view of Monterey Bay. It is a quiet, residential neighborhood. A resident at 218 Claudius can readily walk to Rio del Mar Beach which is only a few blocks down the hill. Likewise, it is a short 15 minute walk to Deluxe Market located on Rio del Mar Blvd. Should there be some life endangering situation — some resident goes out of control — the Fire Department is about a mile away and there are no speed bumps in between.

Public transportation to and from 218 Claudius is a bit iffy however. Say a person wanted to get from the River Street shelter in Santa Cruz, CA to 218 Claudius in Aptos, CA using public transportation. The last bus from Santa Cruz to Cabrillo College (#71) leaves at 4:00 pm and a person must catch the 4:45 pm #55 bus to get to Rio del Mar near Claudius. That is the last bus. Thus, people must drive their car or be driven if arriving after 5 pm. And there are few street lights in Aptos.

The Santa Cruz Metro bus telephone number is 831 425-8600. Expect a 15 minute wait if calling as I did around 3:30 pm. That kind of wait is not good for persons suffering from mental illness and seeking immediate crises assistance.

As there is no bus after 5 pm, persons in crises coming to 218 Caudius must either drive, be driven or walk. There are no street lights. And parking is quite skimpy. Will the 7.3 Full Time Equivalent persons working drive their vehicles? Probably.

How well thought out was this decision? Who were the key players making the decision?

written by Cameorn Jackson DrCameronJackson@gmail.com
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Below are two articles from local papers about the new mental health facility.

Rio Del Mar residents fighting County Mental Health Department

Group home for mental health patients being opened without notice

Residents are up in arms about a mental health facility being placed without notice in the middle of their neighborhood on Claudius Drive in Rio Del Mar by the County’s Mental Health Department. More than a dozen residents have lodged complaints with county Supervisor Ellen Pirie over the County’s plans. Pirie claims she didn’t learn about the facility until recently.

After receiving numerous complaints from residents, Pirie scheduled a neighborhood meeting to allow residents to ask questions and air concerns to county health officials, and for county officials to explain details of the program.

The community meeting is scheduled for 6 p.m. Wednesday Feb 16, 2011 in the meeting room at the Rio Sands Motel on Aptos Beach Drive. Pirie will not be attending the meeting due to another commitment in Washington DC.

County health officials claim they weren’t legally required to provide notification to neighbors. They had intended to contact residents but just hadn’t gotten around to it.

The County plans to begin moving in patients by the end of March.
One of the residents, Cindy Jewell, said, “It was discovered last week by our neighborhood in Rio Del Mar that an eight-bed mental health crisis respite house is being opened at 218 Claudius Drive in Rio Del Mar. Beds and office equipment have been moved in and there was no advance notification to anyone in the neighborhood or the community of Aptos.”

After contacting Pirie, the neighbors were informed that as this crisis respite house was unlicensed and staffed by peers, no notification or zoning requirements were necessary. Further research into the origin of the $3.5 million 5-year federal grant by the County Mental Health Services Department revealed that this program is still being tested. This will only be the seventh facility initiated in the United States and the only one in the state of California. The County has chosen a location, on a cul-de-sac, with little privacy for the mentally ill staying at this crisis house.

It has been reported that County health officials have signed a 5-year lease in February to rent the 3,000-square-foot with ocean views for $3,900 a month. According to the county health department, the facility is to provide transitional housing for people suffering various forms of mental illness, including severe depression, hallucinations and other issues that impair daily living.

The County Mental Health Department received the federal grant in September to operate and innovative treatment facility for those going through a particularly stressful time to prevent an actual mental health crisis. It is to be a voluntary early intervention on the part of the patient, not an alternative to a hospital commitment.

A one-hour program posted last April ran on Santa Cruz CTV with Yana Jacobs, Program Manager of Adult Mental Health Services, stating they wanted to find a ‘pretty’ location that ‘feels like a respite’ for their clients to enjoy.

The neighbors point out that even though this type of facility may be necessary and the program may prove to be a viable option for the future based on results gained in their community, they claim that this location is not the appropriate place for what the county is trying to achieve with success in really helping the mentally ill.

Residents say that the facility selected should have much more separation from its residential neighbors, access to seven-day per week public transportation, more parking, be closer to community services and the home should be located in a mixed use neighborhood versus an area zoned as single family residential posing a possible security threat to kids and adults and it’s an inappropriate facility for the neighborhood.

Jewell said that over 30 neighbors made contact to Supervisor Ellen Pirie with limited response. However, Pirie finally scheduled a community meeting for 6 p.m. Wednesday, March 16 at the Rio Sands Motel meeting room.

According to Jewell the concerns they would like addressed include:

•Why did the County of Santa Cruz purposely avoid a public hearing or public notice before establishing this crisis respite house?

•With a minimum 320 people going through this home per year, why was their not some sort of Environmental Impact Report (EIR) conducted?

•If this facility is not a residential use and is a medical facility, why was there no notice?

•Why was this house selected?

•Who is responsible if something goes wrong as the staff consists of “peers” and not professionals?

At a time when dollars are being conserved throughout our county, state and federal government, those opposing the facility, “have grave concerns about the cavalier attitude of the county employees that are treating this $3.6 million grant as free money.”

Yana Jacobs said on CTV that there was still uncertainty as to whether or not the crisis respite house needed to be licensed. Ellen Pirie stated that the house is unlicensed but no documentation has been shared with the community demonstrating that it was not necessary even though its paid employees – consisting of management, counselors, data collectors and 24/7 staff – will be ‘peers’ with no medical professionals on site.

According to county health officials it is planned to have patients rotating in and out of the eight-bed respite program every 3-10 days, with approximately 320 patients each year. The program will be staffed and managed by on-site peer counselors, people who have suffered from the same mental conditions.

•••

The house is on a cul-de-sac where the homes are close enough that neighbors can hear each another from their houses despite the grant specification that the location should be where houses are “not too close” and neighbors won’t “care much about the goings on inside” the facility. The house is not ADA (Americans with Disability Act) compliant as specified in the grant. There is no street parking available due to the narrow street, no sidewalks or streetlights. The bus service only runs on weekdays during the daytime hours with no weekend or night services. Additionally, it was reported just last week that local bus services would be reduced by 30 percent due to budget constraints.

However, the house does have a full panoramic view of the Monterey Bay.

Community meeting with county health officials and residents concerning respite group home: 6 p.m. Wednesday, Rio Sands Motel, 116 Aptos Beach Drive, Aptos. Information: 566-2202

Santa Cruz County to open new residential psychiatric center
By Kurtis Alexander
Posted: 09/18/2010 01:30:03 AM PDT

SANTA CRUZ — People who may be suffering a mental health problem will soon have another option for treatment — a 24-hour crisis center to help nip small psychiatric issues before they get out of hand.

The new county-run residential facility, scheduled to open before the end of the year, is being funded by a $3.6 million federal grant and will come with the distinction of being staffed not by hospital employees, but by people who have had and have overcome mental health issues themselves.

“The whole idea is to catch the problem early and ratchet it down before people have to go to the hospital,” said Yana Jacobs, county director of adult mental outpatient services, who has been planning the new center. “The story here is that people with mental illness are taking charge and helping one another.”

This week’s news of five years worth of funding from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has county health officials scurrying to find a site and staffing for the new center. Officials have not figured out where they want to be located, only that they’d like a centralized site near a bus line.

Plans for the new center come as county health officials reconfigure services for the mentally ill. Last year, Dominican Hospital announced the closing of its longtime psychiatric center, prompting the county to draw up plans for its own 16-bed acute-care psychiatric unit.

The new peer-run center will work in concert with the acute unit, health
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officials say, allowing them to steer people with bigger issues to the acute unit while still providing help for those with lesser problems.

“Our plans depend on us having a whole healthy network of services,” said Leslie Tremaine, county mental health and substance abuse director.

The peer-run center, according to the terms of the federal grant, will accommodate about 225 patients each year, offering care to the public seven days a week, all day for such problems as mood swings and depression. Stays will average eight days.

“People are going to come for respite. They’re coming here for a break,” said Jacobs, who hopes the care will prevent patients from getting more sick and showing the problems that come with more advanced stages of mental illness, like losing a job or home.

Mental health experts estimate one in five people has suffered from a mental health problem at some point in their life.

To inquire about the new center, suggest a site or apply for a job, call 454-4539.

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Aptos psychologist: It’s time to change laws regulating social security disability. Why and how.

Time to reduce social security entitlement program. Change laws so reports by social security go to the individual and other agencies and entities that provide assistance to the person receiving social security. Encourage independence not dependence by rewarding work. Require life style changes when appropriate to receive social security disability.

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Cameron Jackson DrCameronJackson@gmail.com

When thinking about social security, Instead of thinking “entitlement” people need to think “temporary assistance”. Too often I hear the comment, “Oh, I cannot do more work as that will reduce my social security benefits…” We need entitlement programs such as social security disability to encourage independence not dependency.

Because of social security regulations the public and persons receiving the money do not know why they get what they do. Let’s change that.

By law let’s require open communication between the government agencies and non-profits that assist families who receive social security disability. Currently social security rarely releases reports. By law let’s require that social security release their reports.

It’s time to change social security regulations. Make it lawful that anyone who receives social security has the right to receive a copy of gets their reports – just like medical reports belong to the individual.

Likewise, let’s make it legal that other agencies that have a legitimate reason to know can also access social security reports. For example, if social security if giving money based on “mental retardation” (recently changed to intellectual disability) and school assessment suggests “specific learning disability” it’s time that all the players have access to all the reports.

Here’s a real life example why we need to make changes in how and why children under age 21 receive social security disability. The names have been changed to protect privacy.
Carmen receives around $400 in social security. She is 18 years old. It is not clear why she receives the money. Her father thinks she gets money because of mental retardation.

Carmen’s father is disabled. He used to work in the agricultural fields near Watsonville, CA. Her mother works as a baker. Carmen is an only child. Carmen has various medical issues: obesity, high blood pressure, diabetes and asthma.

Carmen largely refuses to follow the recommended regime for control of her diabetes. She likes to snack on candy and eat throughout the evening hours. She does not like to walk. She is quite obese and her weight is climbing.

Carmen does have some skills: she uses a computer to access the Internet. She can sell Tupperware. She wants to go to junior college.

So what will encourage Carmen to become more independent and less dependent upon the government? For one, let’s change the law so that all entities providing education, medical and money can talk to each other and receive their reports. That way agencies are not working at cross purposes.

Perhaps it’s time that the social security disability money s Carmen receives is conditional on making healthy life style changes? If she wants the money then make the changes that will make her ultimately more independent.

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Aptos, CA psychologist: The placebo effect is a healing effect based on suggestion. The effect is huge. This is mind affecting body. What we believe affects our bodies. How do atheists harness – use – the placebo effect?

How do young adults whose parents are atheists harness the placebo effect? The placebo effect accounts for about 1/3 of all healing per thousands of scientific studies. If you really believe — it will affect you.

Do atheists believe in the power of thought and how it can affect the body? What say you? What says the official site for atheists in the U.S.?

“Atheism is the lack of belief in a deity, which implies that nothing exists but natural phenomena (matter), that thought is a property or function of matter, and that death irreversibly and totally terminates individual organic units.

“This definition means that there are no forces, phenomena, or entities which exist outside of or apart from physical nature, or which transcend nature, or are “super” natural, nor can there be. Humankind is on its own.

The following definition of Atheism was given to the Supreme Court of the United States in the case of Murray v. Curlett, 374 U.S. 203, 83 S. Ct. 1560, 10 L.Ed.2d (MD, 1963), to remove reverential Bible reading and oral unison recitation of the Lord’s Prayer in the public schools:

“Your petitioners are Atheists and they define their beliefs as follows. An Atheist loves his fellow man instead of god. An Atheist believes that heaven is something for which we should work now – here on earth for all men together to enjoy.

An Atheist believes that he can get no help through prayer but that he must find in himself the inner conviction, and strength to meet life, to grapple with it, to subdue it and enjoy it.

Question: What about the power of suggestion?? What is prayer but the hope and desire of help from without and within to help heal and make better ….?

“An Atheist believes that only in a knowledge of himself and a knowledge of his fellow man can he find the understanding that will help to a life of fulfillment.

“[An athiest] seeks to know himself and his fellow man rather than to know a god. An Atheist believes that a hospital should be built instead of a church. An Atheist believes that a deed must be done instead of a prayer said. An Atheist strives for involvement in life and not escape into death. He wants disease conquered, poverty vanquished, war eliminated. He wants man to understand and love man.

“He wants an ethical way of life. He believes that we cannot rely on a god or channel action into prayer nor hope for an end of troubles in a hereafter.

He believes that we are our brother’s keepers; and are keepers of our own lives; that we are responsible persons and the job is here and the time is now.”

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Aptos psychologist: Sign the Obama-Care Pledge chaired by U.S. Senator Jim DeMint? Yes!


Why sign a Pledge to repeal Obama-Care?
1) Two thirds of Americans oppose Obama-Care.
2) All small businesses (under 500 employees) including 1 1/2 million non-profits must give a 1099 to every person/entity they do $600 business with. Another onerous expense. More centralized power.
3) Fast food corporations such as McDonald’s — whose employees have mini health plans — will not be able to afford health care for their workers. This year they got a government reprieve. When not an election year, likely no reprieve. Soon this will force part time workers on to the government plan or else pay a fine for no health care.
4) Specialty health care plans will go out of business as Obama-Care is a “one size fits all”.
5) Health care controlled by the federal government means rationing for all according to the rules set by the health care “czar”.
6) There are excellent ways to improve health care and do so in the private sector: allow everyone to cross state lines and shop for what fits their individual needs; allow businesses to group together and shop; set up competitive exchanges that operate akin to travel exchanges. For more info Google Repeal Obama care or see below:

After months of backroom deals, political payoffs, and strong-arm tactics, President Obama and the Democrats forced an unpopular health care takeover through the United States Congress. Americans lost this battle with their elected leaders in Washington but the war is not over! If we’re willing to the fight to save freedom, we can settle the score in November by electing true conservatives who will repeal this unconstitutional and dangerous bill. The simple truth is the bill cannot be fixed. It must be repealed.

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The Senate Conservatives Fund, chaired by U.S. Senator Jim DeMint, has launched this national “Repeal ObamaCare Pledge” to rally support for conservative candidates who vow to repeal President Obama’s health care takeover. America is teetering toward tyranny and we must work together to reverse the radical agenda in Washington.

Electing just any Republican is not the answer. We’ve seen what happens when we send Republicans to Washington who don’t truly believe in the principles of freedom. They abandon their principles, lose the trust of the American people, and leave us with Democrats controlling Congress and the White House.

Instead, we must support true conservatives who love the Constitution and who will fight for limited government, a strong national defense, and traditional family values. And we must only help those candidates who vow to repeal ObamaCare.

Tell your family and friends about the Repeal ObamaCare Pledge so they can join our national campaign. The more people who sign the pledge at RepealItPledge.com, the bigger the impact.
Share the Repeal ObamaCare Pledge with your friends using our Facebook page. Facebook is a powerful way to quickly spread the word so we can repeal Presiden Obama’s health care takeover.
Share the Repeal ObamaCare Pledge with your Twitter followers and ask them to retweet the message. Use the #repealit hash tag to join the discussion.

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President Obama issues proclamations like Emperor Augustus? “in those days a decree went out frm Emperor Augustus that all the world should be registered…All went to their own towns…Joseph also went from the town of Nazareth …to the city of David called Bethlehem…”

Obama-Care requires all non-profits to register with IRS & give 1099's

DrCameronJackson@gmail.com

Is there is a resemblance between President Obama and Emperor Augustus who, 2010 years ago, required everyone to register where they were born?

Because the Emperor proclaimed they must, Joseph took pregnant Mary to Bethlehem…. And now, in 2010, Obama-Care tells every non-profit organization that they must trudge over to the government and register afresh with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).

There are a million and a half non-profit organizations in the U.S. Because of Obama-Care all of them must register afresh with the IRS. And, all non-profits who do $600 of business with anyone must give that person a 1099. Did you know that failure to re-register with the IRS can result in lose of non-profit status and a huge fine?

So — if you support or know of any tiny non-profit out there be sure to tell them of President Obama’s proclamation: Go to the city of Washington and register with the government! Modern day Emperor Obama requires that you register! Or stand to lose non-profit status and pay a fine.

Only 63% of all non-profits are registered with the IRS. That means that 1/3 are not. So, because of Obama-Care, roughly 500,000 non-profits must — for the first time — journey to Washington and register with the IRS. And every non-profit must take the time — which means money — to fill out the new form.

Do you support repeal of Obama-Care? Vote out every Democrat — including Sam Farr — that voted for Obama-Care.

For some exact figures on non-profits go to:
urban org

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