Health . Society .
Environment
Health Equity
How Do You Cure a Compassion Crisis?
Patients in the U.S. healthcare system often feel they’re treated with a lack of empathy. Doctors and nurses have tragically high levels of burnout. Could fixing the first problem solve the second? And does the rest of society need more compassion too?
Nearly Half of Dementia Cases Could Be Prevented or Delayed
International dementia experts have expanded their list of risk factors that, if reduced or eliminated, could prevent or delay 40% of dementia cases worldwide.
Covid-19 is pushing doctors to the brink. Medicine needs to recognize they’re human and need help.
Remembering healthcare professionals who lost their lives fighting Covid-19
Mexican online publication Milenio remembers the many healthcare professionals that lost their lives fighting Covid-19, through this powerful composite image.
ER Doctor In Los Angeles Captures The Toll Of COVID-19 With His Camera
photo & copyright: Scott Kobner
NPR's Rachel Martin talks to Scott Kobner, chief ER resident at the Los Angeles County USC Medical Center, who has been photographing colleagues and patients on the front lines of COVID-19.
Rural Matters — Coronavirus and the Navajo Nation
An account by Heather Kovich, MD, from the Northern Navajo Medical Center, Shiprock, NM, on how Covid-19 is affecting the Navajo community.
Diagnosing and Treating Systemic Racism
For physicians, the words “I can’t breathe” are a primal cry for help. As many physicians have left their comfort zones to care for patients with Covid-19–associated respiratory failure, the role of the medical profession in addressing this life-defining need has rarely been clearer. But as George Floyd’s repeated cry of “I can’t breathe” while he was being murdered by a Minneapolis police officer has resounded through the country, the physician’s role has seemed less clear. Police brutality against black people, and the systemic racism of which it is but one lethal manifestation, is a festering public health crisis. Can the medical profession use the tools in its armamentarium to address this deep-rooted disease?
The Moral Determinants of Health
The source of what the philosopher Immanuel Kant called “the moral law within” may be mysterious, but its role in the social order is not. In any nation short of dictatorship some form of moral compact, implicit or explicit, should be the basis of a just society. Without a common sense of what is “right,” groups fracture and the fragments wander. Science and knowledge can guide action; they do not cause action.
Comment by Dr. Barry Kerzin
Choices for the “New Normal”
The severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has only 15 genes, compared with 30 000 in the human genome. But it is a stern teacher, indeed. Answers to the questions it has raised may reshape both health care and society as a whole.
Police Reform: Warrior to Guardian
The Police Officers’ Bill of Rights Creates a Double Standard
When Police Unions Impede Justice
To Hold Police Accountable, Ax the Arbitrators
George Floyd’s Autopsy and the Structural Gaslighting of America
A discussion about how to reform policing
Kareem Abdul Jabbar Interview (on Racism)
Poverty
Interview with Fred Brown, President and CEO of The Forbes Funds, on creating equality and equity
Handing out title deeds is not enough.
The quest for secure property rights in Africa
Fred shares candidly his experiences and actions surrounding creating equality and equity. How he, as a black male leader, leads, in a city notable for some of its less equitable actions.
Who owns what?
Enforceable property rights are still far too rare in poor countries.
Poverty and debt driving young women to self-harm
Report says those from poorest backgrounds five times more likely to harm themselves.
Population Health
Innovative Pittsburgh job center trains disadvantaged youth
Despite a robust job market in recent years, the career path for some, notably young people of color, is often dampened by a lack of skills needed for good jobs in today’s economy. In Pittsburgh, one group is trying to clear that path, including Manchester Bidwell which was founded by Mr. Bill Strickland.
What is history's deadliest pandemic? - History of Malaria
The covid-19 pandemic may have derailed the world in 2020, but a far deadlier disease has shaped human history for thousands of years. Malaria defeated armies, fuelled the slave trade and jump-started the modern environmental movement.
How bad is the crisis in democracy?
Around the world, democracies are getting weaker and most elected politicians are becoming more unpopular. Are they still serving the people or themselves?
The Virome
Incredible 30 min. discussion of viruses, nature, and balance
It’s Time for a New Kind of Electronic Health Record
Human Rights
Diagnosing and Treating Systemic Racism
John Lewis on Race and Voting Rights
Take the Next Step Toward Racial Justice
Kadir Nelson’s “Say Their Names”
Civil Rights Law Protects Gay and Transgender Workers, Supreme Court Rules
Climate Crisis
How to fund the green revolution
The Dalai Lama In Conversation with Greta Thunberg and Leading Scientists
From the destruction of forests to the thawing of permafrost, the effects of human-induced climate change have set into motion self-perpetuating feedback loops that are accelerating global warming. What can be done to slow down this threat before it’s too late?
'Invisible killer': fossil fuels caused 8.7m deaths globally in 2018, research finds
Pollution from power plants, vehicles and other sources accounted for one in five of all deaths that year, more detailed analysis reveals
Book: Our Only Home: A Climate Appeal to the World (by H.H. Dalai Lama)
Saving the environment is our collective duty. With each passing day, climate change is causing Pacific islands to disappear into the sea, accelerating the extinction of species at alarming proportions and aggravating a water shortage that has affected the entire European continent. In short, climate change can no longer be denied – it threatens our existence on earth.
Democrats announce climate road map focused on racial justice
The ‘Climate Crisis Action Plan’ calls for reaching a 100% clean, net-zero economy in the US no later than 2050
UN SDGs
Take Action for the Sustainable Development Goals
The Sustainable Development Goals are the blueprint to achieve a better and more sustainable future for all. They address the global challenges we face, including poverty, inequality, climate change, environmental degradation, peace and justice. Learn more and take action.