Sassafras Station Blog

Archive for February, 2010

In what is probably the least surprising news of the day, Business Week reports that Americans are not that fond of the health care reform that is being pushed by the President and Congress.  Well, duh!

The problem is that the people that have put the legislation forward are some of the most egotistical people on the planet.  They think their sh#@ don’t stink as they say and will probably push the legislation forward because they probably won’t admit that they were wrong.  Worse than that, I have seen political research that says it is worse for a politician to change their mind than it is to do the wrong thing because waffling (changing your mind frequently) is attacked more in the press than just doing something stupid.

I hope there is reform of some sort.  The medical industry (drug companies, hospitals, insurance companies, etc.) all need to be addressed.  It is ridiculous that these companies are getting rich while the rest of the country suffurs.  I just hope we can do the right thing, but am fearful something stupid will happen.

Click the link at the bottom if you need more confirmation that the current health care reform is not what most people want.

While half of Americans want some kind of health reform in the next two years, nearly 40 percent say it would be a good thing if the legislation proposed by the Democrats and President Barack Obama never materializes. And one-quarter aren’t sure if health reform would be good or bad for the country, a new Harris Interactive/HealthDay poll finds.

"Essentially what they’re saying is we want reform but we don’t trust or like what we’re seeing now," said Humphrey Taylor, chairman of The Harris Poll, a service of Harris Interactive.

Poll Shows Eroding Support for Health Reform – BusinessWeek

Now this is reality TV worth watching.  It is really good to see this from multiple levels.  First, a reality show that is dedicated to truly helping people is long overdue.  Hopefully it will catch on.  Second, being recognized for doing work that will truly help one of the biggest problems around the world (obesity) is pretty cool.

The show, called Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution USA, will be on ABC this year.  It is being produced by Ryan Seacrest (you’ve heard of that show called American Idol he hosts haven’t you?).  Hopefully, this powerhouse lineup will ensure that this show is seen by a lot of people and truly shows people how to make healthy changes in their lives.

Check out the entire article by clicking on the link after the excerpt below.

“We’re thrilled to award the TED Prize to Jamie Oliver,” said TED Curator Chris Anderson. ”His work directly tackles one of the most distressing issues the world faces… the obesity epidemic. In this year in which his TV show launches in the United States, we look forward to helping him achieve even greater impact.”

The television show mentioned is Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution USA, which will start in 2010 on ABC, and be produced by Ryan Seacrest. The series will show Oliver giving healthy makeovers to places around the U.S.

Jamie Oliver Wins $100K TED Award For Battle Against Childhood Obesity « ecorazzi.com :: the latest in green gossip

I don’t even know where to start on this subject.  I will try to keep from typing 4 letter words and cursing the whole medical industry in this post, but rest assured I am thinking them in my head and if anybody was in hearing distance I would be shouting them out loud.

In one of them most challenging economic times this country has ever faced, the idea of a company hiking its prices by 40% on what is pretty much an essential product is utterly despicable.  Unfortunately, they are not the problem.  The problem lies in the doctors and hospitals.  It lies with the drug companies and corporations that run medical facilities as cash cows where the unfortunate are raped and pillaged.  It is unacceptable.

Our president and elected officials have one thing right – reform is needed.  Unfortunately, they are being paid by those that are the problem.  It isn’t insurance reform that is needed, it is the industry that needs to be changed.  It should be illegal for a hospital to charge $50 for an aspirin – this is a real number from a real medical bill my grandmother got.  One simple, over the counter aspirin (probably not even name brand) was billed at $50.  Why is this acceptable?  Why is this not being addressed?  Simple, there is no money to be made by addressing the ridiculous costs.  Instead, we are going to force people to buy insurance that will pay these prices and everybody makes money while the person that is sick gets screwed.

You can read the article if you choose, but it will probably only make you mad.  Unfortunately, we cannot count on our elected officials to help us because they are mostly in the pocket of big business.  Our only recourse is to get healthy and hope we don’t have to subject ourselves to medical care very often because we will get screwed virtually eveyr time.

The parent company of Anthem Blue Cross on Thursday defended its 39% increase in premiums for individual policyholders in California, saying the rising rates reflect soaring medical costs but are "very competitively priced when compared with other California plans."

Anthem’s parent company defends health insurance rate hike – latimes.com

In an admirable move that probably has nothing to do with profits (maybe PR though), some providers of school lunches are pledging to make their meals healthier.  While this may seem like a small step (and it is), every change has to start somewhere.  Hopefully, this program will expand and more children will be exposed to healthy foods – not just ketchup which was once considered a vegetable by school lunch standards (it still might be, but I don’t know for sure).

The more exposure we can give to health initiatives, the more people will be aware of the problem.  Teaching our kids is the right place to start because they are still open to new things unlike older people who are much less likely to change their eating habits.  Change will be slow, but hopefully it will be for the better.

Check out the link below the excerpt for the whole story.

The National Restaurant Association applauded school lunch providers Aramark, Chartwells Educational Dining Services of Compass Group North America, and Sodexo, which joined with First Lady Michelle Obama in a groundbreaking pledge to help eliminate childhood obesity within a generation.

Fight Against Childhood Obesity Gets Help From NRA – Restaurant News – QSR Magazine

It seems like we are a long ways away from hearing the last of the H1H1 (Swine) Flu.  While this is being recognized around the world as a hugely overstated scam, there are still PR campaigns being run to get people to think all the over-hyped propaganda was worth while.  In the excerpt below, you can see the state of Minnesota is proclaiming the benefits of the vaccine and already starting to push the next round of vaccines.

What is even worse than the media trying to tell people how great the vaccine was, is companies trying to make a buck on selling the vaccine even though it is not needed.  A friend saw a sign at the Walgreens pharmacy instructing pharmacists to push the H1N1 vaccine to every customer whether they needed it or not in order to help slumping profits.  This sign literally existed and while I am sure it will be moved further out of the way because they definitely weren’t happy that my friend had seen it, it will continue to be pushed on unsuspecting customers.  We are taught to trust our pharmacists and this is a clear violation of that trust and probably borderline illegal.

On Wednesday the Minnesota Department of Health reported that for the fourth week in a row there were no deaths from H1N1, and no hospitalizations for the second straight week.

H1N1 squelches seasonal flu in Minn. | StarTribune.com