crosscut.com : Health / Medicine

In the absence of an AIDS cure, prevention gains prominence

Crosscut — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 05:00:01 PDT

As vaccine research retrenches, scientists seek to provide a stopgap with new approaches to HIV prevention that were first explored with help from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Sausage Links, no pun intended edition

Crosscut — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 13:43:01 PDT

Seattle Post-Inteliigencer political writer Chris McGann reports how Republican gubernatorial candidate Dino Rossi's opposition to abortion, gay marriage, gun control, stem cell research and gay rights' expansion has been underplayed by his campaign in an effort to sway liberal voters. Rossi, however, says those aren't the issues he's running on. Meanwhile, Josh Feit at the Stranger has some potentially bad news for Gregoire — the ominous Obama-Rossi yard sign juxtaposition. ...

Seattle City Hall stares at $50 million in cuts

Crosscut — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 00:00:01 PDT

As the economy shrinks tax revenue, the mayor and City Council are making cuts, with more to come next year. One possible casualty would be 20 to 25 promised new cops.

Walkability is nice, but it's not making us skinny

Crosscut — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 10:49:01 PDT

Current theory says that a city's walkability promotes health and will impact the fight against obesity. The claim is that America's weight problem can be helped by making cities more pedestrian-friendly. It should follow, then, that our most dense and walkable cities are where the skinny people are, right? Well, not really.

Is Big Nanny running your town?

Crosscut — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 14:43:01 PDT

The libertarian magazine Reason has published a list of the biggest nanny cities in the country. The results for the big cities on the Pacific Coast are interesting. Portland is caught in a kind of "nanny sandwich" between Seattle and San Francisco. Apparently, the most ecotopian town in the Pacific Northwest has escaped the worst excess of politically correct fussiness.

In the garden: U-pick blueberries

Crosscut — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 06:00:01 PDT

The book Plenty is about a young Vancouver couple, Alisa Smith and J.B. Mackinnon. The two decide to live on locally grown foods for a year. I've just read to the section on blueberries where they find a patch of beautiful, fat juicy ones only to discover that they are being grown for a local Buddhist temple and are not for sale. I don't know, yet, if they talk their way into a sale. Given how personable the couple is, my guess is probably. Putting the book down to attend to chores, I've realized that Smith and Mackinnon have convinced me to seriously consider following their eat-local example. This is the stat that caught me:

Sausage Links, pot, farms, and medicine edition

Crosscut — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 14:58:01 PDT

Count on the alt-weeklies to provide blow-by-blow coverage of the recent ~~medical marijuana bust~~ illegal search and seizure. Dominic Holden at The Stranger has the story about the incident — along with copies of the police report and the arresting officer's search warrant. According to the reports, Seattle Police officers tore down a wall while searching for an illegal pot-growing operation that didn't exist, while seizing bags of marijuana and medical records. The folks at Seattlest would like to remind the SPD that medical marijuana has been legal in Washington for nearly 10 years. ...

More fun than Deliverance!

Crosscut — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 05:00:01 PDT

Spend your summer vacation in Eastern Washington, an exotic locale where lakes are slippery, the Scablands surprising, and wheat farmers are smashing stuff for fun.

Review: Faith and mental illness on Seattle's streets

Crosscut — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 14:33:01 PDT

Craig Rennebohm provides a refreshing look at compassion and caring for Seattle's outcasts in Souls in the Hands of a Tender God: Stories of the Search for Home and Healing on the Streets (Beacon Press, 2008 194 pages).

Sausage Links, mayor-about-town edition

Crosscut — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 14:49:01 PDT

Oh, Greg. You are trying to break our hearts! Just when we vilify you for airballing the Sonics all the way to OKC for a cool $45 million — you show you're a real Mayor-about-town houses and plastic bag taxes.

For better or worse, everybody's talking about Mayor Nickels' proposals today. Erica C. Barnett at The Stranger says she spotted a "Plastic Monster" at last night's public-comment meeting about the proposed plastic bag tax, while Seattle Times columnist Danny Westneat warns if we don't choose paper the plastic bag police will get us. Meanwhile, the folks at Sound Politics rail against Nickels for the new town house plan, which they argue will regulate affordable housing "out of existence." ...

Salmonella may be a key for a new vaccine

Crosscut — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 14:00:01 PDT

Gates Foundation-backed vaccine developers have found a way to send genetic text messages to the cells of the body to evoke immunity to pneumonia. It could save the lives of a million children a year, yet fluency in the language of the immune system will not come easily.

Sausage Links, "freedom to get drunk and blow stuff up" edition

Crosscut — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 13:23:01 PDT

Chris Mulick at the Tri-City Herald has today's top story, reporting this morning that Tim Eyman's Initiative 985 and the Service Employees International Union-backed Initiative 1029 would — if passed by voters in November — increase the state's budget deficit by an estimated $300 million.

Sausage Links, sonic-bust edition

Crosscut — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 13:07:01 PDT

Let the mourning begin about the Seattle SuperGoneics. Everyone's in tears. That is, except the editorial board at the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. They think the settlement was a good deal. Hmmm. Are you kidding me? Heck, even the basketball gods thundered their disapproval throughout the night. ...

Health insurance coverage vs. science

Crosscut — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 05:00:01 PDT

A device to help those with autism and other conditions communicate has been excluded — and then included, and then excluded again — from health insurance coverage in Washington. At issue is the process by which insurers decide what's covered and why, which doesn't always reflect scientific consensus.

Sausage Links, hammer-time edition

Crosscut — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 13:00:01 PDT

Tri-City Herald reporter Chris Mulick digs deep into Washington state's bungled attempt to land a $2 billion uranium enrichment plant, along with its 400 high-paying jobs. According to Mulick, Gov. Chris Gregoire chose not to pursue bidding for the plant, deciding instead to play it cool politically. As a result, Idaho got the plant. Washington lost the money. And Dino Rossi just got more ammo for his campaign. Still, Gregoire's got a sizable lead in the polls, at the moment. ...

Bill Gates 2.0

Crosscut — Sun, 29 Jun 2008 21:00:01 PDT

Traditional methods of scientific research have not produced the medical breakthroughs he expected. Now he's going to use his money, through the Gates Foundation, to challenge old ways. The man is breathtaking.

Polimedia lunch links, binge-drinkers edition

Crosscut — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 11:38:01 PDT

From today's edition of The Seattle Times comes this report from The Los Angeles Times, in what could be the first many reports profiling John and Cindy McCain's ties to the nation's big-time beer brewers. ...

Energy and desperation on the streets of Seattle

Crosscut — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 05:00:01 PDT

A foreign tourist sees this as a place where citizens and the bureaucracy have in many ways abandoned each other, resulting in individualism, survivalism, and capitalism.

One Seattle chaplain's story of homelessness

Crosscut — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 21:00:01 PDT

A chaplain whose pioneering work to end homelessness is recognized worldwide shares the story of encountering the limits of the city's mental health system.

The animal-waste problem is, and is not, a load of crap

Crosscut — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 10:00:01 PDT

Researchers in Snohomish County estimate that pets there account for waste equivalent to a city of 32,000. That's a lot of nasty bacteria in surface-water runoff.