!Re: OT: Kevorkian who?

[Horace Greeley]

Hi, Sarah,

Just catching up:

You wrote:

<big snip>

> > >More alarming still:  Around 1990, as I recall, when I was doing my
> graduate work at the University of Texas, the university health service
> randomly and anonymously tested blood samples from the student 
population.  For
> instance, if some kid were having his blood drawn to measure liver 
enzymes, they would tap a bit of blood, anonymously code it, and test for 
HIV, along with a bizillion other anonymously coded samples.  The result:  
About 20% of the student population (in 1990) was HIV+.  Kinda makes ya' 
think! 

+++++++++++++++++

Yup - this is right up there with the eugenics thinking that has dirven so 
much of the dark side of US research in the 20th Cent.  Take a look some 
time at the work of David Starr Jordan in the early 1900's.

+++++++++++++++
> > >Even more alarming still:  The Bush Administration now proposes that
> the
> > >Office of Management and Budget (OMB) will disqualify the lion's share
> of
> > >independent scientists in the academic sector (those receiving or
> having
> > >received federal research grant money) from reviewing the research
> grant
> > >proposals of their peers.  What this means is that politicians and
> hired-gun
> > >corporate scientists will be deciding which research gets funding.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++

That's the tip of the iceberg.  The proposal has stunning support from the 
folks who will be the most directly and negatively affected.  Further, just 
looking at NIH (National Institutes of Health), since the early 1990's, the 
portion of the NIH budget previously set aside for "pure" (i.e., "not 
immediately profitable") research has been reduced by between 8 and 10% per 
year.  It is now well under $1B.  (FYI, this is the basic, underlying 
research work, based essentially on the intelligence and genius of 
individual researchers that provides the basis for the profit-driven stuff 
to even happen...rather like shooting yourself in the foot, and then 
reloading.)

The documenation on the progress of this devaluation of health care is so 
vast and so compelling as to defy description.  Yet, as a nation, we 
continue to behave as if all is well; and all that is necessary is to 
continue our NIMBY approach.  At the individual level, folks who behave 
like that are called psychotic.

Best.

Horace