A focus on famous people risks blurring the message that mental illness can happen to anyone In an ideal world, it would not take a film star to get the media focused on mental illness. But we don’t live in an ideal world, we live in a celebrity culture where Catherine Zeta-Jones being treated for bipolar disorder can soar to the top of news websites’ “most viewed”, and relegate Andrew Lansley’s woes or even David Cameron’s pre-election views on immigration. I am an ambassador for Time to Change, the campaign to change attitudes on mental illness, to break down the stigma and taboo which still surround it. It appears to be having some success: when England cricketer Michael Yardy left the World Cup because of depression, the “pull yourself together … what has he got to be depressed about?” brigade were in the minority. There is greater understanding, but still stigma. Some people with mental illness say the discrimination can be worse than the symptoms. What the mental health charities find deeply frustrating is that they can only get on the media via celebrities. If Zeta-Jones had been diagnosed with cancer, we would be talking about cancer. It is as though the celebs attached to an issue lead a debate, rather than the issue and how it affects millions of people. There is a danger that focus on famous people tends to get in the way of one of our central messages – it can happen to anyone – or that it reinforces one of the myths, that mental illness hits “creative, achieving people”. But if you are the charity in question, trying to raise your profile so as to raise funds and awareness for the services you provide, you have to play the game. I was inundated with media bids and the charities wanted me to take them up. Isn’t it better if a doctor or a nurse goes up? Ah, but they want a name. So here’s an idea for the Guardian. Take Catherine Zeta-Jones as the “peg” – but open a few pages of G2 to fellow sufferers most of us have never heard of. The charities will help find them. Then your readers will see that not all bipolar sufferers look like Stephen Fry or Catherine Zeta-Jones … They look like the woman next door, the guy on the bus, the colleague across the office, the kid you met on holiday last year. One in four of us will have a mental illness at some point. That is a lot of people. Very few are film stars. Zeta-Jones will help raise the profile of the issues, whether she wanted it that way or not. That should lead to better understanding. But as I said when I spoke to the Royal College of Nursing on Wednesday about mental health, including my own issues of breakdown and depression, better understanding must be an accompaniment to good treatment, not a substitute. I join the many others who wish her well and thank her for the support her name will lend our campaign. But there are people with the same illness who cannot get the support they need, who still feel they have to lie about their condition to get or keep a job, and who really worry about the impact of government cuts and reforms that will fundamentally change the way mental health services are run. Those issues should be getting an airing regardless of celebrity support or involvement. Alastair Campbell has asked for his fee for this article to go to Rethink. Bipolar disorder Mental health Catherine Zeta-Jones Charities Depression Health Alastair Campbell guardian.co.uk
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Heathrow airport operator BAA working on plans to use geothermal energy to stop parked planes getting stuck in ice When temperatures plunged below zero last December and Heathrow ground to a halt, the festive travel plans of around one million passengers were left in tatters. Now the managers of Europe’s busiest airport have dreamed up a solution to prevent a repeat of the nightmare before Christmas: underfloor heating, but on a massive scale. British Airports Authority, which runs Heathrow, is exploring technology to capture the heat of the summer sun as it beats down on the airport’s asphalt and store it until winter to keep the planes moving. The idea, which combines the principles of Roman central heating with 21st-century renewable energy technology, is intended to stop planes becoming stuck in ice on their stands, which was the main cause of the problems last year. Heathrow could not operate at full capacity for five days after an hour-long snowstorm dumped nearly 13cm (5in) of snow followed by a sudden drop in temperature. There was anger that Heathrow was so easily crippled and Philip Hammond, the transport secretary, ordered an immediate review. It identified “a low state of preparedness” for snow that was forecast many days ahead and a lack of specialised equipment to clear it. Hammond said climate change could mean more regular repeats of the extreme temperatures that forced thousands of passengers to sleep in terminal buildings. “It is not the snow that caused problems last year, it was the ice,” Steve Morgan, BAA’s capital projects director, told Building magazine. “We are working on a concept to capture geothermal energy from the surface of the Tarmac … during the summer to then provide a heating capability so the stands don’t freeze in the winter. We would store the energy underground and use it to gently heat water that would run through pipes in freezing conditions to warm the stands, which are the slabs of concrete directly beneath the planes, to just above zero.” The cost of the project is yet to be estimated, but Morgan said it could be paid for by postponing a facelift for one of the terminals, such is the level of concern at Heathrow’s collapse in the winter. BAA is working with an unnamed private company on the plan, which would require digging sump holes up to 10m deep to fit technology to store energy and pump warmed water under the stands. Only the areas beneath the wheels and where crews need to inspect and load the planes would need to be warmed. Another option, which involves pumping water from deep underground, which is naturally above freezing even in cold conditions, up towards the frozen surface, is also being explored. Heathrow has 200 stands, but to limit costs the idea could be rolled out to just a few to at least keep some flights moving. Morgan said he believed the project was viable, adding that Heathrow would probably be the first airport to try it. Heathrow Flights BAA Travel & leisure Weather Air transport Robert Booth guardian.co.uk
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Department for Business, Innovation and Skills to prohibit American orders of three drugs used in lethal injections Britain is to ban the export to the US of three pharmaceutical drugs that are used to execute prisoners on death row, Vince Cable has said. An export ban for pentobarbital, pancuronium bromide and potassium chloride – used in lethal injections – will be formalised in a few days, said the business secretary, who is urging a Europe-wide ban on sales of the drugs to the US. “We oppose the death penalty in all circumstances and are clear that British drugs should not be used to carry out lethal injections,” he said. “Because of the importance and urgency of the situation this is an issue on which we felt we had to take the lead.” The move comes after a parliamentary inquiry heard that enough pharmaceutical drugs have been sold to the US by licensed British wholesalers since last summer to execute 100 death row inmates. The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills last November imposed export controls on sodium thiopental, a rarely-used anaesthetic, after it emerged that a small-scale wholesaler working out of the back office of a west London driving school had sold the drug to Georgia’s and Arizona’s department of corrections. The anti-capital punishment charity Reprieve, which mounted a legal challenge to ban sodium thiopental, welcomed the new block on the three drugs. But the charity said US states imposing the death penalty via lethal injection are now turning to a Danish company, Lundbeck A/S, for supplies of pentobarbital. Denmark’s foreign minister said she will urge US states such as Texas and Ohio to stop using that drug. Reprieve director Clive Stafford Smith said: “Britain has now taken the lead in ending complicity in the US death penalty, which is very welcome. Since the US executing states are now turning to a Danish company, Lundbeck, to kill people, we must hope that the UK can persuade our EU partners to take a similar line.” Pentobarbital is a sedative with a range of medical uses, including the treatment of epileptic seizures and other conditions that require some form of sedation. It is often used for putting down animals. Since late last year, it has been used in the US for lethal injections after supplies of sodium thiopental became scarce. The Danish foreign minister, Lene Espersen, said she cannot take direct action against Lundbeck because the drug is produced by a plant in Kansas. Pentobarbital has been used to execute prisoners in Ohio and Oklahoma. Mississippi and Arizona are also considering switching to the drug for lethal injections. Lundbeck has written letters to US prison authorities asking them not to use pentobarbital for lethal injections, but with little effect. The pharmaceutical company, whose bestsellers include drugs for the treatment of psychiatric and neurological disorders, is under pressure from human rights groups to take stronger action, such as rewriting distribution contracts with clauses prohibiting sales of pentobarbital to US prisons. Lundbeck has rejected that idea, saying it would be impossible for distributors to track how every vial is used. The company said it sells about 50mn doses of pentobarbital a year, but has declined to give any breakdown of sales. Pancuronium bromide is a muscle relaxant and potassium chloride is used to stop the heart and is sometimes used in abortion procedures. In February, a parliamentary inquiry heard that a shortage of supplies in the US was forcing American states to search abroad for painkillers, paralysing agents and heart-stopping compounds administered in lethal injections. Pharmaceuticals industry United States Denmark Europe David Batty guardian.co.uk
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Click here to view this media [YouTube here. ] Big Mike — MoveOn.org’s “Break It Down” guy — is kind of a rationalist response to Glenn Beck: He too uses blackboards, etc., to explain seemingly complex issues. But unlike Beck, who actually makes things out to be much more dense, murky, and inexplicable than they really are (not to mention inventing things that never were), Mike has the gift of taking complex subjects and actually helping ordinary people understand them. So I every much enjoyed his latest “Break It Down” installment — this time on the ongoing federal-budget battles. It really is about the nation’s Top 1 percent income earners against the rest of us — and it’s going to become even more intense: And all of this fighting is just over this year’s budget. Next year’s budget is where things get really crazy. Because even though taxes for the rich are the lowest they have been in generations, the Republicans want to cut them even further, so millionaires and billionaires are paying 25% instead of 35%. But where are they going to get the trillions of dollars they need to do that? Their ideas are fairly simple: Slash $350 billion from things like food stamps, education, training, employment, Cut another $400 billion from programs that help low-income families. Oh, and get rid of Medicare. Yeah, almost forgot about that. They’re going to take away Medicare, give seniors vouchers, and throw them on the mercy of Big Insurance. Because when I think compassion, I think Big Insurance. So if you or your aging parents actually depend on Medicare, they can look forward to a future where they can choose between buying their meds….or eating. If we want to get serious about shrinking the deficit, it won’t happen on the backs of the middle class that’s already being squeezed. He actually might have made good use of another chart MoveOn recently published : enlarge Credit: Source: Center for Budget Priorities and Policy
Continue reading …Rush Limbaugh; Obama’s Base Are "Walking Human Debris" Who Get "Orgasm" From "Savag[ing] Us" Since They "Can’t Find Willing Mate
April 14, 2011 No CommentConservatives are freaking out because Rep. Paul Ryan was made to look like a fool by Obama. Don’t blame the president, blame Ryan’s policies. Yes, we’re not happy with many Obama policies, but I will admit to you now that his speech didn’t cause the orgasmatronic reaction that Rush claims it did. Sorry, Rush. And so we’re clear, I don’t think Conservative people are walking human debris, although I find their politicians and their actions like taking away collective bargaining rights and destroying Medicare horrifying. At least I didn’t have to get a prescription of little blue pills in a different name and fly to the Dominican Republic to look for a “mate” either. Rush Limbaugh could see a deal with prosecutors in a long-running prescription fraud case collapse after authorities found a bottle of Viagra in his bag at Palm Beach International Airport. The prescription was not in his name. Limbaugh was detained for more than three hours Monday at the airport after returning from a vacation in the Dominican Republic. Customs officials found the Viagra in his luggage but his name was not on the prescription, said Paul Miller, a spokesman for the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office. — Limbaugh’s doctor had prescribed the Viagra, but it was “labeled as being issued to the physician rather than Mr. Limbaugh for privacy purposes,” Roy Black, Limbaugh’s attorney, said in a statement. U.S. Customs and Border Protection examined the 55-year-old radio commentator’s luggage after his private plane landed at the airport, Miller said. Investigators confiscated the drugs, which treat erectile dysfunction. Limbaugh was released without being charged. For now, Limbaugh is joking about his brush with the law. He joked about the search on his radio show Tuesday, saying Customs officials didn’t believe him when he said he got the pills at the Clinton Library and he was told they were blue M&Ms. He later added, chuckling: “I had a great time in the Dominican Republic. Wish I could tell you about it.” I’ll bet he did.
Continue reading …Networks Ignore Story of Canadian Baby Saved From Government-Run Health Care
April 14, 2011 1 Comment
The network newscasts and morning shows have thus far ignored the story of Joseph Maraachli, a Canadian baby who was set to have his life support removed. Only Fox News has covered the dramatic transfer of the child on Monday to an American hospital for treatment. The child suffers from a neurological disease and is in a vegetative state. According to Fox News, “Doctors in Canada said the illness is irreversible and wanted to remove the breathing tube. His parents appealed to Canadian courts, but the hospital's decision was upheld.”
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An FA spokesman and the secretary of the Manchester City Supporters Club debate the merits of playing the FA Cup semi-final at the national stadium Matt Phillips, FA spokesman: The Football Association said eight years ago that Wembley is now the host for the semi‑finals and the final of the FA Cup so we won’t see a return to any other stadiums for the foreseeable future. Wembley has a capacity of nearly 90,000, which means many more fans have the opportunity to see their team in the semi-finals now than when the matches were played at grounds such as Anfield, Villa Park and Old Trafford. Semis have been played at Wembley since 1991 and some of the biggest crowds in the history of the FA Cup have come from those matches. Stoke City have already sold out their allocation so the demand for Wembley is clearly there. Wembley is set up to deal with large crowds and that’s what you’ll always get at semi-finals – it’s purpose built for major events, particularly major football events. This is a stadium that will host the Champions League final next month. We’re aware that some fans wonder why Saturday’s semi-final – a Manchester derby – is being played in London rather than Old Trafford or Anfield but when it comes to the FA Cup we’re beholden to the draw. We’ve got two teams from the north in the first semi-final but Saturday’s match could quite easily have been between two London clubs: in the past we’ve seen London sides and teams such as Portsmouth play at Wembley. At the start of the season everyone knows the semi-finals will be in London, so it’s not like it comes as a shock when fans need to make travel arrangements. The semi-finals and the final are both played at Wembley but that doesn’t take away the magic of a final at the stadium. Wembley is set out in a different way for each round so fans who come for the semi-final will have a different experience from those who come for the final. This weekend three of the clubs involved – Manchester City, Bolton Wanderers and Stoke – will play their first game at the new Wembley so it will be a fresh experience for them. At least one of those teams won’t be coming back for the final so playing the semis at Wembley gives more supporters and clubs the chance to experience the national stadium. London will host a number of big events this weekend with the FA Cup semi-finals, the marathon and Liverpool’s visit to Arsenal but it’s a city that can cope with large crowds. Bear in mind that next year the capital will take in the Olympics – if it’s set up to cope with the logistics of so many events and people in one place I’m sure it can handle this weekend’s schedule. Kevin Parker, general secretary, Manchester City Supporters Club: My family, friends and I are looking forward to going to Wembley for the semi-final because we haven’t played in a Cup final since 1981. But the reality is that we’d be looking forward to the semi-final whether it was being played at Wembley, the Millennium Stadium, the Emirates or at St James’s Park
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Dominique de Villepin – a vocal critic of Nicolas Sarkozy on traditional right – is considering run for president in 2012 Dominique de Villepin, the former French prime minister, moved closer to the ultimate standoff with his arch-enemy Nicolas Sarkozy on Thursday as he presented a programme for running for president next year. Villepin, who Sarkozy once said he would like to hang from a butcher’s hook, recently quit Sarkozy’s ruling rightwing UMP party, setting up his own political grouping, République Solidaire, and considering challenging Sarkozy’s bid for presidential re-election in 2012. A Gaullist, Villepin has become the most vocal critic of Sarkozy on the traditional right. He has called him “a problem for France” and slammed his policy to round up Roma migrants as “a stain on the French flag”. Although Villepin has only a small army of activists – his movement claims 25,000 members – if he stands in the election he could split the traditional rightwing vote. This would cause headaches for Sarkozy whose party, the UMP, is falling apart, torn between centrists and rightwingers who can’t agree over the president’s extremist line on immigration, crime and Islam. Villepin, a former protege of Jacques Chirac who became famous for arguing France’s case at the United Nations against the 2003 invasion of Iraq, said it was too early to announce whether or not he would run for president. But the 57-year-old part-time poet and historian laid out his proposals, including a “citizen’s income” welfare benefit of €850 a month for people with no other earnings. He said he offered a “credible alternative” to Sarkozy. The political rivalry between Sarkozy and Villepin is legendary. It culminated in the Clearstream trial last year in which Villepin was cleared of falsely smearing Sarkozy over alleged acts of money laundering. A retrial is due to begin next month, and Villepin may be waiting for that to close before he makes a final announcement on whether or not to run. Sarkozy is at his lowest-ever approval ratings, around 29% according to a Le Point poll. The only other French president to have ever stooped lower was Chirac, at the height of his unpopularity following the EU constitution referendum of 2005. Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the favourite for the primaries for a Socialist candidate, stands at 52% approval ratings, with the far-right’s Marine Le Pen at 28%. Sarkozy, who has yet to officially announce he will stand for re-election, is under severe pressure, not just from the Front National, but within the UMP camp, a broad coalition of centrists and rightwingers which is fast disintegrating. The former environment minister and centrist Jean-Louis Borloo also recently quit the party to prepare for his own bid for the presidency. Addressing his own concerned MPs, Sarkozy insisted this week that he had a “good feeling” about next year’s election. Nicolas Sarkozy France Europe Angelique Chrisafis guardian.co.uk
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High court rules way in which police kettled up to 5,000 demonstrators at G20 protests in April 2009 was illegal Thousands of people found by the high court to have been illegally detained for hours by police at a central London protest may sue Scotland Yard for false imprisonment. The high court has ruled that the Metropolitan police had broken the law in the way it kettled up to 5,000 demonstrators at the G20 protests in April 2009. The judges heard police used the tactic of mass detention against protesters that they accepted were peaceful, with officers meting out punches to the face, slaps and shield strikes as they tried to move a demonstration against climate change. Judges found that the force used by police was “unjustified”, criticised “imprecise” instructions given by senior officers about releasing innocent people, and said the mass detentions for five hours were an unlawful deprivation of liberty under article 5 of the European convention on human rights. The case was brought by Josh Moos and Hannah McClure, who were among the crowd held by police. The judgment does not strike down the police tactic of kettling, or mass detention, but it will be seen as a rebuff to the Met and places police chiefs on notice that the courts will intervene in favour of the rights of protesters over claims that draconian tactics are necessary to prevent violence. The Met announced it would appeal against the judgment. The solicitor who brought the case, John Halford, said the ruling opened the police up to thousands of lawsuits seeking damages for the unlawful behaviour. He said: “Everyone in the kettle has a claim for false imprisonment and damages as they were detained against their will.” The case concerned the G20 protests in London on 1 April 2009, during which Ian Tomlinson, a bystander, died after being struck by an officer. There were several demonstrations in the area that day, but the court case deals with a Climate Camp protest in Bishopsgate. Police said they put in a containment of the camp, fearing people from a sometimes violent protest outside the Royal Exchange may join it. In their judgment Sir Anthony May, president of the Queens Bench Division, and Mr Justice Sweeney said police had failed to meet the conditions for the mass detention of protesters to be lawful: “To be justified in law as being the lawful exercise of the common law power to take reasonable steps to prevent a breach of the peace and as not constituting an unlawful deprivation of liberty under article 5 of the convention, the police had reasonably to apprehend an imminent breach of the peace …” But this was not the case, the judges found, citing the fact the two protests were relatively far apart. Those who left the Royal Exchange took two hours to reach the edge of the Climate Camp protest. The judges said the risk of violence was not imminent, and that was the threshold of danger to public order needed to justify the tactic of kettling. “There was such a risk, but it was at that stage only a risk; and it was not, in our judgment, a risk of imminent breaches of the peace sufficient to justify full containment at the Climate Camp.” For the Met, policing protests has seen them criticised on several fronts, as too heavy handed at G20,and then underprepared at last year’s student protests. The high court judgment found use of force at G20 was excessive, and the rights of innocent protesters were infringed: “It is evident that there were instances of unduly inflexible release [from the containment] and instances of unnecessary and, we think, unjustified force in the pushing operation.” The judges also criticised instructions a police chief said he gave to officers to release the innocent from the detention: “They were very general and imprecise and may not have been fully conveyed to individual officers, some of whom appear not to have been trained for crowd control operations of this kind.” The judges found a police decision to disperse the crowd to avoid it remaining overnight was lawful. The Met said: “We believe that this issue is so important for the police’s ability to prevent disorder within protest that we will be appealing. The MPS believes that the Bishopsgate containment prevented further scenes of violence and criminal damage occurring on 1 April 2009.” Dee Doocey, a Liberal Democrat member of the Metropolitan Police Authority, said: “We must have authoritative and crystal clear guidance on who can trigger the use of kettling … the Met must urgently address the insufficient training that police officers receive in the use of shields.” Jenny Jones, a Green party member of the Metropolitan Police Authority, said: “They have used kettling illegally, and sometimes violently, on peaceful demonstrations since May 2001. Kettling takes away the human rights and civil liberties of innocent, legal protesters.” Police G20 London Protest Human rights Vikram Dodd guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Truth Is Stranger Than Fiction: AZ Birther Law Requires Candidates "To Describe Penis"
April 14, 2011 No Comment
It’s come to this now? This is what happens when you let the inmates run the asylum : They don’t call Arizona the “meth lab of Democracy” for nothing — where else could a lack of foreskin prove citizenship? The Arizona Senate formally passed the “Birther Bill” today, but not in its original version. Apparently, requiring presidential candidates to provide a long-form birth certificate before allowing their names on the ballot in Arizona — despite it already being a federal requirement to run for president — was a bit too much for a few GOP lawmakers. So they made some amendments: if you can’t find your birth certificate, and you have a penis, a document describing your lack (of) foreskin will suffice. A circumcision certificate — a document given to the parents of a male Jewish child after his foreskin is snipped off during a circumcision ceremony — is not a legal document (see an example of one here ) but if you have one, under the amended bill, it’s apparently enough to prove you’re a U.S. citizen and your name can be permitted on the ballot in Arizona. Pulling out your penis in front of election officials, however, will not prove citizenship — and, in the worst case scenario, could get labeled a sex offender. Do I really need to be the one to tell them that Muslims males get circumcised too? Oy. I guess we need to root out all those stealthy Scandinavians planning to run for president. You have to laugh, if only to keep from pulling all your hair out in the face of such stupidity.
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