Tag Archives: Healthcare

This is just a partial of a much longer commentary by Health Affairs on Employer healthcare insurance for single employees am employees with families. “Health Benefits In 2024: Higher Premiums Persist, Employer Strategies for GLP-1 Coverage and Family-Building Benefits,” Health Affairs. I have used two of the charts to emphasis what is occurring. The first chart will show the variance between single and family coverage 1999-1924. The second chart...

While I was raised Roman Catholic, I had already rejected the RCC teaching on abortion by the time I started high school. That teaching was not grounded in the Bible, nor was it grounded in biological science.Most human conceptuses never make it to term, making God the greatest abortionist of all time. And mammalian stem cells have the potential to develop into a complete animal in every case where it’s been tested, so destroying a “potential” human...

If you must know before you dive in, this is a long read. It is also a presentation of a report. Very little editing has been done to it. Editing which may have been done is to make it clearer in explanation. I believe it presents a clear explanation of healthcare in the US. My own experience with one group of doctors in the Phoenix was rather disheartening. I was there for spinal and back issues. They were more interested in my blood pressure,...

Vaccines are an unalloyed triumph of public health. That Donald Trump is attacking vaccines—any vaccines—is obscene.“ . . . on at least 17 occasions this year, Trump has promised to cut funding to schools that mandate vaccines. Campaign spokespeople have previously said that pledge would apply only to schools with COVID mandates. But speeches reviewed by KFF Health News included no such distinction — raising the possibility Trump would also target...

Some of the worst performing cars ever made looked great on the outside and had serious mechanical, etc. problems. Made in America and were flashy but they could not mechanically perform as well or last. It took a while before many of us growing up started to walk past the flash and bought something more dependable. With Trump selecting Vance he gains the flash . . . however, neither Republican candidate is dependable for US citizens. All flash and...

High fructose corn syrup (HFCS) is everywhere—salad dressings, catsup, carbonated beverages. Fructose is sweeter, per unit mass, than cane sugar (sucrose), and apparently keeps better, so is a favored sweetener by the food industry. Unlike glucose, fructose in converted to free fatty acid in the liver and thus can contribute to hyperlipidemia, diabetes and heart disease.I’ve avoided high fructose corn syrup mostly because ever since I stopped eating...

R. J. Sigmund September 29, 2024 The major Covid demographic metrics we track continued to trend lower this past week, but we have a new recombinant mutant out there that is multiplying quite rapidly and is forecast to become the dominant strain, probably just in time for the annual winter holidays infection wave. Among the CDC’s “early indicators” “test positivity”, or the percentage of tests for Covid that were positive, fell to 11.6%...

I was married by the time I started graduate school. I suspect that being in a committed relationship, and in particular with someone who was also a grad student, kept me centered during the stressful times. Perhaps these were different times, but a recent study shows that today’s PhD students are struggling with mental health issues: “The researchers compared the rate at which PhD students, people with master’s degrees and a sample of the...

The recurring bleat of vaccine denialists is that COVID should be addressed through “herd immunity.” Well, OK, a vaccinated population has herd immunity, but that’s not what they mean. They mean herd immunity in the sense of the Black Plague—the people who didn’t die were immune.Apart from all the deaths caused by COVID infections in unvaccinated people, there’s the issue of long COVID. While its etiology is poorly understood, its reality is certain....

Growing up and having Fluoride in the water was a big deal for stronger teeth. It was also in toothpaste. There is a whole industry that has grown up around the use of Fluoride in the water and in toothpaste. In Boot Camp, we were given a special and stronger treatment of fluoride. Now they are coming out with reasons not to use Fluoride above a certain level. ​ Global Water – Santa Cruz Water Company, Inc. recently sent a notice to customers in...