Recent Health Care Commentaries

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The Pope of Hope
Many are acquainted with Dan Piraro’s day job as an artist/satirist who tries to make sense of our world through his cartoon images. However, in real life, he’s a philosopher who motivates us to… are you sitting down… actually think. What has this got to do with ethics? During times of high-stress, we all need to be responsible for our...
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July 1, 2020
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The Second Most Dangerous Virus in the Country
On March 9, Fox pundit Sean Hannity said, “…if you are over the mass hysteria, if you’re over politicizing and weaponizing the coronavirus, you are not alone…. I’m sure in the end, the mob and the media — well, they will be advancing their new conspiracy theory and their newest hoax.” Armed with no evidence except his own opinion, Hannity...
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June 29, 2020
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Why I Continue to Write About Trump
He is an angry, arrogant, bigoted, unprincipled narcissist who was elected to the U.S. presidency by the slimmest of margins. He is the most illiterate, contradictory, and inarticulate individual who has ever held the highest office in the land. According to the watchdog group, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), he has more than 3,000 conflicts of interest....
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May 22, 2020
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Is This Acceptable to You?
Last Sunday, on the CBS News show 60 Minutes, I was shaken by a report by Scott Pelley in which the Trump administration cut funding to a key scientist researching the cause and cure for the coronavirus. His name is Peter Daszak, and his job involves working with Chinese research officials in Wuhan, China, the area of the first outbreak....
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May 15, 2020
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A Few Silver Linings
Former computer scientist Jim Mitchell is another local resident who shared his perspective on the virus and living under quarantine conditions. Mitchell started programming for computers in 1962. During his career, he “worked on programming language design and implementation (FORTRAN WATFOR, Mesa, Euclid, C++, Java), interactive programming systems, dynamic interpretation and compilation, document preparation systems, user interface design, distributed transactional...
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May 8, 2020
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It’s Getting Better
Continuing to share local individuals’ experiences with the Covid-19 virus, and the quarantine orders issued by California state governor Gavin Newsom, Maureen (Mo) Masson worked as a private duty nurse in Los Angeles before joining the Air National Guard to help treat burn patients returning from Vietnam. Her last military assignment was in Desert Shield before retiring in 1992 as...
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May 6, 2020
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We’re Not There Yet
Last week, an experimental drug, remdesivir, was found to shorten the recovery time for those infected with Covid-19. Now that a clinical trial has confirmed the positive effects, the FDA has given the go-ahead to use the drug on virus patients. It’s a small light at the end of a long tunnel. The number of reported cases has dropped as...
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May 4, 2020
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Elephant in the Room
“The Fake News Media and their partner, the Democrat Party, is doing everything within its semi-considerable power (it used to be greater!) to inflame the CoronaVirus situation, far beyond what the facts would warrant.” – Donald J. Trump March 9, 2020 The day before that tweet, the CDC confirmed 537 cases of coronavirus and 21 deaths. Five days later, there...
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April 3, 2020
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Hero Story
Heroes come in all forms: fire, police, paramedics, even everyday citizens. During this worldwide pandemic afflicting millions, we need heroes more than ever. As the top expert on infectious disease, Dr. Anthony Fauci has been praised as the most trusted man in the country due to his straight talk about the spread of the coronavirus which has now infected more...
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April 1, 2020
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How Do They Make That Call? – Conclusion
On Friday I wrote about the painful decision-making confronting physicians throughout the world who are not only facing a tsunami of coronavirus patients, but a shortage of critical supplies including ventilators, devices that provide air to those who are unable to breathe on their own. Ethical decision-making goes back as far as Chinese philosopher Confucius, who advised, “What you do...
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March 30, 2020