News and Issues

"The American Academy of Pediatrics warns that gun violence also carries long-term physical and mental health consequences. The data does not surprise Stephanie Chao, MD, pediatric surgeon and trauma medical director at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital Stanford and assistant professor of the Surgery Division of Pediatric Surgery at Stanford Medicine. She recently appeared on A Little More Conversation with news podcaster Ben O’Hara-Byrne to discuss what it’s like for pediatric surgeons to treat young victims of gun violence. In the podcast, Dr. Chao says that firearm injuries in young patients are not generally from school or gang-related shootings, but from incidents in the home." more »

"The reported amount of unpaid medical bills among older adults increased by 20 percent between 2019 and 2020, from $44.8 billion to $53.8 billion. Yet older adults reported fewer doctor visits and lower out-of-pocket expenses in 2020 than in 2019. Older adults face a complex billing system with a high likelihood of errors and inaccurate bills. Complaints submitted to the CFPB involving Medicare commonly cite inaccurate billing as a source of unpaid medical bills in collections. Consumers who reported having multiple sources of insurance were especially likely to note problems with inaccurate billing." more »

Rose Mula Writes: Some people never leave home without their American Express card; I never leave home without a camera. Digitized pictures of the twenty-five countries and forty-plus states of America that I’ve visited since my first tour of exotic New Hampshire constantly flash on my computer monitors and digital frames throughout my home, helping me relive the magic every day. The galleries on my tablet, IPod, and phone teem with images of everything and everyone I love. more »

"Best known for her 1972 campaign for President, where she received over 400,000 votes in multiple primaries, she always represented the views of her constituents in Brooklyn – poor, Black and disadvantaged. Neither the first woman to run for President nor the only woman to run that year, her campaign was highly publicized at a time when the emerging women’s liberation movement was making waves. It put her into the history books." more »