Journalism – Page 30

Older Americans are risking coronavirus exposure to get their medications

4Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

Older Americans are risking coronavirus exposure to get their medications

It’s been nearly a month since the U.S. government began urging older Americans to stay home to avoid exposure to the new coronavirus. That means many older adults may be running out of their usual 30-day supplies of medication. As the pandemic continues to spread, they increasingly face a difficult challenge: how to get the medications they need without putting themselves at risk. As health services researchers at the University of Michigan, we recently conducted a national survey to see how Americans over age 65 were responding to that dilemma. The results should be a call to action, both for older adults and for those who care about them. A national survey shines light on risky choices The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends that older adults and anyone with chronic ...

With Boris Johnson in intensive care, who runs the UK?

4Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

Journalism

With Boris Johnson in intensive care, who runs the UK?

Boris Johnson – who was admitted to intensive care on April 6 with worsening symptoms of COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus – is not the first British prime minister to experience a life-threatening bout of ill health. Winston Churchill suffered a mild heart attack in 1941 and a much more serious stroke in 1953. In both cases, he successfully kept his illnesses secret from Parliament, the press and the public. Prime ministers have even died in office, although the last to do so was Henry John Temple, Viscount Palmerston, in 1865. In response, the Liberal Party simply selected Lord John Russell, Earl Russell, to succeed Palmerston. Unlike Churchill and the unfortunate Palmerston, Johnson has fallen ill in an era of social media and 24-hour news. In the U.S., the 25th A...

Stuck at home with your partner? Look to retirees for how to make it work

4Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

Journalism

Stuck at home with your partner? Look to retirees for how to make it work

Across the country an unprecedented number of couples are suddenly spending every waking and sleeping hour of the day with one another. That’s what many older retired couples do too, even when there isn’t a pandemic. Their experiences are worth listening to, because many psychology studies find that marriages among the Medicare-eligible set are the happiest of any cohort across the life span. A review of the research reveals a U-shaped pattern of marital happiness over the life cycle. Early marriage features many positive aspects interlaced with a lot of conflict, while older couples enjoy the highest levels of companionship with low levels of conflict. Midlife couples who are raising children are at the bottom of the U. They tend to see a plunge in their enjoyment of one another, along ...

How Mandela stayed fit: from his ‘matchbox’ Soweto home to a prison cell

4Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

Journalism

How Mandela stayed fit: from his ‘matchbox’ Soweto home to a prison cell

The spread of the coronavirus has forced millions all over the world to retreat to base and abandon outdoor exercise and gym sessions. If they own a big house and garden, it’s manageable, but many live in shacks, cramped houses or tiny high-rise flats. How can they avoid going to seed during lockdown? Gavin Evans takes a look at how former boxer and South African liberation struggle icon Nelson Mandela adapted while incarcerated in a tiny cell on Robben Island. February 15, 1990: Nelson Mandela wakes as always at 5am and begins his hour-long exercise routine. The difference this time is that instead of a prison cell, his gym is the front room of his “matchbox” house – so-called for its small size – at 8115 Vilakazi Street, Soweto. And soon he’ll be besieged by journalists, well-wishers, d...

Bob Dylan brings links between JFK assassination and coronavirus into stark relief

4Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

Journalism, VIDEO REELS

Bob Dylan brings links between JFK assassination and coronavirus into stark relief

Over the past few weeks, the coronavirus has turned the country’s cultural spigot off, with sports suspended, museums closed and movies postponed. But the virus hasn’t stopped Bob Dylan, who, on the evening of March 26, released “Murder Most Foul,” a 17-minute long song about the Kennedy assassination. Many have pondered the timing. So have I. I’m a Kennedy scholar writing a book about how television handled coverage of the Kennedy assassination over a traumatic four-day “black weekend,” as it was called. I’ve also explored how Americans responded to the sudden upending of national life with the murder of a popular and uniquely telegenic president. NBC News anchor David Brinkley, as he signed off that first night, called Kennedy’s death “just too much, too ugly and too fast.” The corona...

How high will unemployment go? During the Great Depression, 1 in 4 Americans were out of work

2Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

Journalism, WORK

How high will unemployment go? During the Great Depression, 1 in 4 Americans were out of work

The U.S. unemployment rate climbed from a half-century low of 3.5% to 4.4% in March – and is expected to go a lot higher. But could the rate, as some predict, surpass the 25% joblessness the U.S. experienced at the peak of the Great Depression? CC BY-ND As a macroeconomist who has tracked the labor force for decades, I’ve been wondering about this myself. There are actually two figures the Bureau of Labor Statistics uses to estimate employment levels in the U.S. One is the unemployment rate, which comes from the Current Population Survey. The U.S. Census Bureau contacts about 60,000 randomly selected households every month to get an estimate of this rate. The other is an estimate of how many nonfarm jobs were lost or created in the month. The Bureau of Labor Statistics creates these fi...

What Hundreds Of Prison Gang Members Had To Say About Life Behind Bars

2Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

IN OTHER NEWS, Journalism

What Hundreds Of Prison Gang Members Had To Say About Life Behind Bars

The United States incarcerates a larger proportion of its citizens than any other developed country in the world, with around 1.5 million people serving time in prison. But to anyone who doesn’t work or live in a facility, life behind bars largely remains a mystery. The public gets a glimpse of life on the inside only when there are riots, executions or scandals. As criminologists, we spent nine months interviewing over 800 prisoners in Texas in 2016. They told us about their lives before and during prison, as well as their impending return to the community, a journey shared by over 600,000 people each year. We also learned about a significant reality in prisons: gangs. Our new book pulls back the curtain on how gangs compete for control and structure prison life. Gangs wield power behi...

4Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

COVID-19, HEALTH & WELLNESS, Journalism

What to know about telemedicine

Telehealth and telemedicine are garnering increasing attention as high-tech avenues through which to deliver care at a distance. The American Academy of Family Physicians supports both and clarifies the two terms: “Telehealth is different from telemedicine in that it refers to a broader scope of remote health care services than telemedicine. Telemedicine refers specifically to remote clinical services, while telehealth can refer to remote non-clinical services.” The Washington, D.C.-based Robert Graham Center reported, citing research published last March in the Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association, that Americans experiencing geographical or time constraint challenges, for example, may increasingly pursue health care access through a Wi-Fi/internet-connected device i...

National Guard joins the coronavirus response – 3 questions answered

4Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

COVID-19, HEALTH & WELLNESS, Journalism, VIDEO REELS

National Guard joins the coronavirus response – 3 questions answered

As a military organization divided into 50 distinct parts that can be commanded by either the president or state governors, the National Guard is perhaps the least understood branch of the U.S. armed forces. Despite its complexity – or perhaps because of it – the National Guard is taking the lead role in the military’s response to the coronavirus outbreak crisis. As many as 10,000 National Guard members have already been activated to help communities around the country, with many more expecting a call-up soon. People may know, from TV ads or other brief appearances in the media, that National Guard members are part-time citizen-soldiers, but not much else. As a longtime National Guard attorney and military law professor, I can explain a bit more about how the National Guard works. Ads l...

How SNAP can help people during hard economic times like these

2Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

IN OTHER NEWS, Journalism

How SNAP can help people during hard economic times like these

A record number of Americans are seeing their hours cut or losing their jobs due to the initial economic repercussions of the coronavirus pandemic. How will millions of newly jobless families keep putting food on the table? They might get some help from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. The nation’s largest anti-hunger system helped about 35 million low-income people buy groceries in 2019, down from a peak of over 47 million in 2013 in the aftermath of the Great Recession. After repeatedly trying to scale back SNAP the White House recently agreed to Congress’s efforts to ramp it back up. The Families First Act, which President Donald Trump signed into law on March 18, included an additional US$1 billion in funding for other nutrition programs and will let more people enroll ...