Credit: Stylee (via Flickr)

The biggest healthcare overhaul in decades has been endorsed recently by the US House of Representatives and the bill finally moves to the Senate, with 219 Democrats and 1 Republican voting for it. The lone Republican supporter was Anh Cao of Louisiana. Thirty-nine Democrats voted against the bill.

The bill could only be passed after an amendment was included, which imposes strict bans on using federal funds to finance abortion. This amendment was put forward by the anti-abortion Democrats and their Republican supporters. It was only after that dozens of Democrats came forward to back the health care package.

The anti-abortion amendment was put forth by the Democrat of Michigan, Rep. Bart Stupak, which read, “No funds authorized or appropriated by this Act … may be used to pay for any abortion or to cover any part of the costs of any health plan that includes coverage of abortion.”

Exception can only be made in cases where the woman could die if the abortion is not performed, or if the pregnancy is a result of incest or rape.  Opponents feel that this amendment would affect lower-income working-class women by drastically reducing access to abortion.

Democrat of California, Nancy Pelosi, who was a longtime supporter of abortion rights, talked to Democratic abortion rights advocates in an attempt to gain their support for the amendment, in order to get the bill passed, but many of them walked out of her office because of the strong anti-abortion suggestions in the bill.

However, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, issued a statement urging Catholics to lend their support to the healthcare bill, which they said was “unambiguously pro-life.”

President Obama in a speech after the vote said, “Thanks to the hard work of the House, we are just two steps away from achieving health insurance reform in America.  Now the US Senate must follow suit and pass its version of the legislation.  I am absolutely confident it will.”

This bill is expected to expand coverage to nearly all Americans and eradicate insurance practices such as not covering people with pre-existing conditions.

While Democrats are excited with the outcome, most Republicans criticized the bill, talking about the new taxes on the wealthy and they also expressed that this was excessive interference by the government in the private health sector.

According to Republican representative, Roy Blunt, “We can’t afford this Bill. It’s a 2,000 page road map to a government takeover of healthcare.”

The Republican National Committee released a statement, “Today with help from their liberal House allies, President Obama and Nancy Pelosi finally got what they have been creating behind closed doors these past months — a government-run health care experiment that will increase families’ health care costs, increase the deficit, increase taxes on small businesses and the middle class, and cut Medicare,” the statement said.

This overhaul is expected to spark the biggest changes ever in the $2.5 trillion US health-care system since the beginning of the Medicare government health program in 1965 for the elderly.

The bill will also lower the federal deficit by $104 billion by the year 2019.  These savings would be a result of deep cuts to federal programs, especially to Medicare. The bill includes a mandate that individuals and families have to obtain insurance or end up paying a penalty, which guarantees funneling of millions of dollars to insurance companies in the form of new customers.

While insurers will not have a right to deny coverage or charge more for premiums for individuals with pre-existing conditions, there are no restrictions whatsoever on what they can charge overall.

Many are of the opinion that while Obama took a stance for universal health care during his presidential bid; in just one year, he now supports a legislation that would leave millions of Americans without insurance. Instead of a right of the people to healthcare, it would give the insurance companies the right to collect premiums and charge what they wish to.

When will the bill turn into law?  This remains to be seen.  It’s not clear when the Senate will vote on this health care legislation. If the Senate passes its bill, then the House and Senate bills will have to be reconciled into one document and there will be voting on that again.

Let there be no doubt, President Obama has lost the health care debate. Even if Obama and the Congressional Democrats are able to muster up the political strength to pass health care legislation, the costs will have been too high, and even in victory, the President will have lost. His presidency may very well never regain the sense of optimism and positivity that trailed his first months in office.

The central mistake of the health care debate, and the one the administration will look back on with regret, was the administration’s decision to outsource the actual writing of the bill to Congress. Without any clear direction beyond the President’s insistence that any bill include a “public option,” the debate shifted from the quiet dignified end of Washington to the madhouse known as the Capitol. Once there, the various factions and coalitions each worked to produce their very own fairytales. What emerged was a cacophony of decades-old wishlists, radical reforms and special-interest agendas that even supporters of health care reform couldn’t view seriously.

Lost in the noise on the capitol were a series of true reforms, such as tort reform, that were suppressed rather than ignored. Anyone who wants to reform health care without even talking about tort reform is not being serious. Congressmen like Henry Waxman don’t want to reform health care, they want to remake our system entirely, and they want the government firmly in control. In this way, they simply turn people into products.

Consider this report from Kimberly Strassel of the Wall Street Journal regarding Rep. Waxman’s (D-Van Nuys) tactics:

He ignored requests to wait to see if the Senate could produce, instead forcing a painful floor vote on legislation prior to the July Fourth recess. Members went home to be brutalized by constituents and local employers.

This high-handed treatment already had Blue Dogs loaded for bear, not that Mr. Waxman heeded warnings. When he again ducked into secret meetings to craft health-care legislation, a group of 45 members sent a letter complaining. “We don’t want a briefing on the bill after it’s written. We want to help write it,” declared Arkansas’s Mike Ross, chair of the Blue Dog health-care task force. Rebuffed, conservative Democrats delineated for Mr. Waxman what they saw as an acceptable bill. Rebuffed again, they asked Mr. Waxman to let the Senate go first. Rebuffed yet again, Mr. Ross took his case to the nation, with a revolt that has beat down the House bill for weeks.

Mr. Waxman’s subsequent negotiations with these members—in which he reportedly showed little concern for the political challenges of anyone outside of Los Angeles—made matters worse. Blue Dogs stormed out of one session, with Louisiana’s Charlie Melancon bellowing: “I’ve been lied to. We have not had legitimate negotiations.” Mr. Waxman, for his part, declared he was “not going to let [Blue Dogs] empower Republicans to control the committee.”

When this is the kind of behavior we get from our elected leaders we should not be surprised when congressional approval levels are so low. The most recent Gallup poll showed an approval rating of just over 30%, and more importantly a disapproval rating of 62%. After the automobile and finance industry bailouts, a highly partisan stimulus package that only 3 Republicans deigned to vote for, a massive budget, the health care reform package was simply the straw that broke the camel’s back. It was too much too soon, and the American people reacted. The town hall meetings, though fraught with their own imperfections, remain the only outlet the vast majority of American citizens have left to vent their frustrations.

The summer has seen countless images of congressmen being shouted down by their constituents. What is even more telling than the shouting is the shock and awe of the elected leaders. They simply do not understand why the people aren’t on board.

This is what they don’t get.

The American people are not on board because deep down they know that health care reform was never an attempt at reform, but instead a massive and risky overhaul, a land-grab by the federal government into one area of their lives that is supremely sacred, that of personal health.

No sane person defends our current health care system as a model of efficiency or fairness. It’s not and it needs to be fixed. But adding another giant entitlement program onto the obligations of our already beaten federal treasury is not a solution. Not at time when Social Security and Medicare are already threatening the country with insolvency.

The Democrats and, in particular, President Obama, failed to link their health care reform plans to the larger issues facing America. They simply seized a rare opportunity at almost-unchecked power to install a fairytale dream of theirs. American’s may never be so easily fooled again, at least not on Mr. Obama’s watch.

Credit: Mario Alberto Magallanes Trejo (via Sxc.hu)

Offices can be tense places. You might be surrounded by bright fluorescent lights, people talking, the noise of machinery, bosses looking over your shoulder, deadlines, or a constantly ringing phone. How can you deal with office stress? You might not be able to leave your cubicle or office. You would need to do something discreet — breaking out a massage table won’t quite cut it. You probably couldn’t even get away with kicking your feet up on the desk for a while. Fortunately, there’s an easy solution for office stress release. All you need is a tennis ball.

Here are some ways you can use a simple tennis ball to relieve office stress and get through the work day feeling better than ever:

1. Hand Reflexology

Hand Reflexology Chart - Credit: Michael Coté (via Flickr) Click to Enlarge

I’m a big fan of reflexology. If you aren’t familiar with it, in simple terms you put pressure on reflex points that correspond to other parts of your body. It can be used to help you relax or even decrease pain. For example, I use hand reflexology when I get a headache or toothache. It doesn’t stop the pain entirely, but it eliminates it while the pressure is held, and it always feels a bit duller when released. Look at the chart here to find out what areas of your hands correspond to different areas of your body in hand reflexology.

While you won’t be able to target specific areas as well with a tennis ball, they can give a more general hand reflexology massage to relieve overall tension from office stress. It’s very easy to do. Just take a tennis ball and roll it between your hands. You can roll it between your palms or you can use one hand to gently roll the tennis ball over the outside of the other hand.

When to do it: This simple massage can be done any time your hands aren’t otherwise occupied and when it won’t cause a distraction to others (like in a meeting). It’s a great activity to do while you’re on the phone or listening to messages. If you only have one hand free, you can even roll the tennis ball between your free hand and your desk instead.

2. Stress Ball

Squeeze a tennis ball in your hand to relieve office stress.

You’ve probably seen stress balls, a popular office stress relief tool. They’re sometimes filled with sand or more of a gel-like substance and the outer material is often rubbery. People seem to love them. However, they’re not always easy to find when you want to buy one, they can be more expensive than other options, they can break and make a mess, and they’re easy to lose.

A tennis ball is a natural alternative. They’re firmer, but not as firm as other sports balls, and they have a “warmer” comfortable feel due to the cloth-like texture. They’re also abundant (you can easily buy them in bulk), and they’re very inexpensive.

To use a tennis ball as a makeshift stress ball to relieve office stress, just pick up one and give it a squeeze. It couldn’t be any easier than that!

When to do it: Your tennis ball stress ball is another ideal office stress relief tactic when you’re on the telephone. Because a tennis ball is relatively firm, they’re great for getting out some aggression too. To do that, squeeze the tennis ball as hard as you can, and hold it that way for a few seconds. You can use this stress relief tactic discreetly by holding the tennis ball under your desk.

3. Foot Massage

Is there anything quite as relaxing as a good foot massage? For me, it’s one of the best ways to relax when I’m feeling tense, especially if I’m carrying that tension in my muscles. But giving yourself a foot massage in the office isn’t generally feasible.

Throw constricting office footwear into the mix, and your feet could probably use a break. No worries. Pull out that trusted tennis ball (or two) and give yourself a rolling foot massage hands-free! Just roll your feet back and forth over the tennis ball, gently or firmly (doing whatever feels comfortable for you).

If you find a tender spot on your foot (such as your plantar fascia — the tissue that creates the arch in your foot), you can stop rolling and put some direct and steady pressure there for a few extra seconds. A tennis ball foot massage might sound simple, but it feels amazing. I do this daily and wholeheartedly recommend it! I find this gives me a deeper muscle massage in the feet than even a professional has (and it was a physical therapist who turned me onto this trick when my plantar fascia was tense after being in a walking cast for weeks).

Here’s a tip for you: If you find a regular tennis ball to be too flexible for a good foot massage, visit your local pet store. You’ll often find tennis balls meant for dogs, and they can be firmer. You also might be able to find different sizes there.

While designed for athletes, the video below gives you some great methods for using a tennis ball to massage your feet. You can do these exercises while sitting, making them ideal for the office. The video is from Rich Poley, author of Self-Massage for Athletes.

When to do it: You can give yourself a tennis ball foot massage to relieve office stress any time you can kick off your shoes under your desk (generally when you’re alone). I find it’s most effective when standing, but that isn’t possible in most work environments. It still works quite well while sitting at your desk.

All of these office stress relief tips are extremely simple, and very affordable. For no more than a few dollars you can ease muscle tension and calm your nerves. You’ll be the envy of your office when your coworkers see how relaxed and composed you are. Keep it your little secret or spread the word — the choice is yours. But now is the perfect time to get started. A happy worker is a productive worker, and who knew all it would take was a little tennis ball to brighten your work day?

With the fuel rates touching the skies, the demand for commercialized biofuel has increased and is felt to be the most viable alternative. The aviation industry has taken a significant step forward in adopting biofuel. The newly created Sustainable Aviation Fuel Users Group has revealed that it requires the members to use biofuels that are only produced from nonfood sources and that have minimal environmental impact.

Any plant that produces fat can be used to produce biofuel. The most common feedstock for producing biofuel have been corn, sunflower, rape, sugar cane, palm etc.

Now scientists have turned to making oil from coconuts and soybeans. This biofuel is supposed to be similar to kerosene that is derived from oil.

Scientists at the Energy and Environmental Research Center (EERC) at the University of Dakota produced fuel from these plant oils. This fuel is said to have a similar energy density content and even freezing point, which is -47 degrees Celsius.

People in the know reveal that this is no small feat and could prove to be great as jet fuel. This oil is processed in a manner that it contains the same hydrocarbon molecules that are present in petroleum fuel.

The process involves heating the plant oils in the presence of an undisclosed catalyst to create several petroleum products. The cost of this processing is said to be less expensive than that of refining petroleum oil as there are no contaminants like sulfur.

The exact price tag for this biofuel has not yet been determined and they say that it will depend on the cost that goes into growing these crops.

As of now, only a few gallons have been brewed. Scientists say it is going to take time as the total jet fuel consumed everyday in the U.S. is more than 60 million gallons, which is a huge 225 million liters.

Several airlines have shown interest in biofuels recently. Nuts picked from the rainforests of Amazon helped fuel the world’s first commercial airline flight, which was partly powered by biofuel. Virgin Atlantic, earlier this year, has completed the world’s first biofuel-powered test flight of one of its commercial aircrafts. It flew a jumbo jet to Amsterdam from London with one of the tanks filled with biofuel that contained coconut oil. The airline said the biofuel was 25 percent of the total fuel for this first test flight. This marks a breakthrough for the airline industry as a whole. A jet that was completely powered by biodiesel has also stayed aloft for more than 30 minutes. Of course, they had to use a special device in order to ensure the fuel did not freeze at high altitude.

According to Sustainable Aviation Fuel Users Group, the aviation fuels that can be used are:

• The ones that come from crops that are non-competitive with food and do not spoil the drinking water resources.
• That produce less greenhouse gases; during the growth, harvesting, processing and when during use.
• Crops that do not require involuntary displacement of population.
• Those that do not require clearing of conservation areas or native ecosystems.

Currently, 95 liters of bio-jet fuel is in the process of being produced for ground testing in a jet engine, as early as next month.

This biofuel push is being implemented with the support from the Natural Resources Defense Council and the World Wildlife Fund and Natural Resources.

Since there is less competition to create biofuels for jets, the market is right now huge for production of biometry. There is also likely to be more demand for biofuels for jets, also because European countries limit the carbon emissions or tax the airline industry, which accounts for 2 percent of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions.

Biofuel for jets is in its initial stages and a lot of advances are inevitable in the coming years. Experts say that something good has come out of the rising oil prices, and that is – environmental awareness.

It had to happen one day with people realizing the harmful effects of carbonated drinks and the health drinks slowly taking over the cola market. One of the Cola Kings takes a plunge into the natural product market. The supermarket aisles are now going to be filled up with Pepsi Raw, a new carbonated drink from Pepsi, supposedly “natural.”

Pepsi says that it has replaced corn syrup with cane sugar, thus reducing the calorie content from 120 calories to 90 calories. Pepsi advertises it as a “natural” drink that contains no artificial preservatives, flavorings, colors or sweeteners.

The regular Pepsi contains sugar, artificial colorings, caffeine, phosphoric acid, citric acid, fructose corn syrup and natural flavors. The new Pepsi Raw is said to contain apple extract, coffee leaf, plain caramel coloring, tartaric acid from grapes, cane sugar, gum Arabic from acacia trees and sparkling water. It is pale in color and does not have as much fizz as the other cola brands.

Nobody expected Pepsi’s 100-year-old arch rival, Coke, to sit around appreciating Pepsi’s “innovative ideas.” Coco-Cola’s answer is the launch of a world-wide marketing campaign recently, promoting its “natural-ness.” Coca-Cola, which has always tried to create an aura of mystery around its formula, now revealed a little of its secret by saying the drink has never contained anything artificial and remained the same for more than 122 years.

The reason Coca-Cola is stressing on this is because it had to face a bad situation in the 1980s when it tried to tinker with the formula, and now the public perception of the drink is that it is unnatural and unhealthy.

Coke’s marketing director says, “When we talked to consumers about Coke, we realized they didn’t know that it has no added preservatives or artificial flavors. We felt it was important to reassure Coke drinkers of this fact.”

To make sure consumers know their drink is safe, Coca-Cola Great Britain will add a printed line that reads, “no added preservatives or artificial flavors,” on all the cans and bottles that are sold in Britain. Coke has also created a new website, letsgettogether.co.uk, where all consumer questions are answered. Although, they say that they answer all questions related to their formula too, when a consumer asked them about the ingredients, the response was that all the ingredients are listed on the can or bottle. So, that’s how much of the formula is actually given away.

The list of ingredients mentioned on Coca-Cola is carbonated water, sugar, caffeine, phosphoric acid, caramel for color and “natural flavorings.” This website is part of their “Pemberton” campaign, which is meant to let consumers know that Coca-Cola does not contain and has never in the past contained any added preservatives or artificial flavors.

The popularity of soft drinks has decreased in the recent times and more and more people, even the once Pepsi and Coke addicts, are shifting towards healthier alternatives, such as herbal teas and pure water. Health specialists insist that people reduce consumption of carbonated drinks as they are bad for health. But this attitude brings the soft drink companies under a lot of pressure and they go all out to woo their customers back in every possible way.

Many people feel that these campaigns do not make any difference, including the Pemberton campaign by Coca-Cola. Where soft drinks are concerned, the general feeling is that nobody goes around looking for a soft drink with no additives. They either have a soft drink or do not. It is as simple as that.

The intention of Pepsi and Coke manufacturers, after all, is to seduce consumers into buying their products. They are at each other’s throats at all times, and with Pepsi Raw, Pepsi hopes to knock its rival Coca-Cola off its perch and compete for a greater share of the cola market and at the same time capitalize on the increasing consumer demand for anything natural. Experts say that in the process, these companies will do anything to make consumers feel they are safe, even if it means making “tall” claims. For the consumer, can anything be better than the freshness of sparkling water or freshly squeezed juice?

The struggle for food is not new to man. Man has battled hunger throughout the centuries, from the early hunters who tracked mammoths to the first farmers who scratched the soil to coax the grains to grow. Bible chronicles one famine after another and the Romans prayed to Olympus for food. However, World War II saw man finally win the battle over hunger, with bumper harvests in the U.S. creating food surpluses.

U.S. is no longer the bottomless cornucopia that it once was and with food supplies dwindling, the public have to face the alarming fact of increasing food prices. Even in other countries, food prices have risen higher then they have in the past few years and this is leading to violent protests in several places. Analysts feel that bringing down food prices may take at least a decade.

Amidst all this chaos, comes the comment by the US Secretary of State, Condoleeza Rice, saying that improving diets in India and China is the main reason for the price of food grains going up throughout the world.

This theory raised many eyebrows in these countries, as they felt it questioned the right of people in developing countries to eat a better diet, when they are able to afford it. They feel that eating good and healthy food becomes the right of all human beings, irrespective of where they lived in this world. Just because they could not afford it earlier, does not mean that they starve even when they are able to buy food.

The world food crisis, being called the “silent tsunami” is being attributed to distribution issues, rising oil prices, and the unintended consequence of the alternate fuels effort.

Also Rice’s comment that suggested a cap on the exports to India and China, was taken with a pinch of salt. Even Japan, which is a major food exporting country criticized the ban on food exports by some countries and promised to take it up with the WHO.

Rice said, “We obviously have to look at places where production seems to be declining and declining to the point that people are actually putting export caps on the amount of food. Now some of that is not so much declining production as apparently improvement in the diets of people, for instance, in China and India, and then pressures to keep food inside the country. So, that’s another element that we have to look at.”

One factor that everyone agrees is affecting the food supplies and people in poor countries, is the production of biofuels instead of hydrocarbons. Producing fuel from plants is said to be greener than drilling oil and biofuels are cleaner when they burn; however, producing biofuel entails more investment into these crops and less investment in food crops, resulting in rising prices of foods, which is showing a huge impact in poor countries. The area that is used for biofuel is on the increase and thousands of farmers have been lured away from growing crops for food.

Rice supplies have reached their lowest point in decades and the price is the highest in 20 years. Even the global supply of wheat is far lower than it has been in the past 50 years, and alarmingly only five weeks worth of world consumption is at hand.

In countries, where supermarket shelves are often cleared at the first intimation of snow or a low-grade hurricane, this food crisis is yet another call to hoard up food.

All this talk about food began when a Wall Street Journal shocked people by recommending that Americans start stocking food to beat the rising prices.

Columnist Brett Arendts wrote, “I don’t want to alarm anybody, but maybe it’s time for Americans to start stockpiling food. No, this is not a drill. Food prices are already rising here much faster than the returns you are likely to get from keeping your money in a bank or money-market fund. And there are very good reasons to believe prices on the shelves are about to start rising a lot faster…”

Rising gas prices has been a common complaint for several months now but mounting grocery bills is something unforeseen and is the focus in a country, which has always thrived on cheap food.

You don’t have much if you don’t have your health. With obesity and related diseases on the rise as well as a huge portion of the population aging rapidly, the health industry is expanding to keep pace. Modern discoveries and emerging practices and formulas are keeping the medical field moving forward at a brisk pace.

Health care has moved far beyond a friendly family doctor or dentist. Most offices and businesses now specialize in high tech scientific findings or operations. Technicians in almost any field of medical technology must be heavily trained and certified to ensure they are up to the rigorous standards the industry demands.

Offices, service centers and hospitals must have access to the latest discoveries and equipment as well as the right software and equipment to handle more mundane tasks like patient records, billing and filing.

Software Solutions

There are software solutions for every industry and that includes health care. Patient information, appointments and records can be stored and archived digitally with ease, and web based solutions can offer patients access to critical lab information or just the ability to set up routine appointments online. Computers and software should be making the routine aspects of health care simpler on an almost daily basis.

Training and Supplies

To work in the medical field, extensive training is required at almost every level. From technical schools to medical colleges, resources exist to help satisfy every educational need. Even the best training is worthless without the supplies and equipment to back it up. You need the right uniforms, equipment and staff at all times to be successful.

Whether you need training in a new health care field or basic supplies and uniforms, the Health Care area has what you are looking for.