Research & Rescue

Salon: Chile was ready for quake, Haiti wasn't

The difference between today's earthquake in Chile demonstrates the increased adaptability and resistance to disaster that comes with wealth. If we want to help developing nations, we have to give them the infrastructure and self-reliance to weather this kind of devastation.

Chile is wealthier and infinitely better prepared, with strict building codes, robust emergency response and a long history of handling seismic catastrophes. No living Haitian had experienced a quake at home when the Jan. 12 disaster crumbled their poorly constructed buildings...

...Survivors of Haiti's quake described abject panic -- much of it well-founded as buildings imploded around them. Many Haitians grabbed cement pillars only to watch them crumble in their hands. Haitians were not schooled in how to react -- by sheltering under tables and door frames, and away from glass windows.

Chileans, on the other hand, have homes and offices built to ride out quakes, their steel skeletons designed to sway with seismic waves rather than resist them...

Read the rest of the article at www.salon.com

Poirot Cat

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How genetics works

via 9gag.com

News Dots

I am pretty darned geeked about this news visualization tool over at Slate. It works much like Pearl Trees and links news topics that have been covered in a given day but, beyond that, when you click on a node, a list of relevant new stories appears on the right. To access the tool, click through on the static link below or the Read More link below the graphic.

Like Kevin Bacon's co-stars, topics in the news are all connected by degrees of separation. To examine how every story fits together, News Dots visualizes the most recent topics in the news as a giant social network. Subjects—represented by the circles below—are connected to one another if they appear together in at least two stories, and the size of the dot is proportional to the total number of times the subject is mentioned.

Read more at slatest.slate.com

House passes bill to gives Hawaiian Native Sovereign Powers

In better news from the House of Representatives, the house voted to give Native Hawaiians control over their land, health and educational systems, and governmental systems similar to those of Native Americans. There is more of a possibility of reclaiming of public lands, as well. They will not be able to open casinos as part of the powers given. As you might imagine, it is expected that there will be a fight against this in the senate.

Read more at AOL News

US Congress Extends Patriot Act without Privacy Improvements

What? Huh? "The White House's Democratic Allies"? I would submit that when 162 of your party votes to retain the provisions you campaigned against (and 5 others didn't vote), either you don't have many allies on your own side or none of you ever meant to repeal the privacy provisions.

WASHINGTON - US lawmakers voted to extend key parts of the Patriot Act law enacted after the September 11th attacks without adding privacy safeguards sought by the White House's Democratic allies.

The US House of Representatives, following the Senate, voted 315-97 to renew the counter-terrorism tools, sending the legislation to President Barack Obama to sign into law.

Read the rest at www.commondreams.org

Which supplements really work? An interactive guide to evidence

A static image is presented below. Click through to the Boing Boing article. They have a nice summary. Alternatively, you can click here to Information Is Beautiful 

via www.boingboing.net

How Millennial Are You? Results

Your Millennial score is 46!

The higher your score, the more you have in common with members of the Millennial generation.

via pewresearch.org

Tech failure makes UN miss health targets

If you are one the many people doing awareness campaigns or writing letters for Bread for the World and like-minded organizations (as my husband and I have done for years), you might be interested and dismayed to know that the target for the Millennium Development Goals is far from being reached. Much of the blame lies in the failure of both government and business to leverage new technologies to address health and hunger issues worldwide.

"We are actually going to admit that we are way off achieving these targets and particularly on health," Principal Adviser to the United Nations Office for Partnership Denis Gilhooly said.

Mr Gilhooly said the three health-related goals of the Millennium development project - child mortality, maternal health and infectious diseases - were most at risk of missing their targets as developed and developing nations failed to leverage information communication technology to redress failings and high service costs in current health systems.

"Health is the biggest challenge because it underpins everything. The problem is that in the health sector we are living in silos. The doctors are one of the real problems because they are incredibly resistant to technological change and moving forward. There are also data and confidentiality problems that are inherent in health," Mr Gilhooly said.

This quote, also by Mr. Gilhooly, is really the crux of the issue, in my opinion:

"We have to get away from thinking of mobile as a cash cow and start seeing it as a social and economic enabler for the whole economy."

Read the whole story: www.theaustralian.com.au

E-Health Gains Traction in Developing Countries

Information technology has come more slowly to the area of health care perhaps than some other fields. But the field of e-health, as it's called, is moving forward, and some of the most notable advances are happening in developing countries.

E-health can be as complicated as a national database of medical records or as simple as a daily text message reminding you to take your medicine.

The journal Health Affairs devotes its February issue to "E-Health in the Developing World," focusing on countries where mobile phone use is skyrocketing and where clinics and hospitals are not encumbered by entrenched systems and procedures.

Read the rest at Voice of America's website: www1.voanews.com