Category: Health

This Is Trumpism

For well over a decade there has been a wealth of articles and studies trying to explain Trump and all his biases and hatred…..I have posted most of them for I would like to make sense of this modern day phenom.

Right on cue there is yet another ‘explanation’….

It’s high time commentators stopped trying to shoehorn the American polity into a paradigm that doesn’t fit. Donald Trump’s brand of government is as new and unique as it is volatile and disturbing. Sometimes, history neither repeats nor rhymes. Sometimes, a whole new species bursts onto the scene.

What we’re seeing today with Trump isn’t dictatorship. Dictators control their countries. They don’t rely on the opposition party to pass budgets; they dictate where money is spent. They don’t get bludgeoned every hour in the press; they dominate the media. And they don’t have their key initiatives stymied in the courts; they control the judiciary.

Nor is this Nazism. Nazis don’t make Nazi salutes at rallies and then try (with mixed success) to downsize the government. Nazis make Nazi salutes at rallies and then go kill a bunch of innocent people. Nazis, moreover, don’t just slap tariffs on their neighbors. Nazis invade their neighbors.

This isn’t fascism, either. Fascists enforce a coherent vision of government through a murderous, totalitarian regime. They don’t flail around pursuing incoherent and contradictory policies that get blocked as frequently as they get implemented.

Sure, there are similarities between Trump’s presidency and these historical forms of government. Trump’s rhetoric, for example, is often lifted from the lips of history’s worst tyrants. His abuses of executive power, moreover, often resemble certain dictatorial techniques. But, overall, these political pegs don’t fit into the American hole. Having similarities with something is different from being the same thing. Both the mouse and the elephant have four legs and a tail.

No, what we have in America today is different. It’s new. It’s unprecedented. What we have in America today is Trumpism.

https://thefulcrum.us/donald-trump-leadership-style

I disagree that this a form of leadership….to me his government is a rudderless ship that is precariously close to the rocks of disaster.

On another hand….I personally think that Little Donny is not all there with his decision making capabilities…..the country is slow simmering on collapse and he spends too much time worrying about his golf game….but that aside this a meme going around about dementia.

Donald Trump is dealing with dementia during his second term as president, at least according to psychotherapist and author Dr. John Gartner.

Dr. Gartner has noted numerous symptoms Trump may be suffering from including his inability to “even finishing a sentence,” RadarOnline.com can reveal.

After previously claiming “there is absolutely no doubt” Trump has dementia, Dr. Gartner explained his reasoning to MindSite News in a new interview.

He said: “When we’re diagnosing dementia, what we need to see is a deterioration of someone’s own baseline of functioning. What we see that a lot of people don’t appreciate is that when Donald Trump was younger in the 1980s, he was actually quite articulate. He spoke in polished paragraphs; now he has difficulty even finishing a sentence.

“His thoughts were logical and related: now they’re tangential. He goes off on these ramblings where he is confabulating things – weird things in which he’ll talk about Venezuelans and mental hospitals, and then he’ll talk about sharks and batteries or the late, great Hannibal Lector and Silence of the Lambs.”

https://radaronline.com/p/trump-dementia-obvious-signs-suffering-from-alzheimers/

***Please understand that I am not claiming this is the definitive explanation only that it is being passed around….and I include it as an FYI for my visitors.***

Then we have some of his supporters….I know some that are claiming that they were duped for their vote….all I can do for these people is bust out in raucous laughter…they we told over and over and they chose to disregard the facts and vote for a person that lied to them on ever level.

I guess the old saying ‘Can’t Fix Stupid” is accurate to the nth degree.

Any thoughts you would like to share?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

A Good Screwing Awaits!

How many low income people are having their medical needs covered by Medicaid?  Many of these people bought into the hateful rhetoric and elected this person.

How will Trump and his GOP lackeys pay for some of the promises he made during the campaign….like the cost of his immigration policies and the the tax cuts he is so proud of these days?

Is The GOP prepared to screw over the very people that elect them?

You decide….

Republicans are reportedly prepared to cut Medicaid funding to pay for Donald Trump’s promised crackdown on immigration and to fund tax cuts that would mostly benefit the wealthy.

The GOP in the House and Senate have floated a series of ideas – many of which would target lower-income Americans – to cover the cost of extending tax cuts passed by Trump in 2017, the New York Times reported.

Among the proposals is a plan to reduce access to Medicaid, the government scheme which provides health insurance to low-income Americans, in a move which would cause 600,000 people to lose access to healthcare.

Trump has touted the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act as a key achievement of his first term. The legislation, which reduced the top corporate income tax rate from 35% to 21%, is set to expire at the end of 2025, and the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office has estimated extending it would add $4.6tn to the deficit.

House and Senate Republicans float ideas to pay for Trump’s immigration crackdown and to fund tax cuts

Republicans are reportedly prepared to cut Medicaid funding to pay for Donald Trump’s promised crackdown on immigration and to fund tax cuts that would mostly benefit the wealthy.

The GOP in the House and Senate have floated a series of ideas – many of which would target lower-income Americans – to cover the cost of extending tax cuts passed by Trump in 2017, the New York Times reported.

Among the proposals is a plan to reduce access to Medicaid, the government scheme which provides health insurance to low-income Americans, in a move which would cause 600,000 people to lose access to healthcare.

Trump has touted the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act as a key achievement of his first term. The legislation, which reduced the top corporate income tax rate from 35% to 21%, is set to expire at the end of 2025, and the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office has estimated extending it would add $4.6tn to the deficit.

On the campaign trail Trump repeatedly promised to make the 2017 tax cuts permanent, but with the 2025 deadline looming, Republicans are scrambling to find a way to fund that pledge – along with the money required for Trump’s desired crackdown on immigration.

Along with the Medicaid cut, which would introduce work requirements that would effectively strip 600,000 people of their healthcare coverage, Republicans are considering ending Medicaid for non-US citizens, and repealing Biden-era tax credits which are designed to reduce health costs, the New York Times reported.

A 50-page document being circulated among congressional Republicans also proposes taxing income from scholarships and fellowships, rolling back climate change efforts passed under the Biden administration, and raising taxes on people who can use a free gym in the workplace.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jan/23/republicans-medicaid-funding-trump

Instead of focusing on their own lives they instead backed some lying tool that promised to crackdown on people they hate…..and in no way would this make their lives better….and yet….

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Trumpcare Is Becoming A Bit Clearer

Us old farts have been holding our breath for Donny and his Magic Sharpie have not been too busy with our healthcare problem….but that is about to change….

Large health insurers saw their stocks pop earlier this week, after administration officials announced they would boost benchmark payment rates for Medicare Advantage plans by 5.1% this year — the largest such increase in a decade, and more than double the one first proposed by the Biden administration. The bump means carriers should pocket $25 billion in extra revenue, according to CMS.

The Trump administration was widely expected to be more friendly to Medicare Advantage plans, especially after it appointed Dr. Oz, who had a long record of promoting the private plans on his show, to head CMS. The new payments were reportedly finalized without the celebrity doctor’s input — he was only confirmed by the Senate late last week. But they could both boost insurers profits and help them pay for additional benefits that would attract patients.

The bump could also exacerbate concerns about Medicare Advantage overpayments, which were already expected to cost the government well over $1 trillion during the next decade. According to the administration, the benchmark rate was driven higher by updated estimates of Medicare Fee-for-Service costs, which underpin the formula the government uses to compensate private insurers that sell advantage plans. But Jeffries’ analyst David Windley suggested some politics were still at play.

Then there is the news on prescription drugs….

Trump may have backed down on his staggering round of “reciprocal” tariffs, but the world’s drug makers still have plenty to be nervous about when it comes to trade. On Tuesday, the president said he would impose “major” new import taxes on pharmaceuticals “very shortly.”

“And when they hear that, they will leave China. They will leave other places because they have to sell — most of their product is sold here, and they’re going to be opening up their plants all over the place,” he told the crowd at a dinner for the National Republican Congressional Committee.

yahoo.com)

I am sure with an idiot in charge of HHS , RFK,Jr, and Medicare under the watchful eye of that quack Oz this saga is far from over.

I will be watching and writing whenever something new hits the presses.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

The ‘Advantage’ Con

This is post for all my senior readers.

Daily we are bombarded by ads telling us all the ‘advantages’ of having Medicare Advantage plans….the problem is as I keep pointing out they are full of crap and are little more than a con job.

These plans taunt that we can get special coverage for hearing, vision and dental with these plans…..so how true is that?

As the privatized form of Medicare, Medicare Advantage plans advertise dental, vision, and hearing benefits not covered by traditional Medicare, but a recent analysis found that Medicare Advantage beneficiaries do not typically receive more of these supplemental services than traditional Medicare beneficiaries. Additionally, out-of-pocket spending was similar for most supplemental services.

The research led by a team from Mass General Brigham is published in JAMA Network Open.

“Medicare Advantage plans receive more money per beneficiary than traditional Medicare plans, but our findings add to the evidence that this increased cost is not justified,” said first author Christopher L. Cai, MD, who conducted this work as a resident in the Department of Internal Medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital.

For their study, Cai and his colleagues analyzed 2017–2021 data from two continuous surveys, the Medical Expenditure Panel Survey and the Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey. In total, the investigators assessed information on 76,557 Medicare beneficiaries.

Only 54.2% of Medicare Advantage beneficiaries were aware of having Medicare Advantage while just 54.3% were aware of having vision coverage. Medicare Advantage enrollees were no more likely to receive eye examinations, hearing aids, or eyeglasses than traditional Medicare enrollees.

Out-of-pocket expenses for supplemental benefits were similar or modestly lower for Medicare Advantage. Medicare Advantage and traditional Medicare enrollees paid $205.86 and $226.12, respectively, for eyeglasses (9.0% less for Medicare Advantage); $226.82 and $249.98, respectively for dental visits (9.3% less for Medicare Advantage); and no differences for optometry visits or durable (a proxy for ), after adjusting for demographics.

Nationwide, Medicare Advantage plans’ annual spending on vision, dental services, and durable medical equipment totaled $3.9 billion, while enrollees spent $9.2 billion out-of-pocket for these services and other private insurers covered $2.8 billion.

In contrast, Medicare Advantage plans received $37.2 billion dollars annually more than taxpayers would have spent if beneficiaries had enrolled in traditional Medicare, a cost that is partially intended to fund supplemental benefit use.

“Supplemental benefits are a major draw to Medicare Advantage, but our findings show that people enrolled in Medicare Advantage have no better access to extra services than people in traditional Medicare, and that much of the cost comes out of their own pockets,” said senior author Lisa Simon, MD, DMD, assistant professor in the Division of General and Internal Medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital

(medicalexpress.com)

These are profit generating cons…..yes I said ‘cons’….

The federal agency now headed by former television host Mehmet Oz announced Monday that it is substantially boosting payments to privately run Medicare Advantage plans, a boon for an industry notorious for overcharging taxpayers and denying patients necessary care.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) said it is jacking up payments to Medicare Advantage (MA) plans by more than 5% for 2026—an increase of over $25 billion. That’s more than double the increase proposed by the Biden administration.

Health insurance company stocks jumped in response to the news of the Trump administration’s payment hike, with shares of UnitedHealth Group—the largest provider of Medicare Advantage plans—rising more than 6% following the CMS statement.

Oz, whom the Republican-controlled Senate confirmed in a party-line vote last week, previously reported holding tens of millions of dollars worth of stock in companies with interests before CMS, including UnitedHealth.

Social Security Works, a progressive advocacy group that campaigns against Medicare Advantage, said Monday that “privatized Medicare plans are denying patients the care they need, while defrauding the government of billions a year.”

“Trump is giving them even more taxpayer money,” the group wrote on social media. “Trump-Musk don’t care about ‘efficiency.’ They care about stealing our money.”

https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-medicare-advantage-payments

Please research these plans if you are considering taking one…..arm yourself with information before you talk to the fat cat behind the insurance desk.

Do not fall prey to these vultures……it will cost more of your money and provide little coverage…..you have been warned.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

This Is For My ‘Boomer’ Buddies

Many of my friends voted for Trump in the last election and many are retired and depend on Medicare for their health issues…..so I would like to let them know what their vote will do for the medical necessities….

As part of a flurry of executive actions on the first day of his second White House term, President Donald Trump on Monday rescinded an order signed by his predecessor that aimed to develop programs to lower prescription drug prices in the United States—where residents pay far more for medications than people in peer countries.

News of Trump’s rollback of Executive Order 14087—titled Lowering Prescription Drug Costs for Americans—was buried amid dozens of other rescissions the president ordered shortly following his inauguration.

The decision to scrap Executive Order 14087 brings to a halt several pilot programs undertaken by the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation, including an experiment that involved offering generic medications for a $2 copay to Medicare Part D recipients.

“This act is a good indication of how Trump will approach lower drug prices,” Social Security Works, a progressive advocacy group, wrote in response to Trump’s rescission of President Joe Biden’s executive order.

https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-drug-prices

There is more on this subject…..more screwing to come?

Donald Trump has rescinded yet another Biden-era executive order, and drug prices could skyrocket as a result.

The president recently tossed out executive order 14087, a measure taken by Biden in order to cap certain generic drug prices at $2 for Medicare recipients, improve access to expensive cell and gene therapies for Medicaid beneficiaries, and make new medical procedures more widely available by reducing the evidence gathering process required for drugs. The order was made to allow average Americans faster and more widespread access to affordable care.

While Trump didn’t personally raise the cost of prescription drugs, he did remove one of the barriers that prevents pharmaceutical companies from doing so. While Biden’s order has been rescinded, there are still numerous laws and regulations in place to prevent price gouging for drugs. Pharmaceutical companies do not have free rein over drug prices, yet, but some Democrats believe that the killed executive order is a harbinger of high drug costs to come.

“Donald Trump is already following through on his dangerous plans to jack up the costs of drugs to appease his billionaire backers” said Democratic National Committee rapid response director Alex Floyd in response to the decision. “He lied to the American people and doesn’t care about lowering costs—only what’s best for himself and his ultra-rich friends

According to Bloomberg, pharmaceutical companies are trying to bend the president’s ear. Drug manufacturer Eli Lilly & Co. has petitioned Trump to pause drug price negotiations. Biden’s policies currently allow the U.S. government to buy drugs at a lower cost in order to distribute them to Medicare recipients. While these policies have yet to be rescinded, some worry that it soon will be. California Attorney General Rob Bonta has petitioned the Trump administration not to overturn the policies, saying they grant everyday Americans “substantial benefits” and that repealing them would be a “grave mistake for our nation.”

https://www.themarysue.com/it-was-all-lies-trump-destroyed-for-selfishly-raising-prescription-drug-costs-reversing-cost-caps/

To be fair Trump did not personally raise the price of drugs but he did give big Pharma an opening so they can do as they like.

Now aren’t you glad he is building a wall and could care less about your medical issues.

Your vote was well placed you idiots.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

They Are Coming For Medicare

As promised a look at the Medicare situation taking shape in DC.

This post is for retirees and those close in on retirement…..

A benefit that many of us old farts depend on is soon to be under the knife…The Trump admin and the wretched GOP are looking at the program for cuts….

Beltway journalists reported Thursday on “confusion” spreading throughout the White House and the Republican caucus following U.S. President Donald Trump’s endorsement of a House plan that would slash Medicaid and comments from the administration that suggested Trump will not protect Medicare—but Democratic lawmakers and progressive advocates said the message was crystal clear.

” Donald Trump and Elon Musk want to cut taxes for billionaires like themselves—and pay for it by gutting Medicare and Medicaid,” Maurice Mitchell, national director of the Working Families Party, said in a statement. “They don’t care if families have to take on crushing debt to pay for care, as long as it makes them much, much richer.”

Mitchell offered the translation of contradictory statements from Trump that came Wednesday, with the president expressing support for a House resolution aimed at imposing his border and energy policies and extending his 2017 tax cuts that primarily benefited the wealthy.

The House resolution “implements my FULL America First Agenda, EVERYTHING, not just parts of it,” the president said, suggesting his opposition to a Senate proposal that would push for two separate bills.

Calling for $2 trillion in spending cuts in order to fill the $4.5 trillion hole the tax cuts would blow in the deficit, the proposal would include potential cuts of $880 billion to Medicaid, which have made some Republicans in Congress express doubt that they could support the package without angering millions of constituents who rely on the low-income healthcare program.

https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-on-medicaid

And after some lame campaign promise to guard the benefit….they LIED!

Howard Lutnick, Trump’s billionaire buddy turned commerce secretary, has confirmed that the administration was simply lying to MAGA supporters about not touching Social Security and Medicare.

“Back in October … I flew down to Texas, got Elon Musk to [set up DOGE], and here was our agreement: that Elon was gonna cut a trillion dollars of waste fraud and abuse,” Lutnick told Jesse Waters of Fox News Wednesday night. “We have almost $4 trillion of entitlements, and no one’s ever looked at it before. You know Social Security is wrong, you know Medicaid and Medicare are wrong. So he’s gonna cut a trillion and we’re gonna get rid of all these tax scams that hammer against America and we’re gonna raise a trillion dollars of revenue.”

Just last week, President Trump promised that “Social Security won’t be touched, other than if there’s fraud or something. It’s going to be strengthened. Medicare, Medicaid—none of that stuff is going to be touched.”

Fast forward a week, and he endorsed House Republicans’ budget plan, which is expected to make an $880 billion cut to Medicaid to pay for tax cuts for the rich.

This is a long cry from the party that was telling its voters—many of whom are elderly conservatives on government benefits—that they wouldn’t lay a finger on the programs they need most.

(newrepublic.com)

You were warned numerous times during the campaign and yet 40-50% of you voted for this….how stupid do you feel now?

Hatred makes one stupid and stupidity has found a home here in America.

And when one is stupid then Project 2025 can be used with full support.

I reiterate….You Were Warned!

Speaking of Medicare I start my next round of treatment today, 5 days a week for 6 weeks, I do not know how it will effect me or my writing…..hopefully I will continue my ‘crusade’.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

IST Health Minute

I read a couple of articles that just made me think that some things need to be left in the PC.  When I first read them my first thought was ‘seriously’?

Like men are peeing wrong or your poop schedule….

First your #1……

After a survey revealed all, a doctor has claimed men in the US are peeing all wrong and he explained why.

Ever wondered if you urinate correctly? Well, a study conducted in 2023 looked into the way men positioned themselves upon emptying their bladders how many times a day.

While the survey quizzed people across the globe, they found many men in the US aren’t peeing in the most effective or most health-conscious way.

The survey conducted last year by YouGov investigated ‘where in the world […] men sit down to wee’, and the results were certainly interesting.

“Thinking about times where you go to the toilet to ONLY urinate (i.e. only having a pee, not also having a poo), how often do you sit down in order to do so? percent of men in each country,” the survey states.

I think the majority of us are in agreement it’s pretty common for men to stand when urinating – but is that good for overall health?

Well, countries such as Germany (60 percent) saw a solid stream of men sit down to release their bladders, however, sit-down wees aren’t quite as popular in locations such as the UK and the US.

The US, in particular, scored an overall percentage of 23, with 10 percent of men sitting down every time, 13 most times, 23 some times, 17 rarely, six not having the foggiest idea what the survey was harping on about and 31 percent never sitting down at all.

According to Gerald Collins, a consultant urological surgeon at the Alexandra Hospital, there is a way which is generally considered the most healthy way for those with penises to pee.

https://www.unilad.com/news/health/doctor-men-us-peeing-incorrectly-explains-769810-20250204

Now your #2….

You might already know that how often you go number two can reveal where your gut health is at ― less than three times a week reveals constipation, the NHS says, while you may have diarrhoea if you go four times daily or more.

But while we’re learning more and more about how the health of our gut microbiome can affect our overall well-being, some 2024 research published in Cell Reports Medicine said that existing links between bowel movement frequency and conditions like dementia and kidney issues needed further investigation.

Previous studies were done on people who had already become sick, they said ― so they sought to find out whether how often we go has an effect on otherwise healthy people.

Looking at participants’ self-reported data, researchers grouped their poop patterns into four sub-sections; constipation (one to two bowel movements a week), low to normal (three to six bowel movements a week), high to normal (seven to 21 bowel movements a week) and diarrhoea (more than 21 bowel movements a week).

https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/healthy-poop-frequency_uk_67a1ef47e4b09c94856207cd

Sorry to inflict you with this mundane crap (no pun intended)…..but it was a couple of interesting studies and results.

I hope no one is too grossed out…..it was just an IST FYI….

Please enjoy the rest of your Sunday and as always….Be Well and Be Safe….

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

News On Your Daily Medications

The older we get it seems the more pills and such that we must consume to protect our health….that is a sore spot because drug companies are raising prices and playing with the distribution of said drugs and now we have a leader that does not give a screaming turd about our struggles to pay for these necessities for good health…..

The United States, despite being the richest country in the world and a biopharmaceutical powerhouse, has long struggled with drug shortages. At any given time, up to 100 or more — sometimes many more — drugs are not readily available to American patients, largely because drug manufacturing operates with very little slack that leaves it vulnerable to disruptions. Sometimes, these are specialty drugs for, say, cancer patients who have certain genetics — potentially devastating for those individuals. Other times, as with the recent ADHD medication shortages, it can involve widely prescribed drugs with health impacts that can affect millions of people.

There are moments when these shortages can’t be helped. As I wrote in 2022, the pandemic’s supply chain disruption was the kind of natural emergency that creates unavoidable, acute drug shortages. Americans found it harder to find drugs like Tamiflu or inhalers with albuterol because the manufacturers were having a harder time getting their hands on the raw ingredients for those medicines, which can come from all over the world.

Drug shortages are usually accidental. A pandemic. A factory machine needs repair. Ingredients become tainted. But this time, it would be engineered.

The potential for disruption is enormous: China, which this week has been hit with a 10 percent across-the-board tariff, is the largest supplier of drug or drug ingredients to the US. Pharmaceutical drugs and their components are still the single largest American import from around the world, as longtime health care journalist Merrill Goozner wrote on Monday.

Generic drugmakers, which produce 90 percent of the prescription drugs in the US and often depend on Chinese chemical imports, don’t have easy recourse. It will be difficult for them to raise prices to make up for the additional tariff costs — there’s a good reason for that, but it has the potential to fuel shortages with a trade war afoot.

https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/398161/trump-tariffs-china-prescripton-drugs-medicine-shortage

I guess we should start worrying about the availability of our meds in the near future.

Then there is the uncertainty of the Trump admin actually helping us out with lowering prices of these drugs….think again….this op-ed looks at the possibility….

You’d think that President Donald Trump would have shown a little more empathy to senior citizens. He ties the record for being the oldest candidate elected to the Oval Office — with former President Joe Biden of all people. He’ll be an octogenarian by the time he leaves office, so you may be of the opinion that he’d look out for his elderly peers.

Apparently, not.

Medicare recipients, and the families working hard to support them, just aren’t Trump’s people.

On his first day in office, Trump signed an executive order overturning the two-year effort to give Medicare recipients access to more than 100 drugs for $2 a month. The Medicare $2 Drug List Model included generic drugs for high blood pressure, diabetes, high cholesterol, and other common ailments many elderly face. No matter. With a swipe of a pen, Trump ended the program to, in his words, ” … to deliver emergency price relief.” Go figure.

https://www.palmbeachpost.com/story/opinion/editorials/2025/02/07/trump-cuts-medicare-lower-prescription-drug-costs/78199521007/

Speaking of tariffs…..

Your local pharmacy might be the next front in Donald Trump’s trade war.

The president has in recent weeks promised to impose tariffs on all foreign-made medications, a move intended to encourage drug companies to return more of their manufacturing to the US.

In the meantime, the healthcare industry is already bracing itself for the president’s new 10% levy on goods from China, where much of the globe’s pharmaceutical production is based. Drugmakers and hospitals have said they could increase costs, push some generics into short supply, and hurt Americans’ access to treatments, including cancer and heart medicines.

Independent healthcare and trade experts told Yahoo Finance that, even though there are good policy reasons to encourage more US pharma manufacturing, they believed the tariffs could backfire. Slapping taxes on pills made in other countries might push prices higher without making it worthwhile to bring back many factories, they warned. Worse, it could exacerbate already chronic shortages of generic drugs by driving some companies out of the market entirely.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/trump-wants-to-put-tariffs-on-prescription-drugs-experts-warn-it-could-backfire-131058249.html

So be prepared for your health costs is about to become more expensive and will remain so until someone in DC cares about you…..if ever….

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Elmo Has Your Records

I read that Musk has now been given access to Medicare and Medicaid…..is this a good idea?

Elon Musk’s access to the operations of the federal government appears to be only accelerating. On the heels of his Department of Government Efficiency gaining access—though it may be only “read-only” access—to a sensitive Treasury Department payment system:

  • Medicare/Medicaid: Representatives from DOGE have gotten access to the payment and contracting systems for the agency that oversees Medicare and Medicaid, reports the Wall Street Journal. The reps are looking to identify fraud and waste at CMS—the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services—and study the agency’s structure and staffing.
  • Musk: “Yeah, this is where the big money fraud is happening,” Musk tweeted in response to another’s post about the development.
  • CDC: DOGE reps also visited the Centers for Disease Control and requested a list of employees who have been there less than a year or are within a two-year probationary period, reports the Washington Post.
  • Labor: The reps also visited the Labor Department to discuss access to sensitive data there, per the Post. Labor unions are seeking a restraining order to keep DOGE’s hands off department info, saying the non-government department’s work is “illegal” and has “already been catastrophic.” (Musk has successfully gutted the US Agency for International Development.)
  • VA: Democratic senators are worried about what might happen at the Department of Veterans Affairs. “Musk and his associates already have the personal financial information of every veteran receiving disability or education benefits because of their illegal data mining at the Department of Treasury,” tweeted Sen. Patty Murray. “Will they now look at private health records of veterans?” Sen. Richard Blumenthal raised a similar alarm, calling it “reprehensible an unelected billionaire can freely access veterans’ sensitive and personal information.”

I do not like the idea of this douche bag having access to my medical stuff.

Fraud?

What about the fraud and games the wealthy play with the stability of this country?  These ‘people’ will target individuals while allowing insurance companies and Pharma get a free ride.

At what point are you fuckers going to wake up?

You have a screwing coming and you just bend over and take it like a submissive alter boy.

Pay attention!

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

AI To The Rescue?

Another Sunday and another post…..with all my visits and stuff with my doctors I thought this article would be a good one and hopefully will make people think.

Most of my regulars know that I have no love for AI or anything to do with it….so when I read this article I felt it needed to be passed on…..

If you weren’t convinced we’re spiraling toward an actual cyberpunk future, a new bill seeking to let AI prescribe controlled drugs just might.

The proposed law was introduced in the House of Representatives by Arizona’s David Schweikert this month, where it was referred to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce for review. Its purpose: to “amend the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act to clarify that artificial intelligence and machine learning technologies can qualify as a practitioner eligible to prescribe drugs.”

In theory, it sounds good. Engaging with the American healthcare system often feels like hitting yourself with a slow-motion brick, so the prospect of a perfect AI-powered medical practitioner that could empathically advise on symptoms, promote a healthy lifestyle, and dispense crucial medication sounds like a promising alternative.

But in practice, today’s AI isn’t anywhere near where it’d need to be to provide any of that, nevermind prescribing potentially dangerous drugs, and it’s not clear that it’ll ever get there.

Schweikert’s bill doesn’t quite declare a free-for-all — it caveats that these robodoctors could only be deployed “if authorized by the State involved and approved, cleared, or authorized by the Food and Drug Administration” — but downrange, AI medicine is clearly the goal. Our lawmakers evidently feel the time — and money — is right to remove the brakes and start letting AI into the health care system.

The Congressman’s optimism aside, AI has already fumbled in healthcare repeatedly — like the time an OpenAI-powered medical record tool was caught fabricating patients’ medical histories, or when a Microsoft diagnostic tool confidently asserted that the average hospital was haunted by numerous ghosts, or when an eating disorder helpline’s AI Chatbot went off the rails and started encouraging users to engage in disordered eating.

https://futurism.com/neoscope/new-law-ai-replace-doctor-prescribe-drugs

Sorry but as long as I can I will resist this ‘service’ ….I do not want soul-less piece of tech crap diagnosing my medical situation. and because I am old hopefully I will pass on before this is the rule of the day.

Does this make Americans healthier?

Will this protect us from debilitating disease?

Will this improve Americans quality of life?

What say you?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”