tingilinde

ah healthcare

Denying a four month old coverage for  a pre-existing condition

snip

But in the cold, calculating numbered charts of insurance companies, he is fat. That's why he is being turned down for health insurance. And that's why he is a weighty symbol of a problem in the health care reform debate.

Insurance companies can turn down people with pre-existing conditions who aren't covered in a group health care plan.

Alex's pre-existing condition — "obesity" — makes him a financial risk. Health insurance reform measures are trying to do away with such denials that come from a process called "underwriting."

"If health care reform occurs, underwriting will go away. We do it because everybody else in the industry does it," said Dr. Doug Speedie, medical director at Rocky Mountain Health Plans, the company that turned down Alex.

By the numbers, Alex is in the 99th percentile for height and weight for babies his age. Insurers don't take babies above the 95th percentile, no matter how healthy they are otherwise.

...

(thanks for the link Sara)

a bit over two months 'til the holidays - homemade gifts

Soon several holidays will be upon us and with many, an expectation of spending frantic time rushing around to use incantations from a piece of plastic to find gifts that hopefully will work out.   Some will and some won't, but another approach is to spend time making gifts or having gifts made that may be a better fit.  

This takes some discipline and it is unlikely you can do it for many.  A close friend in San Francisco and I have been doing this for several years.  Expectations are high on both sides and it would be wrong to not spend a lot of time thinking and creating.  Many of my creations fall short and both of us slide the due dates, but many of the gifts have been very special - amazing in fact - the sort of thing you remember and treasure. Such is the stuff of gifts from the heart.

I can't recommend doing this for kids.  They'll probably enjoy making a few things for others, but in general their expectations involve commercial store bought loot.  

You can be very creative as to the type of gift when it is personal.  Last year a friend put together suggestions and updated it recently.  Take a look...

This sort of thing isn't impossible, but you do need time and that means starting soon  The main point is there are people who will value you for your time and your thoughts about them rather than your money. For most people the only thing standing between them and a project like this is the tv.

using a duck to teach kids about disabilities

Lemon the Duck was born with a neurological disability, but she is used to teach kids about disabilities.

give cellphones on airlines a chance

(thanks for the link Dewayne)

finding a voice for electric cars

At low speeds electric cars can be so quiet that they can represent a hazard to pedestrians (blind and sighted) and bike riders.  The general feeling is road an aerodynamic noise starts to make an electric audible enough at around 12 to 15 mph, but what to do below that?

It is likely that  such cars will have speakers and will play some sort of sound at slow speeds.

The idea of the equivalent of ring tones for cars is troubling.  How will these evolve and is there any chance taste will prevail?  (probably not)

for those who think new jersey is unbearable

Alan was near Randolph, New Jersey on Sunday and took this.

a look at healthcare costs

NewScientist  pointed to this video by Peter Aldjous, Jim Giles and MacGregor Campbell who take studies from Dartmouth and the OECD to discuss why the US spends more than other developed countries, but has comparatively little to show.

In the US incentives are for insurance companies, pharmaceuticals, hospitals and doctors and not for good health. It isn't surprising things are broken when you optimize the system for the wrong things.

thriving from within - swiss villagers and utah mormons

Fernando pointed to this fascinating blog post.  You should read part 1, but the crux is in part 2.

snip

In 1942, Wallace Stegner wrote Mormon Country, a diplomatic and charitable look at the culture of the Mormons. In 1921 the twelve-year-old Stegner first set foot in Salt Lake City. Though never baptized as a Latter-day Saint, as a boy Stegner spent time in a Mormon Boy Scout troop. In 1930 he earned his B.A. from the University of Utah and he returned again in 1934 to teach English at the university until 1937. In total, Stegner spent about thriteen years in the Land of Zion.

I first crossed the Utah-Colorado border in the autumn of 1987 and left it for the last time (for now) in the summer of 1999. And about a year before I left, I read Stegner's Mormon Country in the aforementioned graduate seminar at Utah State University. No, I never joined a Boy Scout troop and, no, I never joined the Church, either. But after re-reading Mormon Country here in Switzerland I realize my closeness and fondness for the culture of the "lovely Deseret."

With worldview in mind, the two seemingly opposed cultures of my then and now appear somewhat more affiliated. Take almost any passage from Mormon Country and substitute the words 'Swiss' or 'Switzerland' for 'Mormons' and 'Utah' and the book not only retains its fluidity but the interchangeability of the passages also offers insight into the successful (and sometimes failed) value systems of these two isolated and exclusive cultures.

will you be dumped?

perhaps...

painful, but amusing

“I am not the smartest man in the world, but I have been trained to read scientific documents, and [climate change] is malarkey.”

—Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), who also explained why Jesus would oppose a public option in health care reform