Free Republic

Lawmakers are venting outrage over high prescription drug costs, but if Congress is looking for culprits, it might want to look in the mirror. Republican- and Democratic-controlled Congresses, and presidents of both parties, may have set the stage for the startling prices that have consumers on edge. In the last 13 years, Congress passed major legislation that expanded taxpayer-financed coverage for prescription drugs but lacked explicit mechanisms for dealing with costs, instead relying mainly on market forces. […] “The history we see over and over again is that when the government steps in as a guaranteed payer without regard to...

Maybe you’ve never heard of kratom — a plant from Southeast Asia with large, green leaves that are dried, powdered and taken as a drug with mild, opioid-like effects. Kratom has been used in Asia for generations — usually chewed or brewed into a tea — as a tonic, painkiller and an aid for people weaning themselves off opium. It can be bought in powder or capsule form at smoke shops across the country. But dedicated kratom users might want to stock up. As soon as Friday, the federal Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) says it will classify kratom as a...

Friday afternoons are the Obama administration’s preferred time to release information it doesn’t want the public to see. Case in point: On Sept. 9, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) quietly released a memo indicating its intention to bail out the health insurance companies participating in the Affordable Care Act. Congress — and the American people — should pay attention. Such a bailout is one of the administration’s top goals between now and Dec. 31. But spending billions of taxpayer dollars would only prop up a failing law that continues to harm the people it was supposed to...

1. What time did Killary get out of bed today? Assumes she has gotten up by now. 2. Where did she sleep last night? Maybe at home? Maybe in Chelsea's emergency room?

Mylan’s EpiPen Pretax Profits 60% Higher Than Number Told to CongressCompany applied 37.5% tax rate onto the profits it revealed to a House committee hearing last weekMylan CEO Heather Bresch takes her seat on Capitol Hill in Washington on Wednesday prior to testifying before the House Oversight Committee hearing on EpiPen price increases. Photo: Pablo Martinez Monsivais/Associated Press "> Mylan NV on Monday clarified the profit it said it made from its lifesaving EpiPen drug, days after House members badgered the company’s chief executive to justify the device’s steep price increases. Testifying before a congressional committee last week, CEO...

You might want to sit down for this. On second thought, keep standing. A study published last month in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine found that sitting for more than three hours per day is responsible for 3.8%—or approximately 433,000—of all deaths worldwide every year. At this point, it's old news that sitting for long periods of time is bad for your health. But who knew it could be this deadly? According to a press release, researchers looked at data collected from 54 countries between 2002 and 2011. They found that more than 60% of the world's population sits...

Abort, Euthanize, or Get Out of Medicine Bioethics discourse aims to change the practice of medicine and the thrust of public policy — usually not for the better. As I have been noting, the field is increasingly targeting the right of doctors to refuse to perform an abortion, euthanize patients, and perform other procedures or issue prescriptions that violate their religious beliefs.A bit ago, I discussed a “consensus statement” on this issue in Practical Ethics, published by Oxford. Now, two internationally influential bioethicists — Jualian Savulescu and Udo Schuklenk — join forces to advocate that society legally coerce doctors to kill. First, they deconstruct medical...

How the FDA Manipulates the Media The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has been arm-twisting journalists into relinquishing their reportorial independence, our investigation reveals. Other institutions are following suit By Charles Seife | Scientific American October 2016 Issue The deal was this: NPR, along with a select group of media outlets, would get a briefing about an upcoming announcement by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration a day before anyone else. But in exchange for the scoop, NPR would have to abandon its reportorial independence. The FDA would dictate whom NPR's reporter could and couldn't interview. “My editors are uncomfortable...

So Hillary Clinton claimed that she overheated and collapsed on a perfect 77 degree day in New York. Well, if she was telling the truth, then how will she be able to withstand being on that debate stage with so many hot stage lights all pointing at her? And not just the heat coming from the lights, what about the brightness as well? If Hillary manages to survive the warm and bright stage for 90 minutes, then can we all assume that the "Overheated Excuse" was all a lie between Hillary and all of her paid commentators and leftist news...

Thanks to DCLeaks.com and the work of journalist Kevin Jones the truth is finally out there. George Soros, a U.S. billionaire and one of the richest people in the world, has been secretly pumping funds into the push to legalise abortion in Ireland. In a private memo, clearly never intended to be seen by the Irish people, Soros’ foundation takes aim at Irish laws protecting unborn babies, and commits to funding three groups who will work ‘collectively’ to legalise abortion – Amnesty Ireland, the Abortion Rights Campaign, and the IFPA. The revelations are hugely embarrassing for abortion campaigners. Under pressure...

Clinton accused the 12-year-old of 'seek[ing] out older men' and 'engag[ing] in fantasizing' in court affidavits, and later laughed while discussing aspects of the case in a recently-unearthed audiotape from the 1980s.

On Monday night @ 9pm EST, Hillary will face the Don for 90 minutes. The question is... how long into the bout before Hillary goes face down and drops like a sack of potatoes? Lots of hot lights... 1950s hoover special pantsuit? wayward eyeballs! coughing and phlegm spewing! Get your popcorn and call your time! 1 - 90

$11 Billion In Missing Obamacare Subsidies From Mass Tax NoncomplianceComplications arising from the Affordable Care Act (ACA) premium tax credits (PTCs) are causing millions of people to effectively break the law. People who benefit from advance premium tax credits (APTCs) must file tax returns and include a form to reconcile the advanced amount to the actual end-of-year entitled amount. The failure of so many people to fulfill this new legal requirement has led the government to spend more than it should have as APTCs tend to be higher than legally entitled amounts. The big news is that tax filers,...

A South Florida aspiring soccer player scoring a huge GOAL at only three years old. Little Makinley Edwards beat liver cancer and now she's getting some love from her role models, the Miami FC players. The soccer club opened its doors to Makinley Tuesday for some coaching and fun on the field with players. "The fight in her and what she's gone through to put a smile on her face, it's just as rewarding for us as it is for her," said Miami FC Defender Gabriel Farfan. At only a few months old, Makinley had to undergo a liver transplant....

SACRAMENTO (AP) — Gov. Jerry Brown has signed legislation that regulates emissions from dairy cows and landfills for the first time as California broadens its efforts to fight climate change beyond carbon-based greenhouse gases. Brown’s move Monday targets a category of gases known as short-lived climate pollutants, which have an outsize effect on global warming despite their relatively short life in the atmosphere.

Ashley Jefferson posted a video of the meat on social media - claiming that the 'dog legs' still had claws in them A woman has claimed a Chinese takeaway restaurant served her a DOG PAW after she ordered spare ribs from the menu. Ashley Jefferson was eating at the China Palace in Havre de Grace, Maryland, when she believes she made the horrific discovery. Fighting the urge to throw up, Ashley then headed to the bathroom to record a Facebook video where she claimed the ribs had claws still attached. In the video, she said: "There's nails still in this......

The Russian Healthcare Minister Ms Veronika Skvortsova [Veh-rOh-Nee-Kah Skvor-tsOh-vah] told the press about an incident aboard a plane airborne over St.Petersburg. She had to give first aid to a female passenger who passed out. "In minutes after the take off the stewards announced that a passenger had collapsed, and when we approached, we found a 47-y.o. woman who was unconscious and having the symptoms of focal brain injury, thready pulse and undetectable blood pressure. We decided that the patients' state was a sharp deterioration in the cerebral circulation against the background of systemic changes in the hemodynamics. The Minister and...

Franklin, Tenn.-based Community Health Systems is working with advisers to explore a variety of options with financial sponsors, including the possible sale of its business, sources with knowledge of the matter told Bloomberg. The for-profit hospital operator said discussions are at a preliminary stage. "There can be no certainty that the exploration will result in any kind of transaction," said CHS.

Leo is 10 years old. For most of his life he's lived as a girl, but this summer he began to speak openly about his sense that this didn't feel quite right. With research help for his parents, he's decided he is non-binary - in his case, both masculine and feminine - though for the moment he dresses as a boy and has taken a male name. This is Leo's story in his own words. I'm not a boy. I thought I was a boy, because I'm not entirely a girl. We tried that for a bit, and I thought:...

“Our work demonstrates that the gut bacterial microbiome in chronic fatigue syndrome patients isn’t normal, perhaps leading to gastrointestinal and inflammatory symptoms in victims of the disease,” said Maureen Hanson, a professor of molecular biology and genetics at Cornell. “Furthermore, our detection of a biological abnormality provides further evidence against the ridiculous concept that the disease is psychological in origin.” In a study published this month in the journal Microbiome, Cornell University researchers looked at stool and blood samples of 48 people diagnosed with chronic fatigue syndrome (or more formally, myalgic encephalomyelitis) and at 39 healthy volunteers. They found two...

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Saturday that a record $12.9 billion has been raised for The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria over the next three years. Trudeau made the announcement on the second and final day of an international donors’ meeting as Microsoft founder Bill Gates, U2 frontman Bono, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and others gathered in Montréal to determine how to replenish the major global health fund that combats AIDS and two of the world’s other leading killers in low-income countries. …

“Toxic chromium” fear-mongering Detecting Cr-6 droplets in Olympic-sized swimming pool doesn’t equal health or cancer risks Paul Driessen Erin Brockovich became rich and famous by promoting the notion that people in Hinkley, CA got cancer because of hexavalent chromium (Chromium-6) in drinking water. Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) settled a 1993 lawsuit for $333 million, rather than risk trial by a jury frightened by a steady drumbeat of horror stories from lawyers, activists, celebrities, “journalists” and hired “experts.” The lawyers got $134 million in fees, and Ms. Brockovich pocketed a cool $2-million bonus – plus movie royalties and other cash....

A child suffering a fatal illness has become the first minor to be euthanized since age restrictions on mercy killings were lifted in the country. Mercy killings have become increasingly common in Benelux countries. The head of Belgium’s federal euthanasia commission gave no details of the child beyond saying the patient was an exceptional case of a young person with a terminal illness, the Het Nieuwsblad newspaper reported. […] Any request for euthanasia must be made by the child, approved by a panel of physicians, an independent psychiatrist or psychologist and have parental consent. But the case files — which...

A scientist who named a new species of parasite after President Obama defended his decision, and said that it was meant to honor Obama, not insult him. "Before you accuse me of being some kind of hater, racist or worse — as plenty have — let me be clear: I absolutely intended it as an honor," retired biology professor Thomas Platt wrote in the Washington Post late Thursday. . . Platt named his new species Baracktrema obamai, which is a flatworm that lives in the blood systems of the hosts they inhabit.

...Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) developed the hybrid image called "Marilyn Einstein," which, if you have clear vision, will look like the Hollywood bombshell from afar but will shift into an image of the revered physicist when it gets up close. People who have vision problems may not be able to see a picture of Einstein anywhere....

Never before in human history have babies and children grown up so cleanly, and our diets have lost many of the elements most crucial to the health of our guts. We have become very bad hosts to our microbes. [snip] Babies and toddlers often aren’t allowed to play in the dirt or sand, and when they are, they are wiped clean immediately. Phrases like, “Yuck! Don’t play in the mud!” or “Don’t touch that bug, it’s dirty!” have become second nature. We need to unlearn these habits. By preventing babies and children from following their innate impulse to get dirty,...

The sugar industry began funding research that cast doubt on sugar’s role in heart disease — in part by pointing the finger at fat — as early as the 1960s, according to an analysis of newly uncovered documents. The analysis published Monday is based on correspondence between a sugar trade group and researchers at Harvard University, and is the latest example showing how food and beverage makers attempt to shape public understanding of nutrition. In 1964, the group now known as the Sugar Association internally discussed a campaign to address “negative attitudes toward sugar” after studies began emerging linking sugar...

I turn 45 in November and was just diagnosed with a Bicuspid Aortic Valve. I have no symptoms whatsoever. My doc heard a murmur last month and I had an echocardiogram yesterday. Nurse called me today with the news. I do have pretty high cholesterol, and my blood pressure is usually around 135/80. Any Freepers or their loved ones have this? Any comments are appreciated as I'm continuing my research on the subject.

Candice Hammonds and Thomas Burkett had planned to get married on October 1. But, in late August, doctors in Thomaston, Georgia delivered some heartbreaking news: Candace’s father, Steve Hammonds, only had a few days to live. Quickly, the couple worked to have the ceremony ready in time. In a matter of 24 hours, the wedding was moved to the Upson Regional Medical Center, inside Steve’s ICU room. In many ways, it was a traditional wedding, with the couple exchanging vows and rings.

Yale New Haven Hospital becomes the eighth transplant center and the fifth hospital that gets green light to perform transplantation of HIV-infected organs. The approval is received from the United Network for Organ Sharing. November 2013, President Obama made HOPE (HIV Organ Policy Equity) Act official - allowing organ donor from an HIV patient to another HIV patient.

Don’t mess with pregnant Olivia Wilde. “NBD, able-bodied 🚇 [train] riders who won’t give your seat to a GIANT preggo,” she sarcastically tweeted on Wednesday. “I’ll just stand riiiiight next to your head and pray I go into labor.”

Every morning Alyssa Fairbanks takes a palmful of pills. Twelve to be exact. Green, white, brown, yellow, purple — calcium, vitamin D, magnesium and potassium for muscle cramps. Diuretics to keep toxins flushing, fluids moving. They tend to pool in her abdomen, which became so distended in May she was airlifted to Salt Lake City to drain the liquid from her petite frame. She takes her medication upstairs in her bedroom, a loft directly above where two parents are trying to feed a tableful of kids. It’s not private, there is no door. But it is home for now, and...

The children were seen at Children's Dental Group of Anaheim, located at 2156 E. Lincoln Ave., between May 3 and Aug. 2 for pulpotomies, or "baby root canals," and later developed serious bacterial infections. County health officials said eight children have been reported to have slowly progressive oral cellulitis, a bacterial infection of the mouth that can spread to the gum and bone. Seven children have been hospitalized at Children's Hospital Orange County, and officials were working to contact the parents of 500 more children who were also seen at the Anaheim dental clinic.

The opioid epidemic in America has captured the attention and efforts of policymakers. The Obama administration seeks to allocate $1.1 billion to fight opioid abuse. States are requiring prescribers check databases as part of prescription drug monitoring programs to identify patients who may have dependency or abuse problems. Canada has taken a slightly different approach to help treat addicts: prescribing pharmaceutical-grade heroin.

A health insurance company has said that Germans are going to the doctor twice as much as they actually need to. But doctors disagree. “We don’t have too few doctors, but actually too much contact with doctors,” KKH CEO Ingo Kailuweit told Bild on Tuesday. “Half of all doctor visits are unnecessary.” The OECD’s Health Statistics report for this year showed that Germans went to the doctor on average more than 18 times in 2008, while another OECD report showed that Germans visited the doctor about ten times each in 2013. This made Germans one of the top ten countries...

What if I told you in just 10 seconds a day, you can sleep better, make more money, reduce stress, and lose weight? Sleeping naked can do all these things and more. All you have to do is take off your clothes. While there are countless strategies floating around out there to help you improve in these areas, none is as simple—and many are less effective—as stripping down before you go to sleep. Since only 8% of people sleep naked, most everyone can discover the benefits of sleeping in the buff. This may sound far-fetched, but hear me out before...

NORWALK, OH (WOIO) - A bizarre case out of Huron County has detectives looking for the person who belonged to a heart discovered in a field on Milan Avenue in Norwalk. All the Norwalk police department has right now is a heart in a Ziploc bag. They're hoping to determine if it's human, and where it came from. "This is pretty unusual. We have no idea where it came from," said Sgt. Jim Fulton, with Norwalk Police Department. In late August, a North Central EMS crew idling at the Friendship Store on Milan Avenue came across the heart. Fulton said...

Bodily fluids such as tears, saliva, vomit, urine or stool may have the potential to transmit Zika, suggest the findings of an investigation into a highly irregular Zika case in Utah which produced the first death from the Zika virus in the United States.

TAMPA, Fla. - Police say a Florida man asking if a bulletproof vest "still worked" was fatally shot by his cousin. A Tampa police report says Joaquin Mendez, 23, put on the vest late Saturday and "wondered aloud whether it still worked." Police say his cousin, Alexandro Garibaldi, 24, pulled out a gun and responded, "Let's see." Officers found Mendez outside the house with a gunshot wound in his chest. Mendez died at a hospital.

Hillary Clinton will beat pneumonia. But she won't beat a condition far more fatal: untrustworthiness.

A prominent internist writes with admittedly speculative comments on the diagnosis of pneumonia made public today regarding Hillary Clinton. He writes: During my 19 years as a board certified internist I have taken care of many hundreds of patients with pneumonia. The story about Hillary Clinton being diagnosed with pneumonia raises a red flag as to the cause. It could simply have been a community acquired pneumonia, which means she contracted it as a healthy person living her usual life. This happens occasionally, even to healthy people. If this is the case the timing certainly is unfortunate for her given...

Parkinson's disease strikes people in many different ways, leaving them to experience a broad range of symptoms. Though symptoms may be mild or severe or occur frequently or infrequently, Parkinson's disease appears to have five different stages. The time spent at each stage varies, and the skipping of stages, from stage one to stage three, for example, is not uncommon. Parkinson's disease stages include: Stage one: During this initial phase of the disease, a person usually experiences mild symptoms, such as tremors or shaking in a limb. During this stage, friends and family can usually detect changes caused by Parkinson's,...

Camila Alves is the latest celeb to go on a baby food diet, but the Brazilian model and wife of Matthew McConaughey isn’t choking down jars of Gerber. SNIP “It’s hot out, so they’re the perfect on-the-go snack to stay cool.”

Dear LGBT Community, I am not your daughter. I never carried a flag in one of your gay pride parades. I have never written a letter on your behalf to a congressman or anyone else, and I have never felt the need to make people accept the fact I am the daughter of a lesbian. Perhaps it’s because she never felt the need to force people to accept her for being one. No, I would never align myself to a community as intolerant and self-absorbed as the LGBT community, a community that demands tolerance with fervor and passion, yet does...

A week or two after we spoke to the nurse, my mother sank into a state where she was rarely conscious. When she was awake, it was only the most basic part of her that was there: the part that told her legs to move to get her to the bathroom, the automated steps in brushing her teeth and then wiping the sink afterward. Her mind turned away from her children and husband for the first time. I wanted to know what she was thinking about. I wanted to know where her mind was. Being at the bedside of an...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u4c9TBdD4J0 [A good piece of satire--well worth sharing]

SALT LAKE CITY, Utah (ABC4 News) - A new report by the Pew Center for Research shows the Latino population is on the decline. The slow down is attributed to two things: immigration and birth rates. The research shows the annual average growth rate for Latinos from 2007 to 2014 was 2.8% down from 4.4% between 2000 to 2007 and a dramatic decrease from the 1990's when it was at 5.8%. Experts say economic opportunities elsewhere - including Mexico - are a factor. "As Mexico starts to stabilize and become a stronger economy more Mexican will find jobs," says Juan...