Drought has been especially hard in the U.S. southwest // Source: tamu.edu

submitted by Samuel Bendett

Homeland Security News Wire - July 6, 2012

Analysis of the latest drought monitor data revealed that 46.84 percent of the U.S. land area is in various stages of drought, up from 42.8 percent a week ago; previous records were 45.87 percent in drought on 26 August 2003, and 45.64 percent on 10 September 2002; looking only at the forty-eight contiguous states, 55.96 percent of the country’s land area is in moderate drought or worse — also the highest percentage on record

More of the United States is in moderate drought or worse than at any other time in the 12-year history of the U.S. Drought Monitor, officials from the National Drought Mitigation Center at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln said the other day.

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

submitted by Luis Kun

bulletinhealthcare.com - July 3, 2012

The announcement by the Justice Department of a settlement with drugmaker GlaxoSmithKline of bribery allegations generated heavy media coverage last night and this morning, including more than seven minutes of coverage on network newscasts.

        The CBS Evening News (7/2, story 6, 2:50, Pelley) reported, "The US government is calling it the biggest case of healthcare fraud in American history. The British drug maker GlaxoSmithKline is accused of withholding important safety information about the diabetes drug Avandia [rosiglitazone] and illegally promoting two other drugs for unapproved uses. GSK agreed to pay $3 billion in fines."

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

The Goldberg family, from left, Oren, Elliette, Hannah, Laurel and their dog, Sophie, wait for Pepco to inspect the power lines outside their Verplanck Place NW home in Washington. A massive tree punctured the house when it fell during the June 29 storm. Several power lines snapped, littering the front lawn. A few are still intact, stretched close to the ground beneath the tree. "Before anything happens, they have to get here. It's not safe," Laurel Goldberg said.
Daniel C. Britt / The Washington Post - July 1, 2012

The Washington Post - by Craig Timberg - July 2, 2012

Storm-related outages at an Amazon data center in Ashburn prompted some congressional officials on Monday to question whether the federal government is moving too swiftly to put important data on private-sector cloud computing servers.

Power Outages Impact Millions Across the Nation (This news video is preceded by a brief commercial.)

The Supreme Court upheld health care reform Thursday, which includes a mandate that consumers have to buy coverage by 2014 or pay a penalty.  PHOTO: THINKSTOCK

by Parija Kavilanz - CNNMoney - June 28, 2012

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- The Supreme Court's ruling Thursday to uphold health care reform has widespread implications for both insured and uninsured consumers.

Beginning in 2014, uninsured individuals must buy coverage -- either on their own, through an employer's plan or through a health insurance exchange -- or else pay a tax penalty. Meanwhile, insured consumers will continue to enjoy key mandates of the law, such as free preventive care and coverage of adult dependents up to age 26, but at the expense of higher out-of -pocket costs.

Several key mandates of health reform have already gone into effect since the law passed in 2010. Here's a rundown of those provisions and new mandates rolling out over the next two years that will impact almost all of these consumers.

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

Existing renewable energy source can supply most of U.S. needs // Source: axortagos.gr

submitted by Samuel Bendett

Homeland Security News Wire - June 22, 2012

Renewable electricity generation from technologies that are commercially available today, in combination with a more flexible electric system, is more than adequate to supply 80 percent of total U.S. electricity generation in 2050 while meeting electricity demand on an hourly basis in every region of the country; new study finds that renewable generation could play a more significant role in the U.S. electricity system than previously thought

A class 2 brine disposal well in western Louisiana near the Texas border. The well sat by the side of the road, without restricted access. (Abrahm Lustgarten/ProPublica)

propublica.org - by Abrahm Lustgarten - June 21, 2012

Over the past several decades, U.S. industries have injected more than 30 trillion gallons of toxic liquid deep into the earth, using broad expanses of the nation's geology as an invisible dumping ground.

No company would be allowed to pour such dangerous chemicals into the rivers or onto the soil. But until recently, scientists and environmental officials have assumed that deep layers of rock beneath the earth would safely entomb the waste for millennia.

There are growing signs they were mistaken.

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

Submitted by Luis Kun

homelandsecuritynewswire.com - June 20th, 2012

Using data supplied by a mobile operator, researchers at Sweden’s Karolinska Institutet have shown that population movements after the 2010 Haiti earthquake followed regular patterns. This information can be used to predict beforehand the movements of people after a disaster, and thus improves chances for aid to be delivered to the right places at the right time.

Every year, tens of millions of people are displaced by natural disasters, and to date knowledge of their movement patterns has been sparse.

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

submitted by Albert Gomez

What is Sherpaa?

Sherpaa is around the clock email and phone access to our friendly, NYC-based doctors (or Guides as we call them). Whenever you have a health question or concern, we're here for you. And we play nicely with the insurance you've got.

Who is a Sherpaa Guide?

Our Guides are well connected, in-the-know local doctors. Sometimes they can solve everything for you right away, and other times they’ll collaborate with other New York City specialists to arrange the most appropriate care for you. They make your health simple.

Services

For Individuals

Ask your employer to join us. Our Guides are here 24/7 to solve as many of your health issues as possible.

For Employers

Your employees will love Sherpaa, because they’ll get a doctor they can call or email at any time. But you’ll love Sherpaa because you’ll have healthy, happy, productive employees.

Here are some things our Guides can do for employees:

submitted by Albert Gomez

www.environmentalleader.com - May 31, 2012

Companies can measure the value of sustainability and how their environmental efforts directly contribute to profits, using two evaluation methods described in a report by PricewaterhouseCoopers.

The cost of sustainability programs are readily apparent, PwC said. And companies are typically able to determine the short-term value from cost savings, risk reduction or product and service innovations. Putting a dollar value on intangible benefits, especially those over a long period of time, is where companies struggle, the consultancy said.

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

submitted by Luis Kun

Homeland Security News Wire - May 23, 2012

A study from North Carolina State University shows how people used Twitter following the 2011 nuclear disaster in Japan, highlighting challenges for using the social media tool to share information. The study also indicates that social media have not changed what we communicate so much as how quickly we can disseminate it.

“I wanted to see if Twitter was an effective tool for sharing meaningful information about nuclear risk in the wake of the disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant,” says Dr. Andrew Binder, an assistant professor of communication at NC State and author of a paper describing the work. “I knew people would be sharing information, but I wanted to see whether it was anecdotal or substantive, and whether users were providing analysis and placing information in context.

“In the bigger picture, I wanted to see whether social media is changing the way we communicate, or if we are communicating the same way using different tools.”

Biodefense efforts confounded by congressional inertia // Source: umdnj.edu

submitted by Luis Kun

Homeland Security News Wire - May 15, 2012

H.R. 2356, the WMD Prevention and Preparedness Act of 2011, will soon be debated before four different House committees, before going to the Senate to be debated further – all this four years after a congressionally mandated commission defined bioterrorism as a grave threat to the United States; critics charge that the reason is the unwieldy and dysfunctional manner in which Congress oversees DHS: currently there are 108 congressional committees and subcommittees with oversight responsibilities for different parts of DHS.

All agree that this is an important piece of legislation. It calls for developing a national biodefense plan and a coordinated budget across government departments and agencies – in a way similar to the way the U.S. federal government’s has been handling nuclear and cybersecurity issues.

May 9, 2012

The 2012 Joseph Leiter Lecture will be delivered by Dr. Frederick M. Burkle, at 2:00 p.m. on May 9, 2012, in National Library of Medicine's Lister Hill Center Auditorium. The lectureship, which honors former NLM Associate Director for Library Operations, Joseph Leiter, Ph.D., is sponsored jointly by the National Library of Medicine and the Medical Library Association.

Dr. Burkle is senior fellow and scientist, the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative, Harvard School of Public Health, and former senior scholar and now senior associate faculty and research scientist, the Center for Refugee & Disaster Response, Johns Hopkins University Medical Institutes. He also serves as a senior international public policy scholar, Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars, Washington, DC (2008-present).

In addition, he serves as adjunct professor, and as a clinical professor of surgery and adjunct professor in tropical medicine, at the University of Hawaii. He is also adjunct professor, Department of Military & Emergency Medicine, Uniformed Services University of Health Sciences, Bethesda, MD, and the Department of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, John Cook University, Australia.

submitted by Samuel Bendett

Homeland Security News Wire - May 10, 2012

Many organizations are struggling to manage their data in hybrid physical, virtual, and cloud environments; many still use multiple, disparate tools, which are likely to be spread across multiple sites, with just over a third (36 percent) managing three or more different solutions to protect their critical data

Despite 2011 experiencing record levels of environmental, economic, and political upheaval, the 2012 Acronis Disaster Recovery Index findings from the industrial sector, that is, construction and manufacturing, reveal that only 53 percent of respondents were confident they could recover quickly in the event of a disaster.

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

In this Jan. 2, 2005 file photo, a wide area of destruction is shown from an aerial view taken over Meulaboh, 250 kilometers (156 Miles) west of Banda Aceh, Indonesia. Researchers in the United States are hoping to use GPS data to speed up current warnings. (AP Photo/Dita Alangkara, File)

U.S. seismologists currently testing new warning system

by Andrew Pinsent - CBC News - May 5, 2012

Scientists in the United States have been testing an advanced tsunami warning system using GPS data, combined with traditional seismology networks, to attempt to detect the magnitude of an earthquake faster so warnings of potential tsunamis can get out to potentially affected areas sooner.

The prototype is called California Integrated Seismic Network (CISN), and is a collaboration between the United States Geological Survey (USGS) and The Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, whose focus is on environmental conservation.