Issue 351
October 28, 2005
EDITORIAL
Shut
down death row
STANLEY
"TOOKIE" WILLIAMS is a charismatic symbol of what's wrong with the
death penalty — and of what's wrong with the debate about the death penalty.
His story
of sin and
redemption powerfully illustrates the unfairness of capital punishment. But to
argue that capital punishment is unjust for some defendants is to concede that
it may be acceptable for others.
The reason
to oppose capital punishment has to do with who we are, not who death row
inmates are. The death penalty is inappropriate in all situations because it is
unbefitting of a civilized society. Williams' case, though poignant, is
irrelevant to this argument.
Part of what
makes Williams such an effective symbol in the debate over capital punishment
is his compelling story. If there was a hall of shame for criminals, Williams
would deserve his own wing. Williams founded the violent and oppressive Crips
gang, dealers of crack cocaine and death by gunfire who spread their lethal
gospel nationwide. He was convicted of four 1979 gun murders, and who knows
what other violence he masterminded as the Crips leader.
By most
accounts, however, Williams has become a very different person in his nearly
quarter-century in San Quentin. He has written children's books warning against
gang life, debunked the thug glamour of prison, helped broker gang treaties
and, absurdly, been nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize by supporters who
romanticize his rehabilitation. There is even a TV movie about Williams'
jailhouse conversion.
Williams is
a good symbol, and good symbols are important to opponents of the death
penalty. Yet proponents have their symbols too. And arguing over symbols fails
to reach the core of the injustice of capital punishment.
Which is not
to say there aren't practical arguments against the death penalty. Putting
people to death is more costly than incarcerating them for life, and even then
our legal system is not foolproof. Mounting evidence that innocent people were
on death row led Illinois to impose a moratorium on executions in 2000, and the
pace of executions elsewhere has slowed because of similar concerns. Even U.S.
Supreme Court justices are voicing concern about the death penalty's
application.
California,
which has executed only 11 people since 1976, should give up on capital
punishment altogether, like 12 U.S. states and most of what is often referred
to as the "civilized world." Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger should cancel
Williams' execution, scheduled for Dec. 13, and Williams should spend the rest
of his days in jail. So should everyone else on death row — even those who
haven't had their lives turned into a TV movie.
* * * * *
Lawmakers
target shaken baby syndrome
Measures
would educate parents
By Michael
Levenson
Eight years
after the trial of a Newton au pair helped draw nationwide attention to the
problem of shaken baby syndrome, legislators, pediatricians, and parents are
preparing a major effort to stop that form of child abuse in Massachusetts.
Proposals
being reviewed today on Beacon Hill would teach every parent of a newborn how
to soothe a crying, fussy baby without resorting to shaking, which can cause
serious brain damage, retinal bleeding or, in one quarter of cases, death.
Though the
details have yet to be finalized, the bills have drawn support from key
legislators, Lieutenant Governor Kerry Healey, Attorney General Thomas F.
Reilly, prosecutors, social services officials, and Deborah Eappen, whose
8-month-old son Matthew died in 1997 after being shaken by his au pair, Louise
Woodward.
''I would
never, ever want another parent to go through what our family went
through," Eappen said yesterday. ''The impact of this child abuse and the
loss of a child in the family, the ripples go on forever, and the impact on
parents and siblings is really enormous." She plans to testify on the
issue today.
Doctors have
known about the problem of parents, babysitters, and others shaking babies to
stop them from crying since the 1950s. But only in the last several decades
have social services officials and pediatricians begun to study the problem and
develop public policy solutions, said Dr. Alice Newton, medical director of the
child protection team at
Massachusetts General Hospital.
The
proposals being aired today before a joint meeting of the Legislature's
committees on Children and Families and on Public Health grew out of six
suspected cases of shaken babies in Central Massachusetts in 2001, said Karen
Beaton, a nurse who is director of maternal and child health at Heywood
Hospital in Gardner.
Modeled
after a similar program in upstate New York, it seeks to educate parents on how
they can calm themselves from the frustration of tending to a crying baby.
Under a
pilot program begun at Heywood Hospital in 2003, nurses advise parents to put
their babies in a crib or bassinet and take a breather, rather than trying over
and again to stop a baby's tears. Nurses at Heywood typically give the lessons
within the first 24 hours after a baby is born and send parents home with a
brochure outlining the tips, Beaton
said. They
also ask parents to teach the method to babysitters, cousins, and grandparents
who might care for their babies.
The bill
would replicate the program in hospitals statewide. It also calls for the state
Department of Public Health to track the number of shaken baby cases and to
develop training to help doctors spot the signs of a shaken baby.
Backers say
the cost would be about $250,000 annually, but would save millions in medical
bills. Lifetime care for a severe brain injury can run between $4 million and
$9 million, legislators said.
''We think
this stands a really good shot of preventing injury to young children, that at
least a sizable percent of this is preventable," said Dr. Jean E. Ramsey,
director of pediatric ophthalmology at Boston Medical Center and one of the
doctors, state officials, and parents who plan to testify in support of the
bill today. ''With education, we really can prevent some of these deaths and
injuries."
Shaken baby
cases cut across class and race lines, doctors say, though some trends are
clear. About 75 percent of cases involve parents; men, especially young fathers
and boyfriends, are more often the perpetrators than women, Newton said. About
37 percent of cases involve fathers or stepfathers, and 21 percent involve
boyfriends, she said.
Still,
nearly every parent can relate to the frustration of trying to calm a crying
baby, Beaton said.
''It's not
uncommon to feel extremely frustrated when you're trying to care for a crying
baby, so much so that probably everybody has had the thought about shaking a
baby," Beaton said. ''But the important thing is that you don't carry out
the act."
Doctors say
shaken-baby cases are vastly underreported, partly because hospital staff members
often fail to recognize the signs.
State public
health officials counted 50 cases between 1999 and 2002, but at Children's
Hospital doctors treated 36 cases in that time period alone, suggesting that
the official state data is too low, Newton said.
Nationally,
there about 1,500 reported cases of shaken babies each year, she said.
The syndrome
gained public notoriety with Woodward's trial in 1997, which was televised and
covered by national media. A 19-year-old British nanny hired by the Eappens, Woodward
was convicted of causing Matthew Eappen's death by shaking him violently and
dropping him on the floor.
The judge
reduced Woodward's conviction from second-degree murder to manslaughter and her
sentence from life in prison to the 279 days she spent in jail awaiting trial.
About 50
lawmakers have signed on to support four bills that seek to prevent shaken baby
syndrome.
''Something
will pass this year," said Representative Peter J. Koutoujian, a Waltham
Democrat who is cochairman of the Committee on Public Health.
''I have the
feeling we have a good window of opportunity here."
* * * * *
Priest's
Slaying Shakes Tijuana
A popular
cleric's death, blamed on drug trade, gives the border city a record year for
killings.
By Richard
Marosi
TIJUANA —
The execution-style killing of a popular priest in an upscale restaurant
district here has touched off an outpouring of grief and pushed the homicide
rate to record heights.
At a funeral
Mass on Wednesday, about 2,000 people mourned the death of Father Luis
Velazquez Romero, 52, an outspoken cleric known for his social activism.
He was
gunned down Monday morning in his 1993 Ford Thunderbird in a parking lot.
Police found
six bullet wounds in his head and neck, and his wrists handcuffed behind his
back.
Velazquez's
death, along with another slaying over the weekend, pushed the homicide toll in
the Tijuana area this year past the record of 355 set in 2004, state police
officials said.
The wave of
violence in this sprawling Mexican border city has set new standards for
brazenness. Masked, black-clad gunmen have abducted businessmen from popular
restaurants in front of horrified diners. Their bodies usually appear days
later, gagged and showing signs of torture. Many merchants are moving across
the border to the San Diego area.
Several
police officers have also been killed or targeted. Chief Homicide Investigator
Francisco Castro Trenti escaped injury in a shootout a few weeks ago.
Police said
the motive in the priest's killing was unclear but that the slaying bore the
hallmarks of an organized crime hit.
The violent
death of Velazquez, the corresponding sensational media coverage and
questions
about the police investigation have heightened a sense of frustration in this
crime-weary city. Thousands have turned out at Masses to mourn the priest,
filing into his hillside church to kiss his coffin and touch his white robe.
"This
assassination has touched the most sensitive part of our society," said
Carlos Medina Amaro, a longtime parishioner. "If they kill a priest, they
can kill anybody."
Authorities
said they were investigating whether the killing was related to the cleric's
work and whether he was a victim of drug traffickers. Police said they were
also taking a close look at the priest's personal life.
State police
spokesman Filiberto Martinez said Velazquez was not suspected of being involved
in narcotics trafficking, but that the execution-style killing and the
.38-caliber handgun used were the calling cards of the drug cartels.
"Castro
Trenti says this murder will be solved. But it's too soon to say when," he
said.
The police
statement inspired little confidence among residents. Some noted that many
killings go unsolved and said police often claim victims were involved in the
drug cartels as an excuse not to investigate the crimes thoroughly. "What
are the authorities doing?" read a sign carried by parishioners at a
funeral procession.
Most of the
year's killings have been blamed on drug cartels battling for control of the
trafficking corridor through Tijuana into the U.S.
Velazquez
was described as a dynamic priest with a jovial personality who easily
navigated Tijuana's disparate worlds of wealth and poverty. His role model,
parishioners and fellow priests say, was Archbishop Oscar Romero of El
Salvador, slain while celebrating Mass in 1980.
He was
committed to social causes and founded an outreach group in poor neighborhoods.
His sermons touched on current events and corruption, but he steered clear of
politics, parishioners said. Many angrily dismissed media reports that said
Velazquez might have been involved in organized crime.
Parishioner
Gerardo Rodriguez, 49, said Velazquez was always on the go, fiercely focused on
helping the poor, counseling couples, fundraising and building the church.
"He was
mobbed up all right, mobbed up with God, and the community," Rodriguez
said.
Velazquez, a
native of Guadalajara, was a seminary student and missionary in Mexico City and
New York City before he moved to Tijuana, where he became a priest in 1988.
Within a few years of his arrival at the parish of Santa Maria Reina, in an
upper-middle-class area in the hills above a country club, the one-room church
overflowed with members.
Velazquez
broke ground two years ago on a new church, and was only a few raffles and
fundraisers away from the finishing touches: heavy, engraved wooden doors and
two statues to flank the entrance.
People came
from all over to hear his sermons, a blend of religious and social commentary,
said parishioners and priests. "His motto was, 'Carry a newspaper in one
hand, and a Bible in the other — reality and the word of God,' " said
Jesus Lara, who led Velazquez's outreach group.
Velazquez
was a trailblazer in many ways, said Father Florentino Durazo, who heads a
theological school in Tijuana. Velazquez celebrated Mass in the streets and
spoke strongly against social injustice, he said. Velazquez believed that
marriage was the foundation of a caring and just society, Durazo said, and was
well known for helping couples solve relationship problems.
"His
death is a terrible wound for the church," Durazo said. "He inspired
so much enthusiasm, and now the community is suddenly left without him."
Velazquez
said his last Mass at a retreat for couples in Tecate, about 30 miles east of
Tijuana. Parishioners said he left at 8:30 p.m. Sunday. His body was found
about 7 a.m. the next morning, in the parking lot of the Plaza Fiesta, bullet
casings littering the ground outside his car.
The plaza is
a lively area full of restaurants and bars and some media reports have raised
questions about why Velazquez was in the area. Speculation is rife: Did the
priest hear confessions of drug kingpins and was killed because he knew too
much? Did he take money from the wrong people for his church? Was there a dark
secret in his personal life?
One
parishioner said Velazquez was a good man who accomplished much, but that he
was human.
"Everybody has weaknesses," the parishioner said.
Bishop
Rafael Romo Muñoz of the Tijuana diocese said that "whatever comes out
from the investigation, let it come out."
Meanwhile,
up in the hills, Velazquez's church sits unfinished. The building — with its
beige stucco walls and arched entry — evokes an old California mission.
Velazquez labored for two years on the project, and parishioners said they
intended to fulfill their priest's dream.
"I
don't know how we'll finish, but we will, in the memory of Father Luis,"
said parishioner Jesus Loredo.
* * * * *
Loss
in Iraq
"EACH
LOSS of life is heartbreaking," President Bush said Tuesday, as the
2,000th death of an American soldier in Iraq was recorded. That is surely one
thing about which everyone in an increasingly bitter and polarized debate
regarding the war can agree. The sacrifice of American lives, and the
debilitating injuries suffered by thousands of others, have devastated families
and wounded the nation. That the totals are relatively small compared with
those of previous U.S. wars, or the tens of thousands of Iraqis who have died,
does not change that.
What does
matter is what has come from those sacrifices. The most brutal and dangerous
dictator in the modern history of the Middle East was deposed, and last week he
was put on trial before an Iraqi court. Millions of Iraqis he oppressed
continue to be grateful for their liberation; unlike most Americans, they still
believe that the invasion was worth the cost. Despite the continuing
insurgency, more than 60 percent of registered voters turned out this month for
a constitutional referendum, and slates are forming for a parliamentary vote in
December that could be the most inclusive, competitive and meaningful election
ever held in
the Arab world.
That the war
remains broadly unpopular among Americans, and is routinely and glibly
described as a catastrophe by administration critics, shows that these
achievements are cloaked by the continuing bloodshed. The horrific nature of
car bomb and suicide attacks on U.S. soldiers and innocent civilians has compounded
the effect of the loss of life. So have the failure to find weapons of mass
destruction -- the threat that originally appeared to justify the costs and
risks of an invasion -- and the seeming intractability of the insurgency, which
has survived countless military offensives, killings or arrests of top leaders,
and changes of tactics. The political gains, though real, have been undermined
in recent
months by the sectarian and ethnic polarization of Iraqis and the apparent
effort by a number of Shiite and Kurdish political leaders to carry out a de
facto partition of the country under the guise of "federalism." That
agenda, and the Bush administration's weak response to it, threatens to tip
Iraq into a full-scale civil war, with U.S. troops caught in the middle.
There are no
easy solutions to these problems, nor is there a quick way to end American
losses. In fact, one of the greatest dangers of Iraq is that domestic
disenchantment with the mission will lead to a premature withdrawal of U.S.
troops, a step that would greatly increase the carnage and hand a major victory
to this country's foremost enemy, the Islamic extremist movement headed by al
Qaeda. Mr. Bush could have avoided much of that disillusionment had he been
more honest with the country from the beginning about the likely costs of
thewar. Yet even now he refuses to speak candidly about the conflict; he
describes it as if it were exclusively a battle between U.S.-backed democrats
and foreign terrorists, rather than a complex political and military struggle
among Iraqis. He did say on Tuesday that "this war will require more
sacrifice, more time and more resolve." As U.S. servicemen continue to
give their lives, the president must explain more clearly and more honestly why
that is so -- and why it is necessary.
* * * * *
Port
Authority Found Negligent in 1993 Bombing
By ANEMONA
HARTOCOLLIS
A Manhattan
jury said yesterday that the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey was
negligent in safeguarding the World Trade Center before the first terror attack
on the twin towers, the 1993 bombing that killed six people and injured 1,000.
In a verdict
that could prove costly for the Port Authority, the six-member jury in State
Supreme Court unanimously found that the agency did not heed warnings that the
underground garage was vulnerable to terrorist attack and should be closed to
public parking. This failure, the jury said, was "a substantial
factor" in allowing the bombing to occur.
It was in
the basement garage below the trade center that Islamic terrorists detonated a
van packed with explosives on Feb. 26, 1993, foreshadowing the attack that
brought down the towers and killed nearly 3,000 people on Sept. 11, 2001.
The verdict
came after four weeks of testimony from security experts and three former
directors of the Port Authority. The jury took just over a day to reach its
decision.
Although
Port Authority lawyers said they would appeal, it was the most significant
moment yet in a 12-year battle to hold the agency accountable for the events of
that February day, which ushered in a new era of security consciousness in New
York City and across the country.
The victims
of the 1993 bombings never received the outpouring of public support or
government compensation that went to those of the much more devastating 9/11
attacks.
More than
400 plaintiffs, including people hurt in the attack, families of the dead and
businesses, have lawsuits pending against the Port Authority, lawyers said
yesterday. The negligence verdict clears the way for them to press forward with
claims for lost wages, damage to businesses, and pain and suffering.
Lawyers for
the plaintiffs said they were seeking a total of as much as $1.8 billion. Those
cases will be decided through separate legal proceedings, which could end in
trials or settlements. The authority also faces lawsuits relating to the 9/11
attacks.
David J.
Dean, the lead lawyer for the plaintiffs, called the verdict "an
extraordinary victory." The jury, he said, clearly accepted the
plaintiffs' argument that the Port Authority should have foreseen the terrorist
attack, based on warnings from its own experts as early as 1985, and shut down
the public parking garage.
"The
case was never about blaming the terrorists," Mr. Dean said yesterday.
"It was about what the Port Authority should have done. They disregarded
the advice of their own experts and other experts. They were motivated by
money. They should have thought about the ultimate sacrifice of human
lives."
Marc
Kasowitz, the lead lawyer for the Port Authority, said the jury was wrong in
blaming the authority. "The Feb. 26, 1993, attack on the World Trade
Center was the act of terrorists for which terrorists alone are
responsible," he said. "The Port Authority believes in our American
jury system. It strongly believes that the decision in this case was
egregiously incorrect."
He said
there were strong grounds for appeal of the verdict, "based on errors made
by the court during this trial."
The burden
on the plaintiffs was to show that the Port Authority should have foreseen the
likelihood of a terrorist attack and taken steps to prevent it.
In order to
reach a verdict, at least five of the six jurors had to agree. The jury voted
unanimously that the Port Authority was negligent. It found the authority 68
percent at fault for the bombing, while the terrorists who carried it out were
32 percent at fault.
Mr. Dean,
the plaintiffs' lawyer, said that because the jury apportioned more than half
the blame to the Port Authority, the agency will have to pay 100 percent of any
damages for pain and suffering, the so-called non-economic damages, that might
be awarded.
Regardless
of how the blame was shared, the Port Authority would have to pay 100 percent
of any economic damages, like lost business, he said.
The jury
deadlocked, 4 to 2 in favor of the Port Authority, on whether that negligence
rose to the level of recklessness.
The
plaintiffs, however, indicated that they considered the 4-to-2 vote a hung
jury, leaving open the possibility of a retrial on that question. Mr. Kasowitz,
the Port Authority lawyer, said he considered the verdict on recklessness a no
vote. Justice Nicholas Figueroa said that the lawyers would return to court to
discuss that portion of the verdict.
During the
four weeks of testimony, the trial focused on a 1985 report by the Office of
Special Planning, an antiterrorist task force convened by Peter Goldmark, who
was the executive director of the Port Authority from 1977 to 1985.
Mr. Goldmark
created the office in 1984, after becoming concerned that, given terrorist
activities in other parts of the world, the trade center, as a symbol of
American capitalism and strength, could be a target. After a visit to Scotland
Yard in London that year, he wrote a memo saying that Scotland Yard was
"appalled" that there would be public transient parking beneath a
facility like the World Trade Center.
The report
concluded: "A time-bomb-laden vehicle could be driven into the W.T.C. and
parked in the public parking area. The driver would then exit via elevator into
the W.T.C. and proceed with his business unnoticed. At a predetermined time,
the bomb could be exploded in the basement. The amount of explosives used will
determine the severity of damage to that area."
Among the
report's recommendations was: "Eliminate all public parking in the World
Trade Center." It also recommended a series of compromise steps, including
guarded entrances to the parking lots, random searches of vehicles and
restrictions on pedestrian access.
The report
came out about four months after Mr. Goldmark left the Port Authority, and his
successors decided not to close the public lot, citing the potential loss of
revenue and inconvenience to tenants, according to evidence at the trial. They
also decided against most of the compromise measures.
In 1991,
according to the testimony, the Port Authority commissioned a second report,
from Burns and Roe Securacom, a private security company. That report found
that the major risk to the trade center was from a package or hand-held bomb,
and that the shopping and pedestrian areas, not the parking garage, would be
the most likely targets.
Several
jurors interviewed after the verdict yesterday said the mere fact that the 1985
predictions came true had weighed heavily in the verdict.
One of the
jurors, Rafael Garcia, a development executive at Nickelodeon, who lives in
Chelsea, called the report "irrefutable evidence" that was
"eerily prescient as far as what could happen."
"The
O.S.P. report was paramount," said Ray Gonzalez, another juror, who lives
in Murray Hill and is the director of housekeeping for a nursing home.
"Unfortunately, from there, everybody seemed to drop the ball."
Jurors said
that they were impressed by Mr. Goldmark, who testified for the plaintiffs and
wept on the stand, and that they found the witnesses for the defense less
credible. "Goldmark was the only one who didn't seem to be a Port
Authority company man," said the jury foreman, Alan Nelson, 54, of
Washington Heights, who works in the services department of a law firm.
In contrast,
he said, the witnesses for the Port Authority, "seemed highly programmed
in their answers," and seemed to be speaking, "from a bureaucratic,
organization-man point of view."
The jurors
said they had been offended, as the plaintiffs had hoped, by the Port
Authority's focus on the potential for economic losses of a terrorist attack.
One defense
witness, a security consultant, Robert Ducibella, referred to the loss of human
life as "collateral damage." In one of the reports highlighted by the
plaintiffs, the Port Authority rated the window-washing machine as a
potentially important loss. From the beginning, the Sept. 11 attack hung over
the trial like a ghost. The judge forbade both sides from mentioning it, saying
that what happened after 1993 was not relevant.
But both
sides knew 9/11 would be in the minds of the jury, and the Port Authority
repeatedly tried to capitalize on that by suggesting that nothing was going to
stop terrorists from one day trying to take down the towers.
Mr. Nelson,
the jury foreman, said that while he was satisfied with the verdict, "it's
kind of an empty feeling in a way."
"We're
talking about a building that is no longer there," he said.
* * * * *
Scare
Yourself Silly, but the Real Terrors Are at Your Feet
By ABIGAIL
ZUGER, M.D.
Just in time
for Halloween, the usual yearly ritual of terror by headline is now playing
itself out in medical offices everywhere. Last year it revolved around flu
shots; a few years ago it was anthrax and smallpox; a few years before that it
was the "flesh-eating bacteria"; and before that it was Ebola virus,
and Lyme disease and so on back into the distant past. This year it's the avian
flu.
"I was
crossing Third Avenue yesterday and I was coughing so hard I had to stop and
barely made it across," a patient told me last week. "I'm really
scared I'm getting the avian flu."
I just
looked at him. What could I say? He has smoked two packs of cigarettes a day
for the last 50 years. He has coughed and wheezed and gasped his way across
Third Avenue now for the last 10 years. His emphysema is not going to get any
better, but it might stop getting worse if he were to stop smoking.
He made it
clear long ago that this is not going to happen. When it comes to the whole
cigarette/health question, his motto, apparently, is "What, me
worry?"
But the
avian flu - now there's a health scare a person can sink his teeth into. So
scary and yet, somehow, so pleasantly distant. So thrilling, so chilling, and
yet, at the same time, so not here, not now, not yet. All in all, a completely
satisfying health care fear experience. Unlike his actual illness.
Scary movies
give children nightmares. Scary health news gives adults the extraordinary
ability to ignore the immediate in favor of the distant, to escape from the
real (and the really scary) into a far easier kind of fear.
A few years
ago, a young woman waited patiently to be seen in our office after hours. She
was a patient of one of my colleagues, but she couldn't wait for their
scheduled appointment; she needed to see someone right away.
"I'm
worried I have Lyme disease," she said. "I have all the symptoms. I
think I need to be treated."
"But
you have AIDS," I said.
"I'm
tired and weak and I have fevers and sweats. I've lost my appetite. I can't
think straight. I'm losing so much weight!"
She had seen
a TV news report on Lyme disease, and then she had checked the Internet. All
her symptoms were right there.
"But
you have AIDS," I said. "And you don't want to take meds. That's why
you're feeling so bad."
"I'm
really scared about Lyme disease," she said. "I really need to get
treated."
"If you
want to be scared, how about that untreated AIDS of yours?"
We looked at
each other. It was an impasse. The fact that logic was on my side mattered not
at all: evidently the real was just a little too real for her. How much better
to find another illness to be scared of, obsess over, get treated for, get rid
of.
Eventually
she coerced my colleague into testing her for Lyme disease and treating her
despite negative tests. Then she decided her symptoms might actually be due to
a brain tumor, instead. And so it went, until she died of AIDS.
Of four
patients I saw in a single hour last week, three announced how scared they were
of the avian flu. I reassured them, but there was quite a bit I did not say,
and here it is.
I did not
say: If you want to be scared, then how about that drug habit of yours you
think I don't know about? How about the fact that you are 100 pounds overweight
and eat nothing but junk? How about the fact that in a few short months
Medicaid is going to stop paying for your very expensive medications and no one
knows how just high that Medicare Part D deductible and co-payment are going to
be? I did not say: If you want something to be scared of, how about the
drug-resistant Klebsiella that is all over this very hospital, an ordinary
run-of-the-mill bacterial strain that has become so resistant to so many
antibiotics that we've had to resurrect a few we stopped using 30 years ago
because they
were so toxic.
That
Klebsiella is one scary germ. It's in hospitals all over the country, and by
now it's probably killed a thousandfold more people than the avian flu.
But you
don't hear much about our Klebsiella. Like our bad habits and our dismally
insoluble health insurance tangles, our antibiotic-resistant bacteria are with
us, right here, right now. Apparently they all lack the drama, the suspense,
the titillating worst-case situations that energize our politicians and turn
into a really newsworthy health care scare.
They're all
just too real.
* * * * *