News (1,643 posts)

What is happening here? Why, rather than taking the moral concerns behind social reforms seriously, do we so often respond with this kind of petulant, knee-jerk defensiveness? It’s not that we don’t care about right and wrong. But cases like these can feel like a far cry from the sort of moral issues that we’re inclined to take seriously – you know, like murder and human rights. In fact, there seems to be an unspoken expectation that when we’re confronted with genuine, important arguments for moral change, they’ll be easy to recognise…. Annoyance and irritation, though, are often taken as a sign that the concerns aren’t that big of a deal, that the arguments are mere quibbles that can be safely dismissed. Call this the eyeroll heuristic: if it’s preachy and annoying, it’s OK to ignore it.

The Scottish Government has been forced to release 500 people from prison early, because of concerns about overcrowding and a lack of safety for prisoners and staff. While this is a stop-gap measure, it is an indication that our prison system can no longer cope with the role it is tasked with – implementing justice. Perhaps, then, this is a good time to ask whether it achieves this, even in better times.

The new law establishes a council that will create a model policy for police responding to sexual assault, and it received unanimous, bipartisan support. The law also requires that officers refer victims to a victim advocate, distribute information about services available, and help the victim and any children present obtain medical care. Every law enforcement agency in the state will have to meet or exceed the model policy by September 2025, and the council will collect data about police and the overall criminal justice response to sexual assault statewide.

“With nearly half of teens in New York City reporting depressive symptoms, and suicide as the second leading cause of death in youth, ages 10 to 24, we cannot wait; now is the time to take action and finally address the mental health crises affecting our children,” said Mayor Adams.

Since qualifying in the 1960s and then moving into academia, Professor June Thoburn has carried out extensive research, in the UK and overseas, about child protection, family support, adoption and services for children placed away from home. Crucially, she contributed to reforms that allowed parents to attend child protection conferences. She was also part of the advisory groups on both the Children Act 1989 and the Adoption and Children Act 2002, conducting government-commissioned research that informed the latter.

NAPE president Jerry Earle says social work vacancies in Newfoundland and Labrador are a crisis that is getting worse. CSSD had 99 vacancies almost a year ago, but that number has grown to 105

It has been 41 years since the Mental Health Act (1983) was passed and became the main piece of legislation that covers the assessment, treatment, and rights of people with a mental health disorder in England and Wales. Much has changed in 41 years, including attitudes and understanding towards people who live with mental illness. A new Mental Health Act to bring such important legislation up to date must be a priority for the next government.

Women diagnosed with perinatal depression are more likely to develop cardiovascular disease in the following 20 years compared to women who have given birth without experiencing perinatal depression. The study is the first of its kind to look at cardiovascular health after perinatal depression and included data on around 600,000 women. It found the strongest links with risks of high blood pressure, ischemic heart disease and heart failure.

A clinical trial by Macquarie University’s Spinal Pain Research Group has looked at whether walking could be an effective, cost-effective and accessible intervention. The trial followed 701 adults who had recently recovered from an episode of low back pain, randomly allocating participants to either an individualised walking program and six physiotherapist-guided education sessions over six months, or to a control group.

Linda Tirado is a fine writer. And as a result of police brutality against journalists, she is now dying in her early forties. It started when Tirado covered a George Floyd protest in Minneapolis in 2020. She was shot in the face with a rubber bullet by a police officer. While rubber bullets, law enforcement assures us, are nonlethal, the force of a shot can fracture skulls. Tirado lost her sight in one eye, and over the last few years the full extent of her injury became clear. She also had brain damage and it was getting worse. And now, as her recent co-authored Substack informs us, “she is dying. Slowly, painfully, and with none of the dignity she’s earned and all of the TBI-induced dementia that’s stealing her limited time left with her kids.”

She’s still with us, however. So we wanted to take this chance to honor her, as she has honored others.

Florida’s law, perhaps the nation’s most far-reaching if it does take effect, says the state considers it discriminatory “to subject any student or employee to training or instruction that espouses, promotes, advances, inculcates or compels” them “to believe any of the following concepts.” It then lists eight taboo ideas. Among them: the idea that a person “should be discriminated against or receive adverse treatment to achieve diversity, equity or inclusion” and that a person’s status as privileged or oppressed “is necessarily determined by his or her race, color, sex or national origin.”

A federal court in Philadelphia will soon evaluate claims against the makers of Ozempic, Wegovy and similar products. Dozens of patients who suffered gastrointestinal problems after taking these drugs brought lawsuits alleging that these companies failed to properly warn patients about the risks.

Roughly one in four U.S. households have soil exceeding the new U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s lead screening levels of 200 parts per million (ppm), halved from the previous level of 400 ppm, a new study found. For households with exposure from multiple sources, the EPA lowered the guidance to 100 ppm; nearly 40% of households exceed that level, the study also found.

About 1.1 million Ukrainians have found refuge in Germany since Russia’s full-scale invasion of their country in February 2022. They are entitled to a welfare payment, known as Bürgergeld, or citizen’s income, of €563 a month. Couples receive €506 per person and children are eligible for payments of between €357 and €471 a month, depending on their age. The German state also covers costs such as rent, heating and healthcare. Above: A child refugee wearing a hair bow in the colours of the Ukrainian national flag at Berlin’s Hauptbahnhof central station.

The severity of anxiety and depressive symptoms in the planetary science community is greater than in the general U.S. population, according to a study led by a University of Hawai’i at Manoa scientist and published this week in Nature Astronomy.

Business is booming. The International Coaching Federation, the world’s largest nonprofit coaching association, estimated that the industry was worth $4.6 billion in 2022 and that the number of coaches increased 54 percent between 2019 and 2022. Because the industry lacks standardized accreditation, it’s most likely larger — one of the dangers of life coaching is that anyone can claim the title of life coach.

People who receive Medicare can now use RxPass, Amazon Pharmacy’s subscription service that for an extra $5 per month offers Prime members access to generic medications, Amazon said Tuesday. Though RxPass has been up and running for more than a year and it’s available in most US states, people who receive Medicare couldn’t use the service prior to today. People on Medicaid still can’t use RxPass.

Above: One of the two, Sen. Tanya Vyhovsky, MSW, P/D-Chittenden Central, speaks at the Statehouse in Montpelier on June 20, 2023.

Dr. Christopher Smith, an Associate Professor in Memorial University’s School of Social Work, is researching DFSA test kits

‘I’d done nothing wrong’… Tony Sinclair had worked all his life – but still found himself sleeping rough. Then even his tent was taken away from him

Amid spiralling workloads and a staffing crisis, mental health social workers in Barnet have taken over 60 days of strike action to demand investment in a vital service. Barnet’s Labour Council have responded by using strike-breaking agency workers.

They’ve been touted as an alternative to food banks that provide more choice and dignity to people struggling to afford food… People who use social supermarkets are allocated points to “spend” on food.

The U.S. government on Tuesday acknowledged for the first time the harms that the construction and operation of dams on the Columbia and Snake rivers in the Pacific Northwest have caused Native American tribes. It issued a report that details how the unprecedented structures devastated salmon runs, inundated villages and burial grounds, and continue to severely curtail the tribes’ ability to exercise their treaty fishing rights. Above: The Lower Granite Dam near Colfax, Washington

Clarinda Academy in Iowa, one of dozens of facilities run by Sequel Youth and Family Services, where more than 1,200 California foster youth had been sent in violation of state law.

ProPublica identified a group of connected political nonprofits — with names like American Breast Cancer Coalition and National Coalition for Disabled Veterans — that appear to be funneling more than 90% of donations to fundraisers. Above: A telephone in the living room of retiree Laurence Egger’s Pasadena, California, home. He said his phone rings two to three times a day with different causes asking him for money.

Several Harvard faculty members blasted Dean of Social Science Lawrence D. Bobo for suggesting certain faculty speech should face “sanctionable limits” and argued that his proposals would restrict academic freedom. Bobo argued in a Friday op-ed that some faculty members should face penalties from Harvard’s administration for issuing statements that incite external intervention into the University.

Swedish researchers have surveyed all people under the age of 25 who have had cancer since 1958. The study, led by researchers at Linköping University and Region Östergötland, shows that cancer survivors are at greater risk for cardiovascular diseases, other cancers and other diagnoses later in life. In addition, the researchers saw that socioeconomic factors played a role in survival.

Namibia is rated among the top three countries in Africa – the other two being South Africa and Zimbabwe, with a solid legal framework for social welfare systems in terms of the Social Work and Psychology Act No.6 of 2004, and the Social Work and Psychology Council, established under the same Act. Above: Dr. Lovisa Nghipandulwa is an industrial social work specialist, employed as an industry relations and cooperative education practitioner at the University of Namibia.

The archaic data system – that holds all its vital case management information needed by social workers on a daily basis – is being replaced, extending the data-gathering and analysing power at the ministry.

Despite past misconduct, some former therapists have continued their careers as life coaches. Now, after a high-profile conviction in Utah, legislators are asking whether it’s time for more oversight.

Natacha Gray had an active life, diving, climbing and playing music, before illness left her so tired she would collapse on the way to the couch. She discusses two and a half devastating years – and how she stays optimistic

The $230 million temporary pier that the U.S. military built on short notice to rush humanitarian aid to Gaza has largely failed in its mission, aid organizations say, and will probably end operations weeks earlier than originally expected. WtF??? $230,000,000 (that the DoD admits to) for a temporary pier??? Now more than ever the guiding principle should be “follow the money”

Green MP Ricardo Menéndez March accused the minister of an ‘almost eugenic-type definition of productivity’.

Writing in the latest edition of Scottish Mountaineering, Richard Tiplady, a Scottish Mountaineering member, made several recommendations based on “horror stories” from women.

The study identifies effective, lifesaving interventions following initial nonfatal overdoses. The odds of dying from a subsequent lethal overdose decreased among cohort members who received methadone (58% lower odds), buprenorphine (52% lower odds), or behavioral health assessment or crisis services (75% lower odds). The risk of overdose mortality among those who filled a prescription for naloxone was also reduced by 30%. However, significant gaps in care were also noted.

The government has a variety of strategies to protect the public from price-gouging and information advantages over the consumer. Above: Credit card shopping sites, tax preparation, and grocery stores have been disrupted with public options as an alternative to price-gouging.

Researchers have examined viewer responses to images of distressing and neutrally decorated masks and whether personal life history, particularly past experiences of trauma and difficulty, affected how the person perceived the imagery.

Leah Buckle explains that the loss of previous attitudes towards sexual orientation and gender identity in Africa stemmed from the spread of Christian values by the colonisers.

People who experience prolonged depressive symptoms starting in young adulthood may have worse thinking and memory skills in middle age, according to a new study. The study also found that depressive symptoms were experienced more often by Black adults than white adults.

Inmates exercise at Stanley Prison on Hong Kong Island.

The pandemic fueled a boom in social justice movements and indie bookstores. The two come together in these worker-owned shops. Above: Raquel Espasande is one of several employees at the worker-owned Bluestockings Cooperative in New York City — which provides, among other free services, food to homeless people and English lessons to asylum seekers.

A data-driven intervention that engaged communities to rapidly deploy evidence-based practices to reduce opioid-related overdose deaths – such as increasing naloxone distribution and enhancing access to medication for opioid use disorder – did not result in a statistically significant reduction in opioid-related overdose death rates during the evaluation period, according to results(link is external) from the National Institutes of Health’s HEALing (Helping to End Addiction Long-Term) Communities Study.

UNC professor Larry Chavis’s contract was not renewed for the fall after 18 years with the university…. Chavis declined to go into much detail about his experience with the university since he learned of the recording. But he said that as a lifelong North Carolinian, teaching at Chapel Hill was a dream that he’s disappointed to see end in conflict.

As someone who over the past 50 years has thought about and written many books and articles on U.S. feminism, I should have been less surprised by the strong electoral backlash to the Supreme Court’s 2022 Dobbs V. Jackson Women’s Health Organization ruling, a judgment that overturned the 1973 Roe V. Wade decree and thus 50 years of national abortion rights. Above: Demonstrators rally for abortion rights outside the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., on Nov. 20, 1971.

How successful was the reorganization of Social Work Centers (SWC), implemented in 2018 by the Ministry of Labor, Family, Social Affairs, and Equal Opportunities? The ministry, SWC employees, and users have different opinions.

A care home for children with disabilities is set to open in a street in Norwich despite pushback from its future neighbours…. People living near the home objected to the plans due to fears about increased traffic in the area, as well as noise levels and the impact of this on a “quiet, suburban cul-de-sac”.

Social Workers Registration Board chief executive Sarah Clark (above) said 11 polytechnics offered recognised social work qualifications and the board had supported the unification work. “Our focus is on ensuring that graduates are safe and competent to practise so having some consistency across the country was seen as advantageous,” she said.

Adolescents with an internet addiction undergo changes in the brain that could lead to additional addictive behaviour and tendencies, finds a new study by UCL researchers.