Meanwhile the Republicans and their propaganda service (FOX News) are telling us there is no Ebola in the US, it is all a hoax (Thats the same thing they told us about Climate Change/Global Warming) or Everything is under control (the same thing they said about Fukushima radioactive contamination). Health Experts: Sequester and Other Budget Cuts Left us Vulnerable to Ebola Health experts are saying that the budget cuts, including sequestration, resulting from fiscal conservatives’ goal of cutting government at all costs, has greatly exacerbated the Ebola crisis in Africa and left the U.S. vulnerable. Dr. Francis Collins, the head of the National Institutes of Health, said that a decade of stagnant spending has “slowed down” research on all items, including vaccinations for infectious diseases. As a result, he said, the international community has been left playing catch-up on a potentially avoidable humanitarian catastrophe. Several Democratic lawmakers have introduced legislation that would increase NIH funds to $46.2 billion in 2021. But there is no indication that such a bill will move forward any time soon. You can read more at Huffington Post: tinyurl/q84ghe5. Dr. Collins said that steep budget cuts by Congress have set back the institutes work on both prevention and treatment for Ebola and that if it hadnt been for a decades worth of cuts, “we probably would have had a vaccine in time for this that would’ve gone through clinical trials and would have been ready.” According to Daily Kos, (tinyurl/pfo5s3m), “Its not just the NIH thats suffered, and its not just in Africa where the cuts are harming people. The Center for Disease Controls emergency preparedness budget has been nearly cut in half in just the past seven years…That means that local health departments in this country dont have the funding—or the staff—they need to do the necessary preparation and training to deal with any epidemic.” Dr. Judy Stone, an infectious disease specialist, details the cuts at Scientific American (tinyurl/mskmooe), writing, “Shockingly, annual funding for the CDC’s public health preparedness and response efforts were $1 billion lower for 2013 fiscal year than for 2002 (tinyurl/lyzb9eg). These funding decreases have resulted in more than 45,700 job losses at state and local health departments since 2008.” The U.S. does not have a Surgeon General. President Obama had nominated Dr. Vivek Murthy to be America’s Surgeon General back in November of last year. However, Dr. Vivek expressed his view that he sees a connection between gun violence and overall public health, and Senate Republicans have held up his nomination under pressure from the National Rifle Association. See also why travel bans don’t work in containing Ebola: tinyurl/qgdx6xt. “Fiscal conservatives cut government to the bone, and as a result, the country wasn’t ahead of the curve when it came to disease research and prevention,” said Barbara J. Easterling, President of the Alliance.
Posted on: Sat, 18 Oct 2014 09:43:03 +0000
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