Two things happening now to take note of

[sportage]

For one.... the attack on vaping from the tobacco companies.
The warnings in the media are endless and the scare tactics abdominal.
They dare compare what, ten people with yet to be proven vaping issues against thousands, millions killed off by years of tobacco use?
We know what is happening, tobacco lobbyist want people off vapes and back on cigarettes.
And now they convinced the news media to join in and go along with the vaping scare tactics.
And soon, you can bet your life that the full US congress will join in and start passing bans and restrictions concerning the vaping industry.
Yet.... tobacco goes on as fully legal and fully killing thousands of people every year, with not one concern from congress or from the media other than that little white warning label on the cigarette pack.
The label no one even notices.
But heart attacks, cancer, THAT people will notice, usually when rushed to the nearest ER.
Yet congress? The news media?
They'd rather create mass hysteria over five or ten people and vaping while ignoring the big picture.
Ignoring the thousands and thousands of dying and already dead from years of tobacco use.
So pay attention to this one.
Pay attention to this odd collusion between tobacco and the media in attempts to take vapes out of the hands of vapers, and replace those vapes with tobacco filled cigarettes.

And second to take note of... all of those TV ads.
Those TV ads resurrected from the Bill Clinton era trying to scare people away from supporting Universal Health Care.
The public option.
The medicare for all.
Whatever you want to call it, but allowing every American to having healthcare.
They must think we are stupid.
They got away with this when Bill and Hillary were doing their health care thing back in the 1990's, however since then people have not only realized but personally experienced that the current healthcare for profit system is worthless AND is killing a lot of people.
Obamacare only scratched the surface. And the only real benefit from Obamacare was finally addressing pre-existing conditions.
And even that republicans fight with hopes to take away from the general public.
So as we see endless TV commercials warning us how terrible Medicare for all would be or lying about cost and doctors, as if anyone knows anymore what it is to chose and keep your own doctor.
That went away long long ago when companies started changing healthcare providers every year to save a buck, raise co-pays, while cutting benefits.
So there is no picking of your own doctor or choosing your own provider. Not any more.....
Heck.... if you believe the misinformation from those commercials you'd think we already had medicare for all.
So anyway, they are at it again.
Flooding the airwaves with paid actors decrying the benefits of medicare for all i.e. everyone in America having healthcare coverage.
Trying to convince people that the current way it is now is the best and only way.
You know.... having no healthcare at all, or drugs that no one can afford and that the current providers will not cover the cost of, then people actually start dying.
The one thing to ask yourself, with this floor of TV commercials one must ask WHO IS PAYING FOR ALL THIS AIRTIME?
With the flood of TV spots attacking Medicare for all, someone with BIG BUCKS must be buying these ads.
Wanna guess who?
It's the companies with endless amounts of money to blow, i.e. the status quo pharmaceutical industry and the status quo for profit healthcare industry.
They have endless amounts of money to run the ads 24/7 against people having healthcare.
And why shouldn't they have all the money, they got it from YOU.
Healthcare will be the hot topic in this upcoming election, and just could decide who gets elected and which party prevails.
And the for profit healthcare industry knows that fact but all too well.
And so, they flood the TV with ads.
Ads with actors lying to you.
Ads trying desperately to get people to once again vote against their own best interest.
It's the 1990's all over again, so just be warned.
They have their pretty little ads with their convincing little actors, but the goal is to screw the people once again.
I trust that this time history and experience will win out in the end.
We know a bad deal when we see it, and healthcare for profit has been a very bad deal.
People die.
They take your money, then kick you in the grave, then go happily on their merry way.

 

[Genx87]

Things never change. A wall o text from sportage is one of them.

 

[darkswordsman17]

Sorry OP but there's issues with vaping. I believe tobacco companies are big investors in the vaping industry too, so I doubt that's behind this.

https://arstechnica.com/science/201...cases-jump-from-94-to-153-in-5-days-cdc-says/

The thing you're ignoring is that this seems to be an acute illness. The stuff you're talking about from tobacco takes years, that's why the CDC is issuing warnings. It very likely will turn out to be some contaminated fluid or possibly people having some other illness that normally isn't severe but becomes acute when partaking in certain vaping behavior (i.e. the morons that make themselves sick by trying to vape a ridiculous amount in a short period, where it probably causes issues like significant inflammation in their respiratory system).

Plus I guess you're yet another vaping advocate that wants to ignore that vaping companies have been trying to market to younger people (i.e. the same shit tobacco companies got slammed for), and that due to the nicotine addiction many of them end up trying tobacco as well? I've seen it first hand. Vaping shit was rampant in the high school where my two nephews went and they both started doing it (and later tobacco products even after they tried the "vaping is healthy its nothing like smoking!" and even trying to claim that the shit didn't have nicotine in it and claiming they wouldn't get addicted to nicotine and they'd never smoke cigarettes or chew; one of them had tried chew back when he was in junior high when they lived in rural Kansas, stupid bastard made himself so sick he threw up all over the basement and swore he'd never do chew again, too bad he was so addicted to nicotine but couldn't smoke because he kept getting caught when he'd do that).

Vaping should be healthier than smoking cigarettes. That doesn't make it healthy or free from issues as we're seeing. You're playing a role in the thing you're complaining about as well. Kinda like people that push the "alcohol is healthy" while ignoring stuff like how it carries substantially increased risk for throat cancer.

 

[Commodus]

You can't really argue that the tobacco industry has a grudge against vaping when Juul, one of the most popular vaping brands, is owned by Altria -- you know, the parent company of Philip Morris. If anything, the cigarette industry has a vested interest in seeing vaping succeed.

The truth is that vaping has its own medical concerns, they're just not the same ones as for tobacco. E-cigs have a slew of chemicals that aren't good for you. At best, vaping should be seen as a bridge toward cutting all forms of smoking; it shouldn't be a permanent replacement.

 

[BonzaiDuck]

You can't really argue that the tobacco industry has a grudge against vaping when Juul, one of the most popular vaping brands, is owned by Altria -- you know, the parent company of Philip Morris. If anything, the cigarette industry has a vested interest in seeing vaping succeed.

The truth is that vaping has its own medical concerns, they're just not the same ones as for tobacco. E-cigs have a slew of chemicals that aren't good for you. At best, vaping should be seen as a bridge toward cutting all forms of smoking; it shouldn't be a permanent replacement.

I'm always open to new information. I'm a back-sliding recovering tobacco addict. I also like my casual Prop-64.

I had looked into the issue of carcinogen risk from e-cig vaping a year ago. Other than the nicotine, the base of the fluid can either be a petroleum-based sugar-alcohol, or a vegetable-based sugar-alcohol. I opted to use the vegetable-based fluid. But the sugar-alcohols are deemed medically harmless in the material I read.

Even so there was one exception: there is a minute creation of formaldehyde in the vaping process. The higher the voltage of the vaping tool, the greater the amount of formaldehyde created. Formaldehyde is a carcinogen, and they ran statistical studies of morticians and people in other industries who handled formaldehyde. There was an increased occurrence of an exotic variety of cancer -- maybe it was pancreatic but it wasn't lung cancer -- among the morticians, but there was no significant increase in comparing the industrial workers with the general population.

Is there new information about this?

Returning to the matter of voltage, I made a recent discovery. Different vaping tools provide a different amount of "vape", and this is also a matter of voltage. The more expensive vape tools are designed to give a "throat hit" more like a cigarette.

After replacing one weak vaping-tool with one more adequate, I reached a situation in which my OTHER vaping pen (for Prop-64) was not charging properly. Before I bought another $2 USB charging dongle for it, I attached the Prop-64 cartridge to the regular nicotine vaping pen.

Way too much Prop-64 in a single hit! I was gagging and choking for a few minutes.

There are all sorts of reasons that these dozen or so people went to the hospital, but a dozen occurrences doth not a public health problem make. These hospital visits occurred within a contiguous region of states, so the cause needs more investigation.

 

[s0me0nesmind1]

Vaping should be just like smoking and just like drinking - If you want to harm your body, fine... Toss some warning labels on the product if it makes you feel better.

As long as we have done away with shit like smoking sections in retaraunts - and forcing smokers to go to designated areas where they can all kill eachother then who cares? You could argue the medical costs of it, but to that (like I said) one can argue just as much against beer, wine, soda, liquor, chips, etc...

 

[cytg111]

tobacco + offsprings should be made illegal. Its made to get you hooked and it kills you. Yea no.

 

[nickqt]

tobacco + offsprings should be made illegal. Its made to get you hooked and it kills you. Yea no.

All drugs should be legal, and society has a vested interest in the rehabilitation of addicts.

 

[Maxima1]

Plus I guess you're yet another vaping advocate that wants to ignore that vaping companies have been trying to market to younger people (i.e. the same shit tobacco companies got slammed for), and that due to the nicotine addiction many of them end up trying tobacco as well? I've seen it first hand. Vaping shit was rampant in the high school where my two nephews went and they both started doing it (and later tobacco products even after they tried the "vaping is healthy its nothing like smoking!" and even trying to claim that the shit didn't have nicotine in it and claiming they wouldn't get addicted to nicotine and they'd never smoke cigarettes or chew; one of them had tried chew back when he was in junior high when they lived in rural Kansas, stupid bastard made himself so sick he threw up all over the basement and swore he'd never do chew again, too bad he was so addicted to nicotine but couldn't smoke because he kept getting caught when he'd do that).

Vaping should be healthier than smoking cigarettes. That doesn't make it healthy or free from issues as we're seeing. You're playing a role in the thing you're complaining about as well. Kinda like people that push the "alcohol is healthy" while ignoring stuff like how it carries substantially increased risk for throat cancer.

Vaping isn't nearly as addictive because it lacks the MAOIs in cigarette smoke.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16177026

Monoamine oxidase inhibition dramatically increases the motivation to self-administer nicotine in rats.

Nicotine is the major neuroactive compound of tobacco, which has, by itself, weak reinforcing properties. It is known that levels of the enzymes monoamine oxidase A (MAO-A) and MAO-B are reduced in the platelets and brains of smokers and that substances, other than nicotine, present in tobacco smoke have MAO-inhibitory activities. Here, we report that inhibition of MAO dramatically and specifically increases the motivation to self-administer nicotine in rats. These effects were more prominent in rats selected for high responsiveness to novelty than in rats with low responsiveness to novelty. The results suggest that the inhibition of MAO activity by compounds present in tobacco smoke may combine with nicotine to produce the intense reinforcing properties of cigarette smoking that lead to addiction.

 

[cytg111]

All drugs should be legal, and society has a vested interest in the rehabilitation of addicts.

agree to disagree

 

[shortylickens]

Anyone who thinks the American government should run health care CLEARLY has never been to a veterans hospital.

 

[s0me0nesmind1]

Anyone who thinks the American government should run health care CLEARLY has never been to a veterans hospital.

HAhaahahhaha the funny thing here is the lefties here will defend vet care as if it's above and beyond our normal capitalist care. I know @fskimospy has defended vet care here, I'm sure others have as well.

I've heard plenty of the negative public press, but admittedly, I can't say much outside of that.

 

[fskimospy]

HAhaahahhaha the funny thing here is the lefties here will defend vet care as if it's above and beyond our normal capitalist care. I know @fskimospy has defended vet care here, I'm sure others have as well.

I've heard plenty of the negative public press, but admittedly, I can't say much outside of that.

I sure will defend the VA! If someone would like to make some specific criticisms I’m more than happy to engage on them.

The most productive way to criticize the VA though would be to point out not anecdotes but independently measured metrics that take into account cost, access, and quality.

Let me know!

 

[s0me0nesmind1]

I sure will defend the VA! If someone would like to make some specific criticisms I’m more than happy to engage on them.

The most productive way to criticize the VA though would be to point out not anecdotes but independently measured metrics that take into account cost, access, and quality.

Let me know!

Yup, I'm not going to Google for bias articles or anything -I've heard plenty of negativities regarding vet care. But as I said, if I haven't had to deal with it myself, or had to take a fellow family member - then I honestly can't give a qualified opinion.

I just remember you have defended it in the past. I honestly hope you're right (as much as you might be wrong), because it should be the best care.... But knowing how we treat vets in general, I have a hard time believing it...

 

[fskimospy]

Yup, I'm not going to Google for bias articles or anything -I've heard plenty of negativities regarding vet care. But as I said, if I haven't had to deal with it myself, or had to take a fellow family member - then I honestly can't give a qualified opinion.

I just remember you have defended it in the past. I honestly hope you're right (as much as you might be wrong), because it should be the best care.... But knowing how we treat vets in general, I have a hard time believing it...

It’s not the ‘best’ care that exists but it is broadly comparable to care that people can get at other facilities and it generally controls costs very well.

In some ways it can be hard to compare the VA to other hospitals as the VA serves a unique population, but where you can it does okay. It’s not perfect by any means it’s just when the VA does something shitty we all hear about it while when the local hospital does nobody cares.

 

[nickqt]

Anyone who thinks the American government should run health care CLEARLY has never been to a veterans hospital.

So, ALL VA hospitals are bad?

Is that your claim?

Personal anecdote, you've been to them all?

 

[abj13]

The most productive way to criticize the VA though would be to point out not anecdotes but independently measured metrics that take into account cost, access, and quality.

To supplement your post, VA hospitals have superior outcomes in patient outcome indicators when compared to non-VA hospitals in the US using the CMS hospital data from 2012-2015, including:
Pressure ulcers
Death among surgical inpatients
Iatrogenic pneumothorax
Catheter associated blood stream infections
Perioperative venous thromboembolism
Post-operative sepsis

And were no worse in:
In-hospital fall with hip fracture
Postoperative wound dehiscence
Unrecognized abdominopelvic accidental puncture/laceration

And then when they looked at 30 day mortality or readmission rates for heart attacks, pneumonia, COPD, heart failure, VA hospitals were superior.

Patient satisfaction was lower in VA hospitals, which no doubt reflects some of the anecdoctal experiences. Nonetheless, if you had someone with pneumonia, heart attack, COPD or heart failure, they are more likely to survive their hospitalization at the VA compared to other hospitals.

Blay E Jr, DeLancey JO, Hewitt DB, Chung JW, Bilimoria KY. Initial Public Reporting of Quality at Veterans Affairs vs Non-Veterans Affairs Hospitals. JAMA Intern Med. 2017 Jun 1;177(6):882-885. doi: 10.1001/jamainternmed.2017.0605.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5540047/

 

[Moonbeam]

I have a hard time believing it...

All our lives we have been warned never to trust. It is just as important, I think, to be suspicious of suspision, as it is to doubt things. We fear beimg put down for being naive. Andthe devil quotes scripture. The only way to free oneself from conditioning is to question everything, all our sacred cows qnd everything we believe. What, really, is wrong with not knowing everything, or anything.

 

[tweaker2]

I'm a retired vet and I like the service I get at Spark Matsunaga VAMC. As well, when I was active the service at Tripler was on par with any of the other hospitals I had to go to on the island.