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Study: US Arms Sales Impede Human Rights | Seattle Times

Communications — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 03:22:00 -0500

Timed to the 60th anniversary of the UN's Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the report by the New America Foundation, a nonpartisan policy institute, ...

Columnist Neal Peirce Extols Ray Boshara, Kids Savings Accounts

Communications — Mon, 18 Jun 2007 10:12:00 -0400

Are the bad old days back? Read the headlines and you'd think so: "Violent Crime Blazing Back in America" and "Big-city murders way up since '04..."Let's assume the recent rise is serious. What's happening? Lots of competing explanations get offered: Gang problems are now growing in smaller cities. Gun laws are loose and the politicos fear to stiffen them. Because we have the world's highest incarceration rate, rising numbers of inmates are being released from prisons — far too few rehabilitated or able to land a job...

Everyone wants truly dangerous criminals behind bars — indeed for as long as possible...

How about prevention — investing early, systematically in kids and families? This is the issue all the alarming crime headlines, and quick political fixes, ignore. Poverty, broken families, poor education and significant crime are inextricably bundled. Early childhood nutrition, care and education can pay off hugely later...

What of the argument that we can't "afford" the depth of early-childhood services such as other advanced nations provide?Ray Boshara of the New America Foundation has a radically better idea: Establish an "American Stakeholder Account" for every child at birth — initial government deposit $6,000, plus eligibility for dollar-for-dollar matching funds… more

Official at FDA Warns of Drug Risks

Cecille Isidro — Fri, 19 Nov 2004 00:00:00 -0500

WASHINGTON -- In devastating testimony before a Senate panel yesterday, a whistle-blower at the Food and Drug Administration shocked a packed hearing room when he listed five drugs now on the market that he thinks are dangerous and accused the agency of stifling its own scientists who raise safety questions.

Dr. David Graham, an FDA drug-safety official, said the agency and drug giant Merck, didn't move fast enough to take the painkiller Vioxx off the market.

He said that because of the FDA's flawed structure, Americans are left "virtually defenseless" against dangerous pharmaceuticals.

"I would argue that the FDA ... is incapable of protecting America against another Vioxx," he said, because of the FDA's close relationship to the drug companies it regulates.

He was testifying before the Senate Finance Committee, which is looking into the FDA's drug-approval process.

Merck pulled Vioxx off the market in September in light of new information about its risk of heart attacks.

Graham said an earlier estimate that Vioxx may have caused 27,000 heart attacks was "extremely conservative." He said the drug may have caused as many as 139,000 heart attacks, leading to as many as 55,000 deaths.

Graham stunned the hearing room when he listed, when asked by a senator, five other drugs now in use that he thinks present safety problems: Meridia, a weight-loss drug; Crestor, an anti-cholesterol drug; Accutane, an acne drug linked to birth defects; Bextra, a painkiller; and Serevent, an asthma treatment. Makers of the drugs defended the safety of their products.

Graham said Serevent was shown, in a long-term trial in England, to cause asthma-related deaths. "We've got case reports of people dying, clutching their Serevent inhaler," Graham said. "But Serevent is still on the market."

The FDA approved Vioxx in 1999, just months before Merck released a study that showed an elevated number of heart attacks among Vioxx users. Merck downplayed the study results and kept the drug on the market until September.

In 1999, while Merck was estimating how much Vioxx it could sell, doctors at Group Health Cooperative in Seattle reviewed those results and other data on Vioxx's safety. Group Health's physicians decided not to make the drug available for its half-million members, citing the risks that eventually would lead to its withdrawal, Dr. Bruce Psaty of the University of Washington told Congress yesterday.

Psaty, co-director of UW's cardiovascular-research center and a researcher who works with Group Health patients, said Merck and FDA should have acted earlier on studies and signals regarding Vioxx's potential to cause heart attack and stroke.

Psaty was a key witness in a packed hearing, in which Merck and the FDA came under fire from panel chairman, Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, who called Vioxx "the worst drug disaster in America's history."

Seating was so hard to come by that trial lawyers and industry lobbyists paid people to stand in line for seats for them.

Psaty said that if Merck had completed its 1999 study several months sooner, "Vioxx might not have been approved."

He called on the FDA to institute an independent office to review drug safety "to prevent another disaster like this one."

Merck's Chief Executive Officer Raymond Gilmartin and a FDA official defended their organizations' handling of Vioxx, which generated sales of $2.5 billion last year.

Gilmartin said the company did not have convincing clinical trial evidence of heart-attack risk until just days before the drug was withdrawn. Before that data, "there was no demonstrated increased risk of cardiovascular events for patients taking Vioxx," he said.

But Group Health's Director of Studies, Dr. Eric Larson, who helped Psaty prepare his testimony, reviewed issues surrounding Vioxx in 1999. "We at Group Health decided not to use Vioxx when it came out, because we did not see enough evidence of its safety, or efficacy," Larson said.

Group Health is a nonprofit cooperative that provides care for more than 500,000 people in Washington and Idaho.

Larson said Group Health has rejected several highly touted and heavily advertised drugs for use by its subscribers that later were withdrawn from the market for safety reasons.

They include Baycol, a cholesterol drug; Seldane, an antihistamine; the diet-drug duo fen-phen; Rezulin, a diabetes medicine; and Posicor, a cardiac drug.

After the hearing, Graham was asked how he became a FDA whistle-blower. He said, "I didn't start out that way. The FDA made me into one."

Spokane Bishop Elected to Lead Church in U.S.

Cecille Isidro — Tue, 16 Nov 2004 00:00:00 -0500

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- In an apparent affirmation of church tradition, Bishop William Skylstad of Spokane yesterday was elected president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops at its annual fall meeting.

The election came just five days after Skylstad announced his diocese would file for bankruptcy within the month, and amid clamor by critics in Spokane that Skylstad should not be elected president because he had failed in the past to deal firmly with complaints about sexually abusive clergy.

Skylstad, 70, had served as vice president of the conference during the past three-year term, and no sitting vice president who's run for the presidency has been denied it.

Bishops and other church officials at the conference praised Skylstad's warmth, his work as vice president and his commitment to social justice and the environment.

But they also emphasized the weight of tradition. Cardinal Theodore McCarrick of Washington, D.C., cited continuity as a main reason Skylstad won. Through his spokesperson, McCarrick added that he has known Skylstad for years and considers him honest and able to work well with other bishops.

The Rev. Thomas Reese, editor of the Jesuit magazine, America, had predicted Skylstad's win. "It would have been very unusual for the conference to reject Bishop Skylstad after serving as vice president."

Reese said the bishops may also have wanted to elect Skylstad as a way to show that negative publicity would not derail tradition.

Of 232 possible votes, Skylstad received 120, with the other votes given to nine other contenders. While no other candidate approached Skylstad's tally, his 52 percent share still made it "the closest race I think we have had," Reese said.

Skylstad declined interview requests.

David Clohessy, national director of Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), called the election result a step backward. He said the choice suggests that the church hierarchy still doesn't comprehend the seriousness of the sexual-abuse crisis.

"It's disturbing that the bishops can pretend this election can take place totally disconnected from the greatest crisis the church has faced in modern times."

Members of SNAP and some Spokane parishioners last week called on Skylstad to resign as bishop and withdraw his name as candidate for conference president. They said he was unfit to lead the group, having failed in the past to prevent a priest he supervised -- the Rev. Patrick O'Donnell -- from molesting children, even after parishioners complained repeatedly to Skylstad about O'Donnell.

In his deposition in a lawsuit against him, O'Donnell admitted abusing at least 30 boys during his priesthood. According to his own statements, O'Donnell's most abusive period was 1974-76, when he lived in a North Spokane rectory with Skylstad, who was his supervising priest at the time. Skylstad's failure to stop O'Donnell, even after receiving complaints, is a key allegation in five lawsuits against Skylstad, O'Donnell and the diocese.

The first of those trials was scheduled to begin Nov. 29. The bankruptcy filing would put a halt to the trial.

In Spokane, parishioners had mixed reactions to the election.

Terry Corrigan, whose son, Tim Corrigan, committed suicide the day he told his wife about being abused by O'Donnell, said: "I'm obviously not pleased with the election results. I don't think he showed much leadership in this diocese dealing with the victims of abuse and opposing the ongoing cover-up of shifting priests from parish to parish."

But Barbara Anderson, who attends Immaculate Conception parish in Colville, says Skylstad is beloved by many parishioners. "I think it's absolutely wonderful," Anderson said of the election. "He's a wonderful man. I believe he's done everything he can possibly to correct the situation in our diocese."

Skylstad has gone further than some bishops in being open about the sexual-abuse scandal. For instance, he has released the names of alleged abusers and withdrew an initial request that certain court records in lawsuits be kept from the public.

The election produced some surprises: Cardinal Francis George of Chicago, who served as bishop of Yakima from 1990-96 and later as archbishop in Portland, from 1996-97, was chosen vice president.

It's rare for a cardinal, who ranks higher in the church hierarchy, to hold a leadership position in the conference and "it's been quite a long time" since one did, said Francis Butler, president of Foundations and Donors Interested in Catholic Activities, a consortium of foundations that fund Catholic causes.

The other unusual twist was the lack of support for the outspoken Archbishop Charles Chaput of Denver. Chaput, who attracted attention during the U.S. presidential election for condemning Catholic politicians who don't follow church teachings, received only a handful of votes. That clear rejection, said some observers, indicates that the conference does not want a fight over the issue.

Cutting-Edge Small Technology Deserves Big U.S. Investment

Cecille Isidro — Thu, 28 Jun 2001 00:00:00 -0400

Last January, during a major policy address on science and technology, President Clinton proposed a new $500 million National Nanotechnology Initiative (NNI). A nanometer is one-billionth of a meter, or roughly 70 times the diameter of a cold virus. Nanotechnology will allow us to manipulate matter at the atomic and molecular level, and to make materials and devices with new and useful properties.

As President Clinton noted in his speech, nanotechnology research could eventually lead to amazing breakthroughs, such as the ability to store the equivalent of the Library of Congress in a device the size of a sugar cube, or to develop materials that are 10 times stronger than steel and a fraction of the weight.

Although Congress did not provide full funding for the NNI, they did increase the federal funding for nanotechnology from $285 million to $446 million, a 56 percent increase. Many universities and research institutions are interested in expanding their efforts in this area. The University of Washington, for example, has created the first nanotechnology Ph.D. program in the country, and is teaming up with the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory to create a Joint Institute for Nanoscience and Nanotechnology.

Unfortunately, the budget the Bush administration has submitted to Congress will make it difficult to significantly expand the NNI. The Bush plan would cut the research budgets of the National Science Foundation, NASA and the Department of Energy, agencies that all play a key role in the NNI.

Allan Bromley, who was science adviser to former President George Bush, has called these proposed cuts a "self-defeating policy" that puts at risk all of George W. Bush's major policy goals. Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich has called the Bush administration's proposal to cut the NSF research budget "a tragic mistake."

Even within declining R&D budgets, some agencies are proposing to increase their expenditures on nanotechnology. And to their credit, the Bush administration is continuing to track how much the federal government is investing in this area. For a number of reasons, however, a failure to significantly expand U.S. government funding for nanotechnology would be a serious blow to America's future.

First of all, nanotechnology clearly has the potential to be a transformative technology, with an economic and social impact similar in scope and magnitude to electricity, the computer chip and the Internet. Nanotechnology could lead to dramatic improvements in computing, health care, manufacturing, materials, energy and the environment.

Scientists believe continued research in nanotechnology could lead to advances such as computers that are one million times more powerful than today's by creating transistors made from individual molecules. In the emerging field of nanomedicine, researchers are working to detect cancerous tumors when they are only a few cells in size, and cure diabetes with nanofactories that function as artificial kidneys.

Second, global leadership in this critical technology is up for grabs. As the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) recently concluded, "Nanotechnology is the first economically important revolution in science and technology (S&T) since World War II that the United States has not entered with a commanding lead." Europe and Japan are already ramping up their investments in this area.

Third, investment in nanotechnology will help build the technical work force of the future. Inevitably, some of the University of Washington professors and graduate students who are involved in nanotech research projects will start their own company or join an existing firm.

Finally, nanotechnology is a classic example of a long-term, high-risk investment where government support is important. Researchers believe that many advances in nanotechnology will require a sustained investment over a 10- to 20-year period. This is a very difficult kind of research for companies to support. Obviously, more than a one-year infusion of additional funds will be required to expand the nanotechnology research community.

There is no reason that the NNI has to be a partisan issue. It has strong support from industry, science and engineering societies, Democratic senators such as Barbara Mikulski and Evan Bayh, and leading Republicans such as Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott. At a minimum, the Bush administration and Congress should work together to double federal spending on nanotechnology research over the next five years. America's economic and technology leadership in the 21st century will depend on these kinds of farsighted investments.