Insights

<p>Food is packaged with a veneer of sincerity. Contents are dutifully itemized along with tables showing the percentage of recommended nutrients, fat content, etc. But there is much that remains a mystery. You are never going to see a candy wrapper that says, "May contain lead."</p>

<p>The World Health Organization today <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/homepageCrisis/idUSNLB765857._CH_.2400">… swine flu to be the first global pandemic since 1968</a>, raising its pandemic flu alert to"phasesix" on a six-point scale. Careful with the definitions: while the disease caused by the H1N1 virus is considered to be moderate, swine flu is considered to be unstoppable and countries are urged to come up with long-term plans for combating its spread. </p>

<p>Every doctor is entitled to a bad day, even a bad week.</p><p><a href="http://www2.dca.ca.gov/pls/wllpub/WLLQRYNA$LCEV2.QueryView?P_LICENSE_NU…. Lawrence James Williamson</a> (California License No. 73495), a family doctor in Windsor, Calif., has been having a very bad year.</p><p>In May 2008, Williamson was told he was not entitled to what he apparently thought was a free brunch at a Las Vegas hotel. He did something many denied a free meal have considered doing. He threw a fit, according to the Medical Board of California.</p>

<p>New Health and Human Services Secretary <a href="http://www.hhs.gov/secretary/">Kathleen Sebelius</a> today released a new <a href="http://www.healthreform.gov/reports/healthdisparities/index.html">repor…; on health disparities showing that: </p>

<p>During our first California Broadcast Journalism Fellowship we listened to Julie Rovner, National Public Radio’s correspondent on the Health Policy and Science Desk, talk on a <a href="/blogs/turn-health-care-its-head-say-panelists">panel about health care reform</a>. But at NPR, "health care reform" is a banned phrase on the air. Reform, Rovner said, is not a neutral term so she opts instead for "<a href="http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=104768327">health care overhaul</a>." Whatever you call it, it's a huge and timely issue.

<p>The June 8 edition of Newsweek has a must-read <a href="http://www.newsweek.com/id/200025">story</a&gt; about the world's most influential celebrity.</p><p><a href="http://www.newsweek.com/id/35197">Weston Kosova</a> and <a href="http://www.newsweek.com/id/33610">Pat Wingert</a> meticulously detail how Oprah Winfrey uses her show, her magazine and her Web site as a platform for some completely loony health advice, including needle-and-thread facelifts, avoiding vaccines, daily hormone injections into the vagina to stop aging and thinking positively as an alternative to surgery.</p>

<p>Gary Schwitzer is the professor that health reporters fear. With the creation of <a href="http://www.healthnewsreview.org/">HealthNewsReview</a&gt;, he has brought back nightmares of having your work marked up in red and posted on a corkboard for everyone to see.

<p>A <a href="http://www.businessdayonline.com/index.php?option=com_content&amp;view=…; today out of Nigeria had me thinking about my interview with <a href="/blogs/qa-father-william-cleary-taking-confessions-and-checking-vaccinations-nigeria">Father William Cleary</a> last month.</p>

<p>A new <a href="http://www.healthnews.com/family-health/child-health/unvaccinated-child…; released in the Journal <em>Pediatrics</em> has confirmed what many of us in public health already knew: children whose parents refuse to have them vaccinated are more likely to get and spread pertussis. Some people are likely to say so what. Is pertussis really that common or serious? The answer to both those questions is yes.</p>

<p>This isn't yet posted on the California Department of Public Health <a href="http://www.cdph.ca.gov/Pages/default.aspx">website</a&gt;, but officials just alerted reporters that a Contra Costa County child has died from swine flu. Here's information from the release. ReportingonHealth also has a <a href="/resources/lessons/swine-flu-useful-resources">helpful guide</a> to covering the current swine flu outbreak. </p>