Health
August 10, 2015 at 2:49 pm
Coca-Cola, the world’s largest producer of sugary beverages, is backing a new “science-based” solution to the obesity crisis: To maintain a healthy weight, get more exercise and worry less about cutting calories. The beverage giant has teamed up with influential scientists who are advancing this message in medical journals, at conferences and through social media.…
August 7, 2015 at 2:12 pm
Alabama became the third state in a week to pull state funding for Planned Parenthood on Thursday. Gov. Robert Bentley, a medical doctor, tweeted that life from "conception to birth and beyond" is important to him. "I respect human life, and I do not want Alabama to be associated with an organization that does not,"…
August 5, 2015 at 3:18 pm
When you think about childhood cancer, what images come to mind? What acts of selflessness or empowerment resonate? Chances are, head-shaving is one of them. St. Baldrick’s Foundation, the “world’s largest volunteer organization for childhood cancer” has captured the power of head shaving, packaged it for communities, and unleashed its full potential to mobilize networks…
August 5, 2015 at 12:37 pm
Nonprofit hospitals get billions of dollars in tax breaks every year, but a new study shows that they may not be giving back very much to communities in return, as intended by law. The study, out of the University of California San Francisco, found that some tax-exempt hospitals are spending as much on free or subsidized care…
August 5, 2015 at 12:31 pm
The Senate failed to clear a procedural hurdle Monday on a measure that would have stripped Planned Parenthood of federal funding after a series of controversial videos surfaced which suggest the organization is selling fetal tissue for research. The vote, which failed 53-46, would have redirected the more than $500 million in taxpayer funding Planned…
July 28, 2015 at 1:36 pm
California's attorney general said Friday that she will review an anti-abortion group's undercover videos targeting Planned Parenthood to determine if the activist group has breached nonprofit registration or reporting requirements or other state laws, the Associated Press reports. Kamala Harris announced the investigation in a letter to four congressional Democrats who had requested a probe…
July 28, 2015 at 1:17 pm
The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) in La Jolla, Calif., has announced two grants totaling more than $4.5 million from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to help develop a vaccine against HIV/AIDS. The grants, awarded through the foundation's Collaboration for AIDS Vaccine Discovery program, will fund new tools in TSRI's High Resolution Electron Microscopy Facility…
July 24, 2015 at 2:36 pm
In last week’s blog, I discussed the characteristics of movements. One person, a “lone nut,” typically initiates movements. It is the subsequent followers, who are embraced as equals, who really lend power to the movement. The ALS Ice Bucket Challenge was a movement the likes of which are rarely seen. I had the opportunity to hear about this from the inside over dinner last week with Lance Slaughter, chief chapter relations and development officer of the ALS Association...
July 24, 2015 at 2:17 pm
Paula Kent Meehan made a fortune after launching the Redken hair-care products company in the 1960s. She spent the last years of her life giving that money to charity. One of the biggest beneficiaries was supposed to be St. John's Health Center, a storied Santa Monica, Calif. hospital founded by Roman Catholic nuns that has…
July 23, 2015 at 2:05 pm
The New York-based National Children's Leukemia Foundation appealed to donors across the country, promising lifesaving services, such as locating bone marrow donors, conducting cancer research and even claiming to run a program called "Make a Dream Come True" to fulfill the last wishes of dying cancer-stricken children. The New York attorney general's office said the…
