Tag: government and public policy
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Nation & World
Physicians who are experts on managed care avoid enrolling in HMOs
Researchers from the Harvard School of Public Health and RAND surveyed 279 professors at 17 universities across the country who were prominent experts in managed care to find out their…
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Nation & World
American females at highest risk for murder
A female in the United States is three times more likely to be murdered than a female in Canada, five times more likely to be murdered than a female in…
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Nation & World
State of U.S. public health drinking water reliable
“Over the last century, the U.S. has set the world standard for ensuring a reliable, relatively safe drinking water supply to the general public,” said Ronnie B. Levin, a research…
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Nation & World
Physicians warn of nuclear terrorist threat
In a new study, Lachlan Forrow, director of ethics support services at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School. and his co-authors used…
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Nation & World
Study examines data withholding in academic genetics
Eric G. Campbell, of the Institute for Health Policy at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, and his colleagues recently surveyed geneticists and other life scientists at the 100…
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Nation & World
Grants vs . investment subsidies
In many countries, governments face policy decisions about how to help poor people who have difficulty helping themselves because they can’t borrow money. What is the proper form of intervention?…
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Nation & World
Analysis of potential mad cow risk in U.S. finds little chance of disease spread
The Harvard Center for Risk Analysis (HCRA), part of the Harvard School of Public Health, performed an analysis for the U.S. Department of Agriculture to determine what the effects would…
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Nation & World
Strong student support found for war
American college students strongly support U.S. war objectives in Afghanistan aimed against the Taliban and Osama bin Laden’s al Qaeda terrorist network, according to a survey conducted by the Institute…
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Nation & World
Anthrax expert Matthew Meselson speaks out
In 1992-93, Harvard Professor Matthew Meselson investigated the largest known outbreak of inhalation anthrax in history, which occurred in the Soviet Union in 1979. The anthrax was accidentally released from…
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Nation & World
U.S. stepped aside during Rwandan genocide
Samantha Power, executive director of the John F. Kennedy School’s Carr Center for Human Rights Policy, conducted a three-year-long investigation into what the United States government knew, didn’t know, and…
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Nation & World
Nutrition book author Willett rebuilds USDA food pyramid
For more than 20 years researchers at Harvard and elsewhere have been looking at the long-term health effects of eating certain types of foods. These researchers now have a good…
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Nation & World
Study finds parents of chronically ill children avoid switching to HMOs
The incentive to switch health plans is usually a lower cost to the patient. So if parents of chronically ill children want to retain their old health plans instead of…
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Nation & World
No-fault compensation for medical injury proposed
Three jumbo jets filled with patients crashing every two days — that’s the analogy for the number of patients estimated to die annually from medical injury in the U.S. A…
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Nation & World
Anatomy of the low-income homeownership boom in the 1990s
The rate of home ownership in the United States has grown to an unprecedented 67.7 percent since the 1990s. Low-income ownership has grown in particular. According to a study by…
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Nation & World
National environmental policy during the Clinton years
Researchers at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government examined the environmental policy record of former President Bill Clinton. Environmental quality improved overall during the decade, the researchers found, continuing a trend…
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Nation & World
What determines who goes to college and who does not?
More than ever, policymakers are adopting merit-based, rather than need-based, financial aid programs, a trend that disquiets Harvard Graduate School of Education Assistant Professor Bridget Terry Long. In Georgia, for…
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Nation & World
Bolstering private environmental management
How can government agencies best regulate private firms’ impact on the environment? One popular new approach — advocated by state agencies and by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency — is…
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Nation & World
Non-smoking bar and restaurant workers inhale as much as active smokers
Working in a bar or restaurant can expose you to as much tobacco smoke as if you were an active smoker, a researcher based at the Harvard School of Public…
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Nation & World
Strict enforcement of lead-exposure-prevention policies shows clear benefits
Even at low levels, lead poisoning in children can cause IQ deficiencies, reading and learning disabilities, impaired hearing, reduced attention spans, hyperactivity and other behavior problems. Children who live in…
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Nation & World
Polar bear research shows global warming is real
Harvard Professor James McCarthy was among a handful of top scientists who coordinated a remarkable report by the world scientific community in 2001 that said global warming is real, it’s…
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Nation & World
Should computer code be considered free speech?
Unlike all other forms of “speech” that are protected under the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, computer source code holds a unique place in the law. Computer source code…
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Nation & World
The U.S. and faith-based social initiatives
U.S. President George W. Bush has signaled that he is serious about offering federal support to faith-based social service initiatives. What does that mean for the separation of church and…
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Nation & World
Drivers place children in rear seat because of new law
A Rhode Island law that requires that children sit in the back and wear proper restraints imposes fines of $30 for violation of the rear seating requirement and $150 for…
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Nation & World
Soft news and critical journalism eroding audiences
A rise in soft news and critical journalism “may now be hastening the decline in news audiences” and “weakening the foundation of democracy by diminishing the public’s information about public…
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Nation & World
One in three Massachusetts workers ill-equipped to meet demands
The most startling finding of a new report is that 667,000 of 1.1 million at-risk workers in Massachusetts have earned a high school credential but still lack basic math, reading,…
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Nation & World
Street vendors often define urban landscape
“The question is, how is public space to be created — by designers, by the state, or by the people who use it?” asks Margaret Crawford, a professor at the…