One in 10 Americans Now Uses Food Stamps as Unemployment Continues to Rise
from The Wall Street Journal
Government statistics reveal that unemployment rates have reached the highest level in 15 years; while a record 31.6 million Americans are now receiving food stamp benefits, the highest number since the 1960's. According to figures by the U.S. Department of Labor Bureau of Labor Statistics, the unemployment rate reached 6.7 percent in November, the highest level since October 1993. With 3.2 million more Americans unemployed than 12 months ago, the need for food assistance has risen. More

Latinos, Medicaid and Health Care and SIGs
from NASW IL
For many of us who work in the policy arena, there are periodic gatherings on the calendar in which a variety of advocates come together to learn, network and discuss the many challenges that face the human service network in the state of Illinois. This past week presented a couple of those opportunities, Joel Rubin, executive director of NASW Illinois Chapter discusses. More

Florida Steps in Early, and Troubled Teenagers Respond
from The New York Times
Sarah Cooksey, 30, and her husband, Tom, are firefighters, and Sarah is an emergency medical technician as well. “I run into burning buildings and help people in the deepest crises,” she said. So she felt bewildered and desperate when deteriorating relations with their adopted daughter, Amanda, culminated in a vicious physical fight, with the 17-year-old girl stomping out of the house. More

Illinois Safe Haven Law Offers Chance of a Lifetime
from Nurse.com
When a person hands a newborn to staff with the intent of not coming back or states he or she will not return, he or she is understood to be relinquishing the infant under the safe haven law. Depending on the situation, the nurse, social worker, nurse manager, or clinical specialist can offer parents a "Ready to Go" packet and inform them they will have to petition the court within 60 days to prevent the termination of parental rights. More

In Defense of Teasing
from The New York Times
Today teasing has been all but banished from the lives of many children. In recent years, high-profile school shootings and teenage suicides have inspired a wave of "zero tolerance" movements in our schools. Accused teasers are now made to utter their teases in front of the class, under the stern eye of teachers. Children are given detention for sarcastic comments on the playground. Schools are decreed "teasing free." More

Nobel Winner Sees End to AIDS Spread Within Years
from The Washington Post
A French scientist who shared this year's Nobel prize for medicine said recently he believed the transmission of AIDS could be eliminated within years. Luc Montagnier, director of the World Foundation for AIDS Research and Prevention, told a news conference together with this year's other winners for medicine that halting the transmission of AIDS would make it a disease much like others. More

Scientists Back Brain Drugs for Healthy People
from The Associated Press
Healthy people should have the right to boost their brains with pills, like those prescribed for hyperactive kids or memory-impaired older folks, several scientists contend in a provocative commentary. College students are already illegally taking prescription stimulants like Ritalin to help them study, and demand for such drugs is likely to grow elsewhere, they say. More

About Half of College-aged had Psychiatric Disorders
from Bloomberg
Almost half of college-aged adults had a psychiatric disorder over a one-year span, based on research criteria that ranged from bipolar disease to substance abuse including smoking. Few sought treatment, the study found. About one in five students failed to fulfill an obligation, had a legal problem, did something dangerous or caused social problems by using alcohol, the study found. More