Cuba: Global Free Trade Champion?
K. William Watson
I would like to second Simon Lester’s ambivalent endorsement of the trade agreement reached by WTO members in Bali last week. Despite cheers from governments and embarrassingly unrealistic claims of economic value, the new WTO agreement on trade facilitation is hardly something for free traders to get super-excited about.
There was some excitement, however, when a bit of last-minute diplomatic drama at the talks threatened to derail everything. Cuba, it turns out, had some genuine demands for actual trade liberalization and indecorously refused to be ignored. As reported b...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - December 9, 2013 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Authors: K. William Watson Source Type: blogs
Monday Afternoon LinkFest [UPDATED]
From the spindle:■ A whole raft of ObamaTaxes are due to hit shortly, including:"Section 9010 of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act requires health plans and commercial insurers to pay $8 billion in new taxes in the coming year, and more in later years, to help compensate for the new, subsidized business PPACA is supposed to send to carriers."A quibble with the phrase "health plans and commercial insurers to pay $8 billion in new taxes." Um, no - neither insurers nor health plans will pay these taxes, you will. As regular readers know, businesses don't pay taxes.■ SHOP dropped (temporarily):"An online healt...
Source: InsureBlog - December 2, 2013 Category: Medical Lawyers and Insurers Source Type: blogs
Baxter completes patient enrollment in phase III trial of BAX 855, extended half-life rFVIII to treat haemophilia A
Baxter International Inc. has completed enrollment in its phase III clinical trial of BAX 855, an investigational extended half-life, recombinant factor VIII (rFVIII) treatment for haemophilia A. The ongoing trial is aimed at assessing the efficacy of the compound in reducing annualized bleed rates (ABR) in both prophylaxis and on-demand treatment schedules, and will also evaluate its safety and pharmacokinetic profile.BAX 855 was designed based on the full-length ADVATE [Antihemophilic Factor (Recombinant) Plasma/Albumin-Free Method] molecule, a product with 10 years of real-world experience. The BAX 855 molecule was modi...
Source: Medical Hemostat - November 15, 2013 Category: Technology Consultants Authors: hemostatguy at gmail.com (hemostat guy) Source Type: blogs
Healthcare Update Satellite — 11-14-2013
See more news from around the web over at my other blog at DrWhitecoat.com
An example of the downside to government-run health care. Patients in Venezuela can’t get proper medical care. 300 cancer patients were just sent home when supply shortages and “overtaxed equipment” made it “impossible … to perform non-emergency surgeries.” 70% of the radiation therapy machines are inoperable. Basic supplies such as needles, syringes, medications, operating room equipment, X-ray film, and blood needed for transfusions are all in short supply. There is no anesthesia for elective surgery. Patients can no longer get organ d...
Source: WhiteCoat's Call Room - November 15, 2013 Category: Emergency Medicine Doctors Authors: WhiteCoat Tags: Healthcare Update Source Type: blogs
Venezuela’s House of Cards
Steve H. Hanke
The story of the Venezuelan economy and its troubled currency, the bolivar, can be summed up with the following phrase: “From bad to worse”—over and over again. Yes, the ever deteriorating situation in Venezuela has taken yet another turn for the worse.
In a panicked, misguided response to the country’s economic woes, Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro has requested emergency powers over the economy. And the Maduro government recently announced plans to institute a new exchange rate for tourists in an attempt to quash arbitrage-driven currency smuggling.
These measures will likely prove too little,...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - November 14, 2013 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Authors: Steve H. Hanke Source Type: blogs
Venezuela Is Spiraling out of Control
Juan Carlos Hidalgo
As the economic situation rapidly worsens in Venezuela, the government is growing increasingly authoritarian and is now actively undermining the foundations of the country’s already deteriorated social fabric.
On Friday night, President Nicolás Maduro ordered the military to seize the stores of a consumer electronics retail chain and confiscate all the goods in order to sell them at “a fair price.” Soon afterwards large crowds gathered outside appliance stores all over the country, leading in some instances to mass looting. The announcement came one day after the Central Bank reported that the i...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - November 11, 2013 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Authors: Juan Carlos Hidalgo Source Type: blogs
Reading Iraqi Newspaper (22 Oct 2013)
Well, I got to admit that now that I am writing this I still don’t know who is Charles Theron, and I don’t know if Hogu Chavez had died or not and if so, when that did happen. The article by Nazzar Abdul-Sattar entitled “Are You Okay?” in today’s issue of Al-Sabah talks about a couple, a female lying watching T.V. and a man who when brought her a glass of orange juice found her contemplating Charles Theron’s face appearing on the screen. They talked about Oscar prices. She told himthat acting is difficult and he told her that asking questions is difficult too. She told him that Hugo Chafez had died just before ...
Source: psychiatry for all - October 22, 2013 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Source Type: blogs
The Human Cost of Yellow fever in America: A Chronology
[1,2] (primary references available on request).
1793 to 1900 – An estimated 500,000 cases of yellow fever occurred in the United States.
1693 to 1905- An estimated 100,000 to 150,000 died of yellow fever in the United States. These figures included 14,217 deaths in Philadelphia during 1699 to 1803.
1904 to 1914 – The death rate among American personnel involved in constructing the Panama Canal was 15.8 per 1,000.
Chronology:
1668 – Yellow fever was first reported in North America – including 370 fatal cases in New York City
1803 – 606 fatal cases were reported in New York City.
1856 – 538 fatal cas...
Source: GIDEON blog - October 18, 2013 Category: Databases & Libraries Authors: Dr. Stephen Berger Tags: Ebooks Epidemiology VIPatients united states Yellow fever Source Type: blogs
Syrian Pound Soars, Iran's Single Digit Inflation, and Other Troubled Currencies Project Updates
Steve H. Hanke
Syria: On September 27th, the United Nations Security Council unanimously adopted a resolution outlining the details of the turn over and dismantlement of Syria’s chemical weapons. Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad, has stated that his government will abide by last week’s UN resolution calling for the country’s chemical weapons to be destroyed.
It appears that this news was well received by the people of Syria. The black-market exchange rate for the Syrian pound (SYP) has dropped from 206 per U.S. dollar on September 25th to 168 on September 30th. That’s a whopping 22.6% appreciation in...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - October 4, 2013 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Authors: Steve H. Hanke Source Type: blogs
A Familiar Pattern of Futility in the International Drug War
Ted Galen Carpenter
The UN Office on Drugs and Crime announced last week that the production of coca, the raw ingredient for cocaine, has shifted away from Colombia toward Peru. Observers of the war on drugs are not surprised by that development. During the early and mid-1990s, drug warriors hailed the decline of coca production in Peru and neighboring Bolivia, thanks to a crackdown that Washington heavily funded through aid programs to Lima and La Paz, as a great victory in the crusade against illegal drugs. They ignored the inconvenient fact that cultivation and production had merely moved from Peru and Boli...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - September 30, 2013 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Authors: Ted Galen Carpenter Source Type: blogs
Rouhani Delivers Lower Inflation, and other Troubled Currencies Project Updates
Steve H. Hanke
Iran: Prior to Hassan Rouhani’s election as Iran’s new president in June, the black-market Iranian rial to U.S dollar (IRR/USD) exchange rate stood at 36150, implying an annual inflation rate of 109 percent (June 15th 2013). Since Rouhani took office, Iranian expectations about the economy have turned positive, or at least less negative, and the black-market IRR/USD exchange rate has strengthened to 29200. In consequence, the implied annual inflation rate has fallen like a stone, and currently sits at 20 percent. That’s even lower than the most recent official annual inflation rate of 35.1 percent. (A...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - September 25, 2013 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Authors: Steve H. Hanke Source Type: blogs
The Syrian Pound Zigs and Zags
Steve H. Hanke
Following U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry’s saber-rattling statements on the 26th of August, the value of the Syrian pound (SYP) has zigged and zagged. Indeed, the SYP lost 24.7% of its value against the U.S. dollar in the two days following Kerry’s announcement (moving from 225 to 270 SYP/USD). Then, yesterday, we saw a sharp reversal in the course of the pound. Over the past two days, the SYP regained 25.58% of its value, bringing the black-market exchange rate back down to 215 SYP/USD. At this rate, the implied annual inflation rate is 209.85% (see the charts below the jump).
So, what caused ...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - August 30, 2013 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Authors: Steve H. Hanke Source Type: blogs
Mexico’s Timid Energy Reform
Juan Carlos Hidalgo
After weeks of speculation, yesterday Mexican president Enrique Peña Nieto unveiled his proposal to reform the country’s sclerotic energy sector. The move has been heralded by the media as Mexico’s boldest economic overhaul since the signing of NAFTA in 1994. However, even though the reform aims at relaxing the grip of the country’s state-owned monopoly on oil production, it falls short of significantly opening the sector to much needed private investment.
The reason for so much caution is well-known: The government’s monopoly on oil production is the third rail of Mexican politics. Ever since...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - August 13, 2013 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Authors: Juan Carlos Hidalgo Source Type: blogs
Keystone XL Pipeline: “No Material Impact” on U.S. Carbon Dioxide Emissions
Paul C. "Chip" Knappenberger
President Obama has a ticklish situation on his hands with the Keystone XL pipeline—one long on symbolism but short on practical impacts.
He took a few minutes out of his June 25th speech unveiling his Climate Action Plan to specifically address the pipeline issue:
Now, I know there’s been, for example, a lot of controversy surrounding the proposal to build a pipeline, the Keystone pipeline, that would carry oil from Canadian tar sands down to refineries in the Gulf. And the State Department is going through the final stages of evaluating the proposal. That’s how it...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - August 9, 2013 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Authors: Paul C. "Chip" Knappenberger Source Type: blogs
Sovereign Currency Populism versus Dollarized Populism
Juan Carlos Hidalgo
Venezuela and Ecuador both have left-wing populist governments that have benefited tremendously from record high oil revenues. Both governments used those revenues to significantly increase public spending. However, there is a critical difference between these countries: while Venezuela has its own currency (the so called “strong Bolívar”), Ecuador adopted the U.S. dollar as its official currency in 2000. That means that, no matter how fiscally irresponsible the Ecuadorean government, it can’t print money to pay for its spending.
The result: Venezuela has the highest inflation rate in Latin Amer...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - August 6, 2013 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Authors: Juan Carlos Hidalgo Source Type: blogs
