What is the future of healthcare law?

The future of President Barack Obama's healthcare reform will be at stake after Republicans take charge of the House of Representatives on Wednesday following their gains at midterm elections last year.Here are some questions and answers about the political and legal challenge to healthcare reform.

WILL CONGRESS REPEAL THE WHOLE LAW?
Republicans will be in control of the House but not the Senate, limiting their power to overturn the healthcare law. House Republicans will hold a vote on repeal on Jan 12, before Obama's State of the Union address, and are set to win it.
This is likely to be little more than a symbolic vote given Democrats could block repeal in the Senate, and Obama could veto it if he needed to.
It will be easier for Republicans to chip away at parts of the law such as the individual mandate, given the opposition they will face in the Senate. Obama has said he would veto any bill repealing parts of the healthcare law.
Republicans also can try to withhold money needed to administer and enforce the law, and likely will work to at least delay the funding.
Reid Cherlin, a White House spokesman, has said: "The President is confident about defending the healthcare bill."

WHAT HAPPENS NEXT IN THE COURTS?
A U.S. judge in Virginia last month declared a key part of the healthcare law unconstitutional, in the first major setback to the reform. U.S. District Judge Henry Hudson backed the state of Virginia's argument that Congress exceeded its authority by requiring Americans to start buying health insurance in 2014 or face a fine.
A federal court in Florida is also hearing a multi-state lawsuit opposing the plan on much the same grounds as Virginia's and the judge has said a decision will come soon. Wisconsin recently joined the challenge, bringing the total number of states in the lawsuit to 21.
Constitutional scholars expect one of the two dozen lawsuits filed since the law was enacted to reach the U.S. Supreme Court, most likely the multi-state lawsuit or Virginia's.

WILL OBAMA PUT THE PLAN ON HOLD DURING COURT PROCESS?
Senior White House officials said after the Virginia ruling that Obama will continue implementing the healthcare reform while the court challenges play out.
The administration has the latitude to do so because the part of the law ruled unconstitutional, known as the individual mandate, will not come into force until 2014. Already, provisions allowing states to review increases in health insurance premiums and sending money to community health centers have moved forward.

HOW ELSE CAN STATES AFFECT HEALTHCARE'S FUTURE?
Many of the provisions in the healthcare law were given to the states to implement, which has set them scrambling to start programs or expand existing ones at a time when revenues are low and some are unable to meet basic spending pressures.
Only a few provisions gave them funds to hire additional staff or change computer systems. Adding to the confusion is the process under which the law made it out of Congress, known as reconciliation, which required lawmakers to use an early draft of the bill. By the time the law was signed, many of the legislated deadlines states had to meet had already passed.
Some states have already decided not to establish or run health insurance exchanges, an open market where individuals can buy insurance. Others are putting off expanding Medicaid, the healthcare program for the poor run by the states with federal reimbursements.
Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty, a leader in the Republican Party, and others have issued statewide orders to only implement parts of the plan that are mandatory and not to participate in the optional programs.
(Reporting by Lisa Lambert, Jeremy Pelofsky and Patricia Zengerle; Editing by Vicki Allen)

WASHINGTON | Tue Jan 4, 2011 12:35pm EST
(Reuters)

Chinese artists find new creative freedom in Berlin

Berlin has long been a magnet for international artists but in recent years a growing number of artists from China are making it their new home, combining Western European influences with traditional Chinese imagery.

The 2006 sale of Xu Beihong's work "Slave and Lion" set a new world record; sold for $6.9 million (5 million euros), it was the most expensive piece of Chinese art and started a wave of popularity surrounding art of Chinese origin.

As Xu died in 1953, he is not profiting from his fame. The next generation of Chinese artists is, however, and many of them have discovered Berlin as an increasingly attractive hot spot for art students.

One of those is Duan Yafeng, who has lived in Germany's capital for a year. After studying Chinese art in Beijing, she relocated to Germany where she enrolled in the liberal arts program at legendary design school Bauhaus.

"I think every artist has to come here at some time or another," she said, "We have so many more opportunities here than anywhere else, so many galleries and so many people who are making some really fantastic works."

Duan is extremely animated when talking about the creative possibilities afforded her from Bauhaus; an all-encompassing alternative arts course, it's a world away from the education she received in Beijing.

"I studied Chinese art, but something was missing," she said, "At Bauhaus we learn about how museums work, what kind of exhibitions you can present, how you can use performance in your work - so many different aspects of art."

New look at traditions

While Duan is just one of many young artists currently studying in Berlin, she's by no means the first.

During the 1920s and 30s, Berlin boasted a vibrant Chinese art scene populated by figures who had re-located Paris, which had become increasingly expensive. Even Xu Beihong spent time in Berlin in the 20s.

The rise of the Nazi regime in the early 30s put and end to this lively Chinese art scene - the largest outside of China at that time - as many fled Germany.  

   

"Western art plays an important role in China and I think that's the attraction of these works," said Berlin gallery owner Zhu Ling, "All of my artists studied traditional Chinese painting before they came to Germany and here they studied Western oil painting and in their works I see an effort to combine these two traditions. It's an interesting phenomenon that Chinese people, only after they have left China, begin to reflect on their own traditions."

More than 70 years after Berlin's first wave of Chinese artists left the city, Zhu is one of the next generation of artists to take up residence. Her gallery on Motz Strasse is dedicated to the promotion of Chinese art.

"It's only in the last 10 or 20 years that Chinese people have been allowed to go abroad," she explained, "So these artists are generally very young and they are at the start of their careers. I think these people need a platform to present their works."

Accidental freedom

Current census records show that there are around 6,000 Chinese people living in Berlin and, while not all of them are artists, the figures make for a vibrant Chinese community. While recent media reports suggest that Berlin's cheap rents are the main reason for this influx of Chinese artists, Zhu thinks this is a trivial excuse and that the real reason is a sense of freedom not available to them under the Communist rule in the People's Republic of China.

Communist control runs deep in China's educational system, adding that independent thinking was never promoted in schools and universities.

"From my experience, I think [Berlin's Chinese artists] did not consciously reflect on the political restrictions in China before they came to Germany, but once they arrive here they can feel the difference," commented Zhu. "They have more freedom to develop their own individuality than in China but before they came here they didn't even know what it was like, so you can't say they made the conscious decision to seek more freedom."

Duan Yafeng mentions neither politics nor cheap rent when asked why she decided to make Berlin her new artistic residence. Her answer is simple: "Here I have the right people to work with and the right audience who understands my work. Now I know who I am and what I am doing. I know which direction I am going in."

Author: Neale Lytollis

Editor: Kate Bowen

http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,6291797,00.html

Baker Street singer Gerry Rafferty dies at age of 63

Baker Street singer Gerry Rafferty dies at age of 63

Rafferty was reputed to have earned £80,000 a year from the royalties on Baker Street. Clip courtesy United Artists/EMI

Scottish singer-songwriter Gerry Rafferty has died at the age of 63 after suffering a long illness.

His career high came in the 1970s and included the anthemic Baker Street and Stuck in the Middle with You, recorded with his band Stealers Wheel.
Rafferty had battled a drink problem and spent time in hospital in Bournemouth with liver failure.
He was born in Paisley and began his musical career as a busker on the London Underground.

Solo career

Rafferty died peacefully at his home in Dorset, with his daughter Martha at his bedside.
It is understood his funeral will be held in Paisley later this month.
Rafferty had recorded and toured with Billy Connolly as part of the Humblebums, before forming Stealers Wheel with his friend Joe Egan in 1972.

Stuck in the Middle with You was a hit in the early 70s and also appeared on the soundtrack of Quentin Tarantino's debut film Reservoir Dogs in 1992.
Baker Street charted in the UK and US in 1978 after Rafferty began his solo career and still achieves airplay on radio stations around the world.
Musican Raphael Ravenscroft, who played the song's famous saxophone melody, described Rafferty as "a fantastic writer" who "wrote some of my favourite songs of all time."

Greatly missed

In a statement, Billy Connolly called Rafferty "a hugely talented songwriter and singer who will be greatly missed".
He added, "I was privileged to have spent my formative years working with Gerry and there remained a strong bond of friendship between us that lasted until his untimely death.
"Gerry had extraordinary gifts and his premature passing deprives the world of a true genius."
Music journalist and BBC Radio 2 presenter Paul Gambaccini said it was a cruel irony that Baker Street, about Rafferty's unhappiness with being a star, brought him more of the fame he hated.
Gambaccini said: "He just wasn't of the constitution to deal with the music business, or to respect it.
"And thus he found fame and artistic success incompatible, and he became a wanderer, a lonely man, allegedly a drinker. And now we have this unhappy end."
Musician and BBC 6 Music presenter Tom Robinson said Rafferty would be greatly missed.
"I'm deeply saddened to hear that Gerry has lost the battle with his failing health," he said.
"His early work with Stealers Wheel was an inspiration to a whole generation of songwriters in the 70s, including me.
"Many of us had hoped his recent album Life Goes On in 2009 would lead to a full-time return to writing and performing for a lyrical and highly gifted artist."

Culture capital Turku highlights links between art and health

2011 puts two European cities in the spotlight as cultural capitals: Turku, Finland and Tallinn, Estonia. Turku will offer an unusually interdisciplinary program with Finnish culture at the core.

Turku in southwestern Finland will celebrate its year as one of two European Capitals of Culture in 2011 with a focus on the connection between wellness, science and culture.

Under the motto "Culture does you good," the Finnish city founded in 1229 is set to host 155 cultural projects alongside events planned by fellow culture capital Tallinn in Estonia.

"We want to emphasize that culture has a positive impact on mental and physical well-being, and we're the first European Capital of Culture to focus on this aspect," said the head spokesperson for Turku's 2011 programming, Saara Malila, in an interview with Deutsche Welle.

The city has already drawn attention for an unusual program in which doctors will "prescribe" tickets to cultural happenings as part of their treatment of patients during 2011.

A revival of the musical "Hair," performed entirely by middle-aged actors with no previous stage experience, also puts the connection between health and culture in the spotlight. The performers' blood pressure and other health indicators will be systematically studied during rehearsal and the shows to help draw conclusions about the relationship between creative endeavors and physical well-being.

"We have a lot of smaller-scale, intimate projects that involve going into nursing homes, daycares or institutions for the disabled and bringing people together," Malila said.

Combining research with culture

The 155 projects selected for presentation during 2011 were culled from over 1,000 proposals submitted during an open call in 2008. Over 15 of the selected projects focus on the intersection of science and cultural activity.

"Science and research are important in Turku, given the long tradition of academic life with three major universities here," Malila noted."Those institutions were very active in submitting proposals."

An interactive exhibition titled "Fire! Fire!" combines the science of fire with the history of Finland's oldest city and current culture capital, which was nearly destroyed by a fire in 1827. Another series of events titled "876 Shades of Darkness" takes up themes undoubtedly on the minds of many of Turku's guests during the long winter months: what is darkness, how do we perceive it, and how do we deal with it?

The 14th incarnation of an event titled "Black Market for Useful Knowledge and Non-useful Knowledge" also will also take an academic approach to culture. At 50 tables set up for the "knowledge market," scientists, artists, craftsmen and philosophers impart their knowledge to guests one-on-one in ways that intersect with performance.

'Alice in Wonderland'

Much of Turku's 50 million euro ($66 million) budget is also given over to more traditional cultural programming, including dance and theater performances and gallery exhibitions, like a major, year-long presentation of contemporary photography titled "Alice in Wonderland."

It will be the largest exhibition of contemporary photographic art ever held in Finland, presenting works from Finnish and international artists that explore the intersection of fantasy and reality.

"Our inspiration for the show came from noticing that many Finnish photographers today are producing work that examines the fantastical aspects of life," exhibition curator Elina Heikka told Deutsche Welle.

"Every one of us is living between these two worlds of fantasy and reality, and we wanted to present that issue," she added.

Stories around the campfire

Finnish tradition is also reflected in one of the other major themes of Turku's programming: storytelling, according to festival representative Saara Malila.

"We want to raise the importance of storytelling for a new generation of people growing up around constant media and the Internet," Malila explained. "It goes back to those long, dark winter nights in Finland where there wasn't much to do except gather together and tell stories."

An event titled "Nordic Voices" will draw professional storytellers from across Europe to Finland's capital of culture to share tales both ancient and modern, while a program titled "Poetry Portraits" offers participants the chance to spend anywhere from several minutes to hours with poets and hear a piece about what the writer observed.

Turku's own story as a year-long culture capital will kick off with the opening ceremony on January 15 and last through December, 2011.

Author: Greg Wiser
Editor: Jennifer Abramsohn

 http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,6377549,00.html

Patients underestimate CT scan radiation, risks

Will getting two or three CT scans of the abdomen expose you to the same amount of radiation as people who lived near the atomic blast that ravaged Hiroshima in 1945 but survived?
Will they increase your lifetime cancer risk?
If you answered yes to both questions, you're spot on. You're also better informed than many patients at inner-city emergency departments, according to a new survey from Cooper University Hospital in Camden, New Jersey.
Researchers there asked more than 1,100 patients who came in with stomach pain to rate statements similar to the questions above. Half said they had very little faith in the comparison between Hiroshima survivors and patients who had CT scans, rating their agreement at 13 on a scale from 0 to a perfect 100.
The majority of patients also tended to disagree that the scans would up their cancer risk. And three-quarters underestimated the x-ray radiation from a CT scan compared with traditional chest x-rays, which are at least 100 times weaker.
"The point of the paper was not to create mass hysteria," said Dr. Brigitte Baumann, an emergency physician at Cooper, whose findings appear in the Annals of Emergency Medicine.
"The concern is patients who keep coming back to their physicians and get a lot of scans," she told Reuters Health. "But the person who comes in with chest pain coughing up blood" -- a possible sign of blood clots in the lungs -- "a CT scan might save that person's life."
"The whole topic is just a big shade of gray," Baumann said.
In recent decades, the number of Americans who get CT or computed tomography scans has soared, reaching 72 million in 2007.
While the scans help diagnose serious medical problems, some doctors now worry that they may be overused. At a few hundred to a couple thousand dollars per scan, that would mean wasted healthcare dollars -- and as the Hiroshima comparison hints, lost lives.
According to one government study, CT scans done in 2007 alone will cause about 29,000 cancers and kill nearly 15,000 Americans.
From a single patient's perspective, however, the risk seems less daunting: It would take 1000 "average" scans to produce one extra case of cancer in 50-year-olds, the National Cancer Institute's Amy Berrington told Reuters Health in November.
By comparison, about one in three Americans develop some type of cancer during their life, so the extra risk may be a small price to pay if the consequence is better treatment.
The radiation dosage from one scan typically ranges from a few millisieverts -- comparable to the yearly background radiation from natural sources -- to tens of millisieverts.

By Frederik Joelving

NEW YORK | Wed Jan 5, 2011 2:50pm EST

NEW YORK (Reuters Health)