Elderly psychiatric patients targeted in Merkel’s Greece

This video from Greece says about itself:

16 July 2008

Leros Psychiatric Hospital – Kρατικό Θεραπευτήριο Λέρου

Leros “Psychiatric Hospital”. Filmed in 1995 by achilleasv.

The Asylum of Leros (Colony of Mentally Ill) was established in 1959, taking over the military installations left on the Greek island by the Italians from the Second World War.

The purpose was to contain all psychiatric patients from all Greek mental health instituitions, who were deemed untreatable, to one single confinement space.

The asylum grew rapidly as “difficult” patients were shipped to Leros and by the 1980s as many as 4,000 patients were held there.

Political prisoners had also been incarcerated there, during the military dictatorship in Greece (Greek junta 1967-1974).

The staff were not doctors or nurses and had no medical training.

They were local islanders and were used as guards.

The inmates were systematically beaten, even tortured and crushed of whatever sensibilities they once had.

In the 80s Leros’ asylum has received significant journalistic attention.

In September of 1989, the London Observer published details of horrific conditions at the Leros asylum, describing it a “concentration camp”.

In 1990 the BBC filmed inside the asylum. The documentary “Island of Outcasts” (Channel 4) brought attention to these horrendous human rights abuses.

As Leros’ conditions generally mirror those of the nation’s other public mental hospitals, the last twenty years the psychiatric care system in Greece is undergoing a transformation of its service network, propelled to a great extent by recommendations and funding from the European Union. The new direction is toward deinstitutionalisation and a community-care approach.

However, twenty years since the beginning of the psychiatric reform in Greece, there is a threat for people with mental health problems to return in mental hospitals due to severe financial problems of Psychosocial Rehabilitation Units as the Greek Ministry of Health is unable to correspond to its obligations.

From Keep Talking Greece blog:

14 July 2012

tagged: Greek health ministry, mental health patients rights, pensions cuts, psychiatric patients, psychiatry, scandal

Greek Health Ministry to Deliberately Cut Pensions of Patients at Psychiatric Clinics

Posted by keeptalkinggreece in Economy, Society

I can’t believe what I am reading here. And this I can tell you right away: It is one of the most horrible nightmares, when a state exploits those who cannot defend themselves and deliberately proceeds to actions that should be illegal in any democratic country.

Money-broke Greek Health Ministry is about to cut pensions of patients of psychiatric clinics and use the ‘saved’ money to bolster operating costs. The plan foresees the reduction of patient’s pensions on a sliding scale, with pension of 500 euros to be cut 50%, pensions of 700 euros by 70% and pensions of over 700 euro to be trimmed down by 80%.

Clinics personnel oppose the ministry’s plans saying that they’re asked to turn into revenue collectors as they will have to get the consent of these patients so that the sick health ministry puts its long arm into the income of such patients.

Open is the question what consent patients with heavy psychiatric illnesses will or could give or who will protect their rights.

Nurses’ ire over patient pensions

A state plan to reduce the pensions of patients of psychiatric clinics and use the money to bolster operating costs, which was reportedly prepared by the Health Ministry last year but is yet to be enforced, has triggered protests by employees at the units who claim they are being obliged to collaborate in securing the patients’ consensus for the cuts.

The plan foresees the reduction of patients’ pensions on a sliding scale, Kathimerini understands, with pensions of 500 euros to be cut 50 percent, pensions of 700 euros by 70 percent and pensions over 700 euros per month to be slashed by 80 percent.

It remains unclear whether the plan is in fact legal. “It goes against Article 21 of the Constitution, on the protection of health,” Vassilis Papadopoulos, a lawyer familiar with the matter, told Kathimerini. “It violates the principle of equality and proportionality as it withholds money on a graded scale as is the case with the tax offices,” he said, adding that the changes also ignored the “nursing needs of different individuals.”

As the pension holder’s consensus is required before the amount can be withheld, workers at the clinic claim they are being put in a difficult, and unethical, position. “We are people whom the patients look to and trust,” said Panos Papadopoulos of the union representing staff at psychiatric clinics. “Now we’re being asked to become revenue collectors,” he said. (Kathimerini)

Kathimerini is a conservative daily, usually supportive of New Democracy, the Rightist biggest party in the new Greek coalition government.

Keep Talking Greece blog continues:

It is not clear from the article whether the plan to forcefully ‘deprive’ psychiatric patients from their rights and income has to be voted and approved by the Greek Parliament as a bill. Of course, it would need the cooperation of insurance funds as well as from other ministries like Labour (for pensions) and Finance (income tax declaration).

PS where is this PASOK health minister, who prepared such a plan? He probably sits at the back seats of the parliament, an average MP among others…

Japanese anti-nuclear movement continues

This is a video about an anti-nuclear demonstration in Japan.

From the Japan Times:

Jul 14, 2012

Rain can’t dampen Friday-night antinuclear protest rally

By KAZUAKI NAGATA
Staff writer

Despite a steady downpour and high humidity, another Friday-night demonstration in front of the prime minister’s office attracted a large crowd of protestors expressing their opposition to the restart of reactor 3 at Fukui Prefecture’s Oi nuclear power plant.

The protest rallies have been gradually been growing in size ever since they started being held each Friday night since late March. Police reports estimate that the number of protesters this Friday night was at least 10,000, while event organizers later put the estimate at 150,000 people.

The rally, which followed the official restarting of Oi reactor No. 3 last Sunday, had crowds of people chanting, along with drums and instruments, “No to the restart!”

See also here.

Made in Japan? Fukushima Crisis Is Nuclear, Not Cultural. Gregg Levine, Capitoilette: “What replaces the cultural critique in the Japanese edition and in the body of the English summary is a ringing indictment of the cozy relationship between the Japanese nuclear industry and the government agencies that were supposed to regulate it. This ‘regulatory capture,’ as the report details, is certainly central to the committee’s findings and crucial to understanding how the Fukushima disaster is a manmade catastrophe, but it is not unique to the culture of Japan”: here.

Bahrain dictatorial oppression continues

This video is called Police attack protesters in Sanabis village near Manama, Bahrain – 23 Sept 2011.

This video is called Police attack protesters in Sanabis village near Manama, Bahrain – 23 Sept 2011 part2.

Bahrain Opinion: The Regime’s Propaganda Machine is Cranked Up to Eleven: here.

Bahrain: Riot police attacked a peaceful citizen on Sanabis and beat him with no reason as there was not protest at that time. Photo here.

Bahrain Feature: The Underground Network of Doctors (Wellman): here.

UK urged to probe arms exports to Bahrain, Saudi Arabia: here.

More illegal organ trade

This video is called Black market organ trade thrives in Iraq – 20 July 09.

By Sven Heymann:

Dramatic increase in worldwide illegal organ trade

14 July 2012

Since the global financial crash in 2008, the worldwide illegal organ trade has increased dramatically. Until recently, those looking to sell parts of their bodies generally came from the so-called developing countries; now, the phenomenon can be found in large parts of Europe.

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), in 2010 there were approximately 107,000 donated organs worldwide— both legal and illegal. Kidneys made up about two thirds of all transplanted organs. According to a report in the Guardian, WHO doctor Luc Noel expects that about 10 percent of all transplants are performed illegally. On the other hand, the California human rights organisation Organ Watch talks of 15,000-20,000 illegal kidney transplants per year.

But the transplants carried out represent only a fraction of the actual need. Only one in ten requests are currently realised, according to the Guardian report. The profits that can be achieved are huge, says Noel.

Gangs of organ traffickers conduct a million-dollar business in the illegal trade. Media reports consistently speak of up to US$200,000 dollars (€160,000) being demanded for a single organ on the black market. The illegal traffickers exploit the social plight of the donors, who urgently need money but often receive only a fraction of the total. Many are cheated out of any money.

The economic crisis is the main cause of the surge in the illegal human organ trade. The European Union (EU) openly admits this. The website BioEdge quotes the EU special prosecutor Jonathan Ratel saying, “Thanks to the global financial crisis the organ trade is a growth industry”. He speaks about a mutual vulnerability to criminal organ dealers: on the one hand, chronic poverty prevails; on the other side, there are well-off patients who would do anything to ensure their survival.

Jim Feehally, a professor of renal medicine at the University Hospitals of Leicester in the UK, brings out the class nature of trafficking in organs more clearly. The main problem is exploitation, the Austrian newspaper Der Standard quotes him saying. While the rich can buy not only organs, but also afford medical treatment, the donors are often denied such care.

Kosovo: West Obstructs Trial Over Murder-For-Organs Crimes: here.

Cyprus, Merkel’s next Greece?

This video is called Demonstration: Cypriot and Immigrant workers united – Limassol, Cyprus.

By Jordan Shilton:

Cyprus the focus of escalating regional tensions

14 July 2012

The government of Cyprus has indicated its intention to seek financial support from Russia, even as officials from the European Union (EU), European Central Bank (ECB) and International Monetary Fund (IMF) determine the requirements of a potential bailout.

President Demetris Christofias and Finance Minister Vassos Shiarly stated they planned to turn to Moscow for additional support, following the agreement of a 2.5 billion euro loan in 2011. Russian government sources confirmed last Friday that Cyprus was asking for a further loan of 5 billion euros—almost a third of Cyprus’s GDP. The talks have become more urgent after credit rating agencies Fitch and Moody’s downgraded Cyprus’s three main banks to junk status at the end of May.

Shiarly criticised troika policies, claiming that the cause of Cyprus’s economic problems was the deal struck in late 2011 to force a “haircut” on Greece’s creditors. The agreement saw the debt owed by Athens to private creditors cut by up to 100 billion euro. This resulted in losses for Cypriot banks of up to 80 percent of their investments in Greek government bonds, according to Schiarly, totalling 4.2 billion euro.

Speaking as Cyprus assumed the rotating presidency of the EU, Christofias insisted, “We maintain the right to have relations with third countries”.

Akel rejects troika’s austerity measures for Cyprus: here.

Will the ECB carry on bullying governments into doing what it wants? Here.

United States Republicans attack voting rights

This video from the USA says about itself:

Veteran Denied the Right to Vote

April 23, 2012 by Steelworkers

Restrictive voter I.D. laws are being passed in many states, making it especially difficult for students, the poor, seniors and minorities to vote. Join Gil Paar in fighting for our rights. Visit www.usw.org/election2012.

By Patrick Martin in the USA:

Voting rights in America under attack

14 July 2012

The weeklong trial on a new voter ID law in the state of Texas concluded with members of a three-judge federal court panel indicating they would uphold the federal Department of Justice and block the implementation of the law on the grounds that it has a discriminatory effect on minorities.

The Justice Department presented an overwhelming factual case to substantiate the charge that minorities are far more likely to lack the government-issued photo identification required to vote under the Texas law. One expert witness testified that 11 percent of white registered voters lacked the required ID, compared to 18 percent of Hispanic registered voters and 21 percent of black registered voters. A total of 1.5 million people of all races could be denied the right to vote under the Texas law.

Attorneys representing the Texas state government disputed claims that the law would have a “disproportionate” impact on Hispanic and African American voters and claimed that “only” 167,000 current voters would be disenfranchised by the new ID requirements. Significantly, they never called as witnesses the Texas state legislators and government officials, all Republicans, who drafted and pushed through the new law as a countermeasure to the rapid growth in the Hispanic population in the state. This would have subjected the Republican politicians to cross-examination on their political motives in adopting a law to curb voting by minorities more likely to support the Democratic Party.

Texas attorneys did not dispute evidence that 80 of the state’s 200 counties have no location where photo IDs can be obtained, and that many residents would have to drive more than 120 miles one way to get such an identification card, for a fee of at least $22, a hardship and expense particularly onerous for the elderly and the poor. At one point, Robert Hughes, one of the Texas state attorneys, declared that he also regarded literacy tests as permissible, although they were one of the principal tactics for excluding minorities barred by the 1965 Voting Rights Act.

The case mounted by the state of Texas was so poor that it suggests the real purpose of the state lawsuit was to prepare an appeal to the US Supreme Court, making a direct and unprecedented challenge to the Voting Rights Act itself. Texas is one of 16 states required under the Voting Rights Act to obtain “preclearance” by the federal Justice Department of significant changes in election practices, because of their history of official discrimination against racial minorities. This means that the state had the burden of proof to show that the voter ID law had no discriminatory intent or effect.

Texas is only one of the states that have enacted voter ID requirements and other measures aimed at curbing voter registration and reducing the number of people able to vote, in the name of a fight against “vote fraud.” There have been virtually no documented reports of voter impersonation, the type of fraud that could be prevented by a photo ID requirement. Not a single person has been convicted in Texas of such an offense.

In Michigan, according to a report by the Republican secretary of state, out of nearly 1.2 million ballots cast in the February 28 presidential primary, there were half a dozen from people believed ineligible to vote.

In Florida, where the state attempted to purge 182,000 people from the voter rolls from a dubious list of supposed “illegal aliens,” the number was first whittled down to 2,600, then to only 47, after press revelations that the “illegals” on the list included such individuals as the state’s Republican governor, Rick Scott, principal sponsor of the law, and a 91-year-old decorated veteran of the Battle of the Bulge in World War II.

How Voter Suppression in 2012 Will Erode Reproductive Rights. Charlene Carruthers, RH Reality Check: “There is power in a woman’s right to vote. Since 1984, women have been the majority of the total vote in every presidential election. They will also decide who shapes the future of reproductive health and rights for all women in this country. The power to preserve and expand reproductive rights is inextricably tied the right to vote. But what is power if your ability to leverage that power is stripped away?” Here.

In Pennsylvania, the Rosa Parks of Voter ID Faces Down GOP Voter Suppression: here.

Study: People who “harbor negative sentiments towards African Americans” are also more likely to support voter ID laws: here.

California seaweed contaminated by Fukushima disaster

This video is called Fukushima nuclear waste headed to California Coast by 2013 (Apr 06, 2012).

From NaturalNews in the USA:

Southern California seaweed tests over 500 percent higher for radioactive iodine-131 than anywhere else in US

Thursday, July 12, 2012 by: Jonathan Benson, staff writer

High levels of radiation from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster reached Pacific shores just days after the catastrophe occurred, according to a recent study published in the journal Environmental Science & Technology. Tests conducted on samples of Macrocystis pyrifera, also known as Giant kelp, revealed the presence of radioactive iodine-131 at levels 500 percent higher in Southern California than in any other area of the country tested.

Based on data collected from several different test sites, researchers from the California State University, Long Beach (CSULB) Department of Biological Sciences learned that the highest levels of radioactive contamination from Fukushima occurred in Central and Southern California. But the worst contamination of all, at least as far as iodine-131 is concerned, was found at Southern California’s Corona Del Mar Beach.

From the Santa Barbara Independent in the USA:

From Fukushima to Diablo Canyon

Fallout from Nuclear Meltdown Persists

Thursday, July 12, 2012

By Nick Welsh

There are about 5,200 miles separating Fukushima, Japan ​— ​site of last year’s massive meltdown at the Daiichi nuclear power plant ​— ​and Avila Beach, California, home of the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant, but for Chieko Shiina, a prematurely retired organic farmer from Fukushima turned anti-nuke activist, the message remains the same. “Please learn from our experience,” she told a small gathering clustered in an airless room Tuesday afternoon. “Stop the nuclear power plants right now.”

Bank scandals news

Truthout in the USA says about this video:

Gar Alperovitz: Is Public Ownership the Solution? Paul Jay, The Real News Network: “During the crisis there was a lot of discussion about the importance or need for nationalizing banks and such. But now, two years after the crisis – supposedly after the crisis – the issue of public ownership seems to be back off into the margins of the discussion. Well, we think it should be back up front and center. And now joining us is someone who’s done some work on this issue of public ownership, Gar Alperovitz.”

From Penn State to JPMorgan Chase and Barclays: Destroying Higher Education, Savaging Children and Extinguishing Democracy. Henry A. Giroux, Truthout in the USA: “Rather than representing a society’s dreams and hope for the future, young people, especially poor white and minority children, have become a commodity to be mined for profit and/or pleasure and disposable after they have served those purposes in the age of casino capitalism and big money.” Read the Article here.

Banksters Take Us to the Brink. Bill Moyers and Michael Winship, Moyers & Company: “Every day brings more reminders of the terrible unfairness that besets our country, the tragic reversal of fortune experienced by millions who once had good lives and steady jobs, now gone…. And you wonder why the banksters still roam free, like gunslingers in a Wild West town without a sheriff.” Read the Article here.

Barclays Whistleblower: Diamond Knew About Libor Fixings: here.

Beyond Barclays: Laying Out the LIBOR Investigations. Cora Currier, ProPublica: “Last week, the British bank Barclays was slapped with $450 million in fines and penalties for manipulating information used to set a critical interest rate…. Barclays‘ traders attempted to steer rates up or down in order to benefit trades they had made to profit off of those rates. Separately, the filings show that during the financial crisis, Barclays tried to counter reports that it had financial troubles by changing the interest rate it reported.” Read the Article here.

New York Fed Knew of False Barclays Reports on Rates: here.

Documents released Friday by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York implicate Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner in a cover-up of the rigging of the global interest rate, Libor, by major US and international banks: here.

Will the Obama Administration Prosecute the Big Banks for LIBOR Manipulation? Paul Jay, The Real News Network: “[I]s this a criminal conspiracy? Well, let’s take the word criminal first. There’s no dispute this is a criminal problem. How do we know that? Because the United States Department of Justice entered into an agreement with Barclays and agreed that Barclays would not be prosecuted for criminal conduct if Barclays would pay $160 million to the United States and agree to a set of facts which clearly lays out criminal conduct”: here.

Ripping Off the Public of Billions of Dollars Should Land You in Jail, Not the Forbes Wealthiest Persons List. Mark Karlin, BuzzFlash at Truthout: “This is not just proof that we have two systems of justice: one for the 99% of Americans and none for the 1%, in terms of financial law breaking. It is also a ruinous model that pervades the business climate and financial structure of our entire society. Ripping off the public to the tune of billions and trillions of dollars does not make you an irreplaceable master of the universe; it makes you someone who should be in jail”: here.

Iceland Has Hired an Ex-Cop to Hunt Down the Bankers That Wrecked Its Economy: here.

Angela Davis and Tim Wise: Capitalism, Privatization and Hope. Rose Aguilar, National Radio Project: “Renowned anti-racist author Tim Wise examines how society is being divided and conquered on the basis of race and class. But legendary activist Angela Davis says we must not give up hope. On this edition, we hear Davis and Wise discuss privatization, the economy, and other critical issues of our times.” Here.

Religious and Free-Market Fundamentalism Have More in Common Than Their Fans in the Tea Party. Mugambi Jouet, Truthout: “Because fundamentalists are ideologically driven, they tend to reject basic facts that do not comport with their ideology. Religious fundamentalists have unyielding faith in the literal veracity of the Bible and consequently dispute all conflicting science, such as the theory of evolution. By the same token, free-market fundamentalists dispute basic facts that call into question the efficiency and fairness of strict laissez-faire economics”: here.