Dr. Watson's DNA

On June 1 the Times reported that the complete genome for Dr. James Watson, one of the co-discoverers of DNA, was released to the public. There's many reasons to ponder this event, but the one that struck me is embodied here:

Amy McGuire, an assistant professor of medicine with Baylor's Center for Medical Ethics and Health Policy, said integrating human genomes into medical diagnoses raises various ethical questions. Those include what to do when they reveal personal information about a patient's relatives and whether someone's genetic code could result in discrimination from insurance companies or employers.

''I think we'll have a healthier and more compassionate world 50 years from now because of the technological advances we are celebrating today,'' Watson said.

While Watson said that he would review the map further, there was at least one part he would avoid. He planned to skip the section of the map that would tell him if he was at risk for Alzheimer's disease, which his grandmother died from.

My mother had Alzheimers. And I'm paranoid about having it. But I think I would want to know. After all, I already know my genome contains the genes for death.

But I'm not going to spend money to find out my mind might die sooner than my body.

House and Gawande, Both Better

My wife and I have one, and only one, favorite TV drama--House.
For those who have not seen it, it features an anti-social drug-addicted, crippled MD, who diagnoses difficult cases while fighting with the world.

My wife and I just read "Better" a collection of essays by Atul Gawande, a surgeon. The essays investigate the field of medicine, in very good prose.

What's the common thread here: I think much of the appeal of Dr. House is the theme of many of Gawande's essays, the constant drive to do things better. House is never satisfied unless he's figured out the answer; he cares much more about the answer than about his patients, which means there's a nice contrast between his misanthropy and his drive for answers, which often results in helping the patients. (Often, but not always; occasionally he has to kill someone to find the answer.) Gawande celebrates the doctors who always strive to improve their methods, to better their results. And he mourns the cases, as when the medical professionals fail to wash their hands, when imperfection leads to death, as in one of his cases.

And EWG Can Do It

I blogged a couple times about the USDA's payments database--it attributes farm program payments back to individuals (i.e., if the check is made out to a partnership, joint venture, corporation, the amount is split among the members of the partnership, joint venture, or stockholders). This is different from the data that the Environmental Working Group has been publishing for 10+ years in that it's more detailed. When USDA released it, they said it was too big to make available on-line. But an ag publication claimed to have done it and I tweaked my former co-workers at USDA about it. Now, EWG is promising to publish it by June 12.

Realism and Defeat

Does this statement by former Sens Dole and Daschle reflect the independence of mind resulting from being out of office or the poor judgment that may have caused them to lost their races?

Former Senate leaders Tom Daschle and Bob Dole suggested Wednesday that the nation's agricultural policy should be reformed, saying farmers should become more dependent on the marketplace.

Daschle, a Democrat from South Dakota, and Dole, a Republican from Kansas, proposed eliminating direct payments to farmers but retaining countercyclical payments, which pay farmers only when prices are low. They also suggested that farmers be encouraged to take part in emerging markets such as renewable fuels to help them stay afloat.

A Central Vision from the Brits

The British system of government is more centralized than ours, and more bureaucratic. Their professional civil service is much stronger and, from casual reading, their automation has been much more unified. (It appears that entire departments not only were using the same software system in the early 90's, but some systems were being shared across departments. Compare that with the problems USDA and other US departments have getting the same software to be used across agencies.)

In an apparent continuation of that theme, here's an excerpt from a newspaper:

Paul Wickens, General Manager of Steria in Northern Ireland said: “Records NI is one of the key components of a programme that is helping to realise the Northern Ireland government’s vision to create the ‘Office of the Future’. Its main aim is to set up a single storage location for all documents and records across all 11 departments which will save time, provide faster access to information and significantly reduce the amount of space currently required to store records and documents.

Unkept Promises and Laws

Via Agweb and John Phipps, Jim Wiesemeyer reports:

The lengthy time it took to get the disaster aid package completed is one of the reasons why House Ag Committee Chairman Collin Peterson (D-Minn.) wants a permanent disaster aid program as part of the new farm bill. But as with any new program under that debate, funding has to be found and that is becoming increasingly hard to obtain. Some budget offsets could be found via reduced direct payments, but some farm-state lawmakers are fighting that suggestion, including Senate Ag Committee Chairman Tom Harkin (D-Iowa).

Of course, Congress has repeatedly vowed, no more disaster aid. But "Congress" isn't a person so it can't make promises. Situations change, politicians change, and promises go out the window.

[Update: See this Omaha World-Herald article--disaster programs are in trouble when a paper in the heart of farm country is skeptical.]

Food Stamps II

A commenter (ed. "A"--"the one and only comment, for which you ought to be truly grateful.)* on the posts about living on food stamps challenges me to think further. Perhaps a Q and A format is appropriate:

1 Do I think it's possible to live reasonably healthily on food stamps? Yes, I do. It requires a lot of work and thought, and a good bit of knowledge, but it can be done. I'm less sure of the "organic" lifestyle--I agree with the commenter that the writer was a special case.

2 If my wife and I were told today to start living on $21 a week each, could we do it? Yes. We've the background and knowledge and the free time. Even more important, we've got a starting inventory of staples, like cooking oil, flour, beans, rice, and sugar. And most important of all, we live a quiet, steady life (knock on wood), one that's adapted to long range planning and stable habits. That's very different from the hand-to-mouth life of someone living day-to-day--you don't have the money to buy a 10 pound bag of rice, it's just one vicious cycle after another.

3 Are food stamps intended as the sole source of food dollars for their recipients? No. USDA's Economic research Service has an interesting article on the whole issue of food stamp spending here. (I was surprised by the spending patterns--I had the usual preconceptions.)

4 Which is larger, $21 a person per week or $326 per month for a family of four? Mathematically, they're about equal, but feeding four on the budget is not four times as hard as feeding one. Both workwise and moneywise, feeding four should be more efficient.

5 Do we have irrational expectations of food stamp recipients? Absolutely, read Jason De Parle or the book I just finished, "Off the Books" for some insights. (Plan to post on "Off the Books" separately.)

6 Is good food available in the inner city? That's an example of the sort of irrational picture in our mind we have--food stamp recipients and "inner city" are synonyms. It's just as difficult to get fruits and vegetables in a small town as in the big city, at least in the off season. Where I can walk to two big supermarkets, whole wards of DC and whole counties in rural America don't have one. (When I lived in DC, there were 3 small supermarkets (one Safeway in the basement of an office building around 11th and F, one about 1200 11th St, and one around 1800 P) I could use. I think they're all gone, although there is a Whole Foods in the area now that it's been gentrified. Small urban supermarkets don't carry large economy sizes, because people can't carry them, don't have the money to buy, and don't have the cars nor parking space to do pickups. We're talking close-in NW DC here, not Anacostia or east of Rock Creek Parkway.)

7 On the third hand, while we debate eating on $21 a week, much of the world lives on $1-2 a day.

* Adopting the habit of a few bloggers of splitting their personality in order to try to be funny.

Great Memorial Day Post

See this memory on Dwelling Place of Dragons: evokes childhood, the mystery and dread of the unknown, and recognition of the past.

I Was Right, Right, Right

Wrote a post earlier in the week about living on food stamps. Today an affirmation of my position--that it is possible to live on them--in the Post. The writer not only lives on $25 a week, but makes lunch for co-workers and lives organically.

Dieting and Food Stamps

There have been a number of articles about people, mostly politicians, trying to subsist on $21 a week, the amount allowed by the food stamp program. This article in the LA Times is one of the latest. It seems to me many of the articles are unrealistic in several ways:

• the first mistake is to say, you start the week with $21 and no food on hand and you end the week with $0 and no food on hand. A more realistic cost accounting would look at the cost of the amount of food consumed during the week. If you use a third of a bottle of cooking oil, then your budget is charged with a third of the cost.
  
• a second mistake is not buying in bulk
• a third mistake is buying processed, not ingredients.

Avoid those mistakes and I think it'd be possible to live on the food stamp allowance, reasonably healthily though not with all the fruits and vegetables now recommended. And certainly not enjoyably. Rather like living without TV; it's doable, but no one wants to.