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188 4 pics 1 word But alongside his stark warning of the threats facing Britain and its allies, Admiral Sir Tony Radakin said there would be only a “remote chance” Russia would directly attack or invade the UK if the two countries were at war. The Chief of the Defence Staff laid out the landscape of British defence in a wide-ranging speech, after a minister warned the Army would be wiped out in as little as six months if forced to fight a war on the scale of the Ukraine conflict. The admiral cast doubt on the possibility as he gave a speech at the Royal United Services Institute (Rusi) defence think tank in London. He told the audience Britain needed to be “clear-eyed in our assessment” of the threats it faces, adding: “That includes recognising that there is only a remote chance of a significant direct attack or invasion by Russia on the United Kingdom, and that’s the same for the whole of Nato.” Moscow “knows the response will be overwhelming”, he added, but warned the nuclear deterrent needed to be “kept strong and strengthened”. Sir Tony added: “We are at the dawn of a third nuclear age, which is altogether more complex. It is defined by multiple and concurrent dilemmas, proliferating nuclear and disruptive technologies and the almost total absence of the security architectures that went before.” He listed the “wild threats of tactical nuclear use” by Russia, China building up its weapon stocks, Iran’s failure to co-operate with a nuclear deal, and North Korea’s “erratic behaviour” among the threats faced by the West. But Sir Tony said the UK’s nuclear arsenal is “the one part of our inventory of which Russia is most aware and has more impact on (President Vladimir) Putin than anything else”. Successive British governments had invested “substantial sums of money” in renewing nuclear submarines and warheads because of this, he added. The admiral described the deployment of thousands of North Korean soldiers on Ukraine’s border alongside Russian forces as the year’s “most extraordinary development”. He also signalled further deployments were possible, speaking of “tens of thousands more to follow as part of a new security pact with Russia”. Defence minister Alistair Carns earlier said a rate of casualties similar to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine would lead to the army being “expended” within six to 12 months. He said it illustrated the need to “generate depth and mass rapidly in the event of a crisis”. In comments reported by Sky News, Mr Carns, a former Royal Marines colonel, said Russia was suffering losses of around 1,500 soldiers killed or injured a day. “In a war of scale – not a limited intervention, but one similar to Ukraine – our Army for example, on the current casualty rates, would be expended – as part of a broader multinational coalition – in six months to a year,” Mr Carns said in a speech at Rusi. He added: “That doesn’t mean we need a bigger Army, but it does mean you need to generate depth and mass rapidly in the event of a crisis.” Official figures show the Army had 109,245 personnel on October 1, including 25,814 volunteer reservists. Mr Carns, the minister for veterans and people, said the UK needed to “catch up with Nato allies” to place greater emphasis on the reserves. The Prime Minister’s official spokesman said Defence Secretary John Healey had previously spoken about “the state of the armed forces that were inherited from the previous government”. The spokesman said: “It’s why the Budget invested billions of pounds into defence, it’s why we’re undertaking a strategic defence review to ensure that we have the capabilities and the investment needed to defend this country.”

25 Nov 2024 Landmark mental health act reform set for second reading Victoria Macdonald Health and Social Care Editor Long-awaited reforms to the 40-year-old Mental Health Act moved a step closer to becoming law today with their second reading in the House of Lords. The Mental Health Bill will give patients a greater say in their care, but charities are concerned there may not be enough funding to support these changes Share on Facebook Share Share on Twitter Tweet Share on WhatsApp Send Share on WhatsApp Send Share on WhatsApp Email Load more share optionsHomebound seniors living alone often slip through health system’s cracks

Judith Graham | (TNS) KFF Health News Carolyn Dickens, 76, was sitting at her dining room table, struggling to catch her breath as her physician looked on with concern. “What’s going on with your breathing?” asked Peter Gliatto, director of Mount Sinai’s Visiting Doctors Program. “I don’t know,” she answered, so softly it was hard to hear. “Going from here to the bathroom or the door, I get really winded. I don’t know when it’s going to be my last breath.” Dickens, a lung cancer survivor, lives in central Harlem, barely getting by. She has serious lung disease and high blood pressure and suffers regular fainting spells. In the past year, she’s fallen several times and dropped to 85 pounds, a dangerously low weight. And she lives alone, without any help — a highly perilous situation. This is almost surely an undercount, since the data is from more than a dozen years ago. It’s a population whose numbers far exceed those living in nursing homes — about 1.2 million — and yet it receives much less attention from policymakers, legislators, and academics who study aging. Consider some eye-opening statistics about completely homebound seniors from a study published in 2020 in JAMA Internal Medicine : Nearly 40% have five or more chronic medical conditions, such as heart or lung disease. Almost 30% are believed to have “probable dementia.” Seventy-seven percent have difficulty with at least one daily task such as bathing or dressing. Almost 40% live by themselves. That “on my own” status magnifies these individuals’ already considerable vulnerability, something that became acutely obvious during the covid-19 outbreak, when the number of sick and disabled seniors confined to their homes doubled. “People who are homebound, like other individuals who are seriously ill, rely on other people for so much,” said Katherine Ornstein, director of the Center for Equity in Aging at the Johns Hopkins School of Nursing. “If they don’t have someone there with them, they’re at risk of not having food, not having access to health care, not living in a safe environment.” Related Articles Health | Weight loss drugs like Ozempic, Wegovy are all the rage. Are they safe for kids? Health | Rural governments often fail to communicate with residents who aren’t proficient in English Health | Some breast cancer patients can avoid certain surgeries, studies suggest Health | Who gets obesity drugs covered by insurance? In North Carolina, it helps if you’re on Medicaid Health | How the FDA allows companies to add secret ingredients to our food Research has shown that older homebound adults are less likely to receive regular primary care than other seniors. They’re also more likely to end up in the hospital with medical crises that might have been prevented if someone had been checking on them. To better understand the experiences of these seniors, I accompanied Gliatto on some home visits in New York City. Mount Sinai’s Visiting Doctors Program, established in 1995, is one of the oldest in the nation. Only 12% of older U.S. adults who rarely or never leave home have access to this kind of home-based primary care. Gliatto and his staff — seven part-time doctors, three nurse practitioners, two nurses, two social workers, and three administrative staffers — serve about 1,000 patients in Manhattan each year. These patients have complicated needs and require high levels of assistance. In recent years, Gliatto has had to cut staff as Mount Sinai has reduced its financial contribution to the program. It doesn’t turn a profit, because reimbursement for services is low and expenses are high. First, Gliatto stopped in to see Sandra Pettway, 79, who never married or had children and has lived by herself in a two-bedroom Harlem apartment for 30 years. Pettway has severe spinal problems and back pain, as well as Type 2 diabetes and depression. She has difficulty moving around and rarely leaves her apartment. “Since the pandemic, it’s been awfully lonely,” she told me. When I asked who checks in on her, Pettway mentioned her next-door neighbor. There’s no one else she sees regularly. Pettway told the doctor she was increasingly apprehensive about an upcoming spinal surgery. He reassured her that Medicare would cover in-home nursing care, aides, and physical therapy services. “Someone will be with you, at least for six weeks,” he said. Left unsaid: Afterward, she would be on her own. (The surgery in April went well, Gliatto reported later.) The doctor listened carefully as Pettway talked about her memory lapses. “I can remember when I was a year old, but I can’t remember 10 minutes ago,” she said. He told her that he thought she was managing well but that he would arrange testing if there was further evidence of cognitive decline. For now, he said, he’s not particularly worried about her ability to manage on her own. Several blocks away, Gliatto visited Dickens, who has lived in her one-bedroom Harlem apartment for 31 years. Dickens told me she hasn’t seen other people regularly since her sister, who used to help her out, had a stroke. Most of the neighbors she knew well have died. Her only other close relative is a niece in the Bronx whom she sees about once a month. Dickens worked with special-education students for decades in New York City’s public schools. Now she lives on a small pension and Social Security — too much to qualify for Medicaid. (Medicaid, the program for low-income people, will pay for aides in the home. Medicare, which covers people over age 65, does not.) Like Pettway, she has only a small fixed income, so she can’t afford in-home help. Every Friday, God’s Love We Deliver, an organization that prepares medically tailored meals for sick people, delivers a week’s worth of frozen breakfasts and dinners that Dickens reheats in the microwave. She almost never goes out. When she has energy, she tries to do a bit of cleaning. Without the ongoing attention from Gliatto, Dickens doesn’t know what she’d do. “Having to get up and go out, you know, putting on your clothes, it’s a task,” she said. “And I have the fear of falling.” The next day, Gliatto visited Marianne Gluck Morrison, 73, a former survey researcher for New York City’s personnel department, in her cluttered Greenwich Village apartment. Morrison, who doesn’t have any siblings or children, was widowed in 2010 and has lived alone since. Morrison said she’d been feeling dizzy over the past few weeks, and Gliatto gave her a basic neurological exam, asking her to follow his fingers with her eyes and touch her fingers to her nose. “I think your problem is with your ear, not your brain,” he told her, describing symptoms of vertigo. Because she had severe wounds on her feet related to Type 2 diabetes, Morrison had been getting home health care for several weeks through Medicare. But those services — help from aides, nurses, and physical therapists — were due to expire in two weeks. “I don’t know what I’ll do then, probably just spend a lot of time in bed,” Morrison told me. Among her other medical conditions: congestive heart failure, osteoarthritis, an irregular heartbeat, chronic kidney disease, and depression. Morrison hasn’t left her apartment since November 2023, when she returned home after a hospitalization and several months at a rehabilitation center. Climbing the three steps that lead up into her apartment building is simply too hard. “It’s hard to be by myself so much of the time. It’s lonely,” she told me. “I would love to have people see me in the house. But at this point, because of the clutter, I can’t do it.” When I asked Morrison who she feels she can count on, she listed Gliatto and a mental health therapist from Henry Street Settlement, a social services organization. She has one close friend she speaks with on the phone most nights. “The problem is I’ve lost eight to nine friends in the last 15 years,” she said, sighing heavily. “They’ve died or moved away.” Bruce Leff, director of the Center for Transformative Geriatric Research at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, is a leading advocate of home-based medical care. “It’s kind of amazing how people find ways to get by,” he said when I asked him about homebound older adults who live alone. “There’s a significant degree of frailty and vulnerability, but there is also substantial resilience.” With the rapid expansion of the aging population in the years ahead, Leff is convinced that more kinds of care will move into the home, everything from rehab services to palliative care to hospital-level services. “It will simply be impossible to build enough hospitals and health facilities to meet the demand from an aging population,” he said. But that will be challenging for homebound older adults who are on their own. Without on-site family caregivers, there may be no one around to help manage this home-based care. ©2024 KFF Health News. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.None

Palestinians welcome ICC arrest warrants for Israeli officialsIt’s official: Cadillac has been provisionally confirmed as an 11th Formula 1 team beginning as early as 2026, bringing to rest a chaotic saga involving Andretti Global. F1 has reached an “agreement in principle” with Andretti and Cadillac — and that’s huge for Formula 1, Cadillac, and American motorsport in general. Ask American Formula 1 fans how they feel about Formula 1’s recent push into the U.S. market, and you’ll likely receive mixed reviews. Yes, it’s great that the sport has finally realized America represents a huge and largely untapped market for international open-wheel racing — but some of the attempts to “break through” have felt a little inauthentic. More than anything, many American fans feel that F1 is keen for American eyes and American dollars, but without giving much back to the folks who are tuning into races and buying tickets to high-dollar American events. Bringing in an American manufacturer to field an 11th team offers a great way for American audiences to feel like they’re actively participating in F1. Sure, viewers at home aren’t actually part of the Cadillac F1 operation, but those viewers can carry a sense of pride knowing that their exports are being taken seriously by the sport. Beginning in late 2023, Cadillac began a comprehensive push into the international automotive market after years of absence. The General Motors brand has opened storefronts in Switzerland, Germany, and France, and it has entered cars in prestigious events like the 24 Hours of Le Mans. Motorsport is, at the end of the day, a marketing exercise. Brands like Ford and Audi have signed on to Formula 1 in hopes of associating their names with the pinnacle of automotive technology — and for Cadillac, Formula 1 would be an exceptional way to get its name out among the European fans it’s hoping will buy its cars. 👉 Andretti Global and Group 1001: How a racing sponsorship became team co-ownership 👉 Cadillac’s European push could make sense of its F1 hopes without Andretti Heading into 2025, the F1 world is facing a huge shake-up all through the grid. Young talents like Gabriel Bortoleto and Jack Doohan have inked deals to make their F1 debuts, while tried-and-true talents like Lewis Hamilton are heading off to new team pastures. And yet, there simply isn’t room for many of the talented drivers who deserve a shot at Formula 1. Franco Colapinto, for example, has made waves during his F1 debut, but his hopes for a 2025 seat are slim because there simply isn’t space. The series could use a well-put-together 11th team in order to provide two additional seats for those extremely talented drivers who have more than earned a shot at the pinnacle of open-wheel racing, but who simply arrived at the wrong time. Formula 1 teams have always operated on two different levels: Privateer teams, and manufacturer teams. Privateers like Williams and even Haas tend to operate on smaller budgets, relying on purchasing agreements for power units and chassis; manufacturer teams tend to set the standard for performance through larger budgets and by creating the power units that privateers purchase. More manufacturer teams provide more options, particularly now that Renault has decided to step back from PU manufacturing. No, Cadillac won’t be making its own power units right from the get-go — but by 2028, we’ll see a new name join the likes of Mercedes, Ferrari, Honda, Audi, and Ford. That’s huge for Formula 1; the sport is growing rapidly, both in terms of fans and in terms of manufacturer involvement. Read next: BREAKING: New Cadillac entry provisionally confirmed as 11th team in major F1 2026 shake-up

VICTORIA - A Vancouver Island First Nation whose people were the first to greet European explorers in the region almost 250 years ago is taking British Columbia to court, seeking title to its traditional territories and financial compensation. The Mowachaht/Muchalaht First Nation filed a claim Thursday in B.C. Supreme Court seeking a return of decision-making, resource and ecological stewardship, said Chief Mike Maquinna, a descendent of the former Chief Maquinna who met British explorer Capt. James Cook in 1776. Crown-authorized forest industry activities approved by the province without the consent of the Mowachaht/Muchalaht First Nation have resulted in cultural, economic and environmental impacts, he said at a news conference on Thursday. “Our people, the Mowachaht/Muchalaht, have endured many hardships since first meeting Capt. Cook, who was the explorer who first came into our territory,” said Maquinna. “As a result of the explorations of our territory, the natural resources of our lands have been taken. We want to correct rights and wrongs here and hopefully as time goes on this will show that Mowachaht/Muchalaht has been infringed upon since time of contact.” Capt. Cook and Chief Maquinna met in March 1776 at the traditional Mowachaht/Muchalaht whale-hunting village of Yuquot, later named Friendly Cove by Cook. The Parks Canada website says Yuquot was designated a national historic site in 1923 as the ancestral home of the First Nation, which was continuously occupied for more than 4,300 years and the centre of their social, political and economic world. The Parks Canada website says the village became the capital for all 17 tribes of the Nootka Sound region. Maquinna said the province has been acting as the sole decision-making authority in the Gold River-Tahsis areas of northern Vancouver Island, especially with regards to the forest resource, without the consent of his nation. Hereditary Chief Jerry Jack said the claim seeks title to about 430,000 hectares of land on the northwest coast of Vancouver Island and an amount of financial compensation to be determined by the court. “It is common knowledge we were here long before Capt. Cook and now we have to go to court and definitively prove that,” he said. “I don’t like that we have to prove that we owned it before he showed up to my territory, to my beach.” The land title case does not make any claims against private land owners, homeowners or recreational hunting and fishing operators, said Jack. Premier David Eby said the B.C. government prefers negotiated land-claims settlements rather than become involved in lengthy, expensive court cases, but the Mowachaht/Muchalaht have the right to take that route. “We have no problem with them doing that,” he said at an unrelated news conference in Langley. “We’d rather sit down and find a path forward.” The 15-page notice of claim seeks declarations that the First Nation has Aboriginal title to its lands and that B.C.‘s Forest Act and Land Act will no longer apply to Mowachaht/Muchalaht lands once title is declared. Jack said the nation decided against pursuing formal treaty talks with the federal and provincial government years ago and has been planning the land title court case “for many decades.” This report by The Canadian Press was first published Dec. 12, 2024. Note to readers: This is a corrected story. The Mowachaht/Muchalalaht First Nation previously said it sought title to about 66,000 hectares of land. The First Nation now says it is seeking title to about 430,000 hectares of land.COLLEGE FB NOTES

The latest election results in the U.S. may indeed mark a new era for the world. President-elect Donald Trump’s economic policies are likely to take center stage in his second term. Trump seems very likely to pursue the plans he promised during his campaign, including higher import tariffs and a major crackdown on illegal immigration. Accordingly, s cenarios in which inflation may rise, and economic growth may weaken come to the fore. P olicies toward economic growth, employment, and macro-financial stability, as well as more domestic incentives for high technology and manufacturing, are also anticipated. Yet, it also seems like Trump’s historic comeback and his decisive victory means far more for the markets and the American corporatocracy. Business and tech leaders, American billionaires including CEOs of Amazon, Microsoft, Meta, Alphabet, OpenAI, Apple and others lined up to congratulate Trump on his election victory. However, this is surely more than just being a decent gesture. Trump’s reelection means a lot more to all these business leaders. They all seem eager to be working with the new president and are looking forward to greater opportunities awaiting the U.S. economy. Indeed, the Wall Street elites sensed money and have prepared for Trump’s return much earlier. Despite Trump’s earlier criticism and threats against some of them, many had been seeking connection channels with him, even in the lead-up to the elections. After all, for some, the new Trump era is perceived as a new opportunity to regenerate American exceptionalism, a new era of innovation, productivity, ingenuity and creativity. As a matter of fact, American billionaires, business and tech moguls have recently been increasingly interested in American politics and aiming to keep closer contact with Washington. Of course, all, solely for emotional reasons! Yet, a hard reality at this point, most still depend on public subsidies or government support for their company’s success or to keep their wealth. No doubt, they aim to protect their contracts in the government or benefit more from the new era of privatization policies against any potential anonymity from the new American administration. These American billionaires have recently even been able to donate limitless to political campaigns. And this is, again, with the hope of getting Washington’s support in existing or expected antitrust cases, having a say in prospective regulations or any other potential issues against their powerful tech empires. After all, personal data and privacy issues, market dominance or societal impacts are each increasingly a key concern within the tech industry. However, these new efforts could also, the least, be considered as a new peace offering. Most of these tech leaders are certainly afraid of threats of retribution. Or they may even be aiming to be the next president! Who knows! Nevertheless, market optimism, expected deregulation trends and other market-friendly policies are surely helping these businesses, as most of these company shares were also up recently. Thanks to surging stock prices, most tech billionaires added tens of billions of dollars to their fortunes, even in just a day. The top 10 billionaires added $64 billion to their wealth, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. The CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, Elon Musk ’s fortune alone passed the $300-billion threshold. The other U.S.-based IT, chip and semiconductor producers have all gained. Trump, as a rather aggressive Republican, will likely prioritize supporting growth with much more market-friendly, but often more protectionist policies. The fight against inflation may remain in the background and the risks arising from existing public debt will also grow. In his first term in 2016, Mr. Trump prioritized keeping the economy alive with expansionary policies and easy credit policies. With its protectionist policies, it introduced new sanctions, quotas and customs regulations against economies in the U.S. that had large external deficits. Hence, economic development, together with regulations, subsidies and legal issues will likely take center stage again. It should not be difficult to predict that increasing domestic production and raising import taxes will be priorities of the new period as well. Most likely, energy, technology and even the finance sectors will benefit from the new era's subsidies, as well as tax and credit practices. Low taxes, lighter regulations, and higher tariffs in the finance, energy, and tech industries should benefit American billionaires and stimulate business sentiment. A non-interventionist stance and tariffs may lead to higher inflation, while the combination of higher tariffs, lower taxes and deregulation is likely to mildly reduce growth. Cutting corporate taxes, decreasing Social Security spending, and subsidies to support productivity will attract the attention of large corporations. Other corporatism-friendly policies, tax cuts and relaxing financial regulations are also on the agenda. Business interests also include regulations, tariffs and quotas on trade with China. It is also important to understand to what degree major business leaders in the U.S., led by Musk, will be affected by the new Trump era. Though Trump's poor relations with business moguls such as Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg may take a different turn when all these businessmen step back. Nowadays, even those who backed Democratic candidate Vice President Kamala Harris or earlier critics of Trump 1.0’s policies and his role in the insurrection post the 2020 elections (January 2021) are kissing the ring. Business Roundtable, a nongovernmental organization (NGO) of CEOs and a powerful lobbying group has also congratulated Trump and his new team. Meanwhile, although most high-powered tech executives are lined up to embrace the new Trump administration, most of their workforce is still considered to support the Democrats – Silicon Valley has historically leaned toward the left. Nonetheless, today’s business policy and stance shift should not come as a surprise either. As a matter of fact, there was another similar policy shift (on the tech giants' CEO’s part) back in December 2016, when Trump won his first election. These shifting positions are also part of the bigger strategy to be part of the new game or new era policies. Yet, Trump is still expected to take an anti-establishment and decentralized stance, an antitrust approach to Big Tech power consolidation, as well as being a pro-crypto and AI development candidate. Deregulations are expected to take the lead. Meanwhile, many of these tech or business leaders were rather neutral in the lead-up to the 2024 elections. However, the wealthiest of them all, Musk, donated over $100 million (according to some sources) to Trump’s 2024 campaign. Overall, though, the stock market surge and crypto market volatilities are all good signs of a positive market reaction to the new Trump era. The Dow and S&P 500 indexes registered their biggest one-day percentage gains in a while. The Nasdaq technology index and small-cap Russell 2000 have also rallied. Republicans have captured the presidency, the House of Representatives and the Senate in the U.S. Therefore, they will be deciding all the new economic policies. The Oval Office will surely have a huge influence even over policies directly impacting the tech sector. The hope is that a new era of closer political power and technological innovation partnerships will forge ahead! After all, during Trump 1.0, for example, there was a strong real economy and a dynamic labor market until the pandemic. However, during Trump 2.0, with extreme competition, both the U.S. and Chinese economies are expected to slow down to some degree.