Artwork stating 'Education Destroys Barriers', 'We Demand Treatment', and 'I Need A Chance'

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  • Berlin's mayor tries to wean Germans off the water bottle

    Although commonplace in many parts of the world, Berlin has recently adopted the practice of using water fountains to cut back on plastic bottle usage. Not everyone supports this environmental push, but the mayor is hopeful they will at least catch on with tourists who are accustomed to the invention already as well as act as a resource for refilling plastic bottles rather than throwing them away.

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  • Meet the Delaware Teen Fighting for the Rights of Former Juvenile Offenders

    After her neighbor was incarcerated, a Delaware teenager and her brother began supporting youth coming out of detention with clothes, school supplies and other items. Their nonprofit grew and was so successful in raising money and awareness that the state legislature took over the re-entry fund just a year and a half after the organization's launch. The founder is now working on a pilot program to provide financial literacy training for formerly incarcerated youth.

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  • In California, saving teeth and money—one mouth at a time

    In California, the highest poverty rate also corresponds with an alarmingly high rate of tooth decay in children. Now, state officials are working to pilot changes to Denti-Cal, which is part of California's health program for low-income residents; so far, they've budgeted more than $200 million more for rate increases and recruited hundreds more dentists. Those changes and a focus on prevention are helping children get the dental care they need.

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  • The business of voluntourism: do western do-gooders actually do harm?

    Voluntourism, or the practice of western volunteers paying to do service in developing countries, seems like a moral, do-good activity. However, the practice has been proven to have consequences, including reducing the need for local labor and stunting development of children in orphanages. There has recently been progress in discouraging volunteers from working in orphanages - the volunteer efforts in institutions never benefit the children - but true progress might involve staying at home.

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  • A health care policy that puts the ending first

    The Medicare system is struggling with rising costs and a rapidly aging population, but one solution to the issue might be to encourage people to lay out end-of-life plans and wishes before a health crisis. The Providence St. Joseph health care system is piloting an effort to do just that, working through the barriers to end-of-life planning with financial incentives, comprehensive data, and targeted efforts to make advanced directives, also known as living wills, more common. So far, the initiative has seen "slightly more than 13 percent [of patients] complete [and record] an advance directive."

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  • Connecting your medical data could be the next big payoff

    As new Medicare requirements and expenses change, new start-ups are stepping up to move the hospital industry to share data more easily and break down the silos that keep care from being efficient for both patient and provider. The new strategies are helping to coordinate care and services for the highest-risk patients, but there are still concerns that the data sharing is not a long-term solution.

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  • Medicare's cost surprise: It's going down

    Despite reports of projected increased spending on Medicare and Medicaid, Medicare spending per-person has actually decreased in recent years, a change that has been attributed to a web of factors like value-centered care and better coordination for complex patients. However, although positive results have been found, researchers caution that is is hard to ascertain the exact cause and replicate it flawlessly.

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  • Should Medicare pay for toothpaste and shoes?

    In Massachusetts, nonprofit Commonwealth Care Alliance is piloting a new experiment: using federal dollars from Medicare and Medicaid to provide preventive care and pay for the things that aren't explicitly medical, but are vital for maintaining good health. According to the company, "hospital admissions plunged 27 percent for the organization’s elderly clientele between 2011 and 2017," but there are concerns about whether this model could successfully scale to a national level.

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  • Kyrgyzstan wants transparency to curb corruption

    Kyrgyzstan is using technology to tackle corruption and reduce costs. The country is centralizing and digitizing government services with help from Estonia. It is also using biometrics in elections to reduce the chances of rigged ballots and build public trust.

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  • Government can send immigrants to rural areas. But can it make them stay?

    Canada and Australia have both used targeted immigration policies to grow their rural populations. But Canada’s more holistic approach seems to match the long-term needs of migrant and local populations better than Australia’s.

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