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U.S. ranks near bottom of UNICEF report on child well-being

Fri, 12 Apr 2013 20:20:00 +0000

The United States ranked in the bottom four of a United Nations report on child well-being. Among 29 countries, America landed second from the bottom in child poverty and held a similarly dismal position when it came to “child life satisfaction.”

Keeping the U.S. company at the bottom of the report, which gauged material well-being, overall health, access to housing and education, were Lithuania, Latvia and Romania, three of the poorest countries in the survey.

UNICEF said in a statement on the survey that child poverty in countries like the U.S. “is not inevitable but is policy-susceptible” and that there isn't necessarily a strong relationship between per capita GDP and overall child well-being, explaining: "The Czech Republic is ranked higher than Austria, Slovenia higher than Canada, and Portugal higher than the United States."

The Netherlands ranked number one on the list, with Norway, Iceland, Finland and Sweden filling out the top five.

U.S. infant mortality rate higher than developed world’s

Wed, 09 Jan 2013 23:19:00 +0000

A new report from the Institute of Medicine took a long, hard look at the American healthcare system and found that we lead on healthcare spending but lag on patient outcomes.

But we knew this already. Many other reports have found the exact same thing.

There is, however, some striking -- and troubling -- new research in the report: Our infant mortality rate is nearly double the rate in countries like Japan and Sweden.

Violent crime in U.S. is up by 18 percent

Wed, 17 Oct 2012 22:09:00 +0000

WASHINGTON — Violent crimes unexpectedly jumped 18 percent last year, the first rise in nearly 20 years, and property crimes rose for first time in a decade. But academic experts said the new government data fall short of signaling a reversal of the long decline in crime.

The U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics reported Wednesday that the increase in the number of violent crimes was the result of an upward swing in simple assaults, which rose 22 percent, from 4 million in 2010 to 5 million last year. The incidence of rape, sexual assault and robbery remained largely unchanged, as did serious violent crime involving weapons or injury.

Property crimes were up 11 percent in 2011, from 15.4 million in 2010 to 17 million, according to the bureau’s annual national crime victimization survey. Household burglaries rose 14 percent, from 3.2 million to 3.6 million. The number of thefts jumped by 10 percent, from 11.6 million to 12.8 million.

The statistics bureau said the percentage increases last year were so large primarily because the 2011 crime totals were compared to historically low levels of crime in 2010. Violent crime has fallen by 65 percent since 1993, from 16.8 million to 5.8 million last year.“2011 may be worse than 2010, but it was also the second-best in recent history,” said Northeastern University criminology professor James Alan Fox.

Cuba to end exit permits for foreign travel

Tue, 16 Oct 2012 12:10:00 +0000

HAVANA (AP) — The Cuban government announced Tuesday that it will no longer require islanders to apply for an exit visa, eliminating a much-loathed bureaucratic procedure that has been a major impediment for many seeking to travel overseas.

A notice published in Communist Party newspaper Granma said Cubans will also not have to present a letter of invitation to travel abroad when the rule change takes effect Jan. 13, and beginning on that date islanders will only have to show their passport and a visa from the country they are traveling to.

"As part of the work under way to update the current migratory policy and adjust it to the conditions of the present and the foreseeable future, the Cuban government, in exercise of its sovereignty, has decided to eliminate the procedure of the exit visa for travel to the exterior," the notice read.

The measure also extends to 24 months the amount of time Cubans can remain abroad, and they can request an extension when that runs out. Currently, Cubans lose residency and other rights including social security and free health care and education after 11 months.

Still, the notice said Cuba plans to put limits on travel within unspecified sectors.

Non-religious on the rise

Tue, 09 Oct 2012 12:36:00 +0000

A new study has found that for the first time the U.S. does not have a Protestant majority. The report from the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life released Tuesday put the number of Protestant adults below 50 percent (at 48 percent) for the first time in polling history. The reason for this is partly attributed to the spike in Americans who claim no religion (20 percent, compared to 15 percent five years ago.) The Pew study noted:

Their ranks [the non-religious] now include more than 13 million self-described atheists and agnostics (nearly 6 percent of the U.S. public), as well as nearly 33 million people who say they have no particular religious affiliation (14 percent)... The growth in the number of religiously unaffiliated Americans – sometimes called the rise of the “nones” – is largely driven by generational replacement, the gradual supplanting of older generations by newer ones.

The data about the falling number of Protestants was collected from a sizable sample of 17,000 people. Similarly, a census report earlier this year found "for the first time" whites were surpassed as the majority in the U.S. Of course before European settlement a few centuries ago the area that's now the U.S. had neither white nor Protestant populations.