The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have led to a sharp increase in the need for mental health services for veterans.  In response Thresholds has developed a peer support program and is now launching a Veterans Project offering comprehensive housing, health care, case management, and supported employment services.

Homelessness is a major problem, with nearly 200,000 veterans estimated to be homeless on any given night nationally (over 10,000 in Illinois). Multiple deployments have increased the number of PTSD cases, which can involve anxiety, depression, insomnia, and violent mood swings.  Substance abuse is common among homeless vets, and among veterans generally, suicide rates are high; earlier this year VA Secretary Eric Shinseki estimated there are 6,000 suicides by veterans a year, or 18 each day, far outstripping combat deaths.

Thresholds will bring together many services the agency now offers – outreach to the homeless in shelters and communities, case management, physical and mental health services, and supported employment, which partners with 140 area companies.  These will be combined with the agency’s Peer Success program, in which veterans who have successfully undertaken treatment programs mentor vets who are getting help.

A shareholder resolution calling on WellPoint Inc., the nation’s largest health insurer, to return to its nonprofit roots is on the company’s proxy ballot for consideration at the corporation’s annual shareholder meeting next month in Indianapolis, according to the Bloomington Alternative.

The resolution cites repeated harm to the corporation’s reputation by actions leading from its drive for profits.  The corporation has been taken to court for illegally cancelling policies to avoid paying for treatment (it settled such a case for $10 million in California in 2008) and has sued state regulators in Maine who held a premium hike to 11 percent.

More recently, premium increases as high as 39 percent proposed for thousands of WellPoint policy holders have been denounced, at the same time that WellPoint’s CEO received a 51 percent increase in compensation, to $13.1 million a year.

WellPoint Inc., which operates Blue Cross and Blue Shield plans in 13 states, was formed in 2004 by the merger of Indiana-based Anthem and California’s Wellpoint Health Network.  They grew out of charitable organizations which became for-profit companies after the Blue Cross-Blue Shield Association changed its rules in 1994 to allow such conversions.  A binge of acquisitions of other state associations followed.

A resolution submitted by shareholders who are members of Hoosiers for a Commonsense Health Plan, a group that supports Medicare for all, calls for a feasibility study of a transition back to nonprofit status.

At midnight, a call from parents of a 3-year-old who got up in the middle of the night and started playing with (and ingesting) mango-scented detergent; then a call from a 20-year-old woman who was depressed and took a handful of ibuprofen.

Later an ER nurse calls about a man who drank drain cleaner in a “self-harm gesture” and is now vomitting blood; and an ER nurse  calls about a 16-year-old having seizures after taking 28 cough tablets to get high.

At 7 a.m. a mother calls, her 14-year-old son mistakenly took his morning meds twice.

At 11 a.m., a mother of a 3-year-old who put nail polish on her lips, then the mother of another 3-year-old who mistook rat pellets for candy.

At 2 p.m. a call about a 2-year-old who got into her grandmother’s pill case; a teacher calls after breathing the discharge when a student set off a fire extinguisher as a prank .

At 5 p.m., an 18-year-old who was playing basketball and took a swig out of a bottle of Gatorade he found in a car; the bottle contained windshield fluid.

At 11 p.m. a hospital calls about a man who took his roommate’s diabetes medicine, thinking it was Valium; he’s comatose and having seizures.

That’s just a sample of nearly 300 calls fielded in one day by the Illinois Poison Center’s 24-hour hotline (1-800-222-1222) .  IPC posted them on an organizational blog, initiated in December to tell the center’s story – and explain the need to restore full funding from the state.

State funding cuts have led to staff reductions – and caused longer wait times on the center’s hotline, at a time when the rate of poisoning deaths is steadily increasing.

IPC’s state funding was cut by 30 percent last year – a $600,000 reduction – and Governor Quinn’s proposed budget maintains the reduced funding level for next year.

That forced a reduction in the clinical staff handling the hotline, and that’s meant some longer hold times for callers, said Carol DesLauriers, a pharmacist who manages the poison center.  Calls are still generally answered within seconds, but at busy times waits can be as long as a minute or two.

“In an emergency involving poisoning, most people aren’t going to wait more than ten seconds,” she said. “They’ll hang up and head to the emergency room.”

Each call is handled by a doctor, nurse, or pharmacist with a specialization in toxicology, and calls often involve extensive consultations, sometimes taking 15 minutes or more.

But over 90 percent of calls are resolved on the phone, and the savings to Illinois taxpayers in unnecessary medical costs are estimated conservatively at $50 million, DesLauriers said.

The center fields about 100,000 calls a year, more than half of them regarding children 6 or under.  About 18 percent are consultations with professionals, mainly ER doctors and nurses.

Among the three leading causes of injury-related deaths, motor vehicles and firearms have declined in recent decades, while the rate of poisoning deaths nearly tripled – from 5 to 13 per 100,000 – between 1979 and 2006, according to the Centers for Disease Control.

One reason is a large increase in prescriptions being written, including far more common use of opiate pain medication, DesLauriers said.  People sometimes have “a false sense of security” with drugs that are prescribed by doctors and approved by the FDA, she said. And while abuse of illicit drugs is declining, abuse of prescription drugs is growing dramatically.

In addition to the hotline, IPC carriers out a public education program with outreach to hospitals and community centers, and provides training for nursing, pharmacy, and medical students throughout the state

State funding accounts for about 40 percent of IPC’s budget, but the state cuts have also put federal matching funds at risk.  The Center also receives funding from area hospitals.

With Politico reporting that U.S. Rep Dan Lipinski will oppose health care reform unless it restricts women’s access to abortion coverage, the Campaign for Better Health Care is planning a rally tomorrow afternoon at his LaGrange office (19 W. Hillgrove, Thursday, March 11 at 4 p.m.)

Meanwhile, Huffington Post reports that two more Senators are backing  a public option, putting the total publicly committed at 38, and likely votes up into the 40s (51 votes are needed under budget reconciliation).  “With a push from the White House, the public option is now within striking distance.”

But President Obama has been backing off support for a public option ever since he won the 2008 election by campaigning for one.

He also campaigned on reducing lobbyist influence.  But it was shortly after that election that the basic parameters of the ultimate deal – coverage for preexisting conditions in exchange for a heavily-subsidized individual mandate; and, of course, no public option – were spelled out by an insurance industry lobbyist.  (Indeed, this has been the insurance industry’s program for many years.)

And somehow — though the House bill with a public option would do lots more to control costs, and be more popular to boot — that’s what’s on the table.

Wednesday is National Women and Girls’ HIV/AIDS Awareness Day, and the Chicago Female Condom Campaign is holding trainings for service providers and for high school students on how to use the new, improved female condom, which the FDA approved last year.

About 40 HIV and family planning service providers are expected for a training session at the AIDS Foundation of Chicago, 200 W. Jackson, from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Wednesday, March 10.

From 2 to 5 p.m., a training will be held at the Young Women’s Leadership Charter School, 2641 S. Calumet.

All trainings are open to the media (for more see the group’s press release).  A third training takes place Friday at 4:30 p.m. at Mujeres Latinas en Accion, 1823 W. 17th; it includes a condom hunt.

The trainings are part of a new public awareness campaign by a coalition of health groups, in a city with high rates of gonorrhea, chlamydia and syphillis and where 1,500 new HIV cases were reported in 2008.

The female condom is “the only barrier method available for receptive partners for prevention of HIV, sexually transmitted infections, and unintended pregnancies, and it’s an important option for both women and men,” said Jessica Terlinowski, policy manager for Chicago AIDS Foundation and coordinator of the campaign.

The original female condom, which was approved in 1993, failed to catch on, in part because users found it awkward and expensive.  The new version, tagged the “FC2,” is made of stronger, thinner material that’s quieter and feels more natural – and it’s signficantly less expensive, so that community health centers and public clinics can purchase them in the quantities they need, Terlinowski said.

The campaign is sponsoring a bulk purchasing drive  for health centers, and lists three dozen community organizations and six city clinics where the FC2 is available for free.

One goal of the campaign is to publicize the FC2 as an option for men as well as women, Trelinowski said.  “The name is misleading,” she said.

The trainings reflect the group’s finding that “it’s really important that it be presented in a positive and affirming way,” she said.  “We want to make sure service providers have the language and the familiarity so they can talk about it in an effective way.”

The campaign is also pushing local drug stores to begin stocking the FC2.

***

Also marking National Women’s HIV/AIDS Awareness Day, the Red Pump Project (cofounded by CMW’s own Lovette Ajayi) is on its second year of mobilizing bloggers to spread awareness of the day and the issue.  The group is holding a fashion show fundraiser on March 25 (6 p.m. at the Bottom Lounge, 1375 W. Lake), where it will honor pioneering AIDS activist Rae Lewis Thorton with the group’s first Living Legacy Award.

A demonstration outside Chicago’s Wal-Mart store (4650 W. North) today at 5 p.m. is part of a national campaign targetting the corporation’s “irresponsible sick leave policy” which increases risks to public health.

The Demerit Wal-Mart campaign by Wake Up Wal-Mart and allies highlights the revelation by the New York Times last fall that Wal-Mart gives demerits that can lead to termination to employees who use paid sick days.

The coalition is calling on Wal-Mart to give its employees the right to stay home when they are sick – and to follow government recommendations to let flu epidemic victims stay home without being punished.

Today’s demonstration is sponsored by UFCW Local 881 and backed by the Good Jobs Chicago coalition.

Medicare-for-all proponents including Dr. Quentin Young asked to be included in yesterday’s health care summit, without success, John Nichols reports at the Nation.

Nichols says such voices would have shifted the debate from “Republican grumbling about how Obama is going too far” to “a rational discussion about whether Obama is going far enough.”

Nichols quotes Young: “‘Regrettably, the president’s proposal is built on some of the worst aspects of the Senate bill,’ Young said, in an accurate assessment of Obama’s approach. ‘For example, the president’s proposal would ship hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars to the private health insurance industry in the form of subsidies. And to help finance this, it would impose a new tax on health benefits of workers, especially those in high-cost states….

“‘[Obama's] individual mandate would force millions of middle-income uninsured Americans to buy insurers’ skimpy products — insurance policies full of gaps like ever-rising co-pays, deductibles and premiums. Such policies already leave middle-class American families vulnerable to economic hardship and medical bankruptcy in the event of a serious illness like cancer….

“‘Even so, at least 23 million people would remain uninsured,’ he said. ‘We know that being uninsured raises your chance of dying by about 40 percent,’ he continued, citing another recent study. ‘That translates into about 23,000 unnecessary deaths each year. As physicians, we find this completely unacceptable.’

“‘In short,’ added Young, ‘this proposal is an insurance company bonanza, not good, evidence-based health reform. The president would do better by abandoning the insurance and drug companies and instead taking up the single-payer approach.’

Says Nichols: “Young and his allies are not another ‘party of no’ — they actually propose a viable alternative that could save hundreds of billions of dollars annually by simplifying health administration.

“‘By building on and improving the already popular Medicare program, we could put our patients’ interests first,’ says Dr. Young. ‘Were President Obama to do so, he would meet with strong public support, including from the medical community.’”

On the eve of a White House health care summit, local supporters of reform including union members and small business owners will rally this evening at the Chicago Temple (6 p.m., 77 W. Washington).

They’ll hear by conference  line from Steve Hart, a St. Louis-area man whose partner Melanie Shouse died in January at age 41 after missing critical care for breast cancer due to insurance problems.   Hart is among hundreds of “insurance company survivors” who are taking part in Melanie’s March, a 135-mile trek from Philadelphia to Washington D.C. to build support for reform that includes a strong public option.

Appearing in person will be Andrew Kurtz, former chief financial officer of Wisconsin Blue Cross/Blue Shield, who has spoken out on insurance company profiteering.

The rally will feature posters depicting insurance company CEOs and their salaries, and a candlelight vigil for the hundreds of people who die every week due to lack of coverage.

Sponsors include Citizen Action-Illinois, which is part of the Illinois Main Street Alliance and Health Care for America Now.

“We’ve been disappointed by the lack of urgency from the White House and lack of leadership on the public option,” said John Gaudette.  “We’ll fight to the bitter end” for a publicly-run alternative “but there’s a lot to fight for in this bill,” including “new regulations that are just as important.”

They are urging senators to sign a letter supporting inclusion of a public option in reform legislation — a renewed possibility with the probable use of majority-vote reconciliation [pushed along by adroit organizing, as Chris Hayes explains at the Nation]. So far about two dozen senators have signed.

“We’re excited by the new surge of energy behind the public option,” Gaudette said.