Mental Health

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The Washington Post reports that the rate of coronavirus infections is twice as high in Trump-voting counties as in Biden-voting ones. And ABC News reports that the US now has the highest average daily number of new coronavirus cases in the world.. Only about 57% of Americans ages 12 and […]

Health Care

Why we need to stop Warehousing the Mentally Ill in Jail: Only Private Prison Corps. Profit

F. Douglas Stephenson

Gainesville, Florida (Special to Informed Comment) – By essentially rejecting the provisions of the U.S.Joint Commission on Mental Illness and Health, a very well designed 1963 Kennedy era program entitled, “Action for Mental Health” and other attempts to trim mental health budgets and services, many states and localities have opted to spend the same dollars […]

Mental Health

In our Time of Insurrection and Divisive Violence, can Psychedelics help in Peace-Building?

Thomas Buonomo

Washington, DC (Special to Informed Comment) – In July 2020 the US Institute of Peace published a report titled “Violent Extremist Engagement and Reconciliation: A Peace-Building Approach”. In the wake of riots in several cities across the country that summer and the January 6, 2021 Capitol insurrection that the House of Representatives impeached Donald Trump […]

Epidemics

The other pandemic: Loneliness widespread with the loss of social connections

Cronkite News Arizona PBS

By Chloe Jones | Special for Cronkite News | – PHOENIX – The pandemic has affected different people in different ways, causing financial stress due to job loss, sliding grades, relationship pressures and worries that vulnerable loved ones could contract COVID-19. But one factor that has affected Americans across the country is the loss of […]

Donald Trump

Four Years Later: ‘Welcome to Psychopathocracy,’ the Sequel

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – N.B.: I wrote this essay on January 10, 2017. Four years later, I stand by most of it, and I think its argument has been well substantiated. The one thing I’ve rethought is my conviction that we could fight back against psychopathic policies by appealing to the Congressional majority of […]

Epidemics

Six ways to ‘reboot your brain’ after a hard year of COVID-19 – according to science

The Conversation

By Barbara Jacquelyn Sahakian, Christelle Langley and Jianfeng Feng | – There’s no doubt that 2020 was difficult for everyone and tragic for many. But now vaccines against COVID-19 are finally being administered – giving a much needed hope of a return to normality and a happy 2021. However, months of anxiety, grief and loneliness […]

Epidemics

As pandemic surges, health officials call COVID-19 fatigue real and dangerous

Cronkite News Arizona PBS

By Joycelyn Cabrera | – ( Cronkite News ) – WASHINGTON – The numbers can be numbing. And that’s exactly what health officials fear. More than a half-million Arizonans have contracted COVID-19 and more than 8,700 have died from it so far, according to state data. The disease is surging again, with one week this […]

Authoritarianism

From biblical times to Trump, false messiahs have doomed societies

The Conversation

By Kimberly Stratton | – The prophet Jeremiah records in excruciating detail the catastrophic events leading to the destruction of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar in 587 BCE. Jeremiah describes the devastating famine, escalating sense of fear and ominous foreboding that permeated the city despite optimistic oracles issued in the royal court by prophets, who promised divine […]

Climate Crisis

How America’s Denialism– Elections, COVID, Climate — is Leading to its Downfall

John Feffer

( Foreign Policy in Focus ) – The refusal of tens of millions of Americans to recognize the election results is part of a much larger denialism — of COVID-19, of climate change, and U.S. decline. The presidential election wasn’t close. Joe Biden won the popular vote by more than 7 million votes, which translates […]