The seventh patrol was more
successful. Departing Brisbane on 25 April, Grayback intercepted a convoy whose
position had been radioed to her by Albacore (SS-218) on 11 May. In a night
surface attack Grayback fired a spread of six torpedoes at the seven freighters
and their three escorts. The three escorts charged and she had to go deep to
elude the attacking enemy. She was credited with the sinking of cargo ship
Yodogawa Maru. On 16 May she torpedoed and seriously damaged a destroyer. The
following day Grayback intercepted four marus with one escort and sank
freighter England Maru and damaged two others before she was forced to dive.
She arrived Pearl Harbor on 30 May, then proceeded to San Francisco,
California, for a much needed overhaul.
Arriving Pearl Harbor on 12 September 1943,
Grayback prepared for her eighth war patrol. Sailing 26 September with Shad
(SS-235), she rendezvoused with Cero (SS-225) at Midway Island to form the
first of the Submarine Force's highly successful wolf packs. The three
submarines under Captain "Swede" Momsen in Cero, cruised the China
Sea and returned to base with claims of 38,000 tons sunk and 3300 damaged.
Grayback accounted for two ships, a passenger-cargo vessel torpedoed 14 October
and a former light cruiser, Awata Maru, torpedoed after an end-around run on a
fast convoy 22 October. Wolf pack tactics came into play 2 October as Grayback
closed a convoy already attacked by Shad and administered the coup de grace to
a 9000-ton transport listing from two of Shad’s torpedoes. The submarines had now
expended all torpedoes, and on 10 November they returned to Midway.
With almost a quarter of her crew
untested in battle Grayback departed Pearl Harbor for the East China Sea on 2
December for her ninth war patrol. Within five days of her first contact with
Japanese ships, she had expended all her torpedoes in a brilliant series of
attacks which netted four ships for a total of over 10,000 tons. On the night
of 18 December to 19 December Grayback wreaked havoc on a convoy of four
freighters and three escorts. She sent freighter Gyokurei Maru and escort
Numakaze to the bottom and damaged several others in surface attack. Two nights
later, 20 December to 21 December, she spotted another convoy of six ships;
and, after an end-around run she fired a spread of nine torpedoes into the
heart of the Japanese formation. This first attack sunk one freighter and
damaged another before Grayback dived to elude depth charges. Three hours later
she surfaced and sank a second freighter. After an unsuccessful attack the following
night had exhausted her torpedo supply, Grayback headed home. Undaunted by lack
of torpedoes, the submarine battle surfaced 27 December and sank a good-sized
fishing boat with deck guns before reaching Pearl Harbor on 4 January 1944.
Grayback’s tenth patrol, her most
successful in terms of tonnage sunk, was also to be her last. She sailed from
Pearl Harbor on 28 January 1944, for the East China Sea. On 24 February
Grayback radioed that she had sunk two cargo ships 19 February and had damaged
two others. http://louisijisheehan.blogspot.com/
On 25 February she transmitted her
second and final report. That morning she had sunk tanker Toshin Maru and
severely damaged another. With only two torpedoes remaining, she was ordered
home from patrol. Due to reach Midway on 7 March, Grayback did not arrive. On
30 March ComSubPac listed her as missing and presumed lost with all hands.
From captured Japanese records the
submarine's last few days can be pieced together. Heading home through the East
China Sea, on 27 February Grayback used her last two torpedoes to sink the
freighter Ceylon Maru. That same day, a Japanese carrier-based plane spotted a
submarine on the surface in the East China Sea and attacked. According to
Japanese reports the submarine "exploded and sank immediately," but
antisubmarine craft were called in to depth-charge the area, clearly marked by
a trail of air bubbles, until at last a heavy oil slick swelled to the surface.
Grayback had ended her last patrol, one which cost the enemy some 21,594 tons
of shipping.
Grayback ranked 20th among all
submarines in total tonnage sunk with 63,835 tons and 24th in number of ships
sunk with 14. The submarine and crew had received two Navy Unit Commendations
for their seventh, eighth, ninth, and tenth war patrols.
Grayback received eight battle stars
for World War II service.
USS Grayback (SS/SSG/APSS/LPSS-574),
the lead ship of her class of submarine, was the second ship of the United
States Navy to be named for the grayback, a small herring of great commercial
importance in the Great Lakes.
Grayback (SSG-574), underway, circa
1960.
Grayback (SSG-574), underway, circa
1960.
Career USN Jack
Ordered: 10 March 1951
Laid down: 1 July 1954
Launched: 2 July 1957
Commissioned: 7 March 1958
Decommissioned: 16 June
1984
Fate: sunk
as a target near Subic Bay on 13 April 1986
Stricken: 16 January 1984
General characteristics
Displacement: 1740 tons light, 2768 tons full
Length: 83.2 m (273 ft), later extended to 317 ft 7
in (97 m)
Beam: 27
ft 2 in (8.3 m)
Draft: 19 ft (5.8 m)
Propulsion:
Speed: 14 knot (26 km/h)
Range:
Complement: 87 officers and men
Armament: eight torpedo tubes,
one Regulus launcher
Motto: De Profundis Futurus
Her keel was laid down on 1 July 1954
by the Mare Island Naval Shipyard of Vallejo, California. She was launched on 2
July 1957 sponsored by Mrs. John A. Moore, widow of the last skipper of the
first Grayback, and commissioned at Mare Island on 7 March 1958 with Lieutenant
Commander Hugh G. Nott in command. Grayback was initially designated as an
attack submarine, but was converted to a Regulus guided missile submarine
(SSG-574) in 1958.
The first of the Navy's guided missile
submarines to carry the Regulus II sea-to surface missiles, Grayback conducted
tests and shakedown along the West Coast. While operating out of Port Hueneme,
California, in September 1958 she carried out the first successful launching of
a Regulus II missile from a submarine, which pointed the way to a revolutionary
advance in the power of navies to attack land bases. Departing San Diego,
California, on 30 October, Grayback arrived at Pearl Harbor on 8 November for a
month of exercises and maneuvers before returning to Mare Island for her
"10,000 mile checkup."
On 9 February 1959, Grayback departed
Mare Island to make Pearl Harbor her permanent home base, reaching Hawaii 7
March via Port Hueneme, California, Long Beach, California, and Mazatlan,
Mexico. After a series of exercises there, she cruised to Dutch Harbor, Unmak
Island, Sequam Island, and Kodiak, Alaska, for further missile exercises from 3
July to 31 July. This was followed by the first of her nine deterrent missile
strike missions, from 21 September to 12 November. Grayback's first patrol
terminated at Yokosuka, Japan, as did two others. She returned to Pearl Harbor
8 December.
On 22 February 1960, Grayback modified
her missile launching system and simplified her complex electrical circuits.
After this, she again took up deterrent missile strike missions. Over the next
21⁄2 years she completed seven missions for a total of nearly 18 months at sea,
much of this time submerged. In addition to Yokosuka, both Adak, Alaska, and
Pearl Harbor also served as termination points for these patrols. On her nine
patrols she spent more than 20 months at sea and logged well over 130,000 miles
(209,000 km) on deterrent missile strike missions.
That schedule took its toll. On 27
August 1963, while snorkeling to recharge batteries, Grayback was buffeted by
particularly strong seas. http://louisjjjsheehan.blogspot.com/
The buffeting caused the After Main
Battery breaker to short, starting a fire in the berthing compartment. One
seaman failed to evacuate the compartment and was overcome by smoke and fumes.
Main propulsion was lost for a short time, but was restored, and Grayback was
able return to Pearl Harbor under her own power. Repairs took two weeks.
As more and more Polaris missile
submarines became operational, they assumed the deterrent functions previously
assigned to Grayback and her sister ships. The Regulus missile program ended in
1964 and Grayback was withdrawn from active service. She decommissioned at Mare
Island Naval Shipyard, California, on 25 May 1964.
A second conversion began at the Mare
Island Naval Shipyard in November 1967. The conversion was originally estimated
at US$15.2 million but grew to over US$30 million. She was re-classified from a
guided missile submarine to an amphibious transport submarine with hull
classification symbol LPSS on 30 August 1968. (The Naval Vessel Registry entry
for Grayback shows that at one point she was classified as a "plain"
transport submarine, an APSS. Crew memoirs indicated that they were never aware
of it. Presumably, while this classification was "official," it may
have lasted only days.) The conversion heightened her sail by ten feet, added
two auxiliary tanks to the forward end of the engine room (increasing the
length of the boat by 12 feet), and, most significantly, converted the missile
chambers to carry 67 embarked troops and SEAL Swimmer Delivery Vehicles (SDVs),
including a decompression chamber in the starboard hangar.
Grayback was decommissioned for the
second time on 15 January 1984 at Subic Bay Naval Station in the Republic of
the Philippines. After decommissioning, Grayback was sunk as a target on 13
April 1986 in the South China Sea.
Born Ludmila Babková, she studied
acting at Prague Conservatory and got her first movie role in a Czech film at
the age of 17. Her mother appeared in several theater plays and her younger sister,
Zorka Janů, was
also a movie actress. Lida Baarova's first love affair was with the film
director Karel Lamač. She was renowned for her beauty, with Czech movie director,
Otakar Vávra commenting that, "Her beauty likely infatuated every man she
met." After being discovered by talent scouts for the German movie
studios, Lídá Baarova left Prague for Berlin.
In Berlin she met Gustav Fröhlich, an
actor in the German cinema, and starred in several films with him. In 1935,
following her successful appearance in the German film Barcarole, she received
several job offers from the Hollywood studios. She turned them down, but later
regretted it and told her biographer, Josef Škvorecký:
Baarova and Gustav Fröhlich cheerfully
speak with Goebbels during a party in 1936.
Baarova and Gustav Fröhlich cheerfully
speak with Goebbels during a party in 1936.
"I could have been
as famous as Marlene Dietrich."
After her engagement to Gustav
Fröhlich, she and her fiancé moved to the Schwanenwerder peninsula on the
outskirts of Berlin, where their house on the (later named) Karl-Marx-Straße 8
was close to the residence of Joseph Goebbels on Inselstraße 8. Joseph Goebbels
was a minister in Chancellor Hitler's administration, with a decisive voice in
German movie production. Lída Baarová met Joseph Goebbels while working for Ufa
films. They started an affair that lasted for over a year and caused her
breakup with Gustav Fröhlich.
After Goebbels' wife Magda learned
about this affair, she complained to Adolf Hitler. Hitler, who himself was not
immune to Baarová's beauty, was the godfather of Goebbels' children, and
sympathetic towards Magda; he asked Goebbels to end the affair. Goebbels
offered his resignation instead. He wanted to divorce his wife, marry Lída Baarová,
and leave Germany with his Liduška, (Czech diminutive of Lída, connoting love), as he
affectionatedly called her, for Japan. However, Hitler did not accept his
resignation. On October 15, 1938, Joseph Goebbels attempted suicide.
Shortly afterwards, Lída Baarová
received a call from the German police that she was a persona non grata and was
given consilium abeundi to leave Germany. http://louis1j1sheehan1esquire1.blogspot.com/
She went to Prague and, in 1941, to
Italy, where she starred in such movies as Grazia (1943), La Fornarina (1944),
Vivere ancora (1945), and others. After American troops occupied Italy, she
returned to Prague, where she dated her old friend Hans Albers, another of
Germany's movie idols. In April of 1945, Lída Baarová left Prague for Germany,
to join Albers in his country house on the shores of Lake Starnberg. On the
way, she was taken into custody by the American military police, imprisoned in
Munich, and later extradited to Czechoslovakia.
In Czechoslovakia, Baarová faced a
death sentence for her work with the Germans during the war, but she was able
to prove that she worked in Germany before the war and received only a prison
sentence. In prison, she was often visited by Jan Kopecký who, like many others, was infatuated
with her. Kopecký was
a close relative of a prominent politician in the post-war government of
Czechoslovakia who arranged Lída's release from prison. Jan Kopecký and Lída Baarová were married in 1949
and formed an itinerant troupe playing marionettes before they escaped to
Austria. From there, Kopecký immigrated to Argentina, leaving Lída behind to recuperate in the
sanatorium of Dr. Lundwall.
In Austria, Lída attempted a comeback,
but Anton Walbrook, who was persecuted during the war for his sexual
orientation, withdrew from a film where he was cast with her. To escape the
resulting negative media, she left for Argentina, where she lived in extreme
poverty. She decided to return to Italy. Her husband stayed in Argentina and
they were divorced in 1956. Back in Italy, she appeared in several films,
including Fellini's I Vitelloni (1953), where she played the wife of a rich
merchant. In 1958, she moved to Salzburg, where she performed in a theater. In
1970, she married Kurt Lundwall, a physician 20 years her senior. In the same
year, Rainer Werner Fassbinder gave her a part in The Bitter Tears of Petra von
Kant.
In the 1990s Lída Baarová reappeared
on the cultural scene of the Czech Republic. She published her autobiography
and a movie, Lída Baarová's Bittersweet Memories, appeared in 1995 and won an
award at the 1996 Art Film Festival in Trenčianske Teplice, Slovakia.
Lída Baarová's headstone at Prague's
Strašnice
cemetery.
Lída Baarová's headstone at Prague's
Strašnice
cemetery.
Lída Baarová suffered from Parkinson's
disease and died in 2000 in Salzburg, while living alone on the estate she
inherited after the death of her second husband, Dr. Lundwall. If she ever felt
guilt about her past,and after all many women have had affairs with married
men, she rigorously suppressed it. "There's no doubt that Goebbels was an
interesting character," she observed in 1997, "a charming and
intelligent man and a very good storyteller. You could guarantee that he would
keep a party going with his little asides and jokes.
Her ashes were interred in Prague's
Strašnice
cemetery, where she rests with her parents and sister Zorka Janů.
Filmography
* Sladké hořkosti Lídy Baarové (Lída Baarová's Bittersweet Memories, 1995)
* The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant (1970)
* Il Cielo brucia (The Sky Burns, 1957)
* Retorno a la verdad (The Truth Will Set You
Free, 1957)
* El Batallón de las sombras (The Forgotten
Ones, 1957)
* Rapsodia de sangre (Ecstasy, 1957)
* Todos somos necesarios (We All Matter, 1956)
* Viaje de novios (Honeymoon, 1956)
* La Mestiza (The Mestiza, 1956)
* Miedo (The Fear, 1956)
* Gli innocenti pagano (What Price Innocence?
1953)
* Pietà per chi cade (Compassion, 1953)
* I Vitelloni (The Loafers, 1953)
* La vendetta di una pazza (Revenge of a Crazy
Girl, 1952)
* Carne inquieta (Restless, 1952)
* Gli amanti di Ravello (The Lovers of Ravello,
1950)
* La Bisarca (1950)
* Vivere ancora (Still Alive, 1944)
* L' Ippocampo (The Sea-Horse, 1944)
* Il Cappello da prete (Priest's Hat, 1944)
* Ti conosco, mascherina! (Masked Girl,
Recognized!, 1943)
* Grazia (The Charming Beauty, 1943)
* Turbína (Turbine, 1941)
* Paličova dcera (Arsonist's Daughter, 1941)
* Za tichých nocí (In the Still of the Night, 1941)
* Dívka v modrém (Girl in Blue, 1940)
* Život je krásný (Life Is Beautiful, 1940)
* Artur a Leontýna (Arthur and Leontine, 1940)
* Ohnivé léto (Fiery Summer, 1939)
* Die Geliebte (Love
of my Life, 1939)
* Männer müssen so sein (Men Are That Way, 1939)
* Maskovaná milenka (Masked Paramour, 1939)
* Liebeslegende (Love Story, 1938)
* Der Spieler - Roman eines Schwindlers
(Gambler's Story, 1938)
* Die Fledermaus (The Bat, 1937)
* Die Kronzeugin (The Chief Witness, 1937)
* Panenství (Virginity, 1937)
* Lidé na kře (People on the Floating Ice, 1937)
* Patrioten (Patriots, 1937)
* Unter Ausschluss der Öffentlichkeit (Private
Show, 1937)
* Komediantská princezna (Gypsy Princess, 1936)
* Švadlenka (The Seamstress, 1936)
* Die Stunde der Versuchung (The Hour of
Temptation, 1936)
* Verräter (Traitor, 1936)
* Barcarole (Boatman's Song, 1935)
* Leutnant Bobby, der Teufelskerl, (Lieutenant
Bobby, the Daredevil, 1935)
* Einer zuviel an Bord (The Fifth-Wheel, 1935)
* Grandhotel Nevada, (Grand Hotel Nevada, 1934)
* Dokud máš maminku (As Long as your Mother is Alive, 1934)
* Zlatá Kateřina (Golden Kate, 1934)
* Na růžích ustláno (Easy Life, 1934)
* Pán na roztrhání (A Popular Guy, 1934)
* Pokušení paní Antonie (Antonia's Temptation, 1934)
* Její lékař (The Physician, 1933)
* Sedmá velmoc (The Seventh Superpower, 1933)
* Okénko (The Window, 1933)
* Madla z cihelny (The Brickmaker's Daughter,
1933)
* Jsem děvče s čertem v těle (Funky Girl, 1933)
* Funebrák (The Undertaker, 1932)
* Malostranští mušketýři (Prague's Musketeers, 1932)
* Růžové kombiné (The Pink Slip, 1932)
* Šenkýřka u
divoké krásky (Waitress at the Wild Beauty's Bar, 1932)
* Lelíček ve službách Sherlocka Holmese (Lelíček in Sherlock Holmes' Service, 1932)
* Zapadlí vlastenci (Forgotten Patriots, 1932)
* Kariéra Pavla Čamrdy (Pavel Čamrda's Career, 1931)
* Obraceni Ferdyše Pištory
(Conversion of Fred Pištora, 1931)
Big Brain: The Origins and Future of
Human Intelligence by Gary Lynch and Richard Granger (Palgrave Macmillan,
$26.95)
“Sometimes I think my head is so big
because it is so full of dreams,” says John Merrick in the play The Elephant
Man. He might have been speaking for the Boskops, an almost forgotten group of
early humans who lived in southern Africa between 30,000 and 10,000 years ago. http://louis2j1sheehan2esquire.blogspot.com/
Judging from fossil remains,
scientists say the Boskops were similar to modern humans but had small,
childlike faces and huge melon heads that held brains about 30 percent larger
than our own.
That’s what fascinates psychiatrist
Gary Lynch and cognitive scientist Richard Granger. “Just as we’re smarter than
apes, they were probably smarter than us,” they speculate. More insightful and
self-reflective than modern humans, with fantastic memories and a penchant for
dreaming, the Boskops may have had “an internal mental life literally beyond
anything we can imagine.” Lynch and Granger base their characterization on our
current understanding of how the human brain works, describing in detail its
physiology and structure and comparing it with the brains of other primates.
They also explore what the Boskops’ big brains tell us about evolution (why
didn’t they survive?) and about the future of human intelligence (can we
engineer bigger brains?). These are questions, one suspects, that even the
smallest-brained Boskop would have approved of.
When Lisa Kelly learned she had
leukemia in late 2006, her doctor advised her to seek urgent care at M.D.
Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. But the nonprofit hospital refused to accept
Mrs. Kelly's limited insurance. It asked for $105,000 in cash before it would
admit her.
Sitting in the hospital's business
office, Mrs. Kelly says she told M.D. Anderson's representatives that she had
some money to pay for treatment, but couldn't get all the cash they asked for
that day. "Are they going to send me home?" she recalls thinking.
"Am I going to die?"
A growing trend in the hospital
industry means cancer patients like Lisa Kelly are being asked to pay cash
upfront before receiving treatment.
Hospitals are adopting a policy to
improve their finances: making medical care contingent on upfront payments.
Typically, hospitals have billed people after they receive care. But now,
pointing to their burgeoning bad-debt and charity-care costs, hospitals are
asking patients for money before they get treated.
Hospitals say they have turned to the
practice because of a spike in patients who don't pay their bills.
Uncompensated care cost the hospital industry $31.2 billion in 2006, up 44%
from $21.6 billion in 2000, according to the American Hospital Association.
The bad debt is driven by a larger
number of Americans who are uninsured or who don't have enough insurance to
cover medical costs if catastrophe strikes. Even among those with adequate
insurance, deductibles and co-payments are growing so big that insured patients
also have trouble paying hospitals.
• The Issue: Hospitals are asking
patients for payment before receiving treatment.
• The Background: Hospitals say the
practice is needed because of an increase in the number of people not paying
their bills.
• The Bottom Line: While hospitals
provide care to the poor, uninsured and underinsured people are likely to be
hardest hit.
Letting bad debt balloon unchecked
would threaten hospitals' finances and their ability to provide care, says
Richard Umbdenstock, president of the American Hospital Association. Hospitals
would rather discuss costs with patients upfront, he says. "After, when
it's an ugly surprise or becomes contentious, it doesn't work for
anybody."
M.D. Anderson says it went to a new
upfront-collection system for initial visits in 2005 after its unpaid patient
bills jumped by $18 million to $52 million that year. The hospital said its
increasing bad-debt load threatened its mission to cure cancer, a goal on which
it spends hundreds of millions of dollars a year.
The change had the desired effect: The
hospital's bad debt fell to $33 million the following year.
Asking patients to pay after they've
received treatment is "like asking someone to pay for the car after they've
driven off the lot," says John Tietjen, vice president for patient
financial services at M.D. Anderson. "The time that the patient is most
receptive is before the care is delivered."
M.D. Anderson says it provides
assistance or free care to poor patients who can't afford treatment. It says it
acted appropriately in Mrs. Kelly's case because she wasn't indigent, but
underinsured. http://louis3j3sheehan.blogspot.com/
The hospital says it wouldn't accept
her insurance because the payout, a maximum of $37,000 a year, would be less
than 30% of the estimated costs of her care.
Tenet Healthcare and HCA, two big,
for-profit hospital chains, say they have also been asking patients for upfront
payments before admitting them. While the practice has received little notice,
some patient advocates and health-care experts find it harder to justify at
nonprofit hospitals, given their benevolent mission and improving financial
fortunes.
An Ohio State University study found
net income per bed nearly tripled at nonprofit hospitals to $146,273 in 2005
from $50,669 in 2000. According to the American Hospital Directory, 77% of nonprofit
hospitals are in the black, compared with 61% of for-profit hospitals.
Nonprofit hospitals are exempt from taxes and are supposed to channel the
income they generate back into their operations. Many have used their growing
surpluses to reward their executives with rich pay packages, build new wings
and accumulate large cash reserves.
M.D. Anderson, which is part of the
University of Texas, is a nonprofit institution exempt from taxes. In 2007, it
recorded net income of $310 million, bringing its cash, investments and
endowment to nearly $1.9 billion.
"When you have that much money in
the till and that much profit, it's kind of hard to say no" to sick
patients by asking for money upfront, says Uwe Reinhardt, a health-care
economist at Princeton University, who thinks all hospitals should pay taxes.
Nonprofit organizations "shouldn't behave this way," he says.
It isn't clear how many of the
nation's 2,033 nonprofit hospitals require upfront payments. A voluntary 2006
survey by the Internal Revenue Service found 14% of 481 nonprofit hospitals
required patients to pay or make an arrangement to pay before being admitted.
It was the first time the agency asked that question.
Nataline Sarkisyan, a 17-year-old
cancer patient who died in December waiting for a liver transplant, drew
national attention when former presidential candidate John Edwards lambasted
her health insurer for refusing to pay for the operation. But what went largely
unnoticed is that Ms. Sarkisyan's hospital, UCLA Medical Center, a nonprofit
hospital that is part of the University of California system, refused to do the
procedure after the insurance denial unless the family paid it $75,000 upfront,
according to the family's lawyer, Tamar Arminak.
The family got that money together,
but then the hospital demanded $300,000 to cover costs of caring for Nataline
after surgery, Ms. Arminak says.
UCLA says it can't comment on the case
because the family hasn't given its consent. http://louis4j4sheehan4esquire.blogspot.com/
A spokeswoman says UCLA doesn't have a
specific policy regarding upfront payments, but works with patients on a
case-by-case basis.
Federal law requires hospitals to
treat emergencies, such as heart attacks or injuries from accidents. But the
law doesn't cover conditions that aren't immediately life-threatening.
At the American Cancer Society, which
runs call centers to help patients navigate financial problems, more people are
saying they're being asked for large upfront payments by hospitals that they
can't afford. "My greatest concern is that there are substantial numbers
of people who need cancer care" who don't get it, "usually for
financial reasons," says Otis Brawley, chief medical officer.
Mrs. Kelly's ordeal began in 2006,
when she started bruising easily and was often tired. Her husband, Sam, nagged
her to see a doctor.
A specialist in Lake Jackson, a town
50 miles from Houston, diagnosed Mrs. Kelly with acute leukemia, a cancer of
the blood that can quickly turn fatal. The small cancer center in Lake Jackson
refers acute leukemia patients to M.D. Anderson.
When Mrs. Kelly called M.D. Anderson
to make an appointment, the hospital told her it wouldn't accept her insurance,
a type called limited-benefit.
"When an insurer is going to pay
the small amounts, we don't feel financially able to assume the risk,"
says M.D. Anderson's Mr. Tietjen.
An estimated one million Americans
have limited-benefit plans. Usually less expensive than traditional plans, such
insurance is popular among people like Mrs. Kelly who don't have health
insurance through an employer.
Mrs. Kelly, 52, signed up for AARP's
Medical Advantage plan, underwritten by UnitedHealth Group Inc., three years
ago after she quit her job as a school-bus driver to help care for her mother.
Her husband was retired after a career as a heavy-equipment operator. She says
that at the time, she hardly ever went to the doctor. "I just thought I
needed some kind of insurance policy because you never know what's going to
happen," says Mrs. Kelly. She paid premiums of $185 a month.
A spokeswoman for UnitedHealth, one of
the country's largest marketers of limited-benefit plans, says the plan is
"meant to be a bridge or a gap filler." She says UnitedHealth has
reimbursed Mrs. Kelly $38,478.36 for her medical costs. Because the hospital
wouldn't accept her insurance, Mrs. Kelly paid bills herself, and submitted
them to her insurer to get reimbursed.
See documents related to Mrs. Kelly's
case.
• Mrs. Kelly's certificate of
coverage1 through the AARP.
• Mrs. Kelly's May 2007 bill2 from
M.D. Anderson.
• One of the letters Ms. Wallack sent3
on behalf of Mrs. Kelly, questioning some of M.D. Anderson's charges
• The hospital's response4
• Letter from M.D. Anderson5 to Mrs.
Kelly, regarding a refund for a misbilled item
• Collection notice6 sent to Mrs.
Kelly
• Letter from M.D. Anderson7 offering
a 10% discount for paying the balance in full by April 30.
M.D. Anderson viewed Mrs. Kelly as
uninsured and told her she could get an appointment only if she brought a
certified check for $45,000. http://louis6j6sheehan6esquire.blogspot.com/
The Kellys live comfortably, but
didn't have that kind of cash on hand. They own an apartment building and a
rental house that generate about $11,000 a month before taxes and maintenance
costs. They also earn interest income of about $35,000 a year from two
retirement accounts funded by inheritances left by Mrs. Kelly's mother and Mr.
Kelly's father.
Mr. Kelly arranged to borrow the money
from his father's trust, which was in probate proceedings. Mrs. Kelly says she
told the hospital she had money for treatment, but didn't realize how high her
medical costs would get.
The Kellys arrived at M.D. Anderson
with a check for $45,000 on Dec. 6, 2006. After having blood drawn and a
bone-marrow biopsy, the hospital oncologist wanted to admit Mrs. Kelly right
away.
But the hospital demanded an
additional $60,000 on the spot. It told her the $45,000 had paid for the lab
tests, and it needed the additional cash as a down payment for her actual
treatment.
In the hospital business office, Mrs.
Kelly says she was crying, exhausted and confused.
The hospital eventually lowered its
demand to $30,000. Mr. Kelly lost his cool. "What part don't you
understand?" he recalls saying. "We don't have any more money today.
Are you going to admit her or not?" The hospital says it was trying to
work with Mrs. Kelly, to find an amount she could pay.
Mrs. Kelly was granted an
"override" and admitted at 7 p.m.
After eight days, she emerged from the
hospital. Chemotherapy would continue for more than a year, as would requests
for upfront payments. At times, she arrived at the hospital and learned her
appointment was "blocked." That meant she needed to go to the
business office first and make a payment.
One day, Mrs. Kelly says, nurses
wouldn't change the chemotherapy bag in her pump until her husband made a new
payment. She says she sat for an hour hooked up to a pump that beeped that it
was out of medicine, until he returned with proof of payment.
A hospital spokesperson says "it
is very difficult to imagine that a nursing staff would allow a patient to sit
with a beeping pump until a receipt is presented." The hospital regrets if
patients are inconvenienced by blocked appointments, she says, but it "is
a necessary process to keep patients informed of their mounting bills and to
continue dialog about financial obligations." She says appointments aren't
blocked for patients who require urgent care.
Once, Mrs. Kelly says she was on an
exam table awaiting her doctor, when he walked in with a representative from
the business office. After arguing about money, she says the representative
suggested moving her to another facility.
But the cancer center in Lake Jackson
wouldn't take her back because it didn't have a blood bank or an
infectious-disease specialist. "It risks a person's life by doing that
[type of chemotherapy] at a small institution," says Emerardo Falcon Jr.,
of the Brazosport Cancer Center in Lake Jackson.
Ron Walters, an M.D. Anderson
physician who gets involved in financial decisions about patients, says Mrs.
Kelly's subsequent chemotherapy could have been handled locally. He says he is
sorry if she was offended that the payment representative accompanied the
doctor into the exam room, but it was an example of "a coordinated
teamwork approach."
On TV one night, Mrs. Kelly saw a news
segment about people who try to get patients' bills reduced. She contacted
Holly Wallack, who is part of a group that works on contingency to reduce
patients' bills; she keeps one-third of what she saves clients.
Ms. Wallack began firing off
complaints to M.D. Anderson. She said Mrs. Kelly had been billed more than $360
for blood tests that most insurers pay $20 or less for, and up to $120 for
saline pouches that cost less than $2 at retail.
On one bill, Mrs. Kelly was charged
$20 for a pair of latex gloves. On another itemized bill, Ms. Wallack found
this: CTH SIL 2M 7FX 25CM CLAMP A4356, for $314. http://louis8j8sheehan8esquire.blogspot.com/
It turned out to be a penis clamp,
used to control incontinence.
M.D. Anderson's prices are reasonable
compared with other hospitals, Mr. Tietjen says. The $20 price for the latex
gloves, for example, takes into account the costs of acquiring and storing
gloves, ones that are ripped and not used and ones used for patients who don't
pay at all, he says. The charge for the penis clamp was a "clerical error"
he says; a different type of catheter was used, but the hospital waived the
charge. The hospital didn't reduce or waive other charges on Mrs. Kelly's
bills.
Mrs. Kelly is continuing her treatment
at M.D. Anderson. In February, a new, more comprehensive insurance plan from
Blue Cross Blue Shield that she has switched to started paying most of her new
M.D. Anderson bills. But she is still personally responsible for $145,155.65 in
bills incurred before February. She is paying $2,000 a month toward those. Last
week, she learned that after being in remission for more than a year, her
leukemia has returned.
M.D. Anderson is giving Blue Cross
Blue Shield a 25% discount on the new bills. This month, the hospital offered
Mrs. Kelly a 10% discount on her balance, but only if she pays $130,640.08 by
this Wednesday, April 30. She is still hoping to get a bigger discount, though
numerous requests have been denied. The hospital says it gives commercial
insurers a bigger discount because they bring volume and they are less risky than
people who pay on their own.
The hospital has urged Mrs. Kelly to
sell assets. But she worries about losing her family's income and retirement
savings. Mrs. Kelly says she wants to pay, but, suspicious of the charges she's
seen, she says, "I want to pay what's fair."
"Basic Instinct" director
Paul Verhoeven has written a book that contradicts biblical teaching by
suggesting that Jesus might have been fathered by a Roman soldier who raped
Mary.
An Amsterdam publishing house said
Wednesday it will publish the Dutch filmmaker's biography of Jesus, "Jesus
of Nazareth: A Realistic Portrait," in September.
Verhoeven is best known as the
director of blockbuster films including "Basic Instinct" and
"RoboCop," but he is also a member of "Jesus Seminar," a group
of scholars and authors that seeks to establish historical facts about Jesus.
Marianna Sterk of the publishing house
J.M. Meulenhoff said the book includes several ideas that run contrary to
Christian faith, including the suggestion that Jesus could be the son of a
Roman soldier who raped Mary during a Jewish uprising against Roman rule in 4
B.C.
The book also claims that Judas
Iscariot was not responsible for Jesus' betrayal, she said.
The movie director's claims were
greeted with some skepticism among those who have dedicated their careers to
studying the life of Jesus. One issue is that there is very little information
about the life of Jesus outside of the Gospels. http://louis9j9sheehan9esquire.blogspot.com/
The Gospels as understood by
Christians for nearly 2,000 years do not support Verhoeven's ideas.
William Portier, a professor of
religious studies at the University of Dayton, in Ohio, said the Jesus Seminar
is known for making provocative claims, but "they are real scholars — you
have to deal with them."
However, he said Verhoeven's ideas
sounded "pretty out there."
John Dominic Crossan, a Jesus Seminar
founder, agreed. He said that while Verhoeven was a member in good standing, there
is little evidence for the view that Jesus was illegitimate.
Crossan said the claim is first
reported in a polemic written in the second century against the Book of
Matthew, intended for a Jewish audience.
"It's an obvious first retort to
claims that Mary was a virgin," Crossan said. "If you wanted to do a
hatchet job on Jesus' reputation, this would be the way."
The most likely scenario for people
who don't accept that Jesus was literally the son of God and had no human
father is simply that he was the son of Joseph, Crossan said.
Sterk said the book will be translated
into English in 2009. Verhoeven hopes it will be a springboard for him to raise
interest in making a film along the same lines, she said.
Verhoeven, 69, has dreamed of making a
movie about Jesus' life for decades, she said.
Asked whether it would be difficult to
follow Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ" and Martin Scorsese's
"The Last Temptation of Christ," she said Verhoeven knows he may be
somewhat late to market.
"He is painfully aware of
that," she said. "However, he has quite a different angle."
With a unanimous Senate vote Thursday,
Congress is poised to clear landmark legislation barring insurers and employers
from discriminating based on a person's genetic makeup, a move many employers
dislike but one that could accelerate both genetic testing and research on
personalized medicine.
After more than a decade of
deliberation, the Senate cleared the bill 95-0 Thursday. The same bill is
expected to sail through the House early next week -- just as a similar measure
did a year ago -- and on to President Bush, who is expected to sign it.
The legislation would bar insurance
companies from denying health coverage or charging higher premiums based on a
person's genetic information. It would also bar employers from using genetic
information to make hiring, firing and other job-placement decisions. http://louisjjjsheehan.blogspot.com/
It applies to people who have genes
that carry the risk of disease, but not to those who already have the disease.
"Since no one is born with
perfect genes, each one of us is a potential victim of genetic discrimination,"
said Rep. Louise M. Slaughter (D., N.Y.), a microbiologist, who has introduced
the bill each term since 1995. "By prohibiting the improper use of genetic
information, this bill encourages Americans to undergo the testing necessary
for early treatment and prevention of genetic-based diseases."
"This is tremendous news for
patients and researchers," said Daniel W. Jones, president of the American
Heart Association. "We are now one step closer to realizing genetics' full
potential in fighting heart disease and stroke. http://louis1j1sheehan1.blogspot.com/
Americans will be relieved to know
that they will not be denied employment or basic health care because of their
genetic makeup."
But some employer groups aren't happy,
even with some changes aimed at limiting lawsuits. Among other things, the bill
requires individuals who want to sue an employer to first get approval from the
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which
represents three million businesses, sees the legislation as "more
paperwork, more expense and more litigation," as Michael Eastman, the
group's executive director of labor policy, put it. He posited that
human-resources offices might run into difficulties if an employee requests
time off to care for a relative with a genetic ailment.
In addition, Mr. Eastman said, the
bill doesn't pre-empt about 35 state laws addressing genetic discrimination,
still leaving a patchwork of rules nationwide that businesses must follow.
Neil Trautwein, a vice president at
the National Retail Federation, also expressed concerns about increased
litigation, saying employees contemplating age- or gender-bias lawsuits could
easily include genetic discrimination. "The kitchen sink is thrown at
employers," he said.
Health plans have largely supported
the legislation. Karen Ignagni, president and chief executive of the trade
group America's Health Insurance Plans, said, "While the legislation gives
patients the peace of mind to know that their genetic information can't be
misused, it promotes informed health-care decision-making."
Aetna Inc., the country's
third-largest health insurer in terms of medical-plan members, said the
legislation would have little effect on its own underwriting policies. It
established a policy in 2002 not to use genetic testing in underwriting and to
cover genetic testing that would inform a patient's treatment decision.
Individuals who seek to buy health
insurance on their own are subject to eligibility decisions and rates based on
pre-existing health conditions. While this legislation would bar health
insurers from using individuals' genetic risk of disease for these purposes, it
doesn't change the larger practice of using pre-existing health conditions in
such coverage decisions.
A survey by Johns Hopkins University's
Genetics and Public Policy Center last year found 92% of the adults surveyed
were concerned that genetic information could be used against them. Just 24%
said they trusted health insurers with such information, and only 16% trusted
their employers.
Francis Collins, director of the
National Human Genome Research Institute at the National Institutes of Health,
said individualized disease-prevention programs aren't "going to happen if
people are afraid to get the information in the first place." http://louis1j1sheehan1esquire1.blogspot.com/
Dr. Collins suggested the legislation,
by allaying patients' fears, could boost participation in research trials.
The legislation, which has been under
intense negotiation for weeks, was held up by Sen. Tom Coburn (R., Okla.), who
lifted his hold on the bill earlier this week after lawmakers agreed to a
"firewall" so that companies couldn't be sued twice, both as
employers and insurers.
This case was first reported by the
Associated Press, Johannesburg, S. Africa, Sept.17, 1965, and first published
in the United States by NICAP. The first information was related by UFO
investigator and writer Richard Hall. This case, though not heavy in detail,
features a vehicle encounter, UFO landing, and physical traces, along with official
secrecy.
The events occurred as Constable John
Lockem and Koos de Klerek were doing routine patrol on the
Pretoria-Bronkhorstspruit road. It was just past midnight when to their utter
amazement, the lights on their police van lit up an object ahead of them on the
road. Sitting right on the highway was a disc-shaped object. The object was not
anything they had seen before.
With the object lit up from their
headlights, it appeared to be of a copper color, and was about 30 feet in
diameter. After only a few seconds, the UFO began to rise above the road, and
quickly sped away, throwing flames from double tubes of some type on the
bottom. The two men must have been in awe, wondering from where the strange,
unknown object had come from, and where it was going. Later as the men reported
their unusual encounter, Constable Lockem stated: "Its lift-off was
quicker than anything I have ever seen." Flames from the asphalt road had
shot up into the air about 3 feet, according to the witnesses. The heat was so
intense that the fire lasted for a time, even after the object had zoomed away.
Further investigation indicated that
parts of the road had caved in, as if from a heavy object resting on it. The
gravel had been separated from the tar in an area severely burned about six
feet in diameter, indicating the center underneath of the UFO. An official
investigation into the incident was carried out by Lt. Col. J.B. Brits,
District Commandant of Pretoria North.
In an interview for a local newspaper,
Brits told reporters that the case of the UFO landing was considered "as
being of a highly secret nature and an inquiry is being conducted in top
circles." Samples of the damaged road material were taken by a scientific
agency for analysis, but the results were never released to the public. Because
of the location of the event, and its age, it is unlikely that more information
will be forthcoming. The case remains unexplained.
SDI: Our guest for tonight has degrees
from Harvard in government, law and divinity. He established the Christic
Institute in Washington D.C., and has been legal counsel on many high profile
cases... Cases such as Karen Silkwood for example -- Iran-Contra, the American
Sanctuary Movement, the Pentagon papers, Three Mile Island and Watergate. He
has gained access to many restricted government files. Danny has represented
John Mack, chairman of the Harvard Department of Clinical Psychology, after
Harvard tried to fire him after he published "Abduction: Human Encounters
with Aliens." http://louis2j2sheehan2esquire.blogspot.com/
Mack tried to publish an article on
his research in the New England Journal of Medicine, but the editorial board
wouldn't even consider it, so he wrote the book. Daniel Sheehan, funded by
Laurance Rockefeller, resolved the case against John Mack very quickly. Daniel
Sheehan has said that many members of the human family are not properly
prepared for open contact with extraterrestrials. In May he appeared with many
UFO-related witnesses with the Disclosure Project at a Washington Press
Conference. Joining us from his home in California is lawyer Daniel Sheehan...
(A short segment ensued where Steven Bassett, held over from the hour before,
says hello to Sheehan and thanks him for the work that he has done over the
last year to advance the Disclosure process.) [The interview began with a short
clip of Sheehan recounting his experience of seeing classified materials in the
basement of a building of the Library of Congress in 1977.]
SDI: Dan Sheehan. You have been a busy
man since you were last on this program which was back in October, many months
ago.
DS: Yes I remember.
SDI: That was a clip that we played
from your last appearance with us. Were the documents that they showed you . .
. were they identified in any way? Were there classification marks on them?
DS: No, no. As I had mentioned they
were in a set of boxes, which were sort of like shoe box-sized boxes, kind of
off-khaki green color. There were many, many of them in this room. What I did
is I just started going through one at a time. I was looking at the
photographs. The photographs didn't have any classification markings on them.
They were in these little metal containers, almost like little film canisters.
They didn't have any classification stamps or documents on them. All I know is
this is where I was told to go by Marcia Smith. When I got there they knew that
I was coming. They checked my identification, and cleared me into the room.
They didn't ask for any special verification, whether I had special classified
status or anything. So I just went in and took advantage of the opportunity.
SDI: Daniel take us back to how this
all started. You're obviously out for the truth, the facts. You are, because of
who you are, in a position to gain some access, gain some information, credibility,
to allow this information and these hidden documents to come forward. Tell us
how this all started for those of us who are really not familiar, so we can
discuss it and take it from there.
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