Will American Catholics be disqualified from death penaly juries because of Pope Francis' declaration that the death penalty is immoral?
Will Pope Francis' declaration in August, 2018 that the death penalty is morally unacceptable in all circumstances disqualify American Catholics from serving on death penaly cases? And if these American Catholics are disqualified from serving on death penaly cases does that make it more likely that the death penalty will be used in the United States?From the Washington Post on 01/18/19"In August, Pope Francis declared the death penalty morally unacceptable in all circumstances and committed the church to its global abolition. This pronouncement broke from previous Catholic teaching, which permitted the death pena...
Source: Markham's Behavioral Health - February 2, 2019 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: David G. Markham Source Type: blogs
Media watch - Is Twitter good for your mental health?
Is Twitter the crystal meth of newsrooms asks journalist David Von Drehle in the Washington Post on 01/25/19?The answer is "yes!"Twitter is not only the crystal meth of newsrooms but of social media addicts and internet news junkies.Twitter and other social media are having huge impact on human societies around the world. It is an impact we barely understand.Misinformation, propaganda, illusory understanding, and triggered emotional arousal leading to group think and herd like behavior similar to the two minutes of hate in George Orwell's 1984 are a few of the consequences.Is Twitter good for our mental health? We will be ...
Source: Markham's Behavioral Health - February 2, 2019 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: David G. Markham Source Type: blogs
My Son ’s Tutor Slipped Me Entrance-Exam Questions. Should I Report Him?
From the New York Times on 01/22/19"With some ambivalence, I took him to a well-regarded (and expensive) tutor to help him prepare for the Specialized High School Admission Test. After his session, the tutor asked if my son was also taking the entrance test for a different coveted public high school in the city. When I said yes, he gave me a handwritten paper, explaining that it was a copy of most of the test questions, which he got from “spies” he sent to take the exam. He asked me not to tell others about it. I was shocked and horrified and left with the test. I did not look at it or allow my son to, as I would consi...
Source: Markham's Behavioral Health - February 1, 2019 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: David G. Markham Source Type: blogs
What is cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT)?
From Medical News Today on 09/25/19 by Kathleen Davis, FNP"Cognitive behavioral therapy, or CBT, is a short-term therapy technique that can help people find new ways to behave by changing their thought patterns.Engaging with CBT can help people reduce stress, cope with complicated relationships, deal with grief, and face many other common life challenges.CBT works on the basis that the way we think and interpret life's events affects how we behave and, ultimately, how we feel. Studies have shown that it is useful in many situations.More specifically, CBT is a problem-specific, goal-oriented approach that nee...
Source: Markham's Behavioral Health - February 1, 2019 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: David G. Markham Source Type: blogs
More college students are turning to emotional support animals,
From the Inquirer on 01/21/19"Emotional-support animals (ESAs) are owned by people with mental-health disorders and deemed necessary by medical professionals. The animals, which typically have not had special training, gained popularity in 2015 when they prompted a federal guideline for housing providers, but they seemed to go viral last year following news stories about someone trying to take a dog or a peacock or a goat onto an airplane — sometimes with success.Ever since, ESAs have become the target of ridicule. Popeyes released an “emotional support chicken” carrier availab...
Source: Markham's Behavioral Health - January 31, 2019 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: David G. Markham Source Type: blogs
New York, Virginia become first to require mental health education in schools
From CNN on 07/02/18:On Sunday, New York and Virginia became the first two states to enact laws requiring mental health education in schools.New York's law updates the health curriculum in elementary, middle and high schools to include material on mental health. Virginia's law mandates that mental health education be incorporated into physical education and health curricula for ninth- and 10th-graders.For moreclick here.To see the New York State laws enactedclick here.Editor's note:It's hard to believe that it took until 2018, for New York and Virigina to become the first two states in the United States to require mental h...
Source: Markham's Behavioral Health - January 31, 2019 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: David G. Markham Source Type: blogs
Indiana offers to pay student loans for Mental Health Professionals willing to work in 11 rural counties
From US News& World Report on 01/07/19:"The Indiana Department of Health is hoping to entice mental health care professionals to work in rural and opioid-stricken counties in the state by offering to help pay their student loans."This program will help bring more qualified medical professionals to rural Indiana communities and expand access to quality treatment for individuals with substance use disorder, ” Jim McClelland, the state's executive director for drug prevention, treatment and enforcement, said in a release on the initiative.For moreclick here.Editor's note:I wonder if other states will offe...
Source: Markham's Behavioral Health - January 30, 2019 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: David G. Markham Source Type: blogs
Is there a significant difference in fatal police killings from state to state?
There are huge differences in the number of people killed by police by state.Click on image to enlarge.From Peter Moskos' blog, "Cops In The Hood" on 01/01/19"The national annual average (2015-2018) is 0.31 (rate per 100,000). And yet New Mexico is 0.98 and New York is 0.09.This is a large difference. Or take Utah (because of this story in the paper). Utah has a murder and violence rate below the national average, a low poverty rate, and is 90 percent white. And yet people in Utah are almost 5 times as likely an in New York to be killed by a cop. Utah has murder rate lower than NYC, 1/5 the poverty rate, far...
Source: Markham's Behavioral Health - January 30, 2019 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: David G. Markham Source Type: blogs
MBH index - School lock downs 2017 - 2018
Number of children who experienced school lock downs in the U.S. 2017-2018 = 4 millionNumber of school lock downs in the U.S. 2017 - 2018 = 6,200Number of school lock downs, on average, per day in U.S. schools 2017 - 2018 = 16Source - Washington Post as reported in The Week on 01/11/19Editor's note:There is growing evidence that school lock down drills are very traumatizing to children which raises the question of whether the benefit of such practices are worth the psychological and social costs.These statistics also make one pause and consider what kind of a society we have become as a result of our love of freely availab...
Source: Markham's Behavioral Health - January 30, 2019 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: David G. Markham Source Type: blogs
Pediatricians should talk with parents about guns and their children.
This study is a loud and compelling call to actionfor all pediatricians to start open discussions around firearm ownership with all families and share data on the significant risks associated with unsafe storage. It is an even louder call to firearm manufacturers to step up and innovate, test and design smart handguns, inoperable by young children, to prevent unintentional injury," Dr. Parikh and colleagues continue.The Children's commentators point to the "extremely dangerous" combination of "the small curious hands of a young child" and "the easily accessible and operable, loaded handgun" and suggest that pediatricians w...
Source: Markham's Behavioral Health - January 29, 2019 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: David G. Markham Source Type: blogs
Dads Who Change Diapers in Public Get Help From New York Law
From Governing on 01/07/19Change is coming to men's restrooms in New York -- and it's going to be a big help to fathers all over the state.A new law requires all new or renovated buildings in New York that have bathrooms used by the public to make changing tables available to both men and women.The rule, which passed in April 2018 but didn't go into effect until the new year, applies to restaurants, stores and movie theaters as well as state facilities such as parks and offices of the Department of Motor Vehicles.For moreclick here.Editor's note:Another law which influences social change in enhancing the equality of the se...
Source: Markham's Behavioral Health - January 29, 2019 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: David G. Markham Source Type: blogs
Federal Judge blocks Trump administration new rule letting employer health insurance deny birth control coverage
From Governing on 01/15/19A federal judge in Philadelphia on Monday barred the Trump administration from implementing new rules that would let almost any employer deny female employees coverage for birth control by citing religious or moral objections.U.S. District Judge Wendy Beetlestone found that the new regulations would make it more difficult for thousands of women to obtain no-cost contraception currently mandated under the Affordable Care Act and inflict an undue burden on states who would step in to pick up the tab.For moreclick here.Editor's note:The ability to control and manage one's fertility is a significant f...
Source: Markham's Behavioral Health - January 28, 2019 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: David G. Markham Source Type: blogs
Books - The Square and The Tower by Niall Ferguson
Two organizing ideas about how society is organized can be described as hierarchies and networks. Both have existed throughout human history. Understanding social organization is important because the structures and dynamics of the ways of organizing social life at a marcosystemic level influence behavior at the microsystemic level.Most of the macrosystemic organizing structures and dynamics are unconscious and as such, people don't understand why they think what they think, why they feel what they feel, and why they do what they do. The individual and the micro systems the individual is partipating in are influenced ...
Source: Markham's Behavioral Health - January 28, 2019 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: David G. Markham Source Type: blogs
MBH index - People killed by police in U.S.
Number of people killed by police in the United States in 2015 = 995Number of people killed by police in the United States in 2016 = 963Number of people killed by police in the United States in 2017 = 987Number of people killed by police in the United States in 2018 = 998For moreclick here. (Source: Markham's Behavioral Health)
Source: Markham's Behavioral Health - January 28, 2019 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: David G. Markham Source Type: blogs
Movies - On the Basis Of Sex
On The Basis of Sex is a movie about Ruth Bader Ginsberg's early life and career establishing her expertise in advocating for women's rights in the U.S. in the later half of the twentieth century.It is a five out of five on the MBH movie scale and is highly recommended.Editor's note:This is not only a biographical story about RBG but a good example of how social change is made in an intentional and deliberate way.The norms, attitudes, beliefs, practices of a society are highly influenced in a democracy by the "rule of law." The impact of the changes in women's rights in a patriarchal society made by Ruth Bader Ginsbe...
Source: Markham's Behavioral Health - January 27, 2019 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: David G. Markham Source Type: blogs
