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To: GraceZ who wrote (30454)	5/1/2005 12:18:05 AM
From: shades	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 306849

My native american indian friend used to always tell me THANK GOD for crack rock - that if he relied on the generosity of selfish western women to give him sex he would be a 37 year old virgin. How he has slept with hundreds of crack heads with no condom and still hasn't caught aids really makes me question its spread to certain people. msnbc.msn.com Grace what should we would do ? Don't we live in a silly world?

To: GraceZ who wrote (30454)	5/1/2005 5:02:10 AM
From: Elroy Jetson	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 306849

Golly, after reading your note . . . I think you are one of the most bitter people I have ever run across. People are people. Its very unlikely that there are fewer addicts in Australia or Europe than there are here in the US. But drugs do seem to be causing a much larger problem in the US than in Europe or Australia. Have you ever considered the possibility that social problems are magnified by the way America deals with these problems? Prostitution? In Australia its legal with corporate owned with brothels traded on the stock exchange and inspected by the health department. Individual prostitutes can work from home if they are registered. Of the US, Europe, and Australia, the United States is the only one of the three which is waging a "War on Drugs". I don't use drugs and don't like people who do, but what sane person wants a war being waged within their own borders? What sort of life is that? Importing, selling, buying and possession of heroin is not legal in Australia. Importing and selling has heavy penalties for Australia but lighter than here. Possession and use of heroin is only enforced when someone is causing a problem, and the punishment is very light. To avoid medical emergencies associated with an overdose there are places where addicts can shoot up. One of them, in Kings Cross Sydney, was made official in 2001. Can you imagine that happening in America with uptight, doctrinaire, angry fanatics like you around? society.guardian.co.uk If someone wants to go to a detox center, it costs $4,000 which is not a small sum for addicts and their families. There are a very few charity detox clinics. The government doesn't put much money into deto clinics there is a feeling that they are a waste of money - as addicts are addicts. If they ever get sober, its not going to be because of a detox clinic or a prison. If people walk past a policeman smoking pot or taking Ecstasy, they are taking a risk, but not a really large one. The police have better things to do. Possession of 30 gm or less of pot attracts a ticket with a $150 AUD fine. Who deals drugs in Australia? Criminal gangs. Want to know who they are? There are a number of Australian websites with many of their photos and resumes. The website below is not the best, but melbournecrime.com has currently exceeded their budgeted bandwidth. nationmaster.com The Morans, Graeme Kinniburgh, Alphonse Gagitano, Carl Williams, anyone important is there. They get more press once they're shot dead. Everyone at a restaurant saw Dominic Gatto shoot mobster Benji Venjamin and leave. The police asked Gatto to surrender which he did that evening at 6 pm after an early dinner. The police watch all of them and when they are not going to jail for 7 year terms, they are shooting each other. Addicts are addicts, someone will always supply drugs but the police under Christine Nixon annoy them, jail them, and seize their assets, but come down super-hard on anyone involved in activity other than "accepted" gang activity. In my estimation the way America deals with social problems is delusional. Many Americans think they can make drugs, gangs, prostitution and other social problems go away by putting people in prison for life or waging a war against them. You are suffering the benefits of this approach - I hope you're happy. Perhaps the Australian health care system saves some money from how Australia handles social problems, but that;s a small part of the picture. Australian health care is uniformly superior to American health care. Medicare covers everyone. Private insurance available for those who want more deluxe care and payment for procedures, usually cosmetic, the government doesn't cover. Health care per capita costs dramatically less than what we spend in the US. Things are treated early when they can be treated inexpensively and the government negotiates a huge discount on drugs with the manufacturers. You don't like that? Who cares. I'd bet not even one person in Australia even knows you exist. .

To: GraceZ who wrote (30454)	5/1/2005 6:40:33 AM
From: KyrosL	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 306849

It's a myth that low black life expectancy is responsible for the lower overall US life expectancy. This myth is conveniently trotted out every time someone points out the abominable performance of the US health care system compared to other developed countries, both in terms of results as well as cost. Here are the facts: Black life expectancy is about five years less than white life expectancy, but it only lowers overall US life expectancy by about 0.4 years [1]. US overall life expectancy is 77.7 years. US life expectancy for whites is 78.1 years [2] ((77.7+0.4). Australia's overall life expectancy (which includes the much lower life expectancy of the aboriginals) is 80.4 years [3]. This makes the difference between Australia and US almost the same as the difference between the US and Mexico (Mexican life expectancy is 75.2 years) [4]. Of course, those in the US with good health insurance are more or less OK. But for the 30% poor and uninsured (both black and white) it's a different story: they face third world health care conditions, as objectively measured by their life expectancies. The irony of it all is that they ultimately do get health care, after their conditions reach the critical stage, at which point the "system" treats them at astronomical cost. The insane health care system in the US is, IMO, the biggest problem we are facing. It's a huge impediment to US competitiveness. We are wasting by my estimate 7% of our GDP, which is almost two times our defence budget. Some of our largest companies, like GM and Ford, are in grave danger of going out of business in the next decade because of this insanity. We are importing cars from Ontario, because Canadian workers have a national health care plan, while GM and Ford in the US are burdened with huge health care payment liabilities. And to add insult to injury, they have to pay almost twice as much as national health care systems pay in Europe, Japan, and Canada. 1. childtrendsdatabank.org 2. cia.gov 3. cia.gov 4. cia.gov