A recent case of a more disturbing situation happened in South Africa in December 2007. 49 people were being held in a South African hospital for drug resistant TB (the details of the strain of TB have not been released). Again the treatment of these individuals appeared to be similar to the treatment of prison inmates, these patients-which is really what they are later escaped cutting through a perimeter fence. Of the 49 patients 26 returned, however 23 patients are still “on the loose”. These situations highlight the problems associated with the practice of quarantine.

Mario Raviglione, director of the WHO (World Health Organization) TB department indicated “it’s a last resort.” Arthur Caplan director of the Center for Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania conveyed his sentiments “There are certain circumstances when public health trumps individual rights-when it comes to protecting lives.” Exacerbating this problem, is underdeveloped countries if they even have hospitals, lack the facilities to effectively treat possibly infectious patients. furthermore, the possibility of a major outbreak in such a country would lead to problems of the feasibility of locking up thousands of individuals.

All experts and now policy makers are coming into line with the need for improvement in the use of quarantine in all countries, as Arthur Caplan notes…. “but you have to be careful. The purpose is to prevent spread of disease, not to punish people.”

I see this move being similar to the continued legalization of cigarettes, as long as it can generate government revenue than it is acceptable. Granted prostitution is legal in certain countries and the Hungarian government claims this is an effort to get prostitutes into the economy, but what should be an obvious concern is the sexual slavery that occurs in such countries. Women are forced to become prostitutes and in a lot of cases children as well, yet instead of attempting to fix that problem the government seems more concerned about how to make a profit.

The line, and dare I say the party line was, the right to free speech. There is of course the argument that free speech is absolute, otherwise we begin a slippery slope into apparently….anarchy. However, is this really the case? I agree that there are arguments to be made against censorship many of which are valid and can in fact lead down a path that will result in restrictions. But these should be taken on a case by case basis along with a little common sense. The truth of the matter is, as much as we would like to believe we are in a free society, we are not in a free society where we can say and do what we want. Ask Michael Richards, Mel Gibson, or Don Imus. However, even though these individuals have in effect been disappeared from, at least the entertainment landscape for using words that are offensive these people never said they would kill anybody. I hope you can detect the sarcasm in reading that last line. I am in no way trying to defend these entertainers, but, we cannot condemn some and condone others and claim free speech when we want to. To allow an individual like Ahmadinejad to spew out hatred regardless of the “spirited dialogue” that may ensue afterwards in no way excuses giving him a public forum. Yet we are the ones picking and choosing who gets censored and who doesn’t.

The point is weighing a president’s views which clearly carries important political and global consequences and whose views contain the destruction of a people, should be examined a little more carefully before they are given a public voice.

Sympathy has poured out for the loss of this opera star who is probably well known to the lay person and not true opera fans for his work as part of the three tenors Placido Domingo, Luciano Pavoratti and Jose Carreras (the other guy). One of there live concerts put out on CD is still the highest selling opera album of all time. Highlights to his career also include hitting nine high Cs in a row during a 1972 performance of “Daughter of the Regiment” at New York’s Metropolitan Opera, financing and establishing the Pavarotti Music Center in the Bosnian city of Mostar, raising money to ban land mines worldwide with the late princess Diana, and rumor has it he holds the world record for the longest standing ovation.

Born on Oct. 12, 1935, Pavarotti started his singing career in 1963 and gave his last public performance at the 2006 winter Olympics in Turin, Luciano Pavarotti succumbed to pancreatic cancer after having surgery to remove a tumor in 2006. Pancreatic cancer has a very poor prognosis (a four percent survival rate after 5 years) and Pavarotti died shortly afterward. He is expected to be buried in his hometown Modena, Italy.

Clearly his voice will be missed in the world of Opera.

“I think a life in music is a life beautifully spent and this is what I have devoted my life to”
-Luciano Pavarotti

Russian Czar Alexander II sold Alaska to the United States in 1867 for $7,2 million. The formal transfer occurred on October 18, 1867 which is celebrated as Alaska Day yearly.

The new route will be used for the transportation of goods using a railway as well as energy including oil and natural gas. In addition, Russia intends to supply North America electricity generated in the currently planned Tugurskaya and Pendzhinskaya tidal plants, each with capacity of as much as 10 gigawatts, in the Okhotsk Sea, close to Sakhalin Island.

For many years, the Russian people have celebrated Cosmonauts Day but in recent years there has been global parties organized to honor this space pioneer. Today, 119 parties will take place worldwide (in 32 countries) in what is called Yuri’s Night. Yuri Gagarin was met with an untimely death only a few years after his space flight. The cosmonaut was killed in a plane crash during a training mission on March 27, 1968.

Almost 5 decades later, we are entering a new era in space travel. Wealthy individuals can purchase trips to the International Space Station; the most recent example is billionaire Charles Simonyi who is currently a passenger on the orbiting laboratory. At the same time, space travel is no longer a government endeavor. The private sector has made huge progress in terms of making space travel affordable to more people creating a new class of passengers aptly referred to as space tourists. The Ansari X Prize competition was pivotal in this matter.