All you need to know about government healthcare

In Britain, government hospitals even kill healthy people

Hundreds of babies died needlessly amid repeated failures at Shrewsbury and Telford NHS Trust, according to the first report from an independent review into its maternity services.

The review by Donna Ockenden, a healthcare expert, found a “lack of kindness and compassion” from staff — with women often blamed for the loss of their babies — and a failure to learn when things went wrong.

A review looked at 250 cases of stillbirths, brain damage, and deaths of babies and mothers at the Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital Trust and says “urgent action” is needed to improve safety.

In all, 1,862 cases are being investigated, making it the largest review of its kind in NHS history.

A highly critical report found:

An “unacceptable” lack of kindness and compassion from some maternity staff

Families’ concerns about their care were dismissed or “not listened to at all”

Midwives failed to recognise when a pregnancy wasn’t progressing normally

Repeated failures to escalate problems to more senior staff

“Continuing errors” in monitoring babies’ heart beats

Inappropriate use of drugs, including oxytocin to speed up labour

A culture of reducing the number of caesarean births without considering if it was causing harm

The report found 13 mothers died between 2000 and 2019.

https://www.itv.com/news/2020-12-10/shrewsbury-maternity-scandal-mothers-were-blamed-for-the-death-of-their-baby

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Don't Let COVID-19 Lockdowns Become a Permanent Power Grab

This week, as Los Angeles County announced it would lock down all outdoor dining, a video went viral. That video featured restaurant owner Angela Marsden, proprietor of the Pineapple Hill Saloon and Grill, decrying the lockdown policy while pointing to the erection of production catering set up for a Hollywood shoot just a few feet away. "Everything I own is being taken away from me, and they set up a movie company right next to my outdoor patio," Marsden said, adding that she has spent approximately $80,000 complying with the requirements of LA County, only to see it shut down her business completely.

There is no scientific policy justifying LA County's outdoor-dining shutdown. In fact, during a Board of Supervisors meeting, a community member quizzed LA County Health Officer Dr. Muntu Davis on the evidence to support such a ban. Muntu provided no such evidence, likely because there is none.

But those who want to run their businesses in a safe and secure fashion are being targeted nonetheless by a political class incentivized to pursue tyranny rather than rational policy. LA Mayor Eric Garcetti -- who told police to stand down as rioters tore through his city during a pandemic -- said that his "heart goes out to Ms. Marsden" and then added, "No one likes these restrictions, but I do support them as our hospital ICU beds fill to capacity." He explained, "We must stop this virus before it kills thousands of more Angelenos." He did not explain why, if outdoor dining was so dangerous, Hollywood is still allowed to engage in it.

That's no surprise. Throughout the pandemic, one set of rules has applied to America's most ardent lockdown advocates, and another set of rules has applied to everyone else. LA County Supervisor Sheila Kuehl voted to ban outdoor dining ... and then went to an outdoor restaurant later that evening. California Gov. Gavin Newsom is currently locking down some 33 million citizens but had no problem eating indoors with members of the California Medical Association at The French Laundry. Mayor London Breed of San Francisco ate at that same posh restaurant the next day. Austin Mayor Steve Adler told his constituents, "stay home if you can" in a Facebook video filmed from his vacation timeshare in Cabo San Lucas, where he'd just headed with seven others after a wedding in Austin. Mayor Lori Lightfoot of Chicago got her hair cut and called it an "essential" business activity while promoting lockdown. Gov. Andrew Cuomo told everybody to stay home for Thanksgiving and then announced he would be getting together with his daughters and his 89-year-old mother, only to then reverse himself.

The message is obvious: Our intellectual and moral betters in politics are free to make their own rational calculations on COVID-19 risk. The rest of us are to be locked in our homes until further notice. When these political actors suggest that we must act out of an abundance of caution, they mean that they ought to enjoy abundance while benefitting from our caution.

You and your family are capable of making the same decisions Cuomo, Garcetti, Newsom, Lightfoot and Adler do. You should be careful; you should engage in social distancing, mask up when in close proximity with others and generally avoid social gatherings involving those with preexisting conditions. But you can do all of these things and still live in a free society. Our politicians don't believe that, because our politicians have seen how easily so many Americans were willing to indefinitely suspend their freedoms out of trust in our authorities. Until the incentive structures change, our freedoms will continue to be throttled by people who have no problem exercising their own.

One need not be a COVID-19 skeptic in order to question whether the enthusiastic authoritarian streak revealed by those politicians can be curbed. The longer we tolerate it, the more our politicians will normalize their power grabs.

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2020/12/09/dont_let_covid-19_lockdowns_become_a_permanent_power_grab_144808.html

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IN BRIEF

Michigan judge allows probe of Dominion voting machines (Fox News)

Joe Biden picks California AG Xavier Becerra as health secretary (Reuters)

"Your daily reminder that ... Xavier Becerra tried to FORCE pro-life crisis pregnancy centers in CA to advertise free abortions." —Liz Wheeler

Now who's contesting elections? The Democrat House could overturn results in Iowa and New York (WSJ)

"House Democrats are sweating, having lost at least 10 seats when they were supposed to gain that many. If Ms. Miller-Meeks and Ms. Tenney prevail, the House will likely be split 222-213, leaving the GOP five seats from a majority in 2022 and potentially narrowing Nancy Pelosi's path to be re-elected as Speaker in January. The Democratic pressure to do everything in their power to prevent these two losses will be immense."

DNI John Ratcliffe urges John Durham to release interim report in order to protect investigation (Daily Caller)

House passes bill to end federal marijuana prohibition (Yahoo Finance)

ABC's George Stephanopoulos directs viewers to Democrat fundraising page (The Federalist)

Trump announces lawyer Rudy Giuliani tests positive (Washington Examiner)

California residents under strict stay-at-home orders through Christmas (NPR)

Sweden's infection rate soars above Britain, Germany, and Spain (Daily Mail)

Trump orders withdrawal of troops from Somalia (NY Post)

Congress moves to block troop withdrawal from Afghanistan and Germany (Military.com)

Diplomats who became ill in Cuba and China may have been targeted with a type of radiation (Daily Wire)

NYC's shooting surge reaches "levels unseen in years" (Fox News)

LA restaurant owner's outdoor dining area shut down by mayor. Days later, film production company sets up outdoor dining area 15 feet away. (Not the Bee)

Ohio allows full-contact wrestling but bans post-match handshakes (Disrn)

Policy: The war on the Electoral College has only just begun (National Review)

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