Here is a sampling of links and notes about Carolina people and programs cited recently in the media:
International Coverage
Exercise can combat fatigue in leukemia patients
The Times of India
Exercise may be a great way to combat the debilitating fatigue in patients suffering from leukemia, say researchers. The research team from University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill found that physical activity can significantly improve symptoms of fatigue and depression, increase cardiovascular endurance and maintain quality of life for adult patients undergoing treatment for leukemia.
UNC Release:
http://www.med.unc.edu/www/news/groundbreaking-study-shows-exercise-benefits-leukemia-patients
National Coverage
Health Debate: Costs and Benefits (Letter to the Editor)
The New York Times
Your editorial provides a look behind the veil that covers the grave cultural chasm that confronts the nation on health care. We have had several decades of “excess excess” in health care. The effort to restrain the waste and wrongdoing in the system is called rationing. Too many American declare that their “right of choice” entitles them to the privilege of seeking medically unnecessary care that is often also harmful to their health. (Glenn Wilson, Chapel Hill, N.C. The writer is professor emeritus of social medicine at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill School of Medicine.)
Health professionals debate screening for intimate partner violence (Blog)
The Los Angeles Times
Many doctors and hospitals have implemented procedures to screen women for intimate partner violence. …"It is certainly understandable that clinicians and health care facilities have implemented universal screening programs, given the prevalence and potential severity of intimate partner violence," doctors from the University of North Carolina wrote in an editorial accompanying the study.
State and Local Coverage
Grisham to headline literary festival
The Chapel Hill News
John Grisham, Elizabeth Edwards and Pulitzer Prize winners Douglas Blackmon, Rick Bragg and Elizabeth Strout are among authors to be featured at the North Carolina Literary Festival Sept. 10-13. Others among the 102 authors appearing at the free public festival, to be held at UNC, include Will Blythe, author of the Carolina-Duke basketball rivalry tome "To Hate Like This Is to Be Happy Forever," former North Carolina Poet Laureate Fred Chappell, forensic anthropologist Kathy Reichs and favorite North Carolina novelists Doris Betts and Clyde Edgerton.
UNC Release:
http://uncnews.unc.edu/content/view/2741/73/
Biotech Center grants $100k each to UNC, NCSU projects
The Triangle Business Journal
The North Carolina Biotechnology Center has awarded $300,000 in grants to three university-business collaborations – including ones involving the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and North Carolina State University. The Research Triangle Park-based nonprofit granted $100,000 to UNC’s Scott Randell, an associate professor in the Department of Cell and Molecular Physiology who is working with RTP-based company Entergrion to grow eye cells in test cultures.
Student leader wants safer celebrations
The Chapel Hill News
UNC's new student body president has a crazy notion: students should celebrate big basketball victories safely. Jasmin Jones' initiative is called Safe Celebration. The idea is this: when UNC beats Duke or wins a national championship, the subsequent Franklin Street bonanza could be safer if it was just a bit more structured.
Roses and Raspberries (Editorial)
The Chapel Hill News
Raspberries to whoever stole a trailer full of empty oyster shells from behind Squid's Restaurant. UNC microbiologist Chris Elkins collects the spent shells from Squid's for the Coastal Conservation Association. Every three weeks he drives the trailer full down to the coast, where the N.C. Coastal Federation uses them to prevent erosion, protect marshland and preserve fish and wildlife habitat at Jones Island. The N.C. Division of Marine Fisheries also uses oyster shells to help promote the formation of oyster reefs.
Library preserving Urban Renewal history
The Herald-Sun (Durham)
…The North Carolina Preservation Consortium has awarded the Durham County Library's North Carolina Collection a grant of $840 to preserve reel-to-reel audiotape recordings of nine meetings of Durham's Urban Renewal Commission, held in 1968 and 1969. …Steve Weiss, sound and image librarian and head of UNC Chapel Hill's Southern Folklife Collection at Wilson Library, and his staff assessed the tapes in December 2008 and found them to be in very good condition considering their age.
Commissioners to revisit school purchase contract
The Dispatch (Lexington)
The Davidson County Board of Commissioners will again discuss a contract approved last month to purchase the former location of Davidson Country Day School during their Thursday meeting. …According to a summary written by Prof. David Owens found on the University of North Carolina School of Government Web site, town ordinances apply to shaping development of areas surrounding the municipality.
Ackland again earns reaccreditation from national museums association
The Chapel Hill Herald
The Ackland Art Museum once again earned itself the coveted accolades of reaccreditation from the American Association of Museums. …Ackland remains one of only 13 museums in North Carolina to receive accreditation from the American Association of Museums, having earned that distinction last month. "It is the Good Housekeeping seal of approval," said Emily Kass, director of the Ackland museum.
My one-year anniversary (Column)
The Chapel Hill News
I write this, my first column, on an anniversary. One year ago I learned I had not defied death after all. Seven months after finishing chemotherapy, I had cancer again. (Ashley Osment is senior attorney at the UNC Center for Civil Rights.)
Backyard gardeners get serious, reclaim farmland
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
Darin Knapp and Jane Saiers are science geeks by profession, gardeners by hobby. But these days their hobby has become a second occupation — so much so they can now be called farmers. This summer, they started selling blueberries at the Hillsborough Farmers Market. …Knapp, 45, is a neuroscientist at UNC-Chapel Hill, and Saiers, 44, owns her own medical communications company and works from home.
Issues and Trends
Budget raises your taxes
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
The state would reduce community services for the mentally ill, force school boards to make cuts, pack inmates into fewer prisons, put more than 700 state employees out of work and raise sales taxes under a budget proposal that received preliminary approval Tuesday. The $19 billion spending plan, which is more than a month late, was a hard-fought compromise among Democrats who control both chambers of the legislature and the governor.
Final vote nears on N.C. budget as Perdue waits to sign
News 14 Carolina
Another vote on the state budget is scheduled for Wednesday, as lawmakers tentatively approved the two-year spending plan on Tuesday night. The budget calls for the elimination of over 2,000 positions, which includes laying off over 700 people. More layoffs are expected with the UNC system and public schools.
Related Link:
http://www.newsobserver.com/nation_world/story/1634710.html
Bail reduced for suspect in Mahato killing
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
Witness accounts and a statement from a co-defendant's girlfriend led to a bail reduction for a man accused of killing a Duke University graduate student. …Laurence A. Lovette, who is also accused of killing UNC-Chapel Hill student Eve Carson, is Oates' co-defendant.
Related Link:
http://www.wral.com/news/local/story/5727400/