Patt Morrison schedule for Monday, 12/5/2011

PATT MORRISON SCHEDULE

Monday, December 5, 2011

1-3 p.m.

 

CALL-IN @ 866-893-5722, 866-893-KPCC; OR JOIN THE CONVERSATION ONLINE ON THE PATT MORRISON BLOG AT KPCC-DOT-ORG

 

 

1:00 – 1:30

OPEN

 

1:30 – 2:00

Cedars-Sinai squeezes out psychiatric services

Times are getting tougher, and there are fewer and fewer places for people to go to cope with the challenges. Changes in the organization of healthcare services and cutbacks in mental health treatment facilities have prompted the imminent closing of Cedars-Sinai’s in-patient and out-patient psychiatry programs over the next year. Mental health services will be retained in the emergency room and cancer treatment wings, but the facility’s 51 psychiatric beds and 1,800 out-patient customers will have to turn elsewhere for treatment. The decision by Cedars-Sinai reflects current downward trends in-patient psychiatric treatment in California, which has seen a reduction of 2000 beds over a 15-year period. Other planned cuts will follow as the medical center phases out all services not directly associated with another specialty - like cancer treatment or veterans services.

 

How will those with mental illnesses deal with the changes? Is mental healthcare an essential part of wellness?

 

Guests:

Representative (TBD), California Psychiatric Association

 

NOT CONFIRMED – DO NOT PROMOTE:

Representative of California Hospital Association

 

 

2:00 – 2:30

Catholics, contraceptives and insurance coverage

Catholic bishops are lobbying the Obama administration to change some parts of new federal health care regulations that require employers to offer prescription birth control as part of their insurance plans. Catholic dogma prohibits premarital sex, and the bishops argue that requiring Catholic universities and hospitals to provide birth control coverage is anathema to Catholic teaching. Despite the bishops’ qualms, many Catholic health care organizations are already providing access to birth control. The Catholic Healthcare West System, for example, has been providing contraceptive coverage since 1997, and studies have shown that a significant majority of Catholic women in the U.S. use some kind of artificial birth control. Sarah Lipton-Lubet of the ACLU said, “What the bishops and their allies are asking for is the ability to impose their religious beliefs on people who don’t share them.” Which precept should take precedence, federal law or Catholic doctrine? Can the execution of religious beliefs be discrimination?

 

Guests:

REPRESENTING THE CATHOLIC CHURCH

Archbishop Timothy Dolan, president, U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops

- or -

Sister Carol Keehan, president and CEO of the Catholic Health Association of the United States

 

SUPPORTING BIRTH CONTROL

Cecile Richards, president, Planned Parenthood 

-or –

Sarah Lipton-Lubet representative, ACLU

U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer

 

2:30 – 3:00

Who will rule the Internet?

In the media age, the life cycle of every new invention – from the telephone to radio to film – included a sort of Wild West phase of free range entrepreneurs and visionaries. But in time, all of them settled into a period that was dominated by a monopolist or corporate cartel. In his new book, “The Master Switch: The Rise and Fall of Information Empires,” author and professor Tim Wu posits that the Internet – the driving force of modern media commerce – may very well suffer the same fate. Could the information superhighway be ruled by a singular corporate giant with its own agenda? Or is the Internet dynamic enough to break the paradigm?  

 

Guest:

Tim Wu, author, policy advocate, and professor at Columbia University; currently a senior advisor to the U.S. Federal Trade Commission.