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1. Computers
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As many of you may know, rarely should you need to take your computer into the Geek Squad to get it fixed up. Whether it's your computer, your roommate's, or another friend's, we've got a guide to repairing just about any problem they could have, as well as diagnosing a computer that's just plain slow. If it's a hardware problem, you can always head to iFixit for instructions on how to repair Macs, or open up that PC and see what might be causing the problem. Some hardware can even be fixed at home, like if your CPU pins are bent or if your video card's solder points have become loose. Whatever the issue, make sure you read up on computer maintenance when you're done, so you can avoid the problem in the future.
In the end, doing it yourself is great, but it's also good to know when a project is over your head and it's time to call someone else. In addition, sometimes it actually is better to replace your gear instead of fix it, so make sure you aren't on a fool's errand trying to fix a gadget that's just reached its time to die. Got your own favorite repair project that you did on your own, or a skill any DIYer should know how to do? Share it with us in the comments.
The High Cost of Treating Gun Violence Victims Hits Southerners Especially Hard A new Stanford study tapped a massive database to show how shootings strain hospitals and taxpayers.
The cost of treating gunshot survivors is greatest in states with the highest rates of firearm ownership and the most permissive gun laws, new research shows.
More than 4 in 10 shooting victims admitted to hospitals between 2006 and 2014 were concentrated in 16 Southern states and the District of Columbia, according to a study published this week by two researchers at Stanford University School of Medicine.
Of initial hospital admissions for firearms injuries, 43 percent were in the South. The West and Midwest each had 20 percent of hospitalizations, while the Northeast claimed 16 percent. More than a third of patients treated in the South were uninsured.
Dr. Thomas Weiser, an associate professor of surgery, and Sarabeth Spitzer, a medical student, analyzed inpatient hospital records to conclude that the initial hospitalization of patients wounded by guns over the eight-year period cost Americans more than $6.6 billion. The researchers used a sample of more than 250,000 patients admitted to American hospitals with gunshot injuries.
The average cost per hospitalization was $24,746. Patients with government-funded Medicaid or Medicare were responsible for roughly 40 percent of costs in the survey period. Uninsured patients were accountable for about a quarter of the costs.
The costs attributed to the South alone were $2.7 billion.
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The medical community is in near unanimous agreement that owning a gun increases the risk of being shot, whether intentionally or in an accident. As Americans continue to purchase firearms at breakneck pace, this reality has public safety implications: Every year, roughly 110,000 people are shot in the United States. This epidemic also has financial ramifications for the institutions that must treat victims: Most of the roughly 80,000 people who are wounded by a bullet annually enter the healthcare system, incurring massive costs.
“For every one person who dies from a gunshot, there are three or four people who survive,” Weiser said. “At the end of the day, injuries are associated with a cost. And that’s a cost that’s [often] borne by taxpayers.”
The study draws from a survey of 20 percent of American hospitals conducted by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. The survey collects patient information and insurance trends of roughly 8 million discharges annually. The study does not offer state-by-state breakdowns, but does show costs across geographical regions. Southern states were responsible for a disproportionate amount of patients.
The study counts Alabama, Arkansas, Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, West Virginia, as Southern states.
The researchers focused on financial costs, and did not attempt to account for how gun ownership and gun laws might play a role. Weiser said he wants to better understand the connection, but “we don’t really have data.”
But the finding that the South is the region with the highest number of gunshot victims roughly mirrors gun ownership statistics. According to a survey by researchers from Harvard and Northeastern universities, of America’s 55 million gun owners, nearly 37 percent live in the South, while the West and Midwest claim about 22 percent, respectively. Eighteen percent of gun owners hail from the Northeast.
The same survey found that almost three quarters of Southern gun owners said they own their firearms for self-protection.
Over the last decade, many Southern states have rolled back restrictions on carrying guns in public and relaxed requirements for obtaining a concealed weapons permit, all while strengthening laws protecting the use of deadly force. On Wednesday, Governor Asa Hutchinson of Arkansas signed a bill that would allow people to carry concealed handguns on the campuses of the state’s public colleges and universities.
The Stanford study emerged from Spitzer’s interest in gun violence. When she arrived at Stanford two years ago, she was surprised to learn just how little research had been published about firearms injuries, she said. She hopes that the success of this study will inform researchers more down the road, potentially with a focus on how often gunshot survivors return to the healthcare system for care after their initial injury.
“A motivating factor is filling this [research] gap,” she said.
The study only focused on a patient’s first trip to the hospital with a gunshot wound. It does not include the subsequent hospitalizations, rehabilitation, or patients treated and released from the emergency room.
“This is a very select group of patients,” Weiser said. “And in truth we don’t know anything about patients about once they get out.”
A gunshot victim’s recovery can be an arduous and costly process, especially for those without the financial means to access services. Survivors often require long-term care, such as physical therapy or mental health treatment to deal with the aftermath of such traumatic injuries.
Past studies have included long-term rehabilitation — and a variety of other factors — when calculating the cost of gun violence, but the majority focus on specific states. In one recent analysis, published in February, Dr. Ted Miller of the Pacific Institute and First Coast News determined that gun violence costs each Florida resident $740 every year. The model included estimated costs to the criminal justice system, loss of work, extended medical treatments, and a decline in quality of life.
Miller is the same economist who worked with Mother Jones in 2015 to calculate the national cost of gun violence. The number they landed on, using the expanded criteria of costs: $229 billion per year.
Weiser stressed that such additional costs are extremely important when assessing the total impact of recovering from a gunshot. But he said that many of them can “be perceived as arbitrary.” He said it was his and Spitzer’s intent to conduct their analysis with the most iron-clad data available, to prevent the findings from being misconstrued. His objective was to “remove the emotion” from the research, he said, “and look at the actual dollar figures.”
That’s one of the reasons the authors believe their work may have an impact outside of the medical community.
“If these costs are borne by the government, it has real implications for federal and state budgets,” Weiser said. “If you’re going to argue for increased availability for firearms, you need to calculate the increase in costs.”
Uninsured patients and those with Medicaid each accounted for roughly 30 percent of the sample used in the survey. Slightly more than 20 percent of patients had private insurance, while just 6 percent had Medicare. The insurance status of an additional 14 percent of patients was “other”: individuals whom the hospital opted not to charge, and those with “alternative forms of insurance,” according to the study.
Demographics varied significantly between payer groups. The average Medicaid patient was 26, and more than 50 percent identified as black and reported a household median income in the lowest quartile, below $37,999. Individuals with private insurance were on average older, more likely to be white, and had a higher median income. Patients with Medicare had an average age of 57 and were the most likely to be transferred to another hospital for treatment, or die as a result of their injuries.
However, one factor remained the same: In every payer group, males accounted for more than 80 percent of patients.
Weiser said he is energized about continuing work on the issue of gun violence. In the operating room he interacts with shooting victims first-hand, though he’d rather not have to.
“If I as a trauma surgeon never had to take care of a young kid with a gunshot wound again, that would be fantastic,” he said.
[Photo: Flickr user Airman Magazine]
Joseph Erlanger (January 5, 1874 – December 5, 1965) was an American physiologist who is best known for his contributions to the field of neuroscience. Together with Herbert Spencer Gasser, he identified several varieties of nerve fiber and established the relationship between action potential velocity and fiber diameter. They were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1944 for these achievements.
Biography [ edit ]
Erlanger was born on January 5, 1874, at San Francisco, California. His family was Jewish and his parents both immigrated from the Kingdom of Württemberg, Germany and met in California during the Gold Rush. Joseph was the sixth of seven children born to the couple. He completed his Bachelor of science in Chemistry from the University of California, Berkeley in 1895. He then completed his M.D. in 1899 from the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in Baltimore, Maryland, where he finished second in his class.
Upon graduating, Erlanger interned at Johns Hopkins Hospital under William Osler and worked in a physiology laboratory. Erlanger also gave lectures at the school on digestion and metabolism. Erlanger also had an interest in cardiology, specifically the way that excitation transferred from the atrium to the ventricle and researched with Arthur Hirschfelder. Erlanger developed and patented a new type of sphygmomanometer that could measure blood pressure from the brachial artery. While working at Johns Hopkins in 1901, Erlanger published a paper on the digestive systems of canines. This paper caught the attention of William Henry Howell, a physiology professor at Johns Hopkins. Howell recruited Erlanger as an Assistant Professor. Erlanger was promoted to Associate Professor some time before 1906.
In 1906, Erlanger accepted a position as the first chair of physiology at the University of Wisconsin in Madison. In 1910, he left to take a position as professor at Washington University in St. Louis; the St. Louis position offered Erlanger more funding for his projects. Herbert Spencer Gasser, Erlanger's former student at Wisconsin, joined Erlanger's laboratory soon after the move. During World War I, the pair contributed to the research effort examining the effects of shock. As part of this work, Erlanger was able to produce heart block in an animal model by clamping the bundle of His and tightening it.[4] Together, they managed to amplify the action potential of a bullfrog sciatic nerve in 1922 and published the results in the American Journal of Physiology. It is uncertain why the pair had such a sudden shift in interest to neuroscience, as Erlanger was already widely respected in the cardiology field.
Erlanger and Gasser were able to modify a Western Electric oscilloscope to run at low voltages. Prior to this modification, the only method available to measure neural activity was the electroencephalograph, which could only show large-scale electrical activity. With this technology, they were able to observe that action potentials occurred in two phases—a spike (initial surge) followed by an after-spike (a sequence of slow changes in potential). They discovered that neurons were found in many forms, each with their own potential for excitability. With this research, the pair discovered that the velocity of action potentials was directly proportional to the diameter of the nerve fiber. The partnership ended in 1931, when Gasser accepted a position at Cornell University. In 1944, they won the Nobel Prize in Medicine or Physiology for these discoveries.
He died of heart disease on December 5, 1965 at St. Louis, Missouri. The Joseph Erlanger House in St. Louis was designated a National Historic Landmark on December 8, 1976 as a building of national significance.[9] On January 22, 2009, the International Astronomical Union named a crater on the moon after him.[citation needed]
Citations [ edit ]
References [ edit ]
Former England star Paul Scholes is set to play futsal in India
Former Manchester United and England midfielder Paul Scholes has signed a three-year deal to play in India's new futsal league which starts next month.
The inaugural edition of Premier Futsal, an indoor variant of football where players use a smaller and less bouncier ball than in the traditional game, will run from July 15-26.
"Futsal is a fascinating format that has played a pivotal role in developing the skills of some of the greatest football players," said Scholes.
"Premier Futsal will be a great way to introduce the sport to India and I'm looking forward to meeting the fans across India who I know are some of the most passionate in the world."
Deco (l) will also play in the inaugural league
Ex-Chelsea and Barcelona midfielder Deco and host of the world's top futsallers have already signed up to play in the league, with organisers promising that more marquee signings are on the way.
Premier Futsal co-founder, Nithyashree Subban added: "We are extremely proud to announce Paul Scholes as marquee player for Premier Futsal.
"Since our launch, we have maintained that we are committed to bringing the top talent from across the world to India and we are clearly delivering on our promise.
"Through a pioneering model for introducing futsal and a holistic approach to breeding home-grown talent, Premier Futsal aims to be the marquee all-star futsal tournament in the world."
Scholes retired from playing in 2013
Scholes, 41, won 11 Premier League titles, as well as two Champions League trophies, during more than 700 appearances for Manchester United before retiring in 2013.
Futsal is five-a-side and is played on a hard-court surface. Premier Futsal - whose president is ex-Real Madrid and Barcelona midfielder Figo - is the latest franchise-based sporting competition in India, following the Indian Premier League, Indian Super League and Premier Badminton League.
The percentage of working-age Canadians who aren’t working – who aren’t even looking for a job – is at a historic high years after the economy supposedly bounced back from the recession. The labour participation rate for Canadian men in their working prime – ages 25 through 54 – is the lowest it’s been since Statistics Canada started collecting that data.
Women’s participation rate, rising since the 1950s, has been largely stagnant since 2006.
Canadians want to work. They’re settling for temp, seasonal or part-time jobs, without the stability of a pension or benefits, to stay in the workforce.
But for many, the numbers just don’t add up. They go back to school; they settle for seasonal, contract work; some just throw in the towel.
Read the series
Government response: What the feds had to say about Canadians’ labour instability trap
‘Like banging your head against a wall’
Jillanne Mignon quit her job because she couldn’t afford it.
She was working a decent gig for the city of Winnipeg’s 311 service – a job she’d left her university program to take so she could support her toddler son, Michael.
But even with that salary, she found herself in a cycle of debt just to pay for child care.
“When there’s a subsidy, there’s no spaces. When there are spaces, there’s no subsidy. …
“When you have people depending on you and you can’t give them all that you want, it’s nightmarish.”
Watch: Mark McAllister looks into why so many Canadians have stopped looking for work.
Ultimately, she realized it just didn’t make sense.
“I’m going to work to pay for childcare because I don’t want to be on welfare. “But then it’s better if I go on welfare because then I don’t have to worry about childcare because welfare won’t force me to go to work until my kid is six. So I’m tired. And I don’t know what I want to do.
“It’s like banging your head against a wall.”
So she quit her job. Moved to Toronto, where the combination of family support and all-day kindergarten helped with child care.
Swallowed her pride and went on welfare.
“When you have student loans and you still have to go on welfare, that hurts. Because you’ve tried to educate yourself so you don’t have to be dependent on the government for social assistance,” she said.
It sounds like an inconceivable decision, to abandon a decent job in favour of a penurious social-assistance program that’s become (inaccurately, evidence shows) associated with sloth and system-scammers.
But that’s the reality for a growing number of Canadians.
Job market dropouts
The percentage of Canadians over 15 who are working or actively looking for work is 66.1, its lowest point since 2001. (For both men and women aged 25-54, it’s 86.1 – the lowest since 2002. For men 25-54 it’s 90.4, the lowest since at least 1976.)
Ontario’s participation rate for the same age group, 65.9, hasn’t been this bad since 1998. In British Columbia, under two-thirds of the working-age population is in the job market – the lowest percentage since at least 1990.
“It is indicative of a weak economy, no question,” said Mike Moffatt, an economist with the Mowat Centre and the Ivey School of Business.
While it isn’t unusual for job market participation to drop in a downturn, recoveries are supposed to have the opposite effect, as more people re-enter an invigorated labour market. If the percentage of people working or looking for work continues to drop, as it has, something’s wrong.
Moffatt sees the historic low participation rates as part of a decades-long trend, hastened by the financial crisis.
“It’s a trend, unfortunately, I expect to see continue with globalization and automation: It’s getting tough for men, particularly ones that don’t have levels of higher education,” he said.
It’s “problematic not just for the individuals, but it causes an ever-shrinking tax base if you have smaller proportions of adults in the labour force. “It absolutely is worrisome.”
A government that wants to reverse that trend, then, would have to both encourage men and women to join and remain in the labour market, and ensure they have the skills they need to do so. And while both federal and provincial governments have touted “job creation” partnerships with businesses, economists have argued it makes more sense to focus on the individuals who need jobs and marketable skills.
“People want to be in the workforce. I don’t think anyone wants to stay at home and feel useless,” said David Macdonald, senior economist with the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives.
“The question is, how do we provide circumstances where there’s employment for them?”
A fraying safety net
Mignon has a plan: In Toronto, on welfare, she spent nine months researching the job market to qualify for Second Career funding so she could go back to school and get back in the workforce.
“I worked for that money,” she says.
And now, if she can keep up the commute from her Parkdale apartment to Scarborough for classes at Centennial College, she can make it work.
But it isn’t easy.
Every dollar of the money she’s getting to pay her tuition is being deducted from the welfare cheque she needs to pay rent, feed and clothe herself and Michael, who is now five-going-on-six and adjusting to Grade One and the prospect of homework.
“Social assistance is now saying, ‘Well this [Second Career funding] is an income,” she said. “It’s taxed. They’re going to take it off my cheque, dollar for dollar.
“I’m basically being penalized [for going back to school].”
Ontario Community and Social Services spokesperson Kristen Tedesco confirmed that Second Career funding gets deducted from welfare cheques. But she added that “A recipient’s payment can fluctuate for a variety of reasons. … We encourage Ontario Works clients to contact their caseworker immediately with any payment support issues.”

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