Headlines 04/08/10

Here are my thoughts on today’s headlines. Everything but the titles is written by yours truly.

Free tool allows instant analysis of trends, Google economist says by Tracy Sherlock:

Thanks to Google’s new data-analysis tool, the world’s information, statistics and trends are now universally available and can be easily called-up with the simple click of a button.

By going to www.google.com/insights/search, Internet users can search for data on any subject, making fact-finding and credible research that much easier.

A similar article from PBS recently acknowledged the growing demand of readers and citizens to have access to raw data.

Check out How news organizations should prepare for data dumps by Martin Moore to learn about the interesting data-related projects headed by The Guardian and the New York Times: http://tinyurl.com/2d2k5ck.

Canada’s doctors demand major changes by Meagan Fitzpatrick:

The Canadian Medical Association will be meeting in Niagara Falls later this month to discuss how to better meet the Canada Health Act’s principle of providing universal health care to all Canadians.

Proposals to be discussed include building more long-term-care facilities and establishing more pay-for-performance incentive-based programs, according to the Vancouver Sun.

In its annual report, the CMA disclosed that the Health Act principles are not being met, and that the accessibility of medical services continues to be a major problem.

As the baby-boomer population is nearing retirement, there are more citizens leaving the workforce than entering it. Where will the money needed to create and maintain more facilities come from?

Will income taxes be raised? Will the age of retirement be pushed back?

There is without a doubt a need for major changes, but perhaps those changes are needed in the political system.