'Neurology time bomb' on the cards for NHS

<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9DRsPdl7VpdPlr74MUBo60l7rgvOJzO7TDks-aOrQbq_EPCQ17jTGMp5pqTDXIXOjXXabl-_ueSMecedgXKpMggpIkpo3eZRWENNyf8klF0cO-Llk2JbhYEajMWMbsdqBiIdnsrzlxnA/s1600/SOCIAL+RECOVERY456.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="80" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9DRsPdl7VpdPlr74MUBo60l7rgvOJzO7TDks-aOrQbq_EPCQ17jTGMp5pqTDXIXOjXXabl-_ueSMecedgXKpMggpIkpo3eZRWENNyf8klF0cO-Llk2JbhYEajMWMbsdqBiIdnsrzlxnA/s320/SOCIAL+RECOVERY456.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>  <span style="font-family: "Courier New", Courier, monospace; font-size: large;">The NHS could find itself facing a "neurology time bomb" as more people develop conditions such as motor neurone disease and Parkinson's disease. According to the Neurological Alliance, which represents 70 groups and charities, the rising number of cases is being compounded by the poor quality of services. The alliance's criticisms follow a report by the National Audit Office, which questioned the level of care on offer, bringing particular attention to delays in diagnosis and muddled follow-up care. In response, the government has acknowledged that more needs to be done. Steve Ford, chair of the alliance and chief executive of Parkinson's UK, said: "The situation can only get worse. A crisis is looming but the government has its head in the sand. "When it comes to helping vulnerable people with a neurological condition, the government is floundering around in a fog of its own making." It is estimated that more than 200,000 people in the UK have long-term progressive neurological conditions, according to the BBC.</span>

'Neurology time bomb' on the cards for NHS

  The NHS could find itself facing a "neurology time bomb" as more people develop conditions such as motor neurone disease and P...

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Huaxi: The socialist village where everyone is wealthy

<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPaLnTrjjSp3Q0hDBeYN7RdLhWQbNRuWotA1vE5NoZXlXsd_CKJs4NtTuDsctNGlfDZHh-D9W7xxoqDja_tXq-McEMQfZsgmUxsMeZBcdtxHftw35kGVAq7gW5YfpLm9w4gRKbf7rAgE8/s1600/SOCIAL+RECOVERY456.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="80" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPaLnTrjjSp3Q0hDBeYN7RdLhWQbNRuWotA1vE5NoZXlXsd_CKJs4NtTuDsctNGlfDZHh-D9W7xxoqDja_tXq-McEMQfZsgmUxsMeZBcdtxHftw35kGVAq7gW5YfpLm9w4gRKbf7rAgE8/s320/SOCIAL+RECOVERY456.jpg" width="320" /></a></div> <span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;">The sort of oxen you expect to see in Chinese villages tend to be pulling carts or tilling fields, not a beasts made of a ton of gold. This precious cow is located on the 60th floor of a 328m-tall skyscraper in Huaxi, China's richest village, and building that juts out of the eastern landscape like a giant tripod topped by a golden ball. Huaxi is a "model socialist village", according to local officials, and was founded by local Communist Party secretary Wu Renbao in 1961. His foresight was to transform a poor farming community into a super wealthy community, built on its clever adaptations of modern agribusiness methods, then its diversification into steel mills, its logistics firms, and its textile businesses. The commune listed on the stock exchange in 1998 and is now a major corporation in its own right. Its subsidiary companies, built into something that resembles a modern-day conglomerate, exports to more than 40 countries around the world. </span><div> <span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div> <div> <span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;">Huaxi is where Chinese people come to learn how to get rich. At a time when the rest of the world, and indeed much of China, is trying to absorb an economic slowdown, Huaxi is like a parallel universe. "This cow cost 300 million yuan (£31m), but now it's worth 500 million yuan," says our guide, Tina Yao, as she steers us from floor to floor in the Zengdi Kongzhong New Village Tower, which is taller than anything in London. "Zengdi" translates as "increase the land" and the skyscraper cost three billion yuan (£310m). Other floors have giant animals of solid silver. </span></div> <div> <span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div> <div> <span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;">Fearsomely bejewelled chandeliers hang over your head in banquet halls that hold thousands of people. You approach these glittering sites walking on gold-leaf marble, passing aquariums with sharks and stingrays. Far below, you see the villas and theluxury cars. Every villager gets a share of the corporation's profits and is entitled to a car, a house, free healthcare and free cooking oil. </span></div> <div> <span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div> <div> <span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;">The village feels a little like Dubai. It is not big on charm – the replicas of the Arc de Triomphe and the Sydney Opera House – are of questionable taste, but where it is widely different is in how well it is able to meet its people's needs. Mr Wu is keen that Huaxi should showcase China's achievements and now some two million visitors come to Huaxi every year to gaze upon its splendour. The original founding families, who are known as "stakeholders", number around 1,600 and the average household income is around £100,000 a year, once all the bonuses, pensions and wages are factored in. White BMWs are ubiquitous and the murals, instead of depicting socialist realist muscled workers in overalls, have pictures of happy families living in wealthy villas. This is where Huaxi stands apart from so many other villages in China. </span></div> <div> <span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div> <div> <span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;">While the rest of the country suffers from a yawning wealth gap between the rich cities of the eastern seaboard and southern coasts and the rural hamlets, Huaxi took the initiative, driven by Mr Wu's pragmatism, and headed its own way. It behaved like a city, even importing migrant labour. "We only ever wanted what was good for our people," is a dictum of Mr Wu, who is now 86 years old and retired. His son has taken over as party secretary, but the father still gives lectures on socialism every day. He avoids allying himself too closely with either capitalism or communism, though his pragmatism has strong elements of the Chinese Communist Party about it. No one doubts the wisdom of Mr Wu, and looking at the village's wealth, why would they? He broke up the collective system of farming and encouraged people to grow their own crops. Below the stakeholders in the hierarchy come the residents from neighbouring villages that have been absorbed into Huaxi, and then tens of thousands of migrant workers who perform most of the rest of the work. Work and wealth are the crowning ideologies. No one takes weekend breaks, and the streets tend to be deserted of residents because they are all off working. </span></div> <div> <span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div> <div> <span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;">The hard work has clearly paid off and the money raised has helped the villagers diversify into other industry. One of those areas is tourism – wealth tourism – and some of the locals help to meet and greet the two million tourists that come every year to see the village. A new reason to come is to see the skyscraper, which is impressive, although as there is nothing even remotely as tall in the surrounding countryside, it looks strangely incongruous. The reason it is so tall is a useful insight into the mindset of the people here. </span></div> <div> <span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div> <div> <span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;">It is, as Mr Wu said in a recent interview, because the people Huaxi can compete with anyone in the country. "Beijing's tallest building is the 328m-tall World Trade Centre. Huaxi wants to maintain the same height with the Central Committee of the Communist Party," he said. The village's total square area is a little less than one square kilometre, and there are barrack-style dormitories, factories, and pagoda style-buildings for local residents. The skyscraper houses the Longxi International Hotel, which has 2,000 beds and will employ 3,000 people eager to learn how to become wealthy, Huaxi-style. Intriguingly, in the central village park, there are the statutes of five of the true icons of Communism in China, some more controversial than others. The panoply includes the former mayor of Beijing, Liu Shaoqi, who was purged in the period of ideological frenzy that was the Cultural Revolution and whom many believed Mao had murdered. He has never really been rehabilitated and remains outside the pantheon of true revolutionary heroes. But then Mr Wu himself suffered during the Cultural Revolution. He set up factories but the Red Guards paraded him in the village as a "capitalist roader" and locked him up, much in the same way as Liu Shaoqi. Like Deng Xiaoping, who also suffered during the Cultural Revolution, Mr Wu bided his time and soon was back on his capitalist track after Mao died in 1976, except that these ideas became formulated as socialism with Chinese characteristics. </span></div> <div> <span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div> <div> <span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;">All over the village are megaphones blasting out the village anthem, which tells of how communist skies shine down Huaxi, a village of everyday miracles. "I have heard about Huaxi for many years. I have wanted to see it for many years," said one octogenarian visitor from Chengzhou. Two men, both of them employed in security and not stakeholders in the village, say they love what is going on in Huaxi, but they admit they are a bit jealous of the shareholders who get a stake in the village's profits every year. Certainly, there is a lot of bluster in the way Huaxi markets itself. </span></div> <div> <span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div> <div> <span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;">The divisions between the stakeholders and the migrants on the streets are large. But no one in China doubts its importance as a model for the success of the nation. And deny at your peril the wisdom of Mr Wu and of the wider Chinese psyche: The song from the public address system says it proud: "Socialism is best."</span></div>

Huaxi: The socialist village where everyone is wealthy

The sort of oxen you expect to see in Chinese villages tend to be pulling carts or tilling fields, not a beasts made of a ton of gold. Thi...

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Facebook, Twitter addict? Too much Internet may alter your brain

<p> </p><p>This is your brain. This is your brain on Facebook, Twitter, or Match.com. A recent Chinese study found that the brains of people addicted to the Internet may see similar changes to the brains of those addicted to alcohol or drugs. Yahoo News reported that brain scans were conducted of 35 men and women aged between 14 and 21, and 17 of them were identified with Internet addiction disorder. Brain scans of those classified as addicted showed disruptions in the part of the brain that contains nerve fibers, and changes in the brain areas that are used in emotions, decision-making, and self-control. Some of the questions people needed to ask themselves to determine whether they were addicted were, according to the BBC: Do you feel the need to use the Internet with increasing amounts of time in order to achieve satisfaction? Do you use the Internet as an escape from feelings of helplessness, guilt, anxiety and depression? Have you put a relationship, job, or career opportunity at risk because of the Internet? Have you lied to people to hide the amount of time you spend on the Internet? According to safetyweb.com, an Internet monitoring service for parents, teenagers and young adults are the age groups that are more likely to be addicted to the Internet, and they are more likely to neglect work or school than older addicted adults. The Executive director of an Internet addiction recovery center known as restart says overexposure to the Internet can cause these symptoms in anyone’s brain. Hilarie Cash said to technewsworld.com, "We do a combination of psychotherapy and helping these people figure out the skills they need to function in the world. The road to recovery could include plenty of hiking and backpacking to get them both physically fit and reconnected to the world."</p>

Facebook, Twitter addict? Too much Internet may alter your brain

  This is your brain. This is your brain on Facebook, Twitter, or Match.com. A recent Chinese study found that the brains of people addicte...

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