Congress advances on health care reform: one step at a time

In adopting the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA), Congress made a series of small but significant steps toward improving access to health care benefits. The Act's centerpiece is its new requirements for group health plans and for the health insurance industry for assuring portability, access, and renewability of health insurance coverage. Of nearly equal importance is the pilot program established for testing the viability of medical savings accounts. Other health-related changes include adjustments in the rules governing duplication and coordinating of Medicare-related plans, recommendations with respect to privacy of health information of employees, an increase in the deduction for health insurance costs for self-employed individuals, and permission for unemployed persons to make withdrawals from IRAs and other qualified plans for certain medical services' costs. This article summarizes these and other key provisions of HIPAA.     

Population,economy, and society: conflict or convergence in the future of Mexico?

"Probable demographic trends and characteristics from the 1990s to the year 2020 [in Mexico] are presented. Then, some of the main economic and social implications of these trends are explored at the aggregate level. Also, some general considerations are given to the possibilities of convergence or conflict between the future demographic evolution, the needs of an open and free-market-oriented economic development strategy, and some social demands associated, probably, to a less controlled and less predictable political system." (EXCERPT)     

Reviews

David W. Lovell, From Marx to Lenin. An Evaluation of Marx's Responsibility for Soviet Authoritarianism. London: Cambridge University Press, 1984, xii + 231 pp. £19–50.

A. J. Polan, Lenin and the End of Politics. London: Methuen, 1984, vi + 229 pp. h/b £12–95, p/b £5–95.

David Lane, State and Politics in the USSR. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1985, xv + 398 pp. h/b £27–50 p/b £8.95. Soviet Economy and Society. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1985, xiii + 342 pp. h/b £27–50 p/b £8.95.

Curtis Keeble, ed., The Soviet State. The Domestic Roots of Soviet Foreign Policy, London: Gower, 1985, 244 pp. h/b £17.50 p/b 8.95.

Adam B. Ulam, Dangerous Relations: The Soviet Union in World Politics, 1970–1982. New York: Oxford University Press, 1983 vi + 325 pp., £5–95.

Gerald Segal, ed., The Soviet Union in East Asia: Predicaments of Power. London: Heinemann, 1983. x + 150 pp., h/b £14–50 p/b £6–50.

Bruce D. Porter, The USSR in Third World Conflicts: Soviet Arms and Diplomacy in Local Wars 1945–1980. Cambridge, London, New York, New Rochelle, Melbourne, Sydney: Cambridge University Press, 1984, viii + 248 pp., £20–00, $29.95.

Robert L. Pfaltzgraff, Jr., and Uri Ra'anan, eds., National Security Policy. The Decision‐making Process, Hamden, Conn.: Archon Books, 1984, xiv + 311 pp. £35.30.

Yosef Avidar, The Party and the Army in the Soviet Union. Jerusalem: The Magnes Press, The Hebrew University, 1983, 340 pp., h/b $25.00.

William Moskoff, Labour and Leisure in the Soviet Union: The Conflict Between Public and Private Decision‐Making in a Planned Economy. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1984, xv + 225 pp., £25.00.

Raymond Hutchings, The Soviet Budget. London and Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1983, x + 204 pp., £25.00.

Gary Littlejohn, A Sociology of the Soviet Union. London and Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1984, ix + 286 pp., h/b £18–00, p/b £6–95.

J. P. Cole, Geography of the Soviet Union. London: Butterworths, 1984, xiv + 452 pp., £14.95.

Robert G. Jensen, Theodore Shabad and Arthur W. Wright eds., Soviet Natural Resources in the World Economy. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1983, xix + 700 pp., £92.00.

Olympiad S. Ioffe and Peter B. Maggs, Soviet Law in Theory and Practice, London, Rome, New York: Oceana Publications, Inc., 1983, 237 pp., $35–00.

V. I. Smolyarchuk, Giganty i charodei slova. Russkie sudebnye oratory vtoroi poloviny XIX—nachala XX veka. Moscow, 1984, 272 pp., 65 kop.

Dina Kaminskaya, Final Judgement. My Life as a Soviet Defence Lawyer. London: Harvill Press, 1983, 364 pp., £12.95.

Dina Kaminskaya, Zapiski advokata. Vermont: Khronika Press, 1984, 345 pp., no price.

Gabriel Gorodetsky, Stafford Cripps’ Mission to Moscow 1940–42, Cambridge: the University Press, 1984, 377 pp., £25.00.

E. H. Carr (Edited by Tamara Deutscher), The Comintern and the Spanish Civil War. London: Macmillan, 1984, xx + 111pp., h/b £17–50, p/b £6.95.

David Mandel, The Petrograd Workers and the Fall of the Old Regime: From the February Revolution to the July Days 1917. London: Macmillan, (in association with the Centre for Russian and East European Studies, University of Birmingham), 1983, xii + 210 + 10 pp., £25.00.

David Mandel, The Petrograd Workers and the Soviet Seizure of Power: From the July Days 1917 to July 1918. London: Macmillan, (in association with the Centre for Russian and East European Studies, University of Birmingham), 1984, xv + 227 + 12 pp., £25.00.

Geoffrey Swain, Russian Social Democracy and the Legal Labour Movement, 1906–14. London: Macmillan, 1983, xiv + 239 pp., £25.00.

Benjamin Pinkus, The Soviet Government and the Jews 1948–1967. A Documented Study. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984, xvi + 612 pp., £35.00.

Jakub Blum and Vera Rich, The Image of the Jew in Soviet Literature: the Post‐Stalin Period. New York: Ktav Publishing House, Inc., 1984, 276 pp., No price quoted.

Yaacov Roi ed., The USSR and the Muslim World. London: George Allen and Unwin, 1984, xv + 298 pp., £25.00.

Michael Bruchis, Nations ‐ nationalities ‐ People: A Study of the nationalities policy of the Communist Party in Soviet Moldavia. Boulder Colorado: East European Monographs, distributed by Columbia University Press, New York, 1984, iv + 230 pp., No price quoted.

Michael J. Sodaro and Sharon L. Wolchik eds., Foreign and Domestic Policy in Eastern Europe in the 1980s: Trends and Prospects. London: Macmillan, 1983, x + 265 pp., £25.00.

Adam Zwass, The Economies of Eastern Europe in a time of change. London: Macmillan, 1984, ix + 170 pp., £20.00.

R. Dietz, Die Energiewirtschaft in Osteuropa und der UdSSR. Vienna and New York: Springer‐Verlag, 1984, 248 pp., $17.90, DM 49.—.

Ferenc Feher and Agnes Heller, Hungary 1956 Revisited. The Message of a Revolution—a Quarter of a Century After. London: George Allen & Unwin, 1983, xviii + 174 pp., £15.00.

Ray Taras, Ideology in a Socialist State; Poland 1956–83. Melbourne: Cambridge University Press, 1984, x + 299 pp., £25.00.

Fred Singleton, A Short History of the Yugoslav Peoples, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985, xiii + 309 pp., h/b £22.50, p/b £7.50.

Martin McCauley, The German Democratic Republic since 1945. London: Macmillan, 1983, xiv + 282 pp., £25.00.

Raymond Bentley, Technological Change in the German Democratic Republic. Boulder, Colorado and London: Westview Press, 1984, xx + 296 pp., $25.00.

Paul‐Gunther Schmidt, Internationale Wahrungspolitik im sozialistischen Staat, Stuttgart, New York: Gustav Fischer Verlag, 1985, xii + 447 pp., DM 48.

R. H. Haigh, D. S. Morris, A. R. Peters, eds., German‐Soviet Relations in the Weimar Era. Aldershot: Gower, 1985, viii + 206 pp., £15.00.

Mireille Maqua, Rome‐Moscou, l'Ostpolitik du Vatican, Liège: Cabay publishers, 1985, 248 pp., 580 F.B.

Ian Nish, The Origins of the Russo‐Japanese War, (Origins of Modern Wars Series: General Editor, Harry Hearder), Longman, London and New York, 1985. xiii + 274 pp. £6.95 paper.     

Pathological myophosphorylase reaction in malignant hyperthermia

In malignant hyperthermia, myophosphorylase reaction shows characteristic changes that take place within minutes: (1) a generally strongly weakened reaction; (2) numerous negatively reacting fibres; (3) frequently, fibre sections that show spotty and/or striatal weak or negative reactions and fibre sections with strong striatal reactions with relatively narrow sarcomere spacings (a "sign of hypercontraction"). Obviously, the morphological findings that show characteristic "striated fibres" are typical of the malignant hyperthermia syndrome! It is important to note that the muscular fibres showing such changes are, as a rule, inconspicuous when using other stains and reactions. These pathological myophosphorylase reactions were observed in five deceased patients (one independently of anaesthesia after an extended walk) and in 19 pigs (18 times after halothane testing and once in an experimental animal with clinical evidence of the presence of malignant hyperthermia). These reactions were not noted in pigs with negative halothane reactivity or prior to halothane testing. They were also not seen in a large number of very different healthy and diseased control and reference cases from our biopsy and autopsy material. Myophosphorylase reaction enables convincing demonstration of malignant hyperthermia, past or present. Hence, it is possible to elucidate puzzling deaths or verify apparently clear death occurring during or subsequent to anaesthesia or simply following stress ("human stress syndrome"). Many of these deaths doubtlessly escape the attention of clinicians using the usual morphological examination methods. However, the reaction cannot be used to identify potential victims.