by the Universidad de Míchigan

To stall progress of neuropathy, doctors should monitor levels of an easily measured blood fat as closely as they do blood sugar, study suggests.

ANN ARBOR, Mich. Ð A common blood test for triglycerides  Ð a well-known cardiovascular disease risk factor Ð may also for the first time allow doctors to predict which patients with diabetes are more likely to develop the serious, common complication of neuropathy.

In a study now online in the journal Diabetes, University of Michigan and Wayne State University researchers analyzed data from 427 diabetes patients with neuropathy, a condition in which nerves are damaged or lost with resulting numbness, tingling and pain, often in the hands, arms, legs and feet. The data revealed that if a patient had elevated triglycerides, he or she was significantly more likely to experience worsening neuropathy over a period of one year. Other factors, such as higher levels of other fats in the blood or of blood glucose, did not turn out to be significant. The study will appear in print in the journal’s July issue.

In our study, elevated serum triglycerides were the most accurate at predicting nerve fiber loss, compared to all other measures, says Kelli A. Sullivan, Ph.D., co-first author of the study and an assistant research professor in neurology at the U-M Medical School.

These results set the stage for clinicians to be able to address lowering lipid counts with their diabetes patients with neuropathy as vigilantly as they pursue glucose control, says Eva L. Feldman, M.D., Ph.D., senior author of the study and the Russell N. DeJong Professor of Neurology at vocalesthe U-M Medical School. With a readily available predictor for nerve damage Ð triglycerides are measured as part of routine blood testing Ð doctors and patients can take pro-active steps when interventions can do some good, says Feldman.

Aggressive treatment can be very beneficial to patients in terms of their neuropathy, says Feldman, who is also director of the A. Alfred Taubman Medical Research Institute and director of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation Center at U-M for the study of complications in diabetes.

People can reduce blood triglyceride levels with the same measures that reduce cholesterol levels: by avoiding harmful fats in the diet and exercising regularly.

Context

Diabetic neuropathy affects around 60 percent of the 23 million people in the United States who have diabetes. It is a complication ­in both type 1 and type 2 diabetes.

Until now, doctors have lacked an effective way to predict which diabetes patients are at greatest risk of neuropathy. Most often, the condition becomes evident when irreversible nerve damage has already occurred. Neuropathy is the leading cause of diabetes-related hospital admissions and amputations that are not secondary to trauma.

Triglycerides are a type of lipid, or fat, that the body makes from calories it doesn’t need immediately. Triglycerides are stored in fat cells until they are needed to provide energy. When higher-than-normal amounts circulate in the blood, a person is at higher risk of cardiovascular disease.

by the El Reportero’s staff

An senior citizen lady closes her eyes for tireness during a protest at the San Francisco Civic Center. At right, San Francisco Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi says some breathing words.

Approximately 500 senior citizens and people with disabilities flooded San by the El Reportero’s staff ­Approximately 500 senior citizens and people with disabilities flooded San on Tuesday, May 12.

Many of those old and fragile men and women brought in by their care-keepers and agencies that care for the elderly, were visible tired for spending most morning and mid afternoon under the sun, but full of hope that their presence would help stop the inevitable hack from city-provided services for them. They were brown-bag lunches provided by community organizations that serve the elderly.

Senior citizen leader called upon the public to rally in protest to the recent budget cuts from senior and disability programs as well as the Department of Public Health,” said a communicate.

The communicate added: “We are living through one of the most challenging economic environments in 70 years.

We cannot afford to dismantle a continuum of care that will be needed to serve the greatest expansion of the senior population in our history. By 2030, one in five of San Francisco residents will be over the age of 65 and the number of residents over the age of 85 will double.”

“This is about sending a strong message” to protect the most vulnerable, said San Francisco Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi, who admitted that more taxes are in the horizon in order to replace the revenues lost to the recession.

The rally included music, colorful street theater, and a festive press conference with visual dramatizations of the “silver tsunami” that is about to overwhelm City Hall.

Among the organizations ­that participating, included, Centro Latino, 30th Street Senior Center, Kimochi Home, St. Anthony Foundation, Jewish Family Children Services, Gray Panthers of San Francisco, Project Open Hand, Family Care Giver Alliance.

­by the El Reportero’s staff

Raúl Castro

Fresh details emerged in the Spanish and US press on May 21, about the sudden removal on March 2 of Cuba’s two most high profile ministers, the foreign minister, Felipe Pérez Roque, and the vice president, Carlos Lage.

The crux of the story confirms the thesis that the two, widely seen from outside Cuba as future potential leaders, had become too big for their boots and represented a threat to President Raúl Castro. Neither of the Castro brothers, it seems, tolerates big shots. The case has also prompted a fresh diplomatic spat between Spain and Cuba.

Downturn in the US leads to first decline in remittances by migrants

Remittances by Latin American expatriates, which had been expanding rapidly over the five years to 2007, to the extent that they became one of the leading sources of hard currency for a number of economies, slowed down signifi cantly in 2008, and now, according to a recently released study, will actually shrink.

The overall impact on the recipient economies, while less than the expected loss of export earnings, is not insignificant: amounting to almost 1 percent of GDP in the worst-hit countries, it adds to the trade losses.

Martinelli scores emphatic victory

Right governments.Supermarket tycoon Ricardo Martinelli swept to victory in the 3 May presidential and legislative elections, taking 60 percent of the presidential vote compared with just 37 percernt for Balbina Herrera of the ruling Partido ­Revolucionario Democrático (PRD). He will succeed President Martín Torrijos on July 1. Disillusionment with the PRD was echoed in the congressional elections, which also saw a thumping defeat for the ruling party. While the result marks a swing to the Right for Panama, out of step with the rest of the region, it also underlines Panamanians’ habit of alternating between Left and Right governments.

Venezuela’s hope of more sway dims as riches dip

CARACAS – President Hugo Chávez’s push to extend his sway in Latin America is waning amid low oil prices and disorder in Venezuela’s own energy industry.

In recent years, Mr. Chávez has used his nation’s oil wealth to drive his socialist-inspired agenda at home and draw other countries in the region into his sphere of influence, helping to consolidate a leftward political shift in parts of Latin America.

But more than a dozen big projects intended to broaden his nation’s reach are in limbo – including a gas pipeline across the continent and at least eight refineries, from Jamaica to Uruguay – as Venezuela grapples with falling revenues and other troubles in its national oil company.

Venezuela is also cutting back sharply on other types of fi nancial support for its neighbors, a cornerstone of its regional influence. One recent study by the Center of Economic Investigations, a financial consulting fi rm here, found that Venezuela had announced plans to spend only about $6 billion abroad this year, down from $79 billion in 2008.

by Kirk Whisler

The year 2008 was one of ups and downs for Hispanic newspapers, magazines and other Latino publications throughout the United States.

Despite some rough spots, the $1.4 billion in revenue they generated last year continues to signal a bright future for Hispanic print.

At year’s end, there were 834 Hispanic newspapers, 556 Hispanic magazines and another 526 journals, annuals, yellow-page directories and newsletters keeping this nation’s ever-growing Latino population, now approaching 50 million, informed.

Hispanic newspapers had a combined circulation of 17.8 million, with an impressive 144 of them audited.

Hispanic magazines had a combined circulation of 31.6 million, with 34 of those audited.

That English-language dailies are representative of all newspapers is false. While many of those mainstream publications may have problems, they are not a reflection of the majority of Hispanic publication.

The frequent media rap nowadays that “Print is dead” is as invalid in either language as the tired claim that “Hispanics don’t read.” In Latino Print Network’s annual summary being distributed this week, here are the high points: Hispanic-owned weekly newspapers and magazines Measured by three key criteria, these publications continued to grow: Number of publications (up 20) Combined circulation (up over 550,000) Combined ad revenues (up 4 percent).

Impressive growth statistics could be found within major publication groups such as El Especial in New York and Miami (up 16 percent), and El Aviso (14 percent) and El Clasificado (18 percent) in Los Angeles.

Each topped a quarter of a million circulation and added new neighborhoods to those they serve.

Fama magazine, out of Miami, saw its circulation leap 39 percent to 188,283. To support this growth it increased ad revenues.

Many other publications shined through the nation’s down economy.

New Markets Served Almost every month Hispanic publications start up in new markets.

Today Hispanic newspapers serve all but four of the country’s 50 states and almost 200 markets nationwide.

This provides far better coverage than any other media serving the Hispanic community. On a weekly basis, at least 57 percent of Latino households are using one or more Latino publications.

Ad Category Growth Health services, legal ads, vocational school and governmental ads are some of the types of advertising that are growing. Local ads as a whole are increasing in most markets; hyper-local ads are growing even faster for community publications.

Areas of Concern Spanish Language Dailies: Spanish language dailies reached a high point in the USA in 2005 with 42 dailies with a combined 1.6 million circulation. By the end of 2008 those numbers had declined to 29 dailies with a combined 1.1 million circulation. Those numbers decreased even more in 2009. While major markets like Los Angeles, New York and Miami will undoubtedly have a Spanish language daily for many decades to come, some that were started in the past decade were in markets probably too small to support one.

Employment: Employment at Hispanic publications grew every year just like clock work for decades. Last year all of that ended in a big way with a decline from 17,354 employees in 2007 to 12,122 employed at the end of last year. Over 2,300 positions were lost at Hispanic dailies alone.

Yellow Pages: Another area that saw a major downturn was Spanish-language yellow pages, with the number dropping from 149 in 2007 to 102 in 2003. The biggest problem here was with two groups of yellow pages that were either leveraged too much or had owners who were no longer supportive.

Aside from that, the field of locally owned yellow pages seems to be very healthy and they should continue to grow for years to come.

The Future How will mainstream-owned Hispanic weeklies evolve? For those owned by non-Hispanic media groups, the verdict is still out. Many like Mundo Hispánico in Atlanta, El Tiempo Latino in Washington, D.C. and La Voz de Houston were started and reached maturity as Hispanic-owned publications.

When their original owners sold out to local mainstream-owned dailies, they’ve continued to evolve using the best of their founders’ ideals with the strengths that a major daily can provide.

Other publications have been started by mainstream newspapers with a wide variety of formulas that range from well-thoughtout to ones that seem to have no formula at all.

­Often these publications have no spokesperson at the corporate level so when budgets are being cut, these publications shut down, even if they are profitable.

Hispanic Print on the Internet Today 443 Hispanic newspapers and 311 Hispanic magazines have web sites, the majority of which are updated at least weekly. Millions of people turn to these sites for news and entertainment. Circulation audits can now include online readers.

Merging Publication/lnternet Operations While few Hispanic publications have effectively tied their online and print efforts together, it will be a major test for them over the next few years.

All figures in this article are for the United States and its commonwealth Puerto Rico.

They also include 12 newspapers along the U.S.-Mexico border that have circulation on both sides of the border. Hispanic Link.

(Kirk Whisler is founding president of Latino Print Network, based in Carlsbad, Calif. Email: Kirk@Whisler.com).

por la Universidad de Michigan

ANN ARBOR, Michigan.— Unemployed workers have a new tool to help them find the resources they need to get through difficult times. Created in partnership between the United Way for Southeastern Michigan and the University of Michigan School of Information, Neighbors4Neighbors is an interactive online program that uses social computing technology to connect unemployed workers with each other.

People who visit N4NMichigan.org can get and give advice on the things that matter when someone loses a job. The web application has two components, an online discussion forum that lets people share advice with each other, and a “widget,” or online program, that allows users to add their own comments to partner web sites that have information for the unemployed. Questions and comments created on partner web sites via the widget will be mirrored on the Neighbors4Neighbors discussion forums.

Neighbors4Neighbors is a project of Gov. Jennifer M. Granholm’s Keep Michigan Working Task Force. Michael Brennan, president and CEO of United Way for Southeastern Michigan, is chair of the task force’s community outreach committee.

“These are tough economic times in Michigan, and Neighbors4Neighbors offers an innovative way to address the problem of unemployment in a non-traditional way. Service providers in our region are currently overloaded with requests for assistance in this time of economic crisis,” Brennan said.

“Neighbors4Neighbors is a program that helps people help themselves right away—and eliminates the wait. This collaborative online resource and community discussion forum will be a catalyst for leading social change in the region.”

The University of Michigan and the United Way have developed an innovative way to tap informal networks, allowing unemployed workers the power to communicate with one another in real time. U- M School of Information professor Paul Resnick is the primary architect of the Neighbors4Neighbors website.

“This site demonstrates an efficient, low-cost application of social computing,” Resnick said. “Many websites already aim to help unemployed workers find information or job leads, but they don’t have a way to connect everyone who is visiting the page.

­Neighbors4Neighbors pulls people and information together to create a community.”

The widget encourages all service and community-based organizations to add a “commenting feature” to the web pages of their own sites.

“The widget is another rapid response to crisis from the School of Information,” said Martha E. Pollack, dean and professor in the School of Information. “This project demonstrates how the School of Information continues to live up to its motto of connecting people, information, and technology in more valuable ways.”

Michael Hess, an adjunct lecturer in the School of Information, is the developer of the widget. School of Information master’s students Meico Whitlock, Jeremy Canfield and Kathleen Ludewig also contributed.

by Jacqueline Baylon

No offenses this time: After an exchange of offenses they get together at the Americas Summit.Could they be friends?

Next year’s April 1 Decennial Census kickoff is already attracting lots of interest and some apprehension in the Hispanic community. As Latino organizations pledge to work with the Census Bureau this time around, they’re expressing concern that the federal government could, among other worries, miss counting well over a million Hispanics, as it admitted to doing in 2000.

Several Hispanic organizations have joined­ forces to helpthe Census Bureau by launching the campaign Ya es hora, ¡Hágase Contar (It’s Time, Make Yourself Count!).

The project is led by the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials, which promotes participation of Latinos in the U.S. political process.

In 2006, the Ya es Hora ¡Ciudadanía! drive was geared to encourage eligible permanent residents to apply for U.S. citizenship. In 2008, a second phase, Ya es Hora jVe y Vota!, rallied Latinos to participate in that year’s presidential election.

Now, with the partnership of Mi Familia Vota Education Fund, NALEO’s Educational Fund, along with the National Council of La Raza, League of United Latin American Citizens, Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund and other ethnic and union groups, the civic action continues with a focus on obtaining a full Census count.

Involved also are several Spanish-language media companies, among them Azteca America, Entravisión Communications, ImpreMedia, Univision Communications and Telemundo.

On April 1 the latter cable channel, which is directed at bilingual Latinos, kicked off its public service campaign “Hazle Contar!” (Be Counted). Organizations partnering with Telemundo include LULAC, the U.S. Hispanic Leadership Institute and MANA, a National Latina Organization.

The 2010 Census is expected to cost the government $14 billion. The U.S~ Constitution requires the Census Bureau to count everyone residing in the United States and its territories every ten years regardless of immigration status.

Angelo Falcón, president of the New York-based National Institute for Latino Policy, says to ensure a valid tally, the bureau must hire trained bilingual enumerators, including a sufficient number to reach growing immigrant populations who speak indigenous languages Falcon, who serves as a member of the Census Bureau’s Hispanic advisory committee and chairs the watchdog Latino Census Network, a collaborative of some 30 organizations focused on census issues, mentions workplace raids by Immigration Customs Enforcement (ICE) as a potentially serious turn-off to communities whose cooperation is essential.

Gabriela Lemus, president of Labor Council for Latin American Advancement, told Weekly Report her organization has already gone on record asking ICE to discontinue its aggressive actions that breed distrust of our government and disrupt families. I CE should direct its enforcement attention to employers who are breaking the law.

If the 3 percent Hispanic undercount of 2000 Census is repeated in 2010, 1.4 million Latinos will be missed, by the bureau’s own admission.

That, advocates point congressional districts.

“The census is the foundation of our democracy and we cannot have fair representation as Latinos in Congress and state legislatures without a full census,” says Arturo Vargas, NALEO executive director.

Raúl Cisneros, Decennial’s media relations branch chief at the U.S. Department of Commerce, explains, “The count is used to determine how many seats each state will have in the U. S. House of Representatives.”

More than $300 billion in federal funds is awarded based of census data to states and communities to support a variety of programs and public services.

More than 15 percent of the nation’s population is Hispanic. Between 2010 and 2050 the Hispanic population is projected to triple, raising its proportion to 25 percent.

The Census Bureau projects Hispanics’ economic muscle will rise from $662 billion in 2007 to more than $1.2 trillion in 2012, accounting for 9.7 percent of all U.S. buying power. Hispanic Link.­

­U.S. indicts most wanted Cuban

Luis Posada Carriles

On April 8 a US federal grand jury in El Paso, Texas accused a Cuban-born Venezuelan, Luis Posada Carriles (81), a former CIA employee and confessed terrorist, of lying about his involvement in a string of 1997 bombings against tourist spots in Havana, Cuba. The latest ruling is the first time Posada Carriles has been accused in the US of involvement in the bombings. The US judicial case against the exile, driven by the Justice Department, is slowly gathering momentum. In theory, the latest ruling could eventually pave the way towards his extradition. That could represent a significant political gesture on the part of the US, which has previously refused to extradite him on the grounds that he could face torture in the petitioning state (Venezuela). For the new US president, Barack Obama, who is facing pressure to alter US-Cuba policy, the ruling is nicely timed.

Can Cuba cope with an onslaught of Americans?

HAVANA – A push in Congress to do away with U.S. travel bans on Cuba could set off a flood of American visitors to the long-forbidden island.

But many wonder if a country where foreigners have long complained about lousy food, sluggish service and iffy infrastructure is ready for an onslaught of Americans unseen since the days of Meyer Lansky and Al Capone.

Cuba has about as many hotel rooms as Detroit and most are already full of Canadians and Europeans.

Experts say droves of Americans could drive up prices, unleash calls for more fl ights and cruises than Cuba can handle and force the government to tighten visa restrictions to regulate the stampede.

“There is great pent-up demand,” said Bob Whitley, president of the United States Tour Operators Association, which opposes the travel ban. “It will have to be controlled by offi cials in Cuba, but also by U.S. tour operators to make sure the infrastructure is up to it.”

Obama’s first regional summit sees Cuba on the agenda

When the fifth Summit of the Americas takes place in Port of Spain on April 17-19, U.S. President Barack Obama’s first formal encounter with the region’s leaders as a group will be hallmarked by an important change in hemispheric relations: he will be the representative of one of only two countries that do not have diplomatic ties with Cuba — and the other one, El Salvador, is only a few months away from restoring diplomatic relations with the island. Behind this is another, related change: the repositioning of Cuba vis-à-vis Venezuela.

How Latin America fits into the “New World Order” and the challenges ahead

The British Prime minister, Gordon Brown, announced the creation of a “New World Order” at the conclusion of the summit of the 20 leading economies (G20) in London last week to discuss solutions for the global economic crisis. It is an overblown epithet, of course, as misleading as the headline-grabbing promise of US$1.1 trillion funding for the IMF, most of which consisted of old commitments. But, the three Latin ­American nations present Argentina, Brazil and Mexico – emerged content that IMF conditions for loans, such as deeply unpopular fiscal adjustments, would be removed, and the Fund reformed to make it more meritocratic. They also hailed (somewhat woolly) promises to clamp down on tax havens and eschew trade protectionism. (Latin news and Associated Press contributed to this report).

por David Bacon

(Labor writer David Bacon, author of the controversial 2008 book Illegal People: How Globalization Creates Migration and Criminalizes Immigrants, wrote a lengthy commentary for New America Media providing context to the nation’s Upcoming and 200ti immigrant protest marches. For Weekly Report readers, it is condensed into two pants).

OAKLAND, Calif.— On May 1 hundreds of thousands, perhaps even millions, of U.S. immigrants and their supporters will fill the streets across the United States. Their May Day marches will make important demands on the Obama Administration: End the draconian enforcement policies. Establish a new immigration policy based on human rights and recognition of the crucial economic and social contributions of immigrants to our society.

May Day celebrates worldwide the contributions of working people. Three years ago a million people filled the streets of Los Angeles, with hundreds of thousands more in Chicago, New York and other cities and towns throughout the United States.

Again on May Day in 2007 and 2008, immigrants and their supporters coast to coast demonstrated.

One sign prominent in almost every march said it all: “We are Workers not Criminals!”

It stated an obvious truth. Millions of people have come to the United States to work, some with visas, others without them. But all are contributors to our society.

The protests are a result of years of organizing, the legacy of immigrant rights pioneer Bert Corona. He taught thousands of immigrant activists the value of political in dependence. Most of the leaders of the radical wing of today’s immigrant rights movement limwere his students.

In part, the May Day protests respond to a wave of measures that have criminalized immigration status and work itself. In 1986, the Immigration Reform and Control Act made it a crime for the first time in U.S. history to hire people who lack papers.

Defenders argued that if people could not work legally they would leave.

Life was not so simple.

Undocumented people are part of the communities where they live. They cannot simply go, nor should they.

They seek the same goals of equality and opportunity that U.5. workers have fought for historically. For most immigrants there are no jobs to return to in the countries they left.

After Congress passed The North American Free Trade Agreement, six million Mexicans came here as a result of the massive displacement the treaty caused. Free trade and free market policies have similarly displaced millions more in poor eountries around the world.

In reality, the labor of 12 million undocumented workers is indispensable to this nation’s economy. The wealth created by undocumented workers is never called illegal. No one dreams of taking that wealth from the employers who profited from it. Yet the people who produce this wealth are called exactly that—illegal.

In a country with schools lagging behind the rest of the industrialized world, with bridges that fall into rivers and people living in tent cities for lack of housing, there is clearly no shortage of work to be done. If the trillion dollars showered on banks were used instead to put people to work, there would be plenty of jobs and a better quality of life for everyone.

Nativo López, president of the Mexican American Political Association and the Hermandad Mexicana Latinoamericana, says, “Washington legislators and lobbyists fear a new civil rights movement in the streets, because it rejects their compromises and makes demands that go beyond what they have defined as ‘politically possible.”’

­The price of trying to push out people who have coma here for survival is increased vulnerability for undocumented workers. This ultimately results in cheaper labor and fewer rights for everyone. Under Bush, that was the government’s goal—cheap labor for large employers, enforced by deportations, firings and guest worker programs. This is what millions of people want to change. The Obama administration was elected because it promised “change we can believe in.”

In past May Day marches many participants have put forward an alternative set of demands, which include tying legalization for 12 million undocumented people with jobs programs for communities with high unemployment.

All workers need the right to organize to raise wages and gain workplace rights, including the 12 million people for whom work is a crime. More green cards, especially visas based on family reunification, would enable people to cross the border legally, instead of dying in the desert.

Ending guest worker programs would help stop the use of our immigration system as a supply of cheap labor for employers. And on the border, communities want human rights, not more guns, walls, soldiers and prisons for immigrants.

This May Day, immigrants will again send this powerful message. Their marches have already rescued from obscurity our own holiday, which began in the struggle for the eight-hour day in Chicago over a century ago. Today they are giving May Day a new meaning, putting forward ideas that will not only benefit immigrant communities, but all working families. Hispanic Link.

(Next: The failed United States response.)