Do U.S. pandemic plans threaten rights, ACLU asks
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U.S. policy in preparing for a potential bird flu pandemic is veering dangerously toward a heavy-handed law-enforcement approach, the American Civil Liberties Union said on Monday.
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Experts say it&#39;s only a matter of time before the next pandemic takes a deadly toll. For more information, check www.hhs.gov, the Web site of the Health and Human Services Department.
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Football matches and concerts may be banned if there is a flu pandemic, under  plans being considered by ministers.
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(InfoWorld) - A lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) argued Monday that the government's defense of the controversial Child Online Protection Act (COPA) was inconsistent in defining what kind of online content is harmful to minors, and so the law should continue to remain unenforceable because it violates free speech. Chris Hansen, a staff attorney for the ACLU, said that witnesses in the government's case in support of COPA could not seem to agree on what kind of sexually explicit material or content that shows human nudity is offensive and what has artistic, scientific or political value. Because of this, COPA can be interpreted broadly and can be imposed upon legitimate Web sites such as Nerve.com, Salon.com and the Sexual Health Network, which all were named as co-plaintiffs in the case, the ACLU argued. Hansen made his arguments supporting why COPA is unconstitutional in a Philadelphia courtroom as part of closing arguments in ACLU v. Gonzalez, a four-week trial that wrapped up Monday. Hansen said that alternatives to a federal law -- such as content filters, parental supervision and education -- are effective in preventing children from being exposed to indecent and pornographic material online. He also argued that because COPA only protects content that is sent to the Web via HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol) and not Web-based content in instant messages, VOIP (voice over Internet Protocol) or content sent via FTP (File Transfer Protocol), it is too narrow to truly protect children from pornographic content online. In the law's defense, attorneys from the U.S. Department of Justice tried to poke holes in the ACLU's arguments, rejecting its claims that there are effective alternatives to COPA, such as parental monitoring and content filters, to protect children from harmful material online. "Single-parent households are common, as are places where two parents work full-time," said Joel McElvain, a Justice Department attorney. "It's nice to imagine every family can constantly keep in contact with their children's [Internet usage] but they need further help. COPA offers that help." McElvain also listed examples of sites that did not violate COPA that were blocked by well-known content filters. In this way, filters sometimes serve to block children from accessing helpful Web sites, thus "hindering children form learning about the world around them," he said. Justice Department lawyers also requested that Judge Lowell A. Reed Jr., who is hearing the case, rule that the ACLU and several of its co-plaintiffs in the case -- Free Speech Media, Philadelphia Gay News, Powell's Bookstores, Electronic Frontier Foundation and American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression -- have no legal standing in the case because their members were not called to testify about how COPA affected them. If Reed makes that decision, the ACLU's entire case would be irrelevant. The trial in Philadelphia was the culmination of eight years of litigation by the ACLU against COPA, which was signed into law in 1998. The law can impose severe criminal and civil penalties -- including stiff fines -- on individuals that put up content on the Web that the government considers harmful to minors. Previously, a federal district court in Philadelphia and a federal appeals court found COPA unconstitutional, and in 2004, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld this ban on enforcing COPA. However, the Supreme Court also returned the ACLU's case against it to a Pennsylvania district court for a trial to see whether there are effective ways to keep children safe online that infringe upon speech less than COPA's criminal penalties. The deadline for the parties in ACLU v. Gonzalez to submit any more materials for the discovery phase is Dec. 7. The judge is expected to rule by early next year.
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A global influenza pandemic isn&#39;t something that most people think about on a day-to-day basis. But it could soon become front-page news, if the fears of the World Health Organization are realized.
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It&#39;s encouraging that a conference on AIDS was held in Indianapolis last week. The pandemic has infected 38 million people. The Indiana University School of Medicine has partnered with a Kenyan university
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The U.S. government is co-sponsoring a three-week planning exercise that will simulate the impact of a pandemic on financial services firms, including their ability to support telecommuters.
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Nov. 1, 2004 - If the shortage of flu vaccine was not enough to keep seniors worried, we now have the âflu pandemic,â which the UNâs World Health Organization says is âcloser than ever.
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Future disease pandemics will be scored in the United States much like hurricanes, with the most severe triggering school closings and changes in the workplace, under federal guidelines issued on Thursday.
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Ines Olivia Martinez wonders if her family will be denied medical care. Even her mentally disabled 13-year-old son has been anxiously pointing out police cars amid fears of a local crackdown on illegal immigrants. Resolutions to deny a potentially wide range of public services to illegal immigrants have thrust two northern Virginia counties into the nation's immigration debate.
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WHO calls for every country in the world to make plans to deal with an inevitable influenza pandemic that is likely to be triggered by the bird flu virus that hit Asia this year.
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A lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) argued Monday that the government's defense of the controversial Child Online Protection Act (COPA) was inconsistent in defining what kind of online content is harmful to minors, and so the law should continue to remain unenforceable because it violates free speech.
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The World Health Organization, fearing a killer flu pandemic may be on the way, is stepping up efforts to ensure governments around the globe are ready to fight it, a top official said on Wednesday.
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Scientists have found the first real evidence that restricting air travel can delay flu's spread &#151; a finding that could influence government plans for battling the next influenza pandemic.
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For years, the government has failed to prepare adequately for an influenza pandemic and has no concrete plans for distributing scarce vaccine to people at high risk in such an emergency, a federal health care analyst said yesterday.
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While most health experts agree that the bird flu virus represents a grave danger and is highly likely to spread unless urgent steps are taken, some virologists caution that alarmist warnings could harm preparedness plans.
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Health authorities are drawing up plans to ban public gatherings and close international airports and schools as part of a global strategy in the event of an influenza pandemic.