Cholera response steps up as Haiti’s rainy season begins

An upswing in cholera in Haiti has prompted health care workers and aid agencies to step up efforts to prevent the water-borne disease from spreading rapidly as the rainy season begins. Catholic Relief Services was among the aid agencies that boosted the distribution of soap, water purification tablets and hygiene information within 24 hours of [...]

Seeing the bigger picture on health care

With climate change characterized as “the biggest global health threat of the 21st century,” Catholic health providers are working to do their part to reduce their carbon footprint. Climate change “is already negatively impacting human health” and its effects “will multiply dramatically if no action is taken,” says a new resource from the Catholic Health [...]

Catholic Charities USA makes top 10 in Philanthropy 400

This week the Chronicle of Philanthropy published it annual Philanthropy 400, those U.S. organizations that raised the most money in the last year. According to reporters Noelle Barton and Holly Hall, who wrote the piece accompanying the list, “America’s big charities expect fundraising to rise in 2011, but the increase won’t come close to making up [...]

Healing and teaching go hand-in-hand for Sister Diana

Religious orders of women are known far and wide for two important apostolates, education and healing. Teaching and nursing sisters and brothers are legendary around the world. Take a moment to meet a Dominican sister who unexpectedly found herself the lone medical practitioner in a community of teachers. Vanderbilt Medicine, the alumni publication of the [...]

Get bald for kids on St. Paddy’s Day

What are your plans for this year’s St. Patrick’s Day? If you are like most North Americans, you’ll be accessorizing yourself out in green, putting on silly hats, visiting your neighborhood pub, eating someone’s idea of Irish food — usually bad — drinking beer that might be green (God only knows who came up with [...]

Charitable giving dips, but some Catholic agencies holding on

The Chronicle of Philanthropy reported this week that giving to the 400 largest charities in the U.S. is down overall 11 percent this year. That’s the worst drop in the two decades since the Chronicle began ranking its Philanthropy 400. Collectively, the 400 top charities raised over $68 billion last year. That’s a lot of [...]

The debate continues on abortion and health care

Anyone who closely followed the debate in March over whether the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act did or did not leave open the possibility of federal funding of abortion will want to read this new analysis by Helen Alvare, a law professor at George Mason University who served in the 1990s as director of [...]

The bishops look back — and forward — on health reform

Those who followed the ins and outs of the health reform debate — and especially the Catholic participation in that debate — will be interested in reading a new statement by the chairmen of the three U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ committees most involved. Called “Setting the Record Straight,” the statement reviews the various USCCB [...]

Bishops assess health reform law, executive order

Bishops are continuing to comment on the new health care reform law and President Barack Obama’s executive order intended to guarantee that no federal funding goes to abortions under the new system. And the buzz is overwhelmingly negative. Bishop Samuel J. Aquila of Fargo, N.D., says the law’s shortcomings in terms of abortion funding and [...]

Catholic hospitals make Thomson Reuters top 100 list

Thomson Reuters has released its annual list of the nation’s 100 Top Hospitals. Listings of medical centers, universities, companies to work for, etc., are always dubious at best. Rating agencies use different criteria and different metrics, but no one ever complains when they get a top spot. Thomson Reuters has published its 100 Top Hospitals list [...]