Podcast One: The Pulse - Health Care Reform | 2010-07-22
The major diseases of modern societies are chronic diseases, often brought on by lifestyle. Improved primary health care may head many of them off. After decades of talking about it, the government is attempting to improve primary health care, but private doctors are less than enthusiastic.
Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying went to the Legco chamber this week, at the request of legislators who wanted him to answer questions on the illegal structures at his home. And then, to their annoyance, avoided answering those very questions.
"Freedom of speech, of the press, of assembly, of association, of procession and of demonstration” are guaranteed in Article 35 of the People’s Republic of China’s constitution. But ironically, on Wednesday, two Hong Kong media organisations, Apple Daily and Stand News, were barred from participating in a celebration of the 37th anniversary of the 1982 Chinese constitution which was attended by about 700 people including members of the press. Just a day before, Chief Executive Carrie Lam strongly criticised the United States’ new Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act, calling it unnecessary and unreasonable. Hong Kong, she said, has press freedom and a high degree of other freedoms. With me to talk about rule of law and human rights in Hong Kong are Tom Kellogg, Director of the Georgetown Centre for Asian Law and Michael Davis, Global Fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Centre and previously, professor in the Law Faculty at Hong Kong University.
Last Friday, the police finally returned control of the Polytechnic University campus to the institution’s management. The siege of the university campus lasted 12 days.
On the evening of 18th November, thousands of people gathered in areas near the PolyU campus in the hope of somehow diverting police attention from those holed up inside. Late that night, as police and protesters clashed in Yau Ma Tei, more than 213 people were arrested, and over 30 were injured and taken to hospital. Eyewitnesses, including firefighters, say at least one human stampede took place. Police say they saw nothing.
On the surface at least, Hong Kong is one of the world’s richer places. Yet according to a report published this week many low-income families cannot afford anything like the cost of buying food to meet the government’s own nutritional guidelines.
On October 28th, more than 300 members of China’s Central Committee gathered for a keynote meeting. The aim was to devise policy both in the short and longer terms. Unsurprisingly civil unrest in Hong Kong was high on the agenda. With me to talk about the meeting's implications on Hong Kong is Willy Lam, Adjunct Professor of the Centre for China Studies at the Chinese University of Hong Kong.
Since the start of the protests in June, the police have fired around 6,000 tear gas canisters, often in tightly packed residential neighbourhoods. But this is a not highly target method of crowd control and tear gas can have long term effects on children and other vulnerable individuals. Last month, a group of Chinese University scholars posted a letter in the medical journal The Lancet. They questioned the widespread use of tear gas in densely populated areas and urged the government to provide guidelines for health protection and cleaning. The government wasn’t inclined to listen. Secretary for Health Sophie Chan dismissed the letter and has so far provided no advice to the general public. And tear gas is not the only chemical weapon the police have been using.
The Election Committtee's 689-vote choice of Leung Chun-ying as Chief Executive last Sunday sealed some divisions on the political scene that the campaign process had only served to intensify.
We ask members of the pro-democracy camp whether they are more inclined to, or whether they can, work together now that they have encountered yet another setback
On the day we went to air, democrats tried to introduce a new motion, via a House Committee, to impeach Donald Tsang. After issues involving a Shenzhen flat he was purchasing, freebies from millionaires, and now harsh criticism over spending too much taxpayers' money on his accomodation while on official trips, they have had enoough.
This week, having previously said there was no upper limit on how many new applicants might be awarded TV licences, the government gave them to just two operators, and sidelined company that seems to have done the most to prepare for running such a station. After more than three years of waiting, Ricky Wong, the five hundred workers he has hired, and many of the TV viewing public, have been disappointed. Hong Kong Television Network is the only one of three applicants to have been refused a free TV licence, and many believe the directive came from Beijing. On Thursday evening, hundreds attended a previously arranged open forum at Chinese University. Many came specifically to support speaker Ricky Wong.
In our studio, former TV station head and former executive coucillor Selina Chow talks about the government's decision.
Remember all those children that were being born in Hong Kong to mainlanders just a few years ago? Well, they are now eligible for kindergarten places. Unsurprisingly, their parents want them educated here. The Hong Kong government is happy for them to be educated here. But local parents in the northern new territories are wondering why their children should be the ones to suffer. Meanwhile, some are making money out of helping mainland parents get their kids into Hong Kong kindergartens.
"Give me the child until he is seven, and I will give you the man," runs a quote attributed to St. Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Jesuit order.
Getting the right stuff into eager young minds as early as possible is clearly important to some.
The Hong Kong government now wants some of that “right stuff” to be part of what it likes to call the “Moral and National Education” subject for primary and secondary students.
The subject has yet to be introduced, but it is the topic of The Pulse for tonight.
With us in the studio are Cheung Kwok-wah of the Education Bureau, and Lee Chack-fan who is chairman of an ad-hoc committee set up to oversee the implementation of the classes.And we also have with us Pauline Chow of the Women Teachers’ Organisation, and Ip Kin-yuen of the Professional Teachers’ Union