We Deserted Trillanes

Blow by blow: Senator Antonio Trillanes walks out of Makati RTC, marches along Makati Ave. He is accompanied by General Lim and the Magdalo soldiers. Former Vice President Teofisto Guingona, former UP President Nemenzo, Bishop Tobias, and Father Robert Reyes join their group. They call for President GMA’s ouster as they hole themselves inside the Manila Peninsula hotel. President GMA calls an emergency cabinet meeting. The PNP sends police in full battle gear, SWAT teams surround the rebels. A warrant of arrest is issued. A tank smashes through the Pen’s front doors. Tear gas is released. Trillanes et al voluntarily exit, they are handcuffed, and are escorted to wherever they are now.

Trillanes was elected in the last senatorial elections by a popular mandate. Suffering from a political campaign that was grossly underfunded (his TV ad barely made it to 10 seconds) and a platform that was attacked left and right by the administration and by other detractors, he still was able to secure the 11th seat, besting quite a number of traditional politicians, including some from the administration ticket. This was no doubt to PGMA’s dismay then; now, Trillanes proves again that he is one of GMA’s worst nightmares.

5 Documentaries Today

Sometimes the problem with med school is that you get so busy with duties and with studying, that it becomes difficult to find time to attend to other interests, especially those that are not relatable to work inside the four walls of the hospital. So many episodes, movies, games, plays, books, events, news, issues etc etc were lost this way during my 5-year stay at the PGH. Survival sometimes meant having to block out all other competing interests in an effort to understand and commit to heart (yes, not just to memory) the fronto-ponto-cerebello-dentato-rubro-thalamo-cortico-spinal pathway; and for this, the feeling that one is detached from the real world is an all too common experience for the average med student.

Good thing there are reruns.

Today I watched five documentaries in a docufest sponsored by my sister’s org in UP Diliman. All were from the award-winning GMA show I-Witness, and all I missed when they were originally shown on TV. The first, Howie Severino’s Brod Is Thicker Than Water, discussed the death of UP stude and Sigma Rho neophyte Cris Mendez from hazing. When news broke out of Cris’s death, I was on duty at PGH for pre-residency qualification; I found out about it from my sister, Cris’s classmate at the NCPAG. We usually talk about updates on this issue (or the lack thereof) during dinner.

The QC Reproductive Health Scandal

It was around two Sundays ago when the parish priest in our church first invited mass attendees to read the circular issued by QC bishop Ongtioco opposing the proposed reproductive health bill for Quezon City sponsored by Councilor Joseph Juico. The ordinance “Establishing a Quezon City Population and Reproductive Health Management Policy” was attacked in that it supposedly ”kills unborn children, causes deadly cancers, (and) destroys the Catholic educational formation of our youth.” A leaflet with the letterhead of the Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal Parish (in QC) says the ordinance would bring “sexual promiscuity to intermediate and high school students in their class lessons.” In the next few days, the proponent has apparently been villified by pro-life advocates and has come under intense pressure and condemnation from the Church (see related news items: ABS-CBN, Inquirer).

The objection of the Catholic Church to the progressive concept of Reproductive Health is not new (“progressive,” to distinguish from the Church’s archaic view that the natural method is a safe, effective and acceptable method of reproductive control). In 2005, the Church and its pro-life minions successfully buried House Bill 3773 or the Integrated Reproductive Health and Population Reduction Bill. As a result, there are still no comprehensive government strategies to combat the continually exploding population size of the country and family planning efforts nationwide are still underfunded and lacking; the situation is expected to get worse as the USAID fund for contraceptives (the largest source of free contraceptives for the Filipino poor for the past 30 years) runs out by the end of 2008.

Numbers

One of the major trends in modern medicine is its respect for the intrinsic power of numbers and their study. In the movement known as Evidence Based Medicine (or EBM), the teachings of tired old doctors passed on from generation to generation are not taken as absolute truths, but as principles that are less convincing than those supported by hard evidence. The NHS classification of medical literature uses Level A to apply to theses supported by strong studies such as consistent Randomised Control Trials (or RCTs), and Level E to refer to expert opinion or theoretical results (find out what Level B, C, and D mean in Wikipedia). The whole idea is to determine best practices in the medical field by testing them against objective observations and to do away with extraneous variables such as bias in making important medical decisions.

Indeed numbers have a very strong power to convince. When used properly (ie, in presentations that can sustain the interest number-haters like myself), they can strongly influence opinion, affect stances, and forward certain advocacies  (who can forget that three-storey projection in The Inconvenient Truth? 3:15 on this YouTube video). I am sharing below my favorite number-play sites (ie, sites I go to when I suddenly get that nerdy urge to know more about the world):

Pinoy Internet Trivia

Our internet connection at home has been down for more than a week now; I’ve thus been forced to do my online-related activities at internet cafes outside. Not only is this bothersome in the sense that I have to block out noisy high school kids playing online games while attempting to blog, check blogs, get e-mail, search and surf; the idea of leaving footprints of whatever internet activities I’ve been doing for the next user to see and use is also not a very comfortable thought for me (I remember someone hacked into my e-mail account dati!). This inconvenience has resulted in a few e-mails not replied to last week, some ideas not translated into blogposts, and in research work being postponed (hopefully not indefinitely). So apparently, internet access is important to me, and the current problem in connectivity impacts not just a few of my daily habits.

I wonder, how important really is the internet to Filipinos? In searching for statistics related to internet use in the Philippines, I chanced upon the following interesting facts about Pinoy internet usage and history:

Impeach Again and Again and Again

On Monday, another impeachment complaint was filed against President Arroyo, this time by opposition stalwarts led by former Vice President Teofisto Guingona, Bayan (Bagong Alyansang Makabayan) representatives, and the human rights group Karapatan, among others from civil society. The complaint was endorsed by activist lawmakers Satur Ocampo, Teddy Casino, Luz Ilagan, and Crispin Beltran (of the Bayan Muna, Gabriela, and Anakpawis groups). This after Congress already rejected an impeachment complaint targeting former COMELEC Chair Benjamin Abalos and President Arroyo, citing the House Rule limiting the number of impeachment complaints that can be filed against a certain official in a year to just one. Satur Ocampo had this to say on the rule:”For all intents and purposes, the one impeachment per year limit is antiquated, and worse, it’s being taken advantage of by the incumbent corrupt and illegitimate presidency and its allies in the House of Representatives.”

Several have already voiced the concern that the one impeachment a year limit is being used by the Arroyo government to immunize itself from serious, and possibly successful impeachment proceedings. And especially since a lot of people have noted that the first pleading against GMA was incomplete and lacking in substance (I even heard somewhere that it was only three pages long!), then it is fair to conclude that the political strategists in Malacanang are using the one complaint per year rule as their shield (and a dummy impeachment complaint as their weapon of choice).

Project Proposal: Mission Nutrition

The biggest dilemma I had to decide over post-graduation (and probably one of the most important in my life) was whether to apply for residency or to pursue a career in public health. The choice is an either-or at my level, and unfortunately, the trade-off of my decision to take up Neurology in PGH is that I can’t be a Doctor-to-the-Barrio-Leader-for-Health anymore (well, unless I apply for it after my 4 years in Neuro). I am convinced that as a clinician, there will still be ways for me to contribute to the PH effort, especially in the future (like post-residency), when I have more freedom with my schedule and my choices of activities (and this is probably what swung the decision towards side residency… all is not lost on that WHO job!). In my interview for my Neuro residency application, a lot of time was actually spent explaining to the Admissions Committee why I wrote DOH Secretary/WHO officer in the How-I-See-Myself-20-Years-From-Now part of the qualifying essay (and why, despite the odd goal, they should still accept me into their department).

The following is part of a project proposal I’m making for an NGO’s feeding program (don’t be too harsh, it’s the first draft). Hopefully, it gets funded, so that I can at least say that I had something to contribute before I enter the sucky world of hospital politics.

Do You YouTube?

No pop blog is complete without a post on YouTube. This video sharing website is arguably one of the most popular destinations in the (pla-) net; it’s hard to think of anyone who hasn’t gone to visit it even once. As for me, I YouTube frequently, and although I still haven’t uploaded my own videos (again, the ghost of my techno-incompetence haunts me), I have quite a few favorite YouTube finds that I can share.

Eviction Time!

My Pizza List (updated again)

This is my first post about my superduper-uber-most favoritest foodstuff in the universe… pizza! The obvious question is: which is my favorite? I can’t answer that… I love them all! So what I’ll do instead is list all the pizza places I’ve been to (or ordered from, or places where I have at least tasted their pizza) and I’ll also create a pizzapics page somewhere on this blog where I can post special pizza experiences (watch out for that!). Ack! I’m getting hungry already! Here goes: