Sheilah Kast

It’s estimated that there are about 4,000 people in Maryland prisons with a diagnosable mental illness. A new, controversial report from the Treatment Advocacy Center and the National Sherriff’s Association has drawn attention to those inmates and how they get treatment.

1 in 68 U.S. children have an Autism Spectrum Disorder. In Maryland, 1 in 60 children are on the Spectrum.

These statistics were released last month in a report conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and researchers from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.  In the second part of this interview, we’ll hear from Dr. Li-Ching Lee, the School’s principal investigator for that report and Dr. Rebecca Landa, of Kennedy Krieger.  But first, we want to get a picture of what it’s like for one family who has a child with ASD, an Autism Spectrum Disorder. 

Welcome back to The Checkup, our weekly series on how health care is changing in Maryland. This is our final segment in the series. For seven months, we’ve dug into the details of the Affordable Care Act. How have specific groups of people have been affected by it? Who has and has not been able to get access to insurance through it? How have different components of the health care system responded to the changes?Today, we’re going to take a step back and ask the question: How does the Affordable Care Act fit into the big picture of Maryland’s health care system? 

The General Assembly considered several bills to change implementation of the Common Core State Standards—or as Maryland refers to it—the ‘Maryland College and Career Ready Standards.’ Only three bills passed.

Gov. O’Malley is  expected to sign one of those bills this morning-HB 1164.

Warm temperatures bring more people out on the street, making them more vulnerable to catcalling. Street harassment is sexual harassment or assault in public spaces. This form of harassment can happen in any public space.

Stokely Carmichael’s name comes down to us from the civil rights struggle, and even most of us who recognize his name attach it to just part of his thinking and legacy. We learn more about Carmichael from a new biography by Tufts professor Peniel Joseph.

Twenty states and the District of Columbia, have medical marijuana programs. Patients can either buy or grow marijuana for things like pain relief. The General Assembly took a first, cautious stab at creating a medical marijuana program last year. Marijuana was to be made available through academic medical centers. But, none of the centers in Maryland signed up to participate. Legislators decided this past session to allow certified doctors to write prescriptions for medical marijuana that can be bought from licensed growers and dispensaries.

 

President Obama signed an executive order yesterday that is intended to help even out the gender pay gap.   It would require federal contractors to allow employees to share salary information with each other.  

Dr. Robert Wicks is a clinical psychologist on the faculty of Loyola University Maryland. In his latest book, "Perspective: The Calm Within the Storm," he writes about ways to approach thinking, meditation, and the narratives we tell ourselves about our lives.

The population of Annapolis has gone down this morning.  Maryland state senators and delegates are home, or heading home.  In the legislative session that ended at midnight, they raised the minimum wage to $10.10/hour by 2018 and expanded the school day for some pre-schoolers.