Morning round up: New laws for health insurance benefit adult kids

Your adult children can keep on benefiting from your insurance, thanks to a new state law. Thanks, Mom and Dad!

Health care jobs, which have been sheltered from the economy, are now being hit, says the Wall Street Journal.

The Shriners are closing some hospitals thanks to sagging revenue/endowment, but none are in the Chicago area.

A report cited in the Tribune last week says non-profit hospitals get more charity (in the form of tax breaks) than they give. The Illinois Hospital Association and Metropolitan Chicago Healthcare Council respond.

Only one hospital outside Chicago has interpreters?

It looks like milk may be falling off some school menus.

The push for electronic medical records threatens privacy, even as it has the potential to save lives, says the Daily Herald.

AIDS is hitting the South hard, in part because people don't understand the disease, the Trib reports:

It is an attitude that health-care professionals have battled for almost a decade while HIV/AIDS skyrocketed in rural Southern communities, particularly among African-Americans. With too few doctors, staggering poverty and a history of inadequate AIDS education programs, the South is now home to half of the 1.1 million people living with HIV/AIDS in the United States, according to the Southern AIDS Coalition, which is composed of health professionals.

Last week was National Public Health Week, apparently. Sometimes it seems there's an overload of these specials days/weeks/months. April is apparently National Kite Month, Irritable Bowel Syndrome Month, Prevention of Animal Cruelty Month. There are about 50 other themes this month, too.

This week alone, evidently, celebrates: National Environmental Week, National Library Week, National Personal Training Week, Pan American Week, Egg Salad Week, National Crime Victims' Rights Week and National Occupational Health Nursing Week. Who knew? And with so many themes, how can we possibly give the attention each cause deserves?