Fits and Starts: Reactionary Biodefense
In October 2001, the nation responded to letters containing anthrax, at a time when it was still recovering from the terrorist attacks on September 11th. Since then, other biological events – such as the H1N1 influenza pandemic in 2009-2010 and the outbreak and global spread of Ebola in 2014 – have tested our national security. In addition to response and recovery activities, we also reacted to those events with new policy and programs. Over the years, some of these still exist, while others have languished and disappeared. Join us on October 9, 2018, when we hold a meeting to reexamine the anthrax events of 2001, as well as subsequent biological events. We want to know where we are now and what else we need to do to ensure national biodefense.
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National Biodefense Strategy: Protecting the Nation Against all Biological Threats
Today, the White House and four federal departments unveiled a comprehensive National Biodefense Strategy to make America safer against modern biological threats to the United States. In the 21st century, biological threats are increasingly complex and dangerous, and that demands that we act with urgency and singular effort to save lives and protect Americans. Whether a natural outbreak, an accidental release, or a deliberate attack, biological threats are among the most serious we face, with the potential for significant health, economic and national security impacts. Therefore, promoting our health security is a national security imperative.
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Is China Already in the 21st Century in the Fields of AI for Healthcare and Quantum Computing?
It is 2018 everywhere, but not every country is treating being in the 21st century equally. China is rushing into it, even in healthcare, while the United States is tip-toeing its way towards the future. Especially in healthcare. Ready or not, the future is here...and the U.S. may not be ready...Artificial Intelligence: Yes, the U.S. has been the leader in A.I., with some of the leading universities and tech companies working on it. That may not be enough. A year ago China announced that it intended to be the world leader in A.I. by 2025. The Next Web recently concluded that China's progress since then "remains unchecked." China is far outspending the U.S. on A.I. research and infrastructure, coordinating efforts between government, research institutes, universities, and private companies. Dr. Steven White, a professor at China's Tsinghua University, "likens the country's succeed at all costs AI program to Russia's Sputnik moment." We have yet to have that wake-up call...
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The (Awesome) Economics of Open Source
Successful open source software companies "discover" markets where transaction costs far outweigh all other costs, outcompete the proprietary alternatives for all the good reasons that even the economic nay-sayers already concede (e.g., open source is simply a better development model to create and maintain higher-quality, more rapidly innovative software than the finite limits of proprietary software), and then-and this is the important bit-help clients achieve strategic objectives using open source as a platform for their own innovation. With open source, better/faster/cheaper by itself is available for the low, low price of zero dollars. As an open source company, we don't cry about that. Instead, we look at how open source might create a new inflection point that fundamentally changes the economics of existing markets or how it might create entirely new and more valuable markets.
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ONC EHR Reporting Program RFI: A Public Health Perspective
On August 24, 2018, the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) released a Request for Information (RFI) related to the EHR Reporting Program. This RFI is required by the 21st Century Cures Act and its primary purpose is to gather ideas and suggestions related to how ONC might provide better information about Certified EHR Technology (CEHRT). Apparently, the initial intention was to create a "star rating" like the type used in Consumer Reports to use to rate EHRs, but that seems to have been abandoned in favor of some kind of measurement system. But it is far from clear exactly how this would be done.
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OSEHRA to Hold Kick-Off Meeting for VistA Internationalization Project
OSEHRA Chairman Seong K. Mun will be holding a kick-off meeting for the recently announced VistA Internationalization project called Plan VI...This is an important project as the open source VistA electronic health record is being adopted internationally at a rapid pace. There are large numbers of VistA deployments in Jordan and India, and great interest in South Korea, Japan, and China. The Internationalization project should accelerate the international adoption of the EHR, ranked as the best hospital-based EHR in the world.
- The Future Is Open
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José Andrés’s riveting ‘We Fed an Island’ calls for a revolution in disaster relief
After dealing with so much red tape and mismanagement... Andrés wants the government and nonprofit groups to rethink the way they handle food after a large-scale natural disaster. He wants them to drop the authoritarian, top-down style and embrace the chaos inherent in crisis. Work with available local resources, whether residents or idle restaurants and schools. Give people the authority and the means to help themselves. Stimulate the local economy.“What we did was embrace complexity every single second,” Andrés writes. “Not planning, not meeting, just improvising. The old school wants you to plan, but we needed to feed the people.” Andrés and World Central Kitchen have embraced complexity. An organization not originally designed as a food relief organization, WCK has, in the aftermath of Puerto Rico, sent chefs to Hawaii, Guatemala, Indonesia and other locales to feed locals in need.
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FEMA Was Overwhelmed by Hurricanes and Wildfires in 2017, GAO Says
The back-to-back devastation of hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria, followed by catastrophic wildfires in California, overwhelmed federal disaster responders in 2017, according to a government report released Tuesday. The unprecedented sequence of storms and fires forced Federal Emergency Management Agency staff to jump from one disaster to another and in some cases use uncertified workers to fill key roles. “They were 30% understaffed when Harvey hit,” said Chris Currie, director of emergency management issues at the Government Accountability Office, which wrote Tuesday’s report. “By the time Maria hit Puerto Rico, they were down to the bottom of the barrel.”
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What Puerto Rico’s Death Toll from Hurricane Maria Really Tells Us
The recently released report from the Milken Institute is perhaps the strongest rebuke to date on the impact of Hurricane Maria during the 2017 hurricane season. The report notes nearly 3,000 people have died in Puerto Rico because of the storm. These numbers provide a more accurate depiction of the devastation and lives lost in Puerto Rico. While sad and troubling, it is important to call out that these updated numbers do not even account for the death toll in the U.S. Virgin Islands.
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How to Decide Whether to Open Source Your SaaS Solution
Should a SaaS provider open source its primary platform, and if so, what is the best way to do it? The decision to open source code requires a fair bit of planning if you want to do it right, especially when it comes to user support and documentation. In the case of SaaS, the required planning is different, although it shares some factors with any open source effort. In my series, How to Make Money from Open Source Platforms, I focused on software that exists solely to be deployed on a computer, whether on a local machine, in a data center, or in a cloud platform (yes, I know the last two are redundant).
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