Global Warming, Sea Level Rise And Tort

It is the aim of the law to attempt to provide remedies for wrongs and to attempt to punish those who have caused harm. What harms may be punished and what remedies exist for what wrong are what a life, indeed, many lifetimes in the law can be spent contemplating. According to the August 25, 1924 account on the front page of the New York lTimes ( Bomb Blast Injures 13 in Station Crowd ) thirteen persons were injured when one of three men (assumed to be Italians on their way to a celebration on Long Island) carrying packages of fireworks sought to board a Long Island Railroad train and being helped along by a push from a guard on the platform, dropped a package that fell under the wheels of the train and exploded. The tort action that resulted, Palsgraf v. Long Island Railroad Co., 162 N.E 99 (N.Y. 1928), is the most famous case in all of torts. Generations of students and lawyers have sought to comprehend the nature of causation by reading Judge Cardozo\u27s majority opinion. The debate between Cardozo\u27s limited version of causation and Judge Andrew\u27s much broader minority version of causation is not, and will not ever be, over. The question of how and when the law should act to redress a wrong, to attempt to heal with an order or with money is replayed in ever changing venues in every generation. As a new generation oversees perhaps the final chapters in our relations with the earth, nature and each other, the questions of harm and duty and causation are cast in new terms, but a close observer will note nothing new under the sun

Extreme warming and regime shift toward amplified variability in a far northern lake

Mean annual air temperatures in the High Arctic are rising rapidly, with extreme warming events becoming increasingly common. Little is known, however, about the consequences of such events on the ice‐capped lakes that occur abundantly across this region. Here, we compared 2 years of high‐frequency monitoring data in Ward Hunt Lake in the Canadian High Arctic. One of the years included a period of anomalously warm conditions that allowed us to address the question of how loss of multi‐year ice cover affects the limnological properties of polar lakes. A mooring installed at the deepest point of the lake (9.7 m) recorded temperature, oxygen, chlorophyll a (Chl a ) fluorescence, and underwater irradiance from July 2016 to July 2018, and an automated camera documented changes in ice cover. The complete loss of ice cover in summer 2016 resulted in full wind exposure and complete mixing of the water column. This mixing caused ventilation of lake water heat to the atmosphere and 4°C lower water temperatures than under ice‐covered conditions. There were also high values of Chl a fluorescence, elevated turbidity levels and large oxygen fluctuations throughout fall and winter. During the subsequent summer, the lake retained its ice cover and the water column remained stratified, with lower Chl a fluorescence and anoxic bottom waters. Extreme warming events are likely to shift polar lakes that were formerly capped by continuous thick ice to a regime of irregular ice loss and unstable limnological conditions that vary greatly from year to year

Mapping midwifery and obstetric units in England

Objective: to describe the configuration of midwifery units, both alongside&free-standing, and obstetric units in England.Design: national survey amongst Heads of Midwifery in English Maternity ServicesSetting: National Health Service (NHS) in EnglandParticipants: English Maternity ServicesMeasurements: descriptive statistics of Alongside Midwifery Units and Free-standing Midwifery Units and Obstetric Units and their annual births/year in English Maternity ServicesFindings: alongside midwifery units have nearly doubled since 2010 (n = 53–97); free-standing midwifery units have increased slightly (n = 58–61). There has been a significant reduction in maternity services without either an alongside or free-standing midwifery unit (75–32). The percentage of all births in midwifery units has trebled, now representing 14% of all births in England. This masks significant differences in percentage of all births in midwifery units between different maternity services with a spread of 4% to 31%.Key conclusions: In some areas of England, women have no access to a local midwifery unit, despite the National Institute for Health&Clinical Excellence (NICE) recommending them as an important place of birth option for low risk women. The numbers of midwifery units have increased significantly in England since 2010 but this growth is almost exclusively in alongside midwifery units. The percentage of women giving birth in midwifery units varies significantly between maternity services suggesting that many midwifery units are underutilised.Implications for practice: Both the availability and utilisation of midwifery units in England could be improved

Global Warming, Sea Level Rise And Tort

It is the aim of the law to attempt to provide remedies for wrongs and to attempt to punish those who have caused harm. What harms may be punished and what remedies exist for what wrong are what a life, indeed, many lifetimes in the law can be spent contemplating. According to the August 25, 1924 account on the front page of the New York lTimes ( Bomb Blast Injures 13 in Station Crowd ) thirteen persons were injured when one of three men (assumed to be Italians on their way to a celebration on Long Island) carrying packages of fireworks sought to board a Long Island Railroad train and being helped along by a push from a guard on the platform, dropped a package that fell under the wheels of the train and exploded. The tort action that resulted, Palsgraf v. Long Island Railroad Co., 162 N.E 99 (N.Y. 1928), is the most famous case in all of torts. Generations of students and lawyers have sought to comprehend the nature of causation by reading Judge Cardozo\u27s majority opinion. The debate between Cardozo\u27s limited version of causation and Judge Andrew\u27s much broader minority version of causation is not, and will not ever be, over. The question of how and when the law should act to redress a wrong, to attempt to heal with an order or with money is replayed in ever changing venues in every generation. As a new generation oversees perhaps the final chapters in our relations with the earth, nature and each other, the questions of harm and duty and causation are cast in new terms, but a close observer will note nothing new under the sun

Exploitation and Abuse of the Elderly During the Great Recession: A Maine Practitioner\u27s Perspective

The practitioner often cringes on first exposure to elder abuse. Beating, cheating, or cynically misusing a parent or other beloved elder not only shocks and disheartens those who stumble upon it, but often leaves the practitioner, like the poet, with “a tighter breathing and Zero at the bone.” Nothing in our culture prepares us to behold the abused elder. The elder herself is often similarly shocked and ashamed. Many times, an abused elder is in denial and may feel that she has somehow allowed the abuse to occur. Or the elder may feel that the abuser—oftentimes a family member, trusted neighbor, or caregiver—is somehow entitled to their share of the financial pie for providing companionship or performing basic physical care or household tasks. Approximately 700,000 to 3.5 million elders are abused, exploited, or neglected in America each year. In Maine, an estimated 5 percent of the elderly were victims of abuse in 2009. Further, it is estimated that about 84 percent of elder abuse cases in Maine go unreported. National estimates echo this trend; the National Center on Elder Abuse indicates that only one in six cases of elder abuse are identified and reported each year. Much of the underreporting and outright denial of elder abuse can be attributed to the shock and shame felt by the victim and the subsequent rationalization of her abusive situation. The purpose of this Article to is to explore the roots, nature, and prevalence of elder abuse, and exploitation in Maine from the perspective of a legal services practitioner, with an emphasis on the remedies currently available and the real— and perceived—barriers faced by the elderly and their advocates as they pursue justice against their exploiters during the current economic crisis