State Department confirms US-Cuba migration talks - MiamiHerald.com

The Guardian

State Department confirms US-Cuba migration talks MiamiHerald.com Obama administration officials have said the talks do not represent a change in U.S. policy toward Cuba and are consistent with Washington's efforts to ensure safe migration between the two nations. Nearly 25,000 Cuban migrants received U.S. visas in ... US, Cuba to Hold Migration Talks in Havana US and Cuba to hold fresh round of diplomatic talks in Havana

via cuba - Google News http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=t&fd=R&usg=AFQjCNFKqFf0CHsF7LmzkpjTAIe6gnEoGA&url=http://www.miamiherald.com/2014/01/08/3859299/state-department-confirms-us-cuba.html

Reforms in Cuba: Seat belt, mirrors, brake

WHEN the Cuban government said in December that it intended to let the population buy modern cars without requiring permits, many suspected there would be a catch. They were right.The cars, which can only be bought through state-owned suppliers, cost a fortune. A 2013 Peugeot 508, marketed in Europe as an affordable saloon car costing around $30,000, has a price tag of more than a quarter of a million dollars at a rundown showroom in Havana. A Chinese Geely, with more than 80,000 kilometres (50,000 miles) on the clock, is on sale for around $30,000. The average salary in Cuba is less than $20 a month. “What do they think they are selling? Aeroplanes?” jokes Erik, a handyman, as he looks at the price-list. “They don’t want to sell any cars. It’s all a show,” agrees Ernesto, a mechanic.The prices certainly seem designed to deter purchasers. Some even wondered whether there had been a clerical error and prices had been listed in Cuban pesos, Cuba’s local currency, which is worth 24 times less than the dollar-pegged convertible peso (CUC). Another theory is that the high prices are a preview of a widely predicted devaluation of the CUC as part of the government’s commitment to unify the island’s two currencies.A further explanation may lie in the immediate effect of the reform: the elimination of a thriving black-market trade in the permits to buy new cars. For decades these...

via The Economist: The Americas http://www.economist.com/news/americas/21593492-road-capitalism-does-not-run-smooth-seat-belt-mirrors-brake?fsrc=rss|ame

Mexico’s cowboy pilgrims: Saddle up, kneel down

Sombreros off for church

BEFORE dawn on January 4th the mesquite trees around José Reyes Morin’s farm are lit up with Christmas lights. Inside the house, breakfast is eaten by candlelight. Mr Morin, a stickler for the old ways, doesn’t much believe in using electricity at home for anything other than religious occasions.Appetites sated, a score of cowboys, one young woman and your (less young) correspondent mount scraggy horses. “Viva Cristo Rey,” (“Long Live Christ the King”) shouts Mr Morin, silver-buttoned comandante of the group, as the riders set off on a three-day pilgrimage to the 23-metre (75-foot) statue of Cristo Rey, high on a hill in the very centre of Mexico. That cry could once have got him killed as a Catholic reactionary. Today it is a call to rural traditions of faith and endurance in Mexico’s industrial heartland.As the sun rises, the group grows. By lunchtime about 850 horsemen, and a handful of women, are heading towards the monument, visible many miles away. Priests whom they encounter remind them that they are riding in the hoofprints of the Cristero martyrs, who...



via The Economist: The Americas http://www.economist.com/news/americas/21593493-rural-values-endure-industrial-heartland-saddle-up-kneel-down?fsrc=rss|ame

Tensions in Argentina: Holding the ring

IT HAS been a summer of discontent in Argentina. In December police forces in 20 of the country’s 24 districts went on strike in protest at low salaries, sparking the worst bout of looting since the crisis of 2001. A heatwave then knocked out the power in Buenos Aires during the holiday season, leaving tens of thousands without electricity for more than a fortnight. A combination of political torpor and economic fragility has once again raised questions about the precariousness of the country’s position.A few months ago things looked rosier. After brain surgery had forced her to rest for six weeks, President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner returned to work in November with aplomb. First she purged her cabinet of some of its more ineffectual ministers. Next she nodded through a $5 billion offer to compensate Spain’s Repsol for the nationalisation of YPF, an oil firm, in 2012. Ms Fernández even abandoned the widow’s weeds she had worn since her husband Nestor’s death in 2010.But clothes are easier to shed than Argentina’s grievances, exemplified by striking police. Although police salaries are not meagre, they are devoured by inflation, which private economists...



via The Economist: The Americas http://www.economist.com/news/americas/21593420-government-struggling-stay-its-feet-holding-ring?fsrc=rss|ame

Correction: Argentina’s maize harvest

We got our own numbers wrong when we reported estimates for Argentina’s maize harvest in billions of tonnes ("Still lying after all these years!", December 21st 2013). The units should have been in millions. Sorry.

via The Economist: The Americas http://www.economist.com/news/americas/21593460-correction-argentinas-maize-harvest?fsrc=rss|ame

A Medicine that Differs Slightly from Another Can Have a Big Health Benefit

First, there often are critical differences in clinical safety or effectiveness among drugs that act through similar mechanisms. Second, even if two drugs are each effective in 40% of patients with a particular symptom or disease, each of them may not work in the same 40%. Third, “supplemental,” or secondary, approvals of drugs — which […]



via John Goodman's Health Policy Blog http://healthblog.ncpa.org/a-medicine-that-differs-slightly-from-another-can-have-a-big-health-benefit/

Chile fires spark health alert

Officials in Chile urge residents of four regions to avoid exercising outside as thick smoke from forest fires spreads, fanned by high winds.



via BBC News - Latin America & Caribbean http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-25668238#sa-ns_mchannel=rss&ns_source=PublicRSS20-sa