Jerusalem, Israel Arieh O’Sullivan / The Me – Descending the Tower, the imposing new state-of-the-art inpatient hospital at Hadassah’s Ein Kerem Medical Center, Joseph Mapa was impressed. The chief executive officer of Toronto’s Mt. Sinai Hospital said he’s seen innovations he would like to bring back to Canada.

“It’s leading edge. Just the thinking behind it! Healing gardens, patient rooms, square feet, two beds per room, one bed per room, one window per patient…I mean these are huge developments,” Mapa told The Media Line. “It’s not something we wouldn’t do in the States, or in Canada, and it’s something you certainly want to see and showcased,” he adds.

Mapa was part of a first-ever delegation of CEOs from the top hospitals and medical centers across North America that were visiting Israel this week. This was the brainchild of Rafael Harpaz, director of the Economic Department for America and Africa at Israel’s Foreign Ministry.

“We think we have a lot to share with our friends and colleagues from the USA and Canada on medical technologies, cutting-edge technologies, readiness and preparedness and managing medical science through computers. I think these are areas where Israel has good experience,” Harpaz told The Media Line.

Israel’s life expectancy is much higher than the U.S. and its systems of socialized medicine ensures that everyone has access to basic healthcare while Israel spends a smaller percentage of its gross domestic product on health. There still are problems, most recently with doctors striking for higher wages last year. Its major hospitals are equipped with some of the latest medical technologies, which impressed the delegates.

“The American system has many great things, but also many things to learn from this country and I think that the level of medicine here and the level of training is every bit as good as medicine that I see now at the States,” Kevin Tabb, the CEO of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, told The Media Line.

“In the States, for better or for worse, medicine in many ways is a business,” Tabb said. “It’s about making patients better, but it is also a financial business. But in Israel that really is not the case, and that is very interesting for people, especially for people from the United States, less so for Canada.”

Tabb said they shared data on costs and saw how care similar to that offered in the U.S. was extended with fewer resources in Israel.

“It’s amazing to see the relatively small budgets for an Israeli hospital, doing tremendous amount things, on what would be considered a pittance in the U.S. and that’s fascinating,” Tabb said.

The Tower at Hadassah is slated to be opened later this month and crews are busy scuttling around clearing away scaffolding and supplies. Not all of the floors are finished, but the fifth floor is spectacular with parquet floors and equipment still in plastic.

“This has been a tremendous exchange of North American healthcare leaders with Israeli healthcare leaders,” Amir Dan Rubin, president and CEO of Stanford University Medical Center. “While our political and reimbursement and systems are different, and the organization of our health systems are different, at the core we have common missions; taking care of patients and … research and education.”

“The challenges are similar here,” Rubin said. “We all have issues of how do we provide insurance coverage so there is the payment issue and there is the delivery system, there are access issues, there is improving quality and innovations and while our mechanisms are slightly different those themes are common.”

The group was briefed at Sheba Medical Center and is slated to visit Sourasky Medical Center, Beilinson Hospital — all in Tel Aviv — and Rambam Hospital in Haifa as well as the IDF Medical Forces center in Tzrifin where they will see the emergency unit that deploys at crises around the globe.

“We didn’t anticipate that so many of the CEOs of the big hospitals in North America would come and we are blessed with a delegation which is close to 50 top heads of hospitals and medical centers,” Harpaz said.

“We share the same challenges that we are facing in our medical treatment, and they appreciate that we are doing this, but on the other hand they are really impressed by all which Israel has to offer. And we have a lot to offer when it comes to medical technologies.”

At Sheba, the group observed a simulation of a mass casualty event, something that Israeli hospitals constantly drill for. Catherine Zahn, CEO of Toronto’s Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, found the spirit of Israelis compelling.

“There is a societal receptivity to open mindedness and forward thinkingness,” Zahn told The Media Line. “Like Israel, Canadians believe health care is a basic right of a citizen, a basic human right, rather than a commodity to be bought and sold. There is definitely a kinship there, but I think we have a lot to learn from the perspective of the ‘innovation nation’,” Zahn said.

“It’s also interesting to see how the situation in the Middle East, and the involvement of the military in the country actually probably contributes to that resilience and the attitude that if this doesn’t work out let’s pick up and do something else,” she added. “Picking up on the advances from military science and translating them into health care advances. Those are all very remarkable.”

These sentiments were echoed by her fellow Canadian, Mapa.

“The Israeli system is spectacular — from clinical care to service, to IT in particular, clinical technology, to crisis management,” Mapa said. “It’s state-of-the-art, I mean, its fantastic. We’re excited, but I tell you this not because I am excited, but you see it is evidence based…and that’s what turn us on. Turns me on for sure.”

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Allergies are increasing in America, and a large portion of the overall rise may be attributed to an uptick in ragweed and mold allergies, a new study suggests.

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Initiative Builds on Integrated Care Model of Medicaid Health Plans WASHINGTON, May 13, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — Medicaid Health Plans of America (MHPA) commends Health and Human Services …

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(NaturalNews) A mugger confronts a business man walking down the street, flashing a sharp knife. “Give me all your money. I’ve got kids to feed,” he insists. The business man calmly responds, “Well that’s not fair, I’ve got kids to feed, too.” Momentarily flummoxed, the mugger works out a bit of math and retorts, “Okay, I’m gonna take a balanced approach with you. Just give me HALF of all your money, and we’ll call it even.” Such is the logic of the Obama administration, which now absurdly proposes that spending America into a total debt collapse is somehow a “balanced approach.” Sure, it is balanced in the same way that a man walking a tightrope strung 35 stories above the city street, carrying two suitcases stuffed with hundreds of pounds of T-bills, with strong winds and a forecast of an approaching hail storm is also “balanced.” That Obama could even pretend such a scenario is healthy for the future of America just goes to show you the depth of financial insanity that has gripped the players in Washington D.C. — on both sides of the aisle. Today, President Obama proposed spending cuts of $4 trillion over the next 12 years, but just as we figured, virtually none of those cuts kick in until Obama is out of office. They’re all “back-loaded” cuts that happen at some theoretical time in the future rather than right now. It’s like a heroin addict who says, “I’ll quit my habit tomorrow. Just not right now” as he takes another hit. Notably, Obama’s so-called balanced budget cuts don’t balance the budget . A $4 trillion cut in spending over 12 years is still a complete joke, and here’s why: The U.S. government will likely rack up at least $30 trillion in new debt over those same 12 years, just based on a very conservative estimate of current growth rates in the debt. In other words, under Obama’s new plan, the national debt will grow by $26 trillion over the next 12 years . Obama’s debt spending is accelerating so rapidly that the mathematicians now call it a “blowout phase” of government debt. And what, exactly, is getting blown out? Your future, of course. But according to Obama, that’s a “balanced approach.” He’s going to burden your children and grandchildren with the greatest debt the world has ever seen — a debt so large and growing so quickly that no nation can conceivably escape from under its weight… especially a nation that has lost its manufacturing base, that has dumbed down its education system and that has routinely poisoned its population with fluoride, medications and chemical food additives. The odds of America ever paying off its national debt are approximately the same odds of a Japanese senior citizen surfing a 5-meter-high tsunami wave to the safety of dry land. Enter the realm of economic voodoo (not to be confused with voodoo economics) Debt apologists and deniers, of course, will calmly explain that it’s all no problem. “America can handle a little more debt,” they say. “We can just pay it off down the road, who cares?” History will soon show these people to be fools; and those who follow them cowards. The beautiful thing about the English language is that it offers the breadth of possibilities to express almost any idea you can think of; but words alone don’t make ideas true. The utterance that “We will balance the budget over the next ten years” doesn’t actually make it happen. It is merely a moment of wishful thinking; like a wish upon a star: Star Light Star bright, The first star I see tonight, I wish I may, I wish I might, Have the wish I wish tonight. Let the national debt be ZERO! Shazam! Like some sort of modern economic voodoo, we can wish away all our debt. You just have to BELIEVE in it, folks. You have to have faith, you see. Obama’s New Ministry of Economic Voodoo In this way, Obama’s “balanced approach” fiasco has become The New Ministry of Economic Voodoo. It is a non-denominational church where people of all races and national origins are welcome to join. But the most important factor necessary to join Obama’s New Ministry of Economic Voodoo is that you completely abandon any attachments to economic reality and the laws of mathematics. Those things are mere burdens and have no place inside the New Ministry of Economic Voodoo. They will also distract you from the “faith” to be placed in the “savior” of Obama whose angelic powers will soon overcome the laws of economics, we are promised, much like Moses parting the Red Sea. The Heaven’s Gate cult which ended in 1997 with the mass suicide of its 39 members promised eternal life in Heaven if you would only kill yourself on command (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heaven%27s_Gate_%28religious_group%29). Obama’s New Ministry of Economic Voodoo promises eternal budget surpluses if you will just kill your rational mind and surrender to the power of scripted verbal rhetoric. Obama is to the U.S. economy what Marshall Applewhite was to the members of Heaven’s Gate: The bringer of destruction, disguised as a savior. They both speak the language of salvation, but they only deliver the outcome of destruction. Both Applewhite and Obama are, by any reasonable reckoning, false prophets who use their powers of persuasive rhetoric to gain power over the very people they are harming the most: their followers. The message of the false prophet A false prophet says, “I am going to save you. Follow me and stop thinking for yourself.” A genuine prophet says, “I am going to show you how to save yourself. Follow your inner wisdom and learn how to think for yourself.” Do you recognize which message Obama is spouting? A false prophet comes to you dressed in a slick business suit, with a P.R. team and a cadre of image specialists who check his makeup, lighting and hair style to make sure the presentation is exactly right. A genuine prophet may be dressed in ragged clothing and have holes in his shoes. His hands may still have soil on them from the garden, and his image is largely based on who he is from the inside out, not what he wants you to see from the outside in. A false prophet needs a teleprompter for every speech because he has no inner wisdom to guide his words. His soul, and his mind, are empty. A genuine prophet can speak from the heart, spontaneously and without rehearsing his words, because his speech comes from a place of authentic truth, not a scripted agenda. A false prophet is obsessed with how the public sees him; he is constantly running polls and surveys to see what people think, and he uses those results to determine his direction. A genuine prophet cares little about what others think; he is driven purely by principle, and his direction stays true to his intention regardless of the changes in public sentiment. A false prophet practices the skills of oratory and persuasion in order to persuade people to close their minds and follow him without question. A genuine prophet develops the skills of oratory and persuasion as a natural extension of the truth in his message, and he uses those skills to persuade people to OPEN their minds and start ASKING questions. Here at NaturalNews, we don’t claim to be prophets, but we do encourage everyone to open their minds and start asking lots of questions about health, freedom, government, environment, money and other topics. If you’re new to NaturalNews, I’m the volunteer editor, and I’ve been writing articles like this for over seven years. Lately, I’ve been unleashed in my writings due to the rapid acceleration of troubling world events and the need to reach people with articles that don’t hold back and don’t try to sugar coat the situation. Subscribe to my free email newsletter to receive a daily email update linking to each day’s breaking news stories: http://www.naturalnews.com/ReaderRegistration.html In the mean time, stay on your toes, folks. We are all being fed a complete load of lies by the members of both political parties in Washington. The future of our nation’s financial solvency is at stake, and these jokers are only making the problem worse with each passing moment. Frankly, I now do not expect a solution to come from within the current system. This system is headed towards inevitable collapse, and we can only hope that what comes out of it in the aftermath will be more sensible and sustainable. The idea that we should all just vote for whichever professional politician tells the best-sounding lies has proven it doesn’t work.

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The latest data show that about 40% of adoptions in America involve such families; among children from other countries adopted by American parents, 84% are transracial or transethnic, says Adam …

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Miami, FL, United States (AHN) – President Barack Obama was the guest of honor Friday afternoon at one of Florida’s formerly failing high schools to deliver a speech pushing America to refund and reform education.

Obama spoke alongside Education Secretary Arne Duncan and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, but only after cheering students from Miami Central Senior High, a majority African American school, gave a heartfelt welcome to America’s first African American president.

“How do we attract new jobs, new businesses, new industries to our shores?” Obama asked the crowd. “How do we grow our economy and out-compete our competitors? In today’s economy, companies are making decisions on where to locate, who to hire, based on key factors [including where to find] highly skilled, highly educated workers – that’s what they’re looking for.”

“I decided to come to Miami Central to kick-off ‘Education Month’ because you’re doing what I challenged states to do when I took office, and that’s turning the lowest performing schools around,” Obama said.

In his address, Obama outlined plans to increase funding for failing schools, citing Miami Central as proof federal assistance aimed at turning around “F” institutions can produce real results. The Department of Education has been giving states School Improvement Grants (SIG) since 1965, but Obama boosted funding as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. Duncan pushed for $3.5 billion in SIG funding in 2009 and Obama has added an additional $545 million in funding for 2011.

Obama toured Miami Central, making a surprise visit to spill-over students who couldn’t fit into the gym and thought they were going to see the president speak from a television. Awaiting the Commander-in-Chief’s speech in the school’s library, the students were given a surprise visit from Obama, who received a warm welcome. Other students showed the president their work in creating robots in the classroom.

“This used to be a place where problems on the streets followed children into the classrooms,” Obama explained. “Where there was a culture of failure that brought everyone down. Now, turning around these schools isn’t easy… we have to reform how things are done. It isn’t easy to turn around an expectation of failure, and turn that into an expectation of excellence.”

In Florida, SIG funding totaled $170.2 million, with almost $14 million going to 19 embattled schools in Miami-Dade County, home to America’s fourth-largest public school district serving more than 380,000 students. One SIG success story is Miami Central High School. Miami Central earned an “F” the year Obama took office, but after receiving federal SIG funding, the school improved to receive a “C” this year.

“Here’s what I say; I’m not willing to give up on any child in America. I’m not willing to give up on any school in America. I do not accept failure here in America. I believe the status quo is unacceptable. I believe it’s time to change, and it’s time we come together. Just like Jeb [Bush] and I are doing today – to give every child in America the chance to live up to their God-given potential.”

“A good education equals a good job,” Obama explained. “If we want more good news on the jobs front, we need to make more investments on the education front.”

“Educational achievement is an issue of national priority,” added Bush, whose father and brother have both served time as Republicans in the White House. “Every child, regardless of their zip code or family income should have access to a quality education.”

Aboard Air Force 1 enroute to Florida, newly installed White House Press Secretary Jay Carney explained Obama’s had his eye on Miami Central for a while. “The president very much wanted to go to this particular high school to highlight the dramatic turnaround they have accomplished there and still in the process of accomplishing, and also to make the point that by having former Gov. Jeb Bush join him at this event that he firmly believes what I think most Americans believe and that certainly former Gov. Bush believes, and that is that education and education reform are not Democratic issues, they’re not Republican issues, they’re American issues.”

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Tucson, AZ, United States (AHN) – The University of Arizona has established an institute to promote civility in public debate. The center, which is chaired by two former U.S. presidents, follows last month’s shooting in Tucson that injured Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) and left six dead.

The National Institute for Civil Discourse is a non-partisan center at the university’s School of Government and Public Policy.

Its mission is to promote civic engagement consistent with First Amendment principles by developing programs and by gathering policy-makers to discuss issues that attract controversy and acrimony.

The center is chared by former President George H. W. Bush and former President Bill Clinton.

“Our country needs a setting for political debate that is both frank and civil,” Bush said in a statement released bythe university.

“America faces big challenges in revitalizing the American Dream at home and preserving our leadership for security, peace, freedom and prosperity in the world. Meeting them requires an honest dialogue celebrating both a clarification of our differences and a genuine stand for principled comparisons,” Clinton added.

The institute’s board is made up of a mix of liberal and conservative leaders, including Ken Duberstein, former chief of staff of the Reagan White House, and former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright.

FOX host Greta Van Susteren and Harvard Institute of Politics director Trey Grayson are also members of the board.

Giffords was among 13 people wounded when a gunman opened fire outside a Safeway in Tucson on Jan. 8. One of her aides died in the tragedy along with a judge, John Roll, whom Bush appointed to the federal bench, and a nine-year old girl who had been elected to her school’s student council.

The shooting took place amid a highly charged national debate about issues such as immigration and healthcare. It ignited criticisms and accusations of partisanship and the use of inciteful political rhetoric, an argument President Barack Obama addressed in his speech at the university’s memorial for the shooting victims.

“The truth is none of us can know exactly what triggered this vicious attack,” Obama had said. “None of us can know with any certainty what might have stopped these shots from being fired, or what thoughts lurked in the inner recesses of a violent man’s mind.”

“If, as has been discussed in recent days, their death helps usher in more civility in our public discourse,” he added, “let us remember it is not because a simple lack of civility caused this tragedy — it did not — but rather because only a more civil and honest public discourse can help us face up to the challenges of our nation in a way that would make them proud.”

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(NaturalNews) If you carry bagels or other food items with you on an airplane these days, you’d better paint them red white and blue just to make sure all the passengers around you know you’re truly an American. Otherwise, they just might turn you in. In yet another case of air passengers turning into in-flight SS troops , a Florida professor was arrested, handcuffed and removed from a plane when his fellow passengers reported he had a “suspicious-looking bag” in his hands. The contents of that suspicious-looking bag turned out to be a bagel with cream cheese , a set of keys and a hat. But in America’s ultra-paranoid environment where the U.S. government actually encourages people to spy on each other (http://www.naturalnews.com/030648_Wal-Mart_suspicious_activity.html), apparently just about anything can set off the suspicions of the citizens’ secret police. Maybe you talk funny, or walk funny or just look funny. Maybe your skin isn’t white. Maybe you speak with some sort of foreign accent which, as all Americans already know, means you must be a terrorist. Perhaps you pay with cash instead of a credit card. What? Only a terrorist would carry cash! Or maybe you are just “suspiciously minding your own business” and not chatting it up with all the other people around you. That makes you a potential terrorist, too, didn’t you know? I can’t wait to see how quickly I’ll be arrested on my next flight. I bring superfood powders and a Blender Bottle with that springy metal mixer inside. So during the flight, I’m sitting there mixing water and powders like some sort of mad chemist. Some nutritional noob sitting nearby would no doubt have no clue what was really going on and probably call the flight attendant to report, in secretive tones, “There’s a strange man sitting over there mixing up a bomb!” And that’s all it would take. The FBI’s anti-terrorism unit would be called out, the plane would be diverted to the nearest landing strip, the on-board Air Marshall would pull a gun on me, and I’d be arrested upon landing, then interrogated for 48 hours under the U.S. Patriot Act (no more Bill of Rights, see?) for the mere act of drinking superfoods on a flight. Obama becomes Bush This is no exaggeration, by the way. The paranoia has reached precisely such a level on airplanes crossing the skies of America today. This is all due to government-sponsored paranoia and the idea that people should all spy on each other. Just today, the Obama administration, which was elected primarily to oppose the secret prisons and fear-mongering of the Bush administration, has now announced that federal agencies should all spy on their employees to prevent future Wikileaks incidents (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40916433/ns/us_news-wikileaks_in_security). Now, the mere act of not being a “happy” federal employee makes you a suspicious target for being spied on, too. This just gets more and more like 1984 all the time, doesn’t it? Be sure to watch my “report suspicious behavior at Wal-Mart” video at: http://www.naturalnews.tv/v.asp?v=5A4B5D4B84344D5D9CBD262A53D8B071 Oh, and don’t bring a bagel on any flights. Your average corn-fed American thinks a bagel is “foreign food” and it immediately raises red flags that you might be a terrorist. Same story with hummous. Actually, hummous is even more suspicious and can earn you a trip to Guantanamo Bay just for mentioning it, because your typical TSA moron can’t differentiate between “hummous” and “Hamas.” They think “hummous” is a terrorist group. The whole thing is so sadly laughable. Instead of addressing the real threats to America (such as the Federal Reserve and the FDA), the U.S. government turns the citizenry into a network of secret spies who now accuse each other of being terrorists for things like going to the bathroom too many times during a flight. (I drank some watermelon juice, okay?) If you really want to protect the safety of the American people, just dismantle the FDA and end the government-protected monopolies for Big Pharma and conventional medicine. You would save upwards of several hundred thousand lives a year just from the decrease in deaths caused by the medical industry. Big Pharma’s FDA-approved drugs, just by themselves, kill roughly 30 times the number of Americans killed in 9/11 — every year! That’s why the FDA is far more dangerous than any terrorism group (http://www.naturalnews.com/009278.html). In fact, the most suspicious person on an airplane these days should be a drug company CEO . There’s a terrorist if I ever saw one. Someone call 911. Sources for this story include: http://www.nbcmiami.com/news/local-beat/Florida-Professor-Arrested-for-Having-aSuspicious-Bagel-on-a-Plane-112825029.html

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flu season approaches, a survey of 525 nurses from America’s leading hospitals reveals that 93 percent of nurses are confident that hospitals are “far better prepared” to handle a poten

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(NaturalNews) With the same passion she has brought to her eye-opening discussions about natural cancer cures, Charlotte Gerson is spearheading a live video webcast this coming Tuesday, December 28, that offers advanced solutions for cancer, obesity, diabetes and heart disease. The event is hosted by Jonathan Landsman, host of the NaturalNews Talk Hour, and also features Howard Straus, a health freedom and natural cures advocate who says “The number one killer of Americans is the American medical system.” The full video webcast event is being streamed online in real time. It runs this Tuesday at 6pm (PST) / 9pm (EST) and allows participants to submit questions for Charlotte Gerson to answer. A limited number of seats are available. Learn more at: http://www.naturalnews.com/Charlotte-Gerson-Event.html For those who can’t make the scheduled time on Tuesday, unlimited replays of the entire event are provided through January 28. This also allows webcast participants to review the material, watch it a second time, or even play the webcast for a friend or family member who needs to expand their knowledge of health. Advanced solutions for the world’s most deadly diseases In this webcast event, Charlotte Gerson tackles the biggest diseases threatening America and the western world today: Cancer, diabetes, heart disease and obesity. She told NaturalNews she plans to provide tips for lifelong weight loss (based on real nutrition, not gimmicks), how to boost your immunity using the natural medicine found in real foods, why the cancer industry is incapable of solving the cancer pandemic, proven ways to reverse diabetes by “reconfiguring” your body’s metabolism to function in a more healthful way, how to activate your inner healing potential and other similar topics. Charlotte Gerson is one of the most well-informed, outspoken and widely loved experts on healing cancer, nutritional cleansing and self healing. Her range of knowledge on the subject is truly astounding, and her educational efforts have impacted millions of people and helped save countless lives from not just cancer but also the cancer industry (which kills more people than cancer itself). Join in this live event Tuesday to see Charlotte LIVE, in real time, providing the most up-to-date solutions on healing cancer, heart disease, diabetes and obesity. Here’s the link to reserve your spot: http://www.naturalnews.com/Charlotte-Gerson-Event.html You can watch this event from anywhere in the world, by the way. As long as you have bandwidth, you’ll be able to tune in from any Mac or PC. This event is being coordinated with NaturalNews and earns our highest recommendation for those seeking real answers to life-threatening disease. If you’ve already tried the conventional medical system and have been poisoned instead of healed — or if you’re just looking for a completely natural approach to preventing disease — this live event with Charlotte Gerson may be one of the most life-changing experiences you’ll ever have. The information Charlotte has to offer in this event is the kind of healing wisdom that could save America from sick-care bankruptcy if it were universally embraced, yet the established medical system simply generates too much profit from sickness and disease to allow these solutions to be widely known. However, YOU can learn these health-restoring secrets on your own, regardless of the sick-care industry and its profit agenda that would prefer nobody knows these answers. Stay informed and stay well. Your body knows how to prevent disease , and Charlotte Gerson knows how to activate your body’s healing systems! Watch the entire event by registering today: http://www.naturalnews.com/Charlotte-Gerson-Event.html I’ll be watching the event, too, because I always learn something new with Charlotte Gerson is speaking!

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