The authors looked at how economic changes have affected mortality rates in 26 European Union (EU) countries over the past three decades, and identified how governments might reduce adverse effects.

They found that for every 1% increase in unemployment, there was a 0.8% rise in suicide rates at ages younger than 65 years—or between 60 and 550 extra suicides per year across the EU. Murder rates also rose 0.8%. Both these effects were greatest at working ages…If unemployment rose by more than 3%, suicide rates for those aged under 65 rose by 4.5%, and deaths from alcohol abuse by 28%.

Of course, there was a little icing on the cake:

By contrast, road traffic accidents decreased by 1.4%.

Always a glass-half-full bunch, those researchers.

American dependence on fossil fuels isn’t going to end any time soon: solar panels and wind turbines provided only about a half per cent of total U.S. energy consumption in 2007, and they don’t work when the sun isn’t shining or the wind isn’t blowing.

and poo-poos the entire green jobs initiative with an argument that makes little to no sense:

Creating “green jobs,” a key component of the agenda, is different from creating new jobs, since green jobs, if they’re truly green, displace non-green jobs—wind-turbine mechanics instead of oil-rig roughnecks—probably a zero-sum game, as far as employment is concerned.

Luckily, over at Grist, Joseph Romm, the editor of Climate Progress and a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, has taken up the gauntlet, delivering a righteous smackdown that addresses many of the problems with the piece.

But the trend of major publications tossing out oversimplified, under-proven information and faulty analysis is troubling, to say the least. As just about any climate change scientist will tell you (possibly in a hysterical shriek) the time for action—not endless debate, not rehashing talking points—is now. Making sure the public has access to the most accurate and up-to-date information should be a priority for the media—not spewing apocalyptic prophecies about how we’ll all be sucked into an abyss. Inaction will bring that result whether we like it or not—so we may as well try action.

Is the underlying point fair? Absolutely—simply training more scientists in order to “solve” our economic and environmental problems is like ordaining more priests to “solve” the current marriage decline. But Joe’s details get sucked into the quagmire of poor logic, to the point where a few of them border on ludicrous. Take his stance on health care:

 Given the spiraling cost of healthcare, and the fact that few people are satisfied with our system, this is obviously one of the most fertile industries for growth. But our problem isn’t a lack of science. Our problem isn’t that engineers haven’t created enough dubious miracle pills. It’s that our conception of the system is wrong. We have antiquated models for healthcare delivery on all kinds of fronts, from how it’s paid for to who patients see when they get ill.

We’ll be the last to say there’s no room for improvement in the health care system. There are countless opportunities for improving treatment effectiveness and efficiency that don’t involve just training more doctors (though we need those too, in a BIG way). Computerization of medical records, while not a simple task, will ultimately save time, money, and lives. But halting funding for drug research—particularly when we’re on the cusp of some pretty remarkable new stuff—is pretty absurd.

Then there’s his take on education (we’re assuming he means the larger education system, and not just scientific courses of study):

Our system is in shambles and has been dysfunctional for a long time. We have a huge problem of matching students up against the type of education that would suit them — more vocational training for many of them would be good — and for many students there’s no upside in being educated. It’s a gaping opportunity, but it’s not a science question. It’s more a matter policy and design than anything else.

Well, actually, there is an upside in properly educating our population: Not doing so leads to a disastrous, dogmatic mess that erodes the integrity of education—not to mention causes expensive and pointless ideology battles that take our attention away from problems like oh, say, the looming financial and environmental apocalypses.

But the main problem with Joe’s central argument is this:

Science education isn’t just about teaching 11th graders where dinosaurs came from (which we can’t even do correctly). It’s about investing in our role as a superpower. Since the second World War, the superiority of American science and technology is what has made the U.S. a world leader, with our engineering/tech/medical innovation pumping billions into the economy and establishing all that world dominance we’re now so in danger of losing. If we stop valuing (and funding) research labs that house scientific innovators, and squelch scientific progress for dogmatic reasons—both of which we’ve been doing steadily over the past 8 years—then we risk losing that innovation to other countries—which has already begun happening.

So no, the answer isn’t simply to throw money at education—or at banks, or newspapers, or corn farmers. We need careful assessment of the specific issues in each science-related industry, and enactment of a variety of solutions. But education in all its forms has been, and remains, a pretty crucial cog in this wheel.

Plus we really do need more doctors—unless Boomer-spawn like us want to care for all those aging parents ourselves.

• Scientists give a big thumbs up to Obama’s environmental plan.

• A handy list of all the biggest “global cooling” hacks, now in bar graph form.

• Poor Tesla. The bad news just keeps on comin’.

• A universal flu vaccine nears completion—but will we have the cash to distribute it?

• Finally, some sliding profits news to be happy about. Oh no wait, never mind.

• Senate decides (thank goodness) that children and health insurance are two things that should really continue to go together.

“The Vatican said it was launching the channel to broaden Benedict’s audience while also giving the Holy See better control over the papal image online.”

Nice to know his Holiness is as worried about his online reputation as the rest of us. The channel will be updated daily and include clips of papal news items, with content produced by the Vatican’s television station, CTV (not to be confused with the other CTV, which produces plenty of non-Pope-approved material). The clips will be broadcast in Italian, German, English, and Spanish.

To top off his technological embrace, Benedict also gave social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace his official blessing, calling them a “gift to humanity” in their ability to foster friendships and connections.

Of course, all this Internet love doesn’t come without a caveat:

But Benedict also warned that virtual socializing had its risks, saying “obsessive” online networking could isolate people from real social interaction and broaden the digital divide by further marginalizing people.

Not to mention lead to all sorts of dangerous addictions.

Related:
Disco: Vatican Science: Pope Blames Male Infertility on…the Pill
Disco: They Tried to Make Us Go to Web Surfing Rehab But We Said LOL
RB: One Religion that’s Actually Embracing Science: Buddhism

Image: Courtesy of www.vatican.va

• But first, bye bye absurd abortion laws!

• The Inauguration killed the Internets! No mere series of tubes can withstand the pressure of this seminal moment in history.

• “BarackBerry,” “ObamaBerry”—call it what you will, we still can’t get over the fact that he’s the first president ever to use e-mail while in office.

• An economist explains why all those hospital procedures cost what they do.

• The trees are dying! The trees are dying!

• OMG! We’re in the White House! Blogging, presidential style.

• No, Virginia, there’s no such thing as truly clean coal.

But could all this pro-science fervor have secondary benefits besides, oh, say, putting big dents in global warming and the looming health care crisis? The New York Times takes on this question, asking whether the new administration will enable scientists to “tackle a chronic conundrum of their beloved enterprise: how to attract more women into the fold, and keep them once they are there.”

The general hypothesis behind the supposed Obama-boost for women is that the rise of science awareness and “geek chic” will be good for all scientists, and thus women will eventually get some trickle-down benefit—a somewhat weak line of reasoning, particularly when you consider how well it worked in Reaganomics. And critics of the argument point out—quite rightly—that what could really give women a boost is if a single female scientist was appointed to the President’s Council of Advisers on Science and Technology.

Of course, the real capacity for a pro-female boost, which the article eventually hits on, lies in the new president’s ability to grant additional family leave and parental benefits to the recipients of federal grants—a group that includes a ton of research scientists, many of them women. Though whether that’ll have any affect on the dearth of female physicists is anyone’s guess.

Related:
RB: The Mommy Wars and Science Collide (Again)
RB: Note to Media: They Give Nobel Prizes to Women These Days
RB: Title IX Hits the Science World, But Will It Do Any Good?

So what are some top science priorities that President Obama can stick on his “ASAP” list? Here’s a few ideas, along with the likelihood that they’ll be addressed in the super/semi/not-so-near future:

Abortion: The most likely candidate on the list. CNN reports that the new president may repeal a 2001 Bush policy that prevents federal money from going to international family planning groups that perform abortions as early as today or tomorrow.

Stem Cells: Lifting the ban on federally-funded stem cell research is another move that’s likely to happen quickly.

Energy/Environment: So, uh, how ’bout those emissions cuts? Chances are, they won’t come until later in the year, with alt-energy legislation taking priority. And in the meantime, halting that environmental fire sale sure would be nice.

Health care: We need action. Fast. As in, yesterday. Yes, the task is huge and the hurdles enormous. But the costs of doing nothing to reform the American health care system will be crippling in every sense of the word. So where does the Big H.C. stand on the agenda? According to the Wall Street Journal, the new administration will “move fast on [Obama's] proposal to overhaul” health care, with a “major event at the White House” likely happening sometime in March.

Sure, there’ll be some people who actually attend the event in person—around 2 million brave souls have packed into the Mall in frigid temperatures, with questionable bathroom status (for comparison, around 400,000 showed up for Bush’s first inauguration). But for the rest of the world that didn’t make it to D.C. for the party, there’s a veritable smorgasbord of real-time coverage and information all over the airwaves. For those who still watch TV, you can see Obama take the reins on any cable or broadcast news station, or watch live feeds online from CNN, MSNBC, and just about every other news source. Then there are the liveblogs and Twitters, ot to mention Facebook statuses which, according to CNN (which has partnered with Facebook to offer simultaneous Web viewing and status-updating), are being updated at around 2,000 updates per minute, and 3,000 comments per minute. Not to mention the conversation rampaging among the 4 million fans on Obama’s official Facebook page.

Text messaging the event is rampant as well, to the point where the CEO of EzTexting.com Shane Neman issued a press release saying he believes millions of text messages will be lost, on the level of New Year’s Eve.

So there you have it—500 different ways to find out what’s going on in D.C. And if you miss all of it, not to worry—the replays will show up on YouTube momentarily.

• “Scientific and legal integrity” to return to the EPA. And not a moment too soon.

• A ruckus brews over cookies at the White House—and we don’t mean the kind with sugar and sprinkles.

• Facebook graduates from a civil litigation tool to a crime-fighting tool.

• Recession? What recession? Pass the console.

• And not to spoil the pre-inaugural lovefest with bad news or anything, but that little salmonella outbreak has caused 2 more deaths, bringing the total to 5 dead and over 400 sickened.