My background was for many years academic, but teacher burnout, I guess, was inevitable and I became a free lance Journalist specializing in health related issues. I specifically am interested in third world health problems, end of life issues, "futile care" the wisdom of the business model for health care, the potential abuse of physician assisted suicide, cross cultural stumbling blocks in the physician patient relationship. I have an MA degree in French from Harvard, an MA from Columbia University in TESOL (teaching English to speakers of other languages) plus too many years of experience. I tend to be longwinded , so I will sum this up by saying that my passions are: human rights, tolerance, peace and as John Done said, "no man is an island, entire of itself (20th century English, not his) everyman is a piece of the Continent, a part of the maine: if a clod be washed away by the Sea..." and at the very end "therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls: It tolls for thee..."