Minnesota plays a unique role in the arena of health, with impactful political/cultural moments, and important contributions from institutions such as Mayo Clinic, Hazelden, UCare, among others. Over the decades, MPR News and American RadioWorks have produced a breadth of reports and programming specifically dedicated to the subject of health. This collection includes interviews, debates, speeches, and documentaries that provide greater detail to the many facets of healthcare, from both a local and national perspective.
May 8, 1998 - An MPR special on the tobacco trial and its implications. Contains discussion on tentative tobacco settlement between the State of Minnesota and Blue Cross/Blue Shield with the tobacco industry. Program includes updates and report summary from MPR’s Elizabeth Stawicki, Laura McCullum, and Bob Collins. There are also various interviews, including attorney Ron Meshbesher.
May 8, 1998 - MPR special on the tobacco settlement. Includes report from MPR’s Elizabeth Stawiki, followed by speeches and interviews from Skip Humphrey, Minnesota attorney general; Michael Ciresi, state's lead attorney; jurors, and others. A key component to settlement was the banning of tobacco marketing to children.
May 8, 1998 - Minnesota State Attorney General Skip Humphrey met with reporters and supporters this afternoon to outline some of the details of the tobacco settlement. Humphrey emphasized the elements of the agreement that are designed to reduce smoking among young people...... Minnesota Attorney General Skip Humphrey, speaking to reporters and supporters earlier this afternoon. Sun 28-MAY 11:19:21 MPR NewsPro Archive - Wed 04/11/2001
May 8, 1998 - Minnesota has now become the fourth state to settle its tobacco suit. The industry is already paying out a total of thirty (B) billion dollars to settle cases in Mississippi, Florida and Texas. Mississippi Attorney General Michael Moore was the first to settle with the industry for 3-point-35 (BILLION) dollars. Florida got 11 (Billion) and Texas got just over fifteen. We asked Attorney General Moore how Minnesota's settlement affects Mississippi's:
May 8, 1998 - When tobacco companies agreed to settle 40 state lawsuits against them last June, it did so with astonishing enthusiasm considering it was going to cost them more than 368-billion dollars. Critics, who are naturally suspicious of anything the Companies find acceptable, had little to use in an argument against the settlement.....until the Minnesota tobacco trial started. When it did, momentum toward a national deal stopped and the settlement collapsed. Minnesota Public Radio's Bob Collins looks at how the Minnesota trial has changed the national debate on tobacco.
May 8, 1998 - capitol to follow other stories: Word of a settlement in the case quickly spread from the Federal Courthouse downtown St. Paul...directly UP the HILL to the state capitol. Minnesota Public Radio's Karen-Louise Boothe reports on reaction from the Governor and some lawmakers
May 8, 1998 - Stanton Glantz is an anti-tobacco researcher who was thrust into the national spotlight in 1994 when he received an anonymous shipment of four-thousand internal tobacco company documents. Glantz, a professor of medicine at the University of California at San Francisco, used the papers as a basis for a book called "The Cigarette Papers," a landmark work about the tobacco industry's deception of the American people. Glantz sees the Minnesota's case as a continuation of his work. You might say if "The Cigarette Papers" provided a keyhole glimpse of the tobacco industry, then the Minnesota trial knocked down the door. Glantz doesn't see a settlement as a defeat, he sees it as another important step in defanging the tobacco industry:
May 11, 1998 - Michael Ciresi, Minnesota’s lead state attorney for the tobacco trial, discusses the tobacco settlement, in which the tobacco industry will pay the State of Minnesota 6.1 billion dollars, and Blue Cross/Blue Shield 500 million dollars. Topics include banning of tobacco marketing to children, collaboration with Blue Cross/Blue Shield, and litigation choices made. Ciresi also answers listener questions.
May 11, 1998 - Stephanie Coontz, Professor at Evergreen State College in Washington, speaking at the University Center in Rochester as part of the Visiting Scholar Series. Coontz speech is on challenges of family and work. She is the author of the popular books The Way We Really Are: Coming to Terms with America's Changing Families and The Way we Never Were: American Families and the Nostalgia Trap
May 11, 1998 - It's an old argument with a new twist. Which is more important: economics or the environment? As new technologies have emerged, some people criticize the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency for favoring the economics of new ventures, and ignoring the serious environmental questions posed by emerging industries. All this week we will look at specific cases ... including animal feedlots, expanding potato farms and a new ethanol plant. In some cases, the concerns center around how a variety of state and federal agencies work together, or do not, to protect our environmental resources. We begin our series of reports, with an issue that's received a lot of attention recently. Opponents of large livestock feedlots say the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency has ignored health problems created by those operations. They're especially concerned with air pollution. This spring for the first time the MPCA documented hydrogen sulfide emissions from a hog farm which violated state law. Opponents call it vindication, but wonder if the MPCA will take vigorous action to bring the feedlot into compliance. Mainstreet Radio's Mark Steil reports: