EXTRA...

Salt of Cape Cod; Beatty's address problem; Hospital errors

TODAY's quote:  "What is the use of a house if you haven't got a tolerable planet to put it on?"  - Henry David Thoreau

Errors test openness at Beth Israel Deaconess
Disclosures will benefit hospital, president insists

When asked about Hicks's case, Levy said he could not respond in detail because of pending litigation. The death of Karen Vasques while delivering her baby on Oct. 17 is one of four maternal deaths during childbirth this year that have been reported to the state Department of Public Health, which investigates all such cases. The other deaths were at Cape Cod Hospital in Hyannis, Newton-Wellesley Hospital in Newton, and South Shore Hospital in Weymouth, according to the state health department.

For the past year, Paul Levy, president of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, has more than ever before staked his reputation on "transparency," particularly about medical errors inside his Harvard teaching hospital.

In January, he made a splash when he announced the hospital would aim to eliminate all preventable harm to patients within four years and would publish quarterly reports on its progress. Whether speaking from a podium or writing on his blog, Levy maintains that admitting and learning from serious mistakes is far more important than avoiding public-relations blows.

This stance has won him praise in some quarters - and, in recent months, has sorely tested him as well.  In late June, news broke that a cosmetic surgeon was fired after he appeared to be dozing while performing a liposuction procedure. A few days later, a veteran surgeon completed surgery on a woman's ankle - only to discover it was the wrong ankle... Globe.
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The History Of Salt, In A Pinch
Sodium Chloride Comes In Gourmet Flavors And Designer Colors - You Can Even Cook On It

The British tried to impose a salt monopoly on their American colonies as well, and here too, the response was defiance. Colonists built their own salt works on Cape Cod.

Did you know that a hundred years ago salt shakers were practically non-existent? That was before 1911, when Joy Morton began adding an anti-clumping agent to salt.

Before Morton's ad agency thought up the little umbrella girl and the slogan "When it rains, it pours," the very idea of tiny, perfectly white, uniformly-sized salt crystals was a revolution.

But as so often happens with revolutions, now, a counter-revolution has begun.

"Right in the center is our Maldon salt, coming from the town of Maldon in Essex County, England."

No matter what you call it, it's sodium chloride (NcCl). Its chemical make-up was determined in 1807 by Sir Humphrey Davy, a British scientist doomed to be remembered because of a silly rhyme:

     "Sir Humphrey Davy
      Abominated gravy
      And shall live in odium
      For having discovered sodium."

Salt you can't put in a shaker, in all kinds and colors, is turning up in the fanciest restaurants, like Per Se in New York City, where Olivia Young introduced us to a red salt, "haleakala from Molokai. The middle one is, of course, the black salt. It's Kilauea and it's blended with activated charcoal. And very last is Himalayan salt. It's harvested right in the heart of the Himalayan mountains."

Salt is a substance whose time has come - foodies take note...  Prices range from $4 to $50 a pound. But they've got one, a rare Korean salt, that's $270 a pound - more than the price of silver! ... CBS News. Read a History of Salt here.
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John Kerry challenger right at home - all over nation
Harwich's Jeff Beatty in address battle with opponent

Among the campaign items offered on Jeff Beatty's site is a t-shirt with a "Missing from Massachusetts" milk carton  with his opponent's photo.

John F. Kerry's GOP challenger Jeff Beatty has relentlessly hammered the senator as a no-show in the Bay State but Beatty himself has lived all over the country and ran a business in Virginia until just months before he entered the race, records show.

From December 2004 to August 2007, the former CIA operative and FBI agent listed his address as Ryder Cup Drive in Haymarket, Va. He also lived there in 1985. From 1999 to 2008, he's also listed at an address in Marietta, Ga., according to public records.

Beatty is also listed at various other Virginia, Georgia and Texas addresses going as far back as 1992 and lived in North Carolina for three years in the 1980s, records show.

He currently lives in Harwich and says that has been his permanent address since his family moved to Cape Cod from New Jersey in the 1970s.

But in addition to his out-of-state mailing addresses, Beatty's former company, Total Security Services International, was based in Arlington, Va. from 2002 until August. Also, records from his divorce are filed in Virginia, not Massachusetts.

Beatty campaign director Joe Manzoli said: "Beatty lives here in his 1,200 square foot house, he votes here, and he pays taxes here. Meanwhile, only two out of five of Kerry's mansions are in Massachusetts. That's why you don't worry about tripping over him here - except every four years around vote time."

But Beatty's own multiple addresses raise questions about his constant criticism of Kerry as a carpetbagger. The Republican's Web site sells T-shirts that depict the senator on a milk carton with the slogan "Missing from Massachusetts"... Herald.