Military Medical System

The Associated Press ran a story about a new policy seeking to punish those who become pregnant in Iraq:

A U.S. Army general in northern Iraq has added pregnancy to the list of reasons a soldier under his command could be court-martialed.

Computer enthusiast website ars technica featured a story recently about the huge success that Valve has had with PC gaming and the Steam digital software distribution platform. Their secret: LISTENING TO CUSTOMERS AND KEEPING THEM CONNECTED. Read on for some quotes from the story:

My friend forwarded me the following fictitious story about a struggle with laser printers in the Air Force medical clinic. I'm sure it can't be true!

I was stationed at an Air Force Base for 4 years. I had a computer and a printer in my office. The printer was non-networked and plugged directly in the back of the computer.

The first year everything went fine with that arrangement. Then the toner ran out. No money for toner I was told, you have to wait until the first of the next fiscal year. As it turns out I waited for toner for over a year, walking down the hall to collect printer documents. Great exercise, walking up and down the hallway 5-10 minutes per hour. All the time the Air Force is asking, "why aren't Air Force providers more efficient?"

Army dentist Capt. Tina Mahuika's struggle to resign from military service is featured in a recent Stripes article. Apparently Mahuika took a 3-year HPSP scholarship for dental school graduating in 2005. Her 3-year payback was fulfilled in 2008 but she has been unable to leave active duty due to a lost request for release and a stop loss order:

The Army Surgeon General was reported in a recent Stars and Stripes article by Tom Philbot as saying AHLTA is a significant contributing factor to attrition of military medicine personnel. The Deputy Surgeons General from the Navy and Air Force were also described as having similar remarks. Efforts by Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs, Dr. Ward Cascells to fix the problems are also detailed.