And then there were 306...

NOAA: “August 2010 was the 306th consecutive month with a global temperature above the 20th century average. The last month with below average temperatures was February 1985.” Any day the temperatures for September will be in. It's a safe bet to expect they will make it 307.

The most commonly cited target in international climate negotiations is that we ought to limit warming to an average of 2°C. However, that may already be too high.

How to shrink a city: this will become an increasing issue in many parts of the world due to likely demographic and economic changes of the next few decades.

Peak oil and healthcare, a UK perspective.

Terminological clarification: irreversible vs unstoppable.

Hot Topic: On giving up non-essential flying.

The health benefit of more ambitious emissions targets. If Europe raised its sights from 20% to 30% emissions cuts by 2020, then it could be saving an extra €30 billion per year in health costs. This saving alone would account for a significant portion of the estimated €46 billion p.a. the higher target would require.

Twenty-two percent of the world's plant species are threatened with extinction and another thirty-three percent have an unknown status. The main culprit? Land use changes associated with agriculture.

Rivers in peril worldwide: study in Nature claims that eighty percent of the world's population (nearly 5.5 billion people) lives in an area where rivers are seriously threatened. "[S]ome of the highest threat levels in the world are in the United States and Europe." See also here a graphic of the threat distribution.

Oceans acidifying much faster than ever before in Earth's history.

Soil degradation, erosion and desertification continues in many places around the world, reducing the amount of arable land.

On average, every single man, woman and child on the planet is US$28,000 in debt.

Speaking of money, a new study has estimated that the cost of vanishing rainforest each year is approximately US$5 trillion (with a "t". i.e. US$5,000,000,000,000).

However, the real issue is that each of these crises are not isolated, but are all converging on similar time scales.

US Healthcare debate: lies, damned lies and the NHS

When massive health insurers have millions of dollars of profit at stake, it is no surprise that there is a huge amount of misinformation being deliberately spread about nationalised health care in the US at the moment. In particular, the UK's National Health Service (NHS) has been grossly misrepresented. It has its problems, of course, but overall, we have found it to be an excellent service and it has been of great help during my ongoing checkups after cancer and so far through the first half of Jessica's pregnancy. We have never had to wait long, we have received quality care on top equipment and we have not paid a penny despite not even being UK citizens. Indeed, the NHS was no small part in our decision to study in the UK rather than the US. I have also written in the past about my experiences of Australia's Medicare system, which were also positive. I am no health care expert, but it doesn't take much expertise to see through some of the deliberate lies and ensuing confusion that seem to be increasingly mudding the waters of public debate in the US.

As I understand them, the proposed health care reforms in the States are not even aiming at a system as nationalised as the NHS here in the UK. Here is a campaign allowing those who have benefited from the UK's NHS to tell it like it is in an open letter to US Congress and people that simply says this:

We urge you to ignore the myths about health systems in our country and others that are being pushed by US healthcare companies. Our national system of public healthcare works very well and enjoys extremely high levels of public support. We wish you a healthy and honest debate about healthcare in the US.

Now of course there is much debate about the use of public money, and rightly so, but debate isn't helped by smear campaigns spreading lies about what nationalised health care systems are like. If you have benefited from the NHS and would like to say so, then you can do so here.

That said, I do still wonder whether our societies (Australia, UK and US) all spend too much on acute health care, especially in comparison to the relatively little spent on preventative health care. We expect to be able to live however we like and then have the most expensive medical aid help us get out of the holes we have gleefully and collectively jumped into.

UPDATE: I don't think I'm alone on this.