| United States Patent | 8,697,077 |
| Faustman | April 15, 2014 |
Methods and compositions for treating autoimmune diseases
The invention features methods for increasing or maintaining the number of functional cells of a predetermined type, for example, insulin producing cells of the pancreas, blood cells, spleen cells, brain cells, heart cells, vascular tissue cells, cells of the bile duct, or skin cells, in a mammal (e.g., a human patient) that has injured or damaged cells of the predetermined type.
| Inventors: | Faustman; Denise L. (Boston, MA) | ||||||||||
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| Applicant: |
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| Assignee: | The General Hospital Corporation (Boston, MA) | ||||||||||
| Family ID: | 30002891 | ||||||||||
| Appl. No.: | 13/462,160 | ||||||||||
| Filed: | May 2, 2012 |
| Document Identifier | Publication Date | |
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| US 20120213731 A1 | Aug 23, 2012 | |
It was a simple gesture captured in a photograph: Malcolm Turnbull, the prime minister of Australia, leaning over and placing money in the paper cup of a homeless man in Melbourne this week.
The contrasts in that moment of charity were stark. There were the buffed shoes and suit of a man of power, next to the ragged clothes of a man sitting on a sidewalk. The prime minister’s cleanshaven face was inches from the man’s scraggly hair and furrowed brow. In one of Mr. Turnbull’s hands, a wad of bank notes; in the other, the single note he was depositing in the cup, an Australian 5-dollar bill (worth about $3.80).
The political overtones were also hard to miss: Mr. Turnbull, who led his conservative coalition to an election victory just last month, was on his way to deliver a major speech at the Committee for Economic Development of Australia.
By the end of the week, those few dollars had bought Mr. Turnbull a barrage of attention and had spurred a debate about how best to help homeless people — a problem that has bedeviled major cities around the world, including New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco.
Some critics called the prime minister a cheapskate, while others complained that his actions flew in the face of official efforts to address the problem of people living on the streets of Melbourne, a coastal city of about four million people.
“Turnbull — a man with a $133 million net worth, a man who carries a stash of bank notes in a money clip, a man who donated a cool $1 million to his own election campaign — could only spare a fiver to shove in another, poorer man’s coffee cup,” Erin Stewart wrote in The Sydney Morning Herald. “The reality is that Turnbull’s government may cause homelessness.”
Robert Doyle, the mayor of Melbourne, has maintained that giving money to beggars entrenches homelessness, and he has urged people to donate to charitable organizations that help the homeless instead.
“Please stop coming into the city and dropping off tents, and bedding and clothing and blankets,” Mr. Doyle said in an interview last week with 3AW. “It’s misguided.”
Officials and advocates for the homeless in the United States also discourage people from giving money to homeless people on the streets, saying that donations to service providers like the Salvation Army do much more good. In New York City, Mayor Bill de Blasio makes the same argument.
Some of the reaction to Mr. Turnbull’s gesture was supportive, but he also faced questions and criticism from social media users and the news media.
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“I noticed you put $5 in a street beggar’s cup in Melbourne the day before yesterday,” Neil Mitchell, a3AW Morning host, said to Mr. Turnbull on Friday in the middle of an interview that touched on the country’s budget. “We are told not to do that. Do you think it’s a good idea to give money to beggars?”
Mr. Turnbull replied: “I know people have got different views on that. But you know, every time I see someone in that situation, I always think: There but for the grace of God go I.”
“It was a human reaction, and I am sorry if that has disappointed some people,” Mr. Turnbull continued. “Maybe they think you should not give money to people who are sitting on the street, but I felt sorry for the guy.”
Last month, shortly after the election won by Mr. Turnbull and his right-wing Liberal Party, a Salvation Army official, Brendan Nottle, said that homelessness in Melbourne was at a crisis point. The Age newspaper reported that 247 people were living on the city’s streets, according to the latest census report.
“We’ve just been through a federal election, and there was no mention of homelessness,” Mr. Nottle was quoted as saying. “And yet I think, in a lot of people’s minds, it is a crisis, not just for our city but for cities around the country.”
David Leydon, the assistant secretary of the Australian Services Union, was critical of Mr. Turnbull on Twitter, prompting replies that insinuated the prime minister had meant his gesture to serve as a photo opportunity.
“Cheap skate Turnbull. He found $2 million for the Liberal Party but only managed $5 for a poor homeless fella,” Mr. Leydon wrote.
Myriam Robin, a journalist with the news website Crikey, wrote on Twitter, “Have now seen Malcolm Turnbull criticized from every angle for giving $5 to a homeless man.”
Another man suggested the attention had gone too far.
Politicians especially seem to be the targets of criticism, and sometimes ridicule, when they drop change in cups, especially if cameras are around when they do. In 2014, Ed Miliband, the former Labour leader of Britain, was criticized for giving a woman a few coins.
In March of this year, he was spotted handing over 10 British pounds ($13) to several youths on the street, The Independent reported. But that was after the teenagers had directed him to an automated teller machine, reports said.
The homeless recipient of Mr. Turnbull’s cash, a man who identified himself only as Peter, told a reporter for The Sydney Morning Herald that he had not wanted his photograph taken, and that the polished stranger who put the money in his cup had told him, “Have a nice day.”
After learning it was the prime minister, the man said: “It’s a little stingy, because he’s a millionaire, but that’s O.K. It’s his money, and he worked hard for it.”
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