Viewpoints: CMS Should Reconsider Covering GLP-1 Drugs; Cuts To HIV Care Terrify Vulnerable Patients
Opinion writers tackle these public health issues.
The Washington Post:
Covering GLP-1s Under Medicare And Medicaid Would Make America Richer
Too bad the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services decided on Friday not to broadly cover new anti-obesity medications. For the moment, at least, the Trump administration has missed a chance to achieve a spectacular return on investment — try 13 percent a year. (Alison Sexton Ward and Dana Goldman, 4/7)
The New York Times:
Is This The End Of Progress ON H.I.V.?
Among other cuts to federal health agencies, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is said to be planning to lay off the entire staff of the Office of Infectious Diseases and H.I.V./AIDS Policy, which was working to end the H.I.V. epidemic in the United States and to solve related racial health disparities. (Ruth Madievsky, 4/8)
Stat:
Personal Choice Has Been Weaponized To Undermine Public Health
As one of many pulmonary and critical care physicians in this country who served during the pandemic, I had a difficult time wrapping my head around how we could get to this place where public health is the enemy, that opting out is strength. (MeiLan Han, 4/8)
The Baltimore Sun:
Vaccine Cynic Leading CDC's Autism Investigation Should Raise Alarm
My education of measles was, at one point, limited to a single page in a medical school textbook with a grainy photo from decades ago displaying an unwell child covered in a rash. Previously, measles was nearly an eradicated disease thanks to vaccines. Now physicians need to revisit this disease — not as the success story of the past but to prepare for the next outbreak. (Rachel Cole and James M. Gaylor, 4/7)
Stat:
The Trump Administration Should Rescind The NIH 'Access Planning' Rule
At the start of the year, the National Institutes of Health finalized a policy that will require anyone seeking to license certain NIH-owned patents to submit an “access plan” detailing how they plan to make their products available to underserved groups. (Jon Soderstrom, 4/8)
The New York Times:
Are Embryos Property Or People? Even The Courts Don’t Know.
Before fertility patients begin the long journey through hormone treatments, egg retrieval, fertilization and — hopefully, if everything goes well — a baby, there’s the paperwork. As a first order of business, would-be parents are typically presented with a form that requires them to choose the fate of embryos they do not use in the course of building their families. (Anna Louie Sussman, 4/8)
