Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
'Curing All Diseases?': By Making It The North Star, Priscilla Chan Says She And Mark Zuckerberg Can Do It
Stat: Priscilla Chan Charts An Ambitious, Unglamorous Course To Fight Disease. (Her Husband Is Involved, Too.)
Three and a half years later, Chan, who turns 35 this month, insists that the goal she and Zuckerberg have set for themselves — to “cure, prevent, or manage all diseases” by the year 2100 — is a realistic one. “We are serious about it,” Chan told STAT in an interview. “We think that if that’s our north star, we think it’s not impossible.” Today, Chan presides over the 400-person organization tasked with gradually giving away almost all of the couple’s fortune, which is currently worth about $80 billion. During a period in which her husband’s public image has been dented by a series of controversies involving privacy and disinformation, Chan has emerged as one of the most influential philanthropists in science — and as the key day-to-day decision-maker shaping an unusual approach to supporting research. (Robbins, 2/11)
The Wall Street Journal: A Transplant Surgeon Is Operating Again—With A New Heart
Robert Montgomery was performing his first kidney transplant as the lead surgeon since his own heart transplant in September of 2018. “I’m super excited, totally excited,” the 60-year-old surgeon said shortly before operating on a recent Friday morning. His patient, Daniel Flori, had had a heart transplant about 12 years ago, and the two swapped stories about their experiences before the kidney operation. Mr. Flori, who is 59 and lives in New Hyde Park, N.Y., asked how Dr. Montgomery, the director of the NYU Langone Transplant Institute here, was doing with his new heart. (Reddy, 2/10)
NPR: Michael Pollan On Caffeine Addiction's Upside — And Ugly History
After wrapping up his book about the potential therapeutic benefits of psychedelic drugs, author Michael Pollan turned his attention to a drug that's hidden "in plain sight" in many people's lives: caffeine. "Here's a drug we use every day. ... We never think about it as a drug or an addiction, but that's exactly what it is," Pollan says. "I thought, 'Why not explore that relationship?'" (Gross, 2/10)
The New York Times: New Campus Sexual Misconduct Rules Will Tackle Dating Violence
Education Secretary Betsy DeVos’s pending rules on sexual misconduct at the nation’s schools and colleges will include provisions to shore up protections for victims of stalking and dating violence, a response to lethal attacks that have underscored the weakness of current policies. The rules will for the first time cement domestic violence, dating violence and stalking as forms of gender discrimination that schools must address under Title IX, the federal civil rights law that prohibits sex discrimination in education programs that receive government funding. (Green, 2/10)
NPR: Got A Cold? A Body Of Research Shows Zinc Supplements Can Help
The common cold is a top reason for missed work and school days. Most of us have two or three colds per year, each lasting at least a week. There's no real cure, but studies from the last several years show that some supplement containing zinc can help shorten the duration of cold symptoms by up to 40% — depending on the amount of the mineral in each dose and what it's combined with. (Aubrey, 2/10)
The New York Times: A Daily Aspirin For Pregnancy?
Pregnant women who take a daily baby aspirin may reduce the risk for premature birth. Researchers did a randomized, double-blinded placebo-controlled study of 11,976 women in six countries with high rates of premature birth: India, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Guatemala, Kenya, Pakistan and Zambia. Beginning in the first trimester of pregnancy, half the women received a daily 81 milligram aspirin tablet, while the rest took a placebo. (Bakalar, 2/11)
Boston Globe: More Beer Outlets Could Mean More Violence, Researchers Say
The Consumer Protection and Professional Licensure Committee held a hearing on the legislative version of the ballot initiative that would, as described in the attorney general’s official summary, “create a license allowing food stores to sell wine and beer for off-premises consumption, progressively increase and then eliminate the limit on the number of licenses for the sale of alcoholic beverages consumed off-premises that any one retailer could own or control.” In effect, the proposal would allow more food stores — think Cumberland Farms stores, Targets or Walmarts that sell groceries — to sell beer and wine. Under current law, food store companies can hold up to nine alcohol retail licenses in Massachusetts as of the start of this year. (Young, 2/10)
CNN: Don't Trust Your Memories If You're High On Weed, Study Says
A new study published Monday found people who took just one hit of weed doubled their number of "false memories" in a virtual reality scenario compared to those who puffed on a placebo, said study author Johannes Ramaekers, a professor of psychopharmacology at Maastricht University in The Netherlands. A false memory is a recollection of something that didn't occur or a memory that is different from the way it actually happened, often triggered by suggestions from others. "We are all prone to the formation of false memories, independent of cannabis use," Ramaekers said. "The susceptibility for false memory, however, increases with cannabis. Under cannabis, users can easily accept fake truths for true memory." (LaMotte, 2/10)
KQED: Psychedelic Therapy Available To More People Before Clinical Trials End
Until recently, only participants in clinical trials could qualify for MDMA-assisted therapy. Now the federal Food and Drug Administration has granted researchers what it calls “expanded access.” That means people who can’t find relief other ways — who are “treatment-resistant” — can get this therapy before the FDA approves it. (Klivans, 2/10)
NPR: Antidepressant Prescribing Could Get More Precise With AI, Research Finds
Scientists have taken a small step toward personalizing treatment for depression. A study of more than 300 people with major depression found that brain wave patterns predicted which ones were most likely to respond to the drug sertraline (Zoloft), a team reported Monday in the journal Nature Biotechnology. If the approach pans out, it could offer better care for the millions of people in the U.S. with major depression. (Hamilton, 2/10)
The Boston Globe: For Homebound People, Smarter Speakers To Track Their Health
Every day, Kathleen McVicar of Cotuit, Mass., has a few simple questions for her 85-year-old mother in Virginia. How well did she sleep? Did she remember to eat breakfast, to take her meds, to check her voicemails? McVicar could get the answers by making an endless series of phone calls throughout the day. Instead, she just checks her email every morning. The previous day’s answers are there, rounded up and compiled by her mother’s voice-activated personal assistant, a device called LifePod which is programmed to ask questions instead of just answering them. “It’s a major improvement because it gives me peace of mind,” said McVicar, a 58-year-old retiree. “It gives you a sense of comfort that she’s OK.” (Bray, 2/10)
