Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
HHS Redirects $2 Billion To Pay For Migrant Shelter Operations: Report
Politico: Biden Admin Reroutes Billions In Emergency Stockpile, Covid Funds To Border Crunch
The Department of Health and Human Services has diverted more than $2 billion meant for other health initiatives toward covering the cost of caring for unaccompanied immigrant children, as the Biden administration grapples with a record influx of migrants on the southern border. The redirected funds include $850 million that Congress originally allocated to rebuild the nation’s Strategic National Stockpile, the emergency medical reserve strained by the Covid-19 response. Another $850 million is being taken from a pot intended to help expand coronavirus testing, according to three people with knowledge of the matter. (Cancryn, 5/15)
AP: 'There Was No Going Back': Migrants Send Kids Into US Alone
Growing numbers of migrant families are making the heart-wrenching decision to separate from their children and send them into America alone. Many families with kids older than 6 have been quickly expelled from the country under federal pandemic-related powers that don’t allow migrants to seek asylum. But they know that President Joe Biden’s administration is allowing unaccompanied children to stay in the U.S. while their cases are decided. (Gomez Licon, 5/15)
In updates about the Trump administration —
FiercePharma: FDA Releases Treasure Trove Of Trump Administration Emails From Early Days Of COVID-19 Crisis
What was going through the minds of the FDA officials during the earliest days of the COVID-19 pandemic? Thanks to hundreds of emails released by the FDA on Thursday—forced through the Freedom of Information Act—enquiring minds can find out. It's still just a glimpse, however, as quite a bit of the text copy, subject lines and emails are blacked out for confidentially reasons. (Bulik, 5/14)
Stat: Abandoned Trump Order On Bioeconomy Highlights Path Forward For Biden
The Trump administration came remarkably close to shoring up the scattershot way the United States regulates the “bioeconomy” — a wide-ranging category of products like lab grown meat, biofuels, DNA storage drives, and CAR-T cancer drugs — but fell short. Now, a bipartisan group of lawmakers is within striking distance of the same. (Florko, 5/17)
In news about vaccine patent waivers —
Modern Healthcare: Why The Push For Vaccine Patent Waivers Worries Drugmakers
To help increase access to vaccines in poor countries, the Biden administration recently said the U.S. would participate in World Trade Organization negotiations over waiving intellectual property rights of pharmaceutical companies. The U.S. previously was among wealthy nations opposed to easing patent protections. "Once you start saying that a particular type of intellectual property is no longer going to be respected, people start worrying about: What's the limiting principle here? What's stopping you from applying this to other settings?" says Craig Garthwaite, a health economist at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University. (Goldberg, 5/16)
KHN: Listen: Exploring Controversial Efforts To Waive Drugmakers’ Vaccine Patent Rights
President Joe Biden has thrown his support to an international effort to waive drugmakers’ patent rights on the covid vaccines, but the pharmaceutical industry vows to fight back. Julie Rovner, KHN’s chief Washington correspondent, joins The Atlantic’s “Social Distance” podcast, hosted by Dr. James Hamblin and Maeve Higgins, to talk about the current patent controversy and how the drug industry has protected itself over the years with vibrant campaigns about the needs for high profits to support drug development. (5/14)
