Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Longer Looks: Cancer In Appalachia; Doctors In Syria; And Dying Without Insurance
Stat: Breaking The Cycle Of Despair: One Woman’s Battle For The Health Of Appalachia
[Electra] Paskett, a 59-year-old New York transplant, has spent considerable time here and in other towns across the region, trying to figure out why cancer rates have remained so stubbornly high. Even as the death rate from cancer has steadily declined for years across much of the country, the mortality rate in Appalachia is down only slightly from what it was in 1968 — and in some counties the rate has increased. (Bob Tedeschi, 6/20)
The New Yorker: The Shadow Doctors
Despite the onslaught, doctors and international N.G.O.s have forged an elaborate network of underground hospitals throughout Syria. They have installed cameras in intensive-care units, so that doctors abroad can monitor patients by Skype and direct technicians to administer proper treatment. In besieged areas, they have adapted hospitals to run on fuel from animal waste. (Ben Taub, 6/19)
The Atlantic: The Unconscionable Difficulty Of Getting Health Insurance For A Newborn
Before I gave birth, I made three calls: one to Oscar, my health-insurance company; one to the New York state exchange through which I receive my insurance, thanks to the Affordable Care Act; and one to Child Health Plus, New York’s “health insurance program for kids,” through which my toddler daughter receives her coverage and with which I wanted to enroll my son. (Ester Bloom, 6/20)
The Nation: The Devastating Process Of Dying In America Without Insurance
Doris Portillo keeps the door to her father’s old room closed to avoid remembering the last few months of his life. It’s a small room, barely large enough for a bed, a small bureau, and a television, all of which are long gone. This is where she, her siblings, and her nephew cared for her father, Aquilino Portillo—feeding him, lifting him out of bed to take him to the bathroom, doing their best to clean the sores that festered beneath his weight. (Mark Betancourt, 6/20)
Stat: When A Patient Nears The End, A Feared Therapy Can Also Comfort
Before making the 15-minute ride from Yale-New Haven Hospital to Connecticut Hospice, the man was told he had maybe three days before his heart would fail completely. He couldn’t catch his breath. His eyes were wide, his fingertips dusky from lack of oxygen. (Bob Tedeschi, 6/21)
The Atlantic: ‘Using Against My Will’
Adrian Silva, 52, is a sober addict who spent most of his adulthood getting high and cycling through jails in Southern California. We recently met in a Santa Ana Starbucks to talk about his drug use—which continued even while he was in jail—his criminal past, and the redemption he found at the Orange County Community Court’s drug program. An edited version of our conversation follows. (Juleyka Lantigua-Williams, 6/19)
