Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Longer Looks: Feuding Sacklers; Expensive Procedures; And The Flu
The Guardian: The Family Feuding Over Blame For The Opioid Crisis
The Sackler family, a sprawling and now feuding transatlantic dynasty, is famous in cultural and academic circles for decades of generous philanthropy towards some of the world’s leading institutions, from Yale University to the Guggenheim Museum in the US and the Serpentine Gallery to the Royal Academy in Britain. But what’s less well known, though increasingly being exposed, is that much of their wealth comes from one product – OxyContin, the blockbuster prescription painkiller first launched in 1996. (Joanna Waltlers, 2/13)
Vox: Why American Doctors Keep Doing Expensive Procedures That Don’t Work
The news last fall that stents inserted in patients with heart disease to keep arteries open work no better than a placebo ought to be shocking. Each year, hundreds of thousands of American patients receive stents for the relief of chest pain, and the cost of the procedure ranges from $11,000 to $41,000 in US hospitals. (Eric Patashnik, 2/14)
The Atlantic: The Man Who Saw Inside Himself
Larry is using his own body, and his ongoing struggle with Crohn’s, as an experiment. He keeps precise measures of his body’s input (what he eats and drinks) and output (the energy he burns and what he excretes—and yes, that is precisely what it sounds like). He undergoes periodic MRIs, has his blood and stool analyzed frequently, submits to annual colonoscopies, and has had his DNA sequenced. (Mark Bowden, 2/8)
Vox: 3 Things Parents Should Know About Flu
It can be difficult for parents of kids sick with fly to know what’s normal and when to rush to the hospital. Here are three things parents should know. (Julia Belluz, 2/10)
