Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Longer Looks: Interesting Reads You Might Have Missed
The New York Times: How Educators Secretly Remove Students With Disabilities From School
Jessica LaVigne was nervous but hopeful on a recent afternoon that the team managing her son’s special education plan at Roseburg High School would tell her something she had dreamed of for more than a decade: He would be able to attend a full day of school for the first time since second grade. During her son’s elementary years, Ms. LaVigne was called almost daily to pick him up hours early because he was having “a bad day.” By middle school, he was only attending an hour a day. By high school, he was told he had to “earn” back two class periods taken off his schedule by proving he was academically and socially ready. (Green, 2/9)
Stat: Mm-Hm, Uh-Huh: How Mumbling Trips Up 'Digital Scribes' For Doctors
“Your vision is good?” asked the doctor. “Mm-hm,” replied the patient. “And your dentures fit fine?” “Yep,” the patient said. “No problems with them?” the doctor followed up. “Mm,” the patient said, indicating everything was OK. The back-and-forth would have made perfect sense to the two people talking in the clinic. But to the automatic speech recognition tool tasked with transcribing it and turning it into visit notes, the “mm-hms” and mumbles became a garbled mess. (Trang, 2/7)
The Wall Street Journal: Even A Brain-Eating Amoeba Can’t Hide From This Cutting-Edge DNA Tech
When a middle-aged man who had suffered a seizure was admitted to the University of California San Francisco Medical Center in 2021, doctors seeking the cause for his condition quickly became stumped. After pathologists spent two weeks peering through microscopes and monitoring petri dishes, doctors knew something serious was harming the patient’s brain; they had no idea what it was or how to treat it. (Winslow, 2/8)
The New York Times: The Mean Life Of A ‘Midsize’ Model
In Paris last month, at the Chanel couture show, there was something about one model that set her apart from the others on the runway. Strikingly beautiful, Jill Kortleve has almond-shaped eyes, dark bushy eyebrows and chiseled cheekbones. ... But what makes her an unusual star for the high fashion industry is not the fact that she is 29, making her older than many of her peers, or that she is 5-foot-8, making her shorter than many of them too. It is the fact that Ms. Kortleve is a U.S. size 8 to 10 — or “midsize,” as the middle ground between petite and plus size is increasingly known. “Straight” size, or under a U.S. size 2, remains, overwhelmingly, the fashion industry norm. (Paton, 2/4)
Los Angeles Times: Some Latinos Don’t Trust Western Mental Health. That’s Where Curanderos Come In
Grace Sesma works methodically to set up her home office, lighting candles and cutting thorns from seven stemmed red roses for the day’s first session as her client chatters nearby. The man, 47, is talking fast — about the nice view of the area from Sesma’s backyard, his connection to the San Diego area, and how he got the supplies at the last minute that Sesma told him they would need: roses, an egg and tobacco. (Garcia, 2/8)
The Washington Post: The Power Of Social Touch: How A Loving Caress Really Can Ease Anxiety
Physical isolation during the coronavirus pandemic led many to develop “skin hunger” and resulted in an uptick in mental health problems. One 2021 study surveying almost 1,500 participants reported that deprivation of intimate touch from close family and partners was associated with worse feelings of anxiety and loneliness. Lack of friendly or professional touch from friends, acquaintances or work colleagues did not have the same impact on mental health. (Sima, 2/9)
The New York Times: How To Talk To Your Partner About Sex
Vanessa Marin has dedicated her career to discussing the most private details of other people’s sex lives. But, for a long time, she found it hard to talk about her own. In a new book, “Sex Talks: The Five Conversations That Will Transform Your Love Life,” the sex therapist, 38, admits that she faked orgasms for 10 years because she couldn’t bring herself to tell partners what she liked. Things improved when she met her husband, Xander Marin, now 37, but once the initial excitement wore off, the pair found themselves in front of an expensive couples counselor, struggling to articulate why their sex life sometimes felt disappointing. Today, the Marins have parlayed their radical honesty and relatability into a business centered around sexual education, with a popular podcast, a suite of online courses and more than 300,000 followers on Instagram. (Pearson, 2/7)
Politico: Biden’s Top Covid Adviser Wishes He Had Tangled With Tucker Carlson
When a terrifying new virus shut down the country in March 2020, Joe Biden turned to David Kessler for advice. A former FDA chief who served under two presidents of different parties, Kessler was someone who instinctively understood both science and politics. He began tutoring Biden regularly on the pandemic during the presidential campaign, offering blunt warnings about the growing threat to the country — and to Biden himself — as they faced a once-in-a-century crisis. (Cancryn, 2/6)
