Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Longer Looks: Midterm Cram, Tuberculosis' Influence On Modernist Architecture And The Tampon Tax
Late Night With Seth Meyers: Midterm Cram: Health Care (Ft. Sarah Kliff)
Late Night staffers Sal Gentile and Henry Melcher talk to their special guest Sarah Kliff, senior policy correspondent at Vox who focuses on health care, and host of The Impact podcast. Podcast. (10/28)
CityLab: How The Tuberculosis Epidemic Influenced Modernist Architecture
Since the widespread use of antibiotics to treat tuberculosis started in the 1950s, most people have forgotten about the disease that was, at one point, the deadliest illness in America. But go back two or three generations in your own family, and chances are, you’ll find at least one relative who was affected by tuberculosis, also known as consumption or “the white plague.” (Elizabeth Yuko, 10/30)
Bloomberg: What Life Would Look Like Without The ‘Tampon Tax’
Many employers and health insurance plans offer special expense accounts that let workers set aside a portion of their earnings before paying taxes to go toward medical expenses. These accounts, including Flexible Spending Accounts and Health Savings Accounts, can mean savings of up to 40 percent on over-the-counter medical purchases, as well as prescription drugs and doctors’ visits. But the Internal Revenue Service doesn’t classify tampons and pads as medical expenses, which means they can’t be purchased with untaxed earnings. (Hannah Recht, 10/30)
The Atlantic: The Main Suspect Behind An Ominous Spike In A Polio-Like Illness
As the summer of 2014 gave way to fall, Kevin Messacar, a pediatrician at Children’s Hospital Colorado, started seeing a wave of children with inexplicable paralysis. All of them shared the same story. One day, they had a cold. The next, they couldn’t move an arm or a leg. (Ed Yong, 10/25)
BuzzFeed News: These Doctors Are Illegally Prescribing Addiction Medications. But Should They Be Prosecuted?
It’s true that some doctors are prescribing Suboxone illegally: making fraudulent insurance claims, signing blank prescriptions, and even laundering profits at a casino. Some demand large cash payments and knowingly provide the drug to people who sell their meds on the street. But health experts worry that cracking down on these cases could scare off reputable doctors from getting approved to prescribe Suboxone — effectively leading to a shortage of one of the few effective treatments for opioid addiction. In their view, the justice system shouldn’t be wasting its resources on an opioid that can save lives. (Scott Pham and Dan Vergano, 10/29)
Huffington Post: A Brutal Clock
As she watches her daughter head off to kindergarten, Amber thinks about the $2.6 million she needs to raise, the scientists she has to fund, the lobbying of Congress she must do ― all to make sure that a gene therapy to halt the disease’s progress will be created in a ridiculously short time. (Lauren Weber and Damon Dahlen, 10/26)
WIRED: The Science Of The Sniff: Why Dogs Are Great Disease Detectors
Dogs have been trained to detect a dozen human diseases—most recently, malaria—but even these pups may ultimately find their jobs replaced by machines. (Megan Molteni, 10/30)
