Latest KFF Health News Stories
Expected Shortfalls For Black Lung Fund Will Be Covered By Taxpayers Instead Of Coal Companies
In January, the tax rate coal companies pay to support the Black Lung Disability Trust Fund was cut in half, leaving sick miners and their advocates fearing future benefit cuts from a fund that is already about some $4 billion in debt. The Department of Labor said in a statement Wednesday that it is obligated to continue paying benefits to sick miners, so a shortfall would be covered by borrowing from taxpayers. In other environmental health news: unsafe drinking water, manufacturing industry’s lingering effects on health, coal ash and more.
HHS Secretary Alex Azar and FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb wrote that the government will step in if even further than it already has if the e-cigarette industry doesn’t take an active role in curbing the epidemic. Meanwhile, in a podcast, Gottlieb talks about his work at the agency and if he’ll ever return to the government.
Authorities are touting a Los Angeles County program as a breakthrough in policing that could save lives of veterans who are having a crisis. Since the program’s launch in September, local law enforcement agencies answering such 911 calls have dispatched not only deputies or officers but also two-person teams from the Veterans Affairs hospital in Long Beach. Supporters call the program the first of its kind and hope it will be replicated nationwide.
More than 5,000 of the current 18,000 comments were made public this week, and nearly all of them support the proposal with very similar wording that matches a RetireSafe-sponsored form letter available at the website SubmitForChange.org. In other pharmaceutical news: Pfizer makes a gene-therapy deal, AbbVie is sued over its patent deals, and the FDA is taking steps to cut down on blood pressure medication recalls.
The death rate among African Americans from fentanyl-involved drug overdoses rose 141 percent each year, on average, from 2011 to 2016, and the death rate for Hispanics rose 118 percent in that period every year on average. Altogether, the records revealed that more than 36,000 Americans died with fentanyl in their systems during the study period. The majority of those deaths — 18,335 — occurred in 2016 alone. Meanwhile, the nation’s top medical advisers say that medication for addiction is vastly underused.
New Hampshire residents are challenging the Trump administration’s approval of work requirements for Medicaid recipients, after suits filed in Arkansas and Kentucky. Critics of the work requirement waivers say they are an attack on the poor. “This approval will not promote coverage, but it will result in significant coverage losses, and that is the administration’s goal,” said Jane Perkins, legal director of the National Health Law Program, which filed the suit on behalf of the New Hampshire residents. Meanwhile, an analysis finds that most of the 18,000 people kicked of Arkansas’ Medicaid program because they didn’t report work hours are still uninsured. The data contradicts statements from Trump administration and state officials, who have claimed that most of the people who lost Medicaid have found jobs.
Today’s early morning highlights from the major news organizations.
Opinion writers weigh in on these health issues and others.
Perspectives: We Need To Bring Down The Cost Of Developing Miracle Cures
Read recent commentaries about drug-cost issues.
HHS Has Been Deluged With Comments Over PBMs And Drug Rebates. Who Is Stoking That Fervent Response?
News outlets report on stories related to pharmaceutical pricing.
Media outlets report on news from California, Washington, Wyoming, Kansas, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Arizona, Florida, Ohio, Connecticut, New York, Georgia, Louisiana and Texas.
News from state legislatures comes out of Connecticut, Georgia and Massachusetts.
According to new documents, the University of Illinois at Chicago Institutional Review Board, the committee responsible for protecting research subjects, improperly fast-tracked approval of Dr. Mani Pavuluri’s clinical trial, didn’t catch serious omissions from the consent forms parents had to sign and allowed children to enroll in the study even though they weren’t eligible. Still, UIC officials have continued to blame only Pavuluri, and have downplayed the institution’s role in the research.
Medicaid Work Requirements Move Forward In Iowa State Senate
The measure, if it becomes law, would require weekly work hours for Medicaid recipients but carves out people with physical and mental conditions. It’s one of several measures moving through red states that would impose restrictions on the program. Medicaid news comes out of New Hampshire and Pennsylvania, as well.
Britain’s National Portrait Gallery has announced it won’t proceed with a $1.3 million pledge from a charitable organization overseen by some members of the Sackler family, which founded Purdue Pharma. A recent court case has been shedding light on just how large a role the family played in the aggressive marketing of the painkillers.
New Treatments Might Provide Hope To Patients With Rare Genetic Disease That Turns Tissue Into Bone
The genetic disease, fibrodysplasia ossificans, in which the body’s machinery for healing goes awry, growing immovable bone where it doesn’t belong, had been languishing as nothing more than a medical curiosity. But a community of patient advocates rallied, and now there are three medicines in human trials, the most advanced of which could win Food and Drug Administration approval next year. In other public health news: weight lifting, primate emotions, the “bliss point” in food, and psychic mediums.
Daily Use Of High-Potency Marijuana Can Increase Risk Of Developing Psychosis By Nearly Five Times
Experts say that this should temper some of the enthusiasm that’s been growing about the healthfulness of marijuana. They also say it provides reasoning behind putting some restrictions on legalized use of the drugs–such as making sure high-potency versions are harder to get.
The court case is unusual in that the judge split it into two parts. The first, which the jury just decided on, was whether the weedkiller played a role in his cancer. The second phase will address whether the company should be held liable for that damage. Lawyers will argue that Monsanto knew or should have known that Roundup causes cancer.
Experts offer an in-depth look at the belief system behind the Kentucky lawsuit filed by a family who didn’t vaccinate their son because of their religious beliefs. The Varicella vaccine, specifically, is derived from the cell lines of two fetuses that were electively aborted in the 1960s. “There are no further abortions that have occurred to continue these cell lines,” said Josh Williams, an assistant professor. Meanwhile, antivaccination activists are targeting parents on Facebook who recently lost a child with cruel taunts.
The World Health Organization formed the panel following the controversial work of a Chinese scientist who announced after the fact that he’d gene-edited human embryos. The committee said a registry would help with transparency and tracking of such ethically precarious research. It also said that over the next two years, it will develop recommendations for a “comprehensive governance framework” to help prevent rogue uses of genome editing.
