Latest KFF Health News Stories
Public health experts are alarmed by the new statistics released by the CDC. In contrast, life expectancy has marched steadily upward for decades in most other developed nations. “After three years of stagnation and decline, what do we do now?” asked S.V. Subramanian, a professor of population health and geography at Harvard’s T.H. Chan School of Public Health. “Do we say this is the new normal?
First Edition: November 29, 2018
Today’s early morning highlights from the major news organizations.
Viewpoints: Thumbs Up To CDC For Warnings About Romaine; Research On Suicide Prevention Falls Short
Opinion writers weigh in on these health issues and others.
Editorial pages weigh in on these health care topics.
Opinion writers express views on producing genetically-modified human babies.
Read recent commentaries about drug-cost issues.
News outlets report on stories related to pharmaceutical pricing.
Media outlets report on news from Florida, California, Maryland, Texas, Washington, Ohio, Minnesota, Colorado, Iowa and Massachusetts.
These workplaces are willing to overlook employment gaps and some brushes with police that accompany drug use. They also encourage open discussion of addiction in the workplace to reduce stigma, and treat substance abuse and relapse as medical issues like surgery or maternity.
The new Amazon software can read digitized patient records and other clinical notes, analyze them and pluck out key data points to help identify cost-saving opportunities, Amazon said. It’s just the most recent move by a big technology company to get in on an industry that is nearly a fifth of the U.S. economy.
In Face Of Intense Government Scrutiny, Juul To Retool Product To Lower Nicotine Levels
Some experts though said the higher vapor in the new products could potentially make the pods even more addictive, increasing the risk particularly to young people, whose developing brains are more susceptible to the addictive qualities of nicotine.
Balancing innovation, regulation and a symbiotic relationship with the medical industry it oversees is a tricky task for the agency. The Associated Press takes a look at the FDA’s push for quick approvals and how that may have lead to problems with current devices on the market.
In addition, the federal government is allowing the nonprofit running the detention facility in Texas to sidestep mental health care requirements. Under federal policy, migrant youth shelters generally must have one mental health clinician for every 12 kids, but the federal agency’s contract with BCFS allows it to staff Tornillo with just one clinician for every 100 children. Meanwhile, a report finds that family separations at the border have quietly resumed.
Doctors and other experts currently or formerly working in the region point to a landscape that is not quite a war zone but in which violence can break out almost anywhere for unknown reasons. Other global health news stories report on abortion, HIV rates and child safety.
About 16 million Americans suffer from alcohol use disorder and shouldn’t go it alone when trying to stop, doctors warn. Alcohol is often the most dangerous substance for the body to withdraw from and requires medical supervision. Other public health news focuses on childhood obesity, sports nutrition, workplace wellness programs, and more.
in his first public remarks about the research, He Jiankui also said that a second pregnancy may be underway. He set off a firestorm this week after announcing that he’d created the world’s first gene-edited babies, using a technique called CRISPR, to make sure that the twin girls are impervious to HIV infection. Other scientists have lambasted the research as “deeply unethical” and “driven by hubris.”
But CMS Administrator Seema Verma did not provide any specifics on how the government would respond. Meanwhile, reinsurance programs meant to help states shore up their exchanges have found success in stabilizing the marketplace and boosting enrollment.
But CMS Administrator Seema Verma says there’s no plan to slow implementation of the work requirement rules. Since June, more than 12,000 beneficiaries in Arkansas have lost their Medicaid coverage, and thousands more are poised to be dropped next month. Verma thinks it’s “very possible” that people left Medicaid coverage because they found a job or “decided that they didn’t want coverage.” Other Medicaid news comes out of Maine, Kentucky, Georgia and Minnesota.
FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb said, “We cannot control commercial decisions on pricing, [but] importantly, we have found that having three or more generic competitors brings prices down more sharply than with only one or two generic competitors.”
First Edition: November 28, 2018
Today’s early morning highlights from the major news organizations.
