Archives: Morning Breakouts

This new survey measures how the public views President Barack Obama and GOP presidential hopeful Mitt Romney on three top issues. Meanwhile, news outlets examine how candidates and organizations are positioning themselves on the campaign trail.

In a graduation speech, the HHS secretary didn't mention the controversy over the mandate for contraception coverage but she told students that public policy debates "can be painful."

The House Appropriations Committee on Thursday approved its FY 2013 State and Foreign Operations appropriations bill (.pdf), which would provide $40.1 billion in regular discretionary funding and an additional $8.2 billion in funding for ongoing efforts in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Pakistan, The Hill's "On the Money" blog reports (Wasson, 5/17). Taken together, the bill would provide about $5 billion, or nine percent, less than FY 2012 funding levels, a committee press release notes (5/17). "The bill contains tough new limitations on aid," including cutting all funding for the U.N. Population Fund (UNFPA) and reinstating the Mexico City policy, also known as the "global gag rule," which prohibits foreign aid from going to any organization that performs abortions or provides information about or referral for the procedure as a method of family planning, according to The Hill.

Several blogs recently have published posts in anticipation of a symposium on food security taking place in Washington on Friday, at which President Barack Obama is expected to speak, and the G8 summit at Camp David in Maryland on Friday and Saturday, both of which will focus on food security and agriculture in Africa.

The June/July issue of USAID's "Frontlines" focuses on the agency's efforts to improve child survival and its portfolio of projects in Ethiopia, according to an overview of the issue in USAID's "IMPACTblog." In his "Insights" column, USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah writes, "Over the past decade, we've made tremendous strides to reduce child mortality across the world, thanks in large part to the scaled up distribution of proven interventions and new technologies that are making it easier to reach and save more children," noting, "In Ethiopia, where families have had to contend with one of the highest rates of infant and child mortality in the world, we've seen a dramatic and rapid decline" (Rucker, 5/17).

In this post on her blog, "The Garrett Update" -- the last of a series of posts examining the safety of drugs and vaccines -- Laurie Garrett, senior fellow for global health at the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), further details the key findings of the CFR's Policy Innovation Memorandum No. 21, a six-point policy recommendation for the G8/20 that she authored, titled "Ensuring the Safety and Integrity of the World's Drug, Vaccine, and Medicines Supply." She concludes, "The crisis is global, growing and massive. Unless international solutions are eagerly embraced, such as we and others have recommended, the very integrity of Medicine and Public Health will be undermined amid a steadily rising toll of illnesses and deaths ascribed to bad medicines" (May 2012).

Below are summaries of an opinion piece and an editorial responding to a report (.pdf) from the Indian Parliamentary Standing Committee on Health and Family Welfare on India's drug regulatory agency, the Central Drugs Standard Control Organization (CDSCO).

Below are summaries of two opinion pieces and an editorial published in anticipation of the G8 summit at Camp David in rural Maryland from May 18-19.

In this editorial in the International Herald Tribune's "Express Tribune," U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon examines the global push to eradicate polio, highlighting progress in the "world's war on polio" since it was declared nearly a quarter century ago but warning that "we are in danger of falling victim to our own success," as "the world is now populated by a generation which has either never been exposed to polio or has been inadequately vaccinated." However, "[w]ith a determined push, the international community can wipe out polio once and for all," Ban continues, adding, "To do so, ... it must organize and commit the required financial resources." Ban highlights two upcoming meetings -- the G8 summit at Camp David this week, and a meeting of World Health Assembly in Geneva the following week -- as opportunities for world leaders to push for polio eradication on the international agenda.

PRI's "The World" profiles Gabon's Albert Schweitzer Hospital, which "is struggling to achieve the goals of its founder while adapting to a new century and a different Africa." The story recaps the hospital's history and its board's recent efforts to address what one board member described as locals' "dependency" on historically European directors. However, Lachlan Forrow, a doctor at Harvard Medical School and Boston's Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and the only American on the hospital's board, recently became president of the board, and he has worked to establish "a new relationship between locals and outsiders -- blacks and whites," PRI reports. Forrow "found an experienced Gabonese hospital administrator -- Antoine Nziengui --" who is now the Schweitzer Hospital director, an African "for the first time since the hospital was founded 99 years ago," the news service writes, adding that the hospital "still faces huge obstacles: a million-dollar budget deficit, antiquated facilities, a rising burden of HIV and tuberculosis" (Baron, 5/17).

In this post in USAID's "IMPACTblog," International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI) President and CEO Margaret McGlynn discusses new modeling data from IAVI and the Futures Institute, with support from USAID, which "illustrates how a safe, preventive HIV vaccine that is accessible and affordable can help us end the AIDS pandemic." The information, released in recognition of World AIDS Vaccine Day, also known as HIV Vaccine Awareness Day, "is available in a series of publications and an interactive web tool," according to McGlynn. She writes, "The world must continue to scale up and improve the response to HIV by using powerful prevention tools that are currently at our disposal. ... Our new models show that a vaccine can build on these existing tools and take us down the last mile to the end of the AIDS pandemic" (5/18).

May 18 is World AIDS Vaccine Day, also known as HIV Vaccine Awareness Day, and the following summarizes two opinion pieces recognizing the event.

The general election TV ad released by GOP presidential hopeful Mitt Romney's campaign touts the candidates first-day plan to "move to replace" the health law with "common sense health reform." Also in the news, President Barack Obama's campaign rebuts an attack ad by Crossroads GPS.

"Afghanistan has begun work on a $30 million hospital for the treatment of tuberculosis [TB], a disease that health officials say kills more than 10,000 Afghans every year," VOA's "Breaking News" blog reports. "The Japanese government is paying for the 80-bed center in the Afghan capital, which will also treat malaria and AIDS patients," the news service writes, noting, "Japan is the second-largest donor to Afghanistan, after the United States." VOA adds, "During Thursday's groundbreaking in Kabul, Afghan Health Minister Suraya Dalil said Afghanistan ranks in the top 20 worldwide for the most TB patients," and she noted the country has 2,000 centers nationwide that can diagnose and treat the disease (5/17).