Archives: Morning Breakouts

NPR reports that the latest flashpoint involves a $15 billion cut from the health law's prevention trust fund. Meanwhile, The Washington Post offers a fact check on stats offered by the Romney campaign about the Obama administration and women.

A poll by the Pew Research Center for People and the Press found the court's favorability rating to be 52 percent, the lowest in 25 years.

UNICEF "has voiced alarm at the decline of breastfeeding across East Asia, stressing the need for mothers to understand its long-term benefits for the survival and development of their children," Bernama reports (5/2). In Thailand, as few as five percent of all mothers breastfeed, about 10 percent of mothers breastfeed in Vietnam, and approximately 28 percent of mothers do so in China, according to the U.N. News Centre. "The low breastfeeding rates across East Asia result from economic developments that enable more women to enter the workforce, as well as 'aggressive' marketing of infant formula in the region, [UNICEF] added in a news release," the news service reports.

Reuters examines cancer in Africa, writing, "Most of Africa's around 2,000 languages have no word for cancer. The common perception in both developing and developed countries is that it's a disease of the wealthy world, where high-fat, processed-food diets, alcohol, smoking and sedentary lifestyles fuel tumor growth." However, according to the news service, sub-Saharan Africa will see an estimated one million new cancer cases this year -- "a number predicted to double to two million a year in the next decade," and, "[b]y 2030, according to predictions from the [WHO], 70 percent of the world's cancer burden will be in poor countries."

"Hundreds of thousands of people are struggling to feed their families in the parts of Syria hardest hit by violence, activists and aid workers say, with access to food cut off by ruined infrastructure, rocketing prices and, say some, security forces who steal and spoil food supplies," the Washington Post reports. Last month, the U.N. World Food Programme (WFP) "scaled up assistance to reach a quarter-million people" and "is planning to increase that to 500,000 by the end of this month," according to the newspaper. "[T]he government in March introduced a system of price-fixing for essential foods that has stabilized the cost of bread, sugar and meat -- although they remain much higher than they were a year ago," the Washington Post writes, adding, "Despite efforts to mitigate the problem, around half of Syrians may live in poverty, said Salman Shaikh of the Brookings Institute in Doha, who argued that this is increasing anti-government feeling" (Fordham, 5/1).

The Center for Global Health Policy's "Science Speaks" blog rounds up results presented at a late breaker session at last week's 2nd International Treatment as Prevention Workshop in Vancouver. The blog notes the session "offered some interesting insights relevant to HIV treatment scale up" (Lubinski, 4/30).

"In public comments [.pdf] submitted this week, a group of 14 leading HIV/AIDS and health organizations stated their support for Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval of emtricitabine/tenofovir disoproxil fumarate [TDF/FTC] ... as pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) to prevent HIV infection in adult men and women," a press release from AVAC: Global Advocacy for HIV Prevention states. "Modeling studies have shown that widespread access to PrEP could reduce new HIV infections, and thus the scale of the global HIV epidemic, substantially around the world," the press release says, adding, "The FDA's decision on TDF/FTC as PrEP could help pave the way for global health funders and developing countries to step up their planning for implementation" (5/1).

A post on the Global Health Technologies Coalition's (GHTC) "Breakthroughs" blog describes an event to launch a recent report from GHTC and Policy Cures on "data on U.S. investments over the past 10 years in global health research and development (R&D)." The event, co-hosted by Research!America, featured comments from panelists Javier Guzman, director of research at Policy Cures; Lee Hall, chief of the Parasitology and International Programs Branch at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID); Heather Ignatius, senior manager for policy at the Global Alliance for TB Drug Development; and Eric Easom, program leader for neglected diseases at Anacor Pharmaceuticals, according to the blog (Lufkin, 5/1).

Some states plan to test new ways to care for people who qualify for both Medicare and Medicaid early next year.

The funds will help centers in 48 states expand their capacity to serve an additional 900,000 people.

CNN reports on how "[t]he issue of forced abortions -- and in some cases, forced sterilizations -- in China has seized the spotlight in recent days with news of escaped activist Chen Guangcheng," who "rose to fame in the late 1990s because of his advocacy for what he calls victims of abusive practices, such as forced abortions, by Chinese family planning officials." China's so-called "one-child policy has been blamed for abuses," the news service reports. The news service writes, "In some cases, advocates say, fetuses identified as female are aborted, ... abandoned, left to die or raised as orphans," as "Chinese traditionally prefer boys over girls." CNN describes several reports from women's health advocates working in China of women undergoing forced abortion and sterilization; a report from the Congressional-Executive Commission on China, "created by Congress to monitor human rights and the rule of law in China"; and the State Department's 2009 Human Rights Report, the news service notes.

Although President Barack Obama and GOP presidential hopeful Mitt Romney offer voters "a distinct choice," Romney is still courting conservatives within his party who have been concerned about his past positions on things such as abortion and health reform.

"The world is falling behind in its pledge to reduce HIV/AIDS infections and improve treatment, especially in sub-Saharan Africa, according to a U.N. report [.pdf] released Monday" by U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, the Associated Press reports. The report to the U.N. General Assembly "said that 'critical challenges remain' if the world is to make good on promises made at a U.N.-sponsored meeting on HIV/AIDS in June 2011," the AP writes (Alt Powell, 4/30). "Among the targets set by the international community at the June 2011 high-level meeting are the elimination of new HIV/AIDS infections in children, cutting sexually transmitted infections by 50 percent, and delivering antiretroviral therapy to 15 million people," Xinhua/China Daily notes (5/1).

The federal judge prevented Texas from enforcing the law, which banned Planned Parenthood from the state's health care program for women, until the legal challenge is concluded.