Latest KFF Health News Stories
Defending Washington’s Basic Health Plan; Questioning Wisconsin’s Proposed Health Care Cuts
Opinions from Washington state, Wisconsin, Massachusetts and Georgia explore issues in the health care marketplace. Meanwhile, the individual mandate and recent Avastin decision also raise questions.
Health Spending Still In Jeopardy Despite End Of Super Committee
Although Medicare and Medicaid were largely protected when the panel broke up, budget cutters will continue to eye them, and other health programs will likely have funding reduced.
Super Committee Ends Work Without A Deal; Automatic Cuts Take Effect In 2013
The divide between Republicans and Democrats proved too deep for the committee to find compromise.
Insurers Fear Consequences Of Individual Mandate Being Struck Down
The Hill writes that letting the 2010 health law stand without the individual mandate is the worst possible outcome for insurers. Meanwhile, CQ looks into the Medicaid expansion issue and demands for Kagan and Thomas to recuse themselves.
Obama Administration Calls On Pa. Insurer To Lower Rate Hike
The Obama administration on Monday called on a Pennsylvania insurer to lower its proposed 12 percent rate increase for a small business health insurance plan. It’s the first time the administration has used such new powers given it in the health reform law.
First Edition: November 22, 2011
Today’s early morning highlights from the major news organizations, including news and analysis about the collapse of the super committee talks Monday.
Super Committee Ends Talks, Cuts For Health Programs May Result
Late Monday afternoon, the co-chairmen of the congressional super committee announced that their talks had ended in stalemate.
Significant Drops Seen In AIDS-Related Deaths, New HIV Infections, UNAIDS Report Shows
UNAIDS on Monday released its World AIDS Day Report 2011 (.pdf), “which shows more people than ever living with HIV, but deaths and new infections steadily dropping,” the Guardian reports (Boseley, 11/21). The number of AIDS-related deaths in 2010 was 21 percent lower than its peak in 2005, and the number of new HIV infections in 2010 also was down 21 percent from its peak in 1997, according to the report, BBC News notes (11/21). The report credits more widespread treatment, behavior change and male circumcision for significant drops in the number of new cases, according to the Guardian (11/21). “Of the 14.2 million people eligible for treatment in low- and middle-income countries, around 6.6 million, or 47 percent, are now receiving it, UNAIDS said, and 11 poor- and mid-income countries now have universal access to HIV treatment, with coverage of 80 percent or more,” Reuters notes, adding, “This compares with 36 percent of the 15 million people needing treatment in 2009 who got AIDS drugs” (Kelland, 11/21).
After two months of deliberation and debate to try to find ways to cut the deficit by $1.2 trillion over ten years, the deficit panel is expected to announce today that it was unable to come to terms on an agreement.
If There’s No Deficit Reduction Deal, What Happens Next?
Both parties are jockeying for position, trying to spin the super committee’s expected announcement of failure into political victory. Meanwhile, some news outlets are examining what happens next for the automatic cuts, which will be triggered in 2013 if the deficit panel indeed does not offer a plan.
Medicare Will Still Cover Avastin For Breast Cancer, Despite Revocation Of FDA Approval
The FDA announced that Avastin, while still approved for other cancers, is more harmful than helpful to breast cancer patients.
WFP Says More Than 1M Zimbabweans Will Need Food Aid Through March 2012
More than one million Zimbabweans will need food aid between now and March 2012 because of poor harvests and food prices out of reach for vulnerable families, the U.N. World Food Programme (WFP) said Monday, the Associated Press reports (11/21). The agency “said it was facing a $42 million funding shortfall for food aid it planned to provide to vulnerable households in Zimbabwe’s hardest-hit areas until the start of the harvest season in March,” Reuters writes (11/21). According to a recent survey, “12 percent of the rural population will not have the means to feed themselves adequately during the lean season,” a WFP press release notes, adding, “Most at risk are low-income families hit by failed harvests, and households with orphans and vulnerable children” (11/21).
U.N. Makes Statement, WaterAid Releases Report On Sanitation To Coincide With World Toilet Day
“The United Nations independent expert on access to water and sanitation as a human right [on Saturday] urged States to allocate more resources to improving sanitation and promote efficient use of existing hygiene facilities, stressing that people are entitled to decent toilets,” the U.N. News Centre reports. “‘Lack of sanitation implies the loss of millions of school and work days as well as enormous health costs,’ said Catarina de Albuquerque, the U.N. Special Rapporteur on the Human Right to Safe Drinking Water and Sanitation, in a statement to mark the World Toilet Day, which is observed on 19 November each year,” the news service writes (11/19).
Wall Street Journal CEO Council Highlights Global Health As Priority Area
The Wall Street Journal last week held its CEO Council, “assembl[ing] nearly 100 chief executives of large companies for a day and a half to discuss the policy choices facing business and government, and the effects those choices may have on the global economy.” The CEOs formed five task forces to discuss priority areas, including global health, according to the newspaper (11/21). The Wall Street Journal summarizes the top four recommended priorities from the task-force discussion on global health, which include fighting non-communicable diseases, encouraging the global use of health technologies, targeting vaccine-preventable diseases, and stopping the spread of HIV/AIDS (Landro, 11/21).
Innovations, New Solutions Needed To End ‘Global Sanitation Crisis’
In this CNN opinion piece, Jenna Davis — a faculty member in Stanford University’s Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering, where her research and teaching focuses on water, sanitation and health, and a former member of the U.N. Millennium Task Force for Water and Sanitation — reports on what she calls a “global sanitation crisis,” writing, “More than 40 percent of the world’s population does not have access to a toilet. These 2.6 billion people, most living in low- and middle-income countries in Asia and Africa, face the daily challenge of finding a bush, train track or empty lot where they can urinate and defecate in relative privacy.”
Potential Cuts To Global Health Spending Threaten Vision Of ‘AIDS-Free Generation’
The vision of an “AIDS-free generation” presented in a speech earlier this month by Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton “is under threat in Congress,” as “[t]he House and the Senate are discussing significant cuts to the 2012 Obama administration request for global health funding,” Jeanie Yoon, a physician with Doctors Without Borders/Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF), writes in a Baltimore Sun opinion piece. Yoon describes an MSF program in Zambia working to prevent mother-to-child HIV transmission (PMTCT), saying such programs “provide an opportunity for mothers be tested for HIV (as well as other dangerous conditions for pregnant women) and to take the steps needed for them and their babies to live healthy lives; as well as for communities to gain productive members instead of incurring yet more losses.”
Medicare Physician Pay Cut Again In Play
Because the deficit panel’s prospects are increasingly dim, efforts to intervene to prevent a 27 percent reduction in Medicare physician payments are becoming increasingly dire.
Health Policies, Entitlements Grab Headlines In GOP Campaign Coverage
Newt Gingrich’s health policies are getting a thorough review as his standings in the polls improve. In the background, Mitt Romney blames President Barack Obama for the super committee’s difficulties.
Increasing Food Supply Through Production, Trade Policies Necessary To Prevent Widespread Hunger
“If we are to succeed in alleviating poverty and providing the necessary framework for sustainable development on our planet, there is no more pressing need than ensuring the supply of affordable food for our people,” Pascal Lamy, director-general of the World Trade Organization, writes in the Guardian’s “Poverty Matters Blog.” He continues, “There are two keys to tackling this problem, enhancing production — particularly in Africa — and ensuring that trade in food flows unhindered from the lands of the plenty to the lands of the few. Without immediate action in these two areas, there is a risk that hunger will become even more widespread, with many million more lives at stake” (11/21).
