Archives: Morning Breakouts

The New York Times reports that the costs of drugs used by older Americans rose nearly 26 percent.

"Global health programs now teeter on the edge of disaster," Foreign Affairs writes in this feature article, adding, "The world economic crisis and the politics of debt reduction are threatening everything from malaria control and AIDS treatment to well-baby programs and health care worker training efforts." The article provides a historical overview of global health programming and funding. "Like it or not, the burden of reducing suffering and increasing the health of the world's poor now falls largely on the backs of the two Washingtons," Foreign Affairs writes, referring to politicians in Washington and the Washington state-based Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The article concludes, "It would be a catastrophe were the 'age of generosity' to end so soon after it began, leaving millions without life-sparing medicines and tools they have come to rely upon" (Garrett, 5/6).

Rep. Donald Payne (D-N.J.), the first African American elected to Congress from New Jersey, died of complications from colon cancer on Tuesday at age 77, VOA News reports (Simkins, 3/6). "Payne, the highest ranked Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health and Human Rights, worked to protect human rights and provide humanitarian aid to developing countries, particularly in Africa," United Press International writes (3/6). "He was ... a founder of the Malaria Caucus in Congress and helped secure billions of dollars in foreign aid for treating HIV, AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria," the New York Times notes (Hernandez, 3/6).

In this Huffington Post "Global Motherhood" opinion piece, Kate Roberts, vice president of corporate marketing, communications and advocacy at Population Services International, marks International Women's Day, to be recognized on March 8, and its 2012 theme, "Connecting Girls, Inspiring Futures." She says "the story of Facebook exemplifies precisely why the global community needs to invest in young minds and young leaders -- especially girls," and speculates what might have happened if Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg "had been born a girl in Rwanda." Roberts outlines what could happen to Rwandan girls growing up, including dying because of malaria or diarrhea before age five; missing out on educational opportunities; dying in childbirth at a young age; or contracting HIV.

"U.S. envoys said there was progress in talks Wednesday on arrangements for the first U.S. government food aid shipment to impoverished North Korea in three years, part of an agreement aimed at ending Pyongyang's nuclear programs," the Associated Press reports. Negotiators reached an agreement last week to provide 240,000 tons of U.S. food aid "in exchange for North Korea agreeing to freeze nuclear activities and allow the return of U.N. nuclear inspectors," the news agency continues. Special envoy Robert King "and senior aid official Jon Brause said the talks are intended to ensure proper procedures and safeguards are in place to make sure that nutritional aid for about one million North Koreans gets to those who need it most," including children, pregnant women, nursing mothers and the elderly, according to the AP. Officials are expected to meet again Thursday, the AP notes (3/6).

UNICEF's West and Central Africa Regional Office "on Tuesday appealed to western African governments to prevent a new cholera outbreak, after the disease claimed nearly 3,000 lives there last year," Agence France-Presse reports. The "bureau said that 'at least 105,248 cases of cholera were registered in 17 countries in 2011, and 2,898 people died' in what was one of the most severe outbreaks of the disease in years," the news agency writes. Though the number of cases is close to zero in most countries now, "governments should be prepared 'to minimize risks for the next season which, in West and Central Africa, is projected to start in April 2012,'" the agency said, and noted it was concerned the disease could spread to the Sahel region, where people already are weakened by malnutrition, according to AFP (3/6).

Not too many hospital administrators have their mom as head of two federal health insurance programs. Matt Tavenner does.

Meanwhile, as some House Republicans push to undo the measure's cost-cutting panel, known as the Independent Payment Advisory Board, advocates are springing to its defense.

"Opponents of birth control don't just want to limit access in the U.S., they want to slash U.S. support for international family planning programs. It's a perennial debate, and it's about to start all over again," Chloe Cooney, director of global advocacy at Planned Parenthood Federation of America, writes in an RH Reality Check blog post. President Obama's FY 2013 budget "demonstrates the value the administration places on family planning," as "funding for international family planning programs is preserved," she writes, noting Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's recent testimony to Congress about the budget proposal, in which "she consistently reiterated the importance of development as a key pillar of our foreign policy and national security strategy" and "the administration's focus on women and girls as central to these goals." Cooney concludes, "The president's budget protects U.S. investments in family planning programs around the world. Now it's up to Congress to make sure those funds remain intact" (3/5).

"The World Bank boasts that it has positioned itself as a 'global leader' in reproductive health, especially for youth and the poor," but in 2011, it dedicated "just 0.2 percent of its $43 billion budget" to reproductive health projects, and much of that money was provided as loans, which can "leave poor countries indebted and threaten to divert domestic spending away from vital public health services," Elizabeth Arend, program coordinator at Gender Action, writes in the Guardian's "Poverty Matters Blog." In addition, "[t]here is a striking mismatch between countries' maternal mortality rates and the bank's spending on reproductive health," Arend states, citing the examples of Sierra Leone, where the lifetime average risk of dying from pregnancy or childbirth is one in 35 and the World Bank provides $7.43 per person, versus Niger, Liberia, or Somalia, where women "face an average lifetime one in 17 risk of maternal death, yet these countries receive no reproductive health funding from the bank at all."