Archives: Morning Breakouts

Exit polls from Tuesday's New Hampshire primary found the economy to be the highest ranking issue among voters. Meanwhile, as campaigns move on to South Carolina, GOP presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich is set to run a new ad about rival Mitt Romney's abortion positions.

Researchers in this PLoS Medicine article examine the efforts necessary to reach the WHO goal of reducing mother-to-child HIV transmission (MTCT) risk to less than five percent in Zimbabwe. They conclude, "Implementation of the WHO [prevention of MTCT (PMTCT)] guidelines must be accompanied by efforts to improve access to PMTCT services, retain women in care, and support medication adherence throughout pregnancy and breastfeeding, to approach the 'virtual elimination' of pediatric HIV in Zimbabwe," according to the study (Ciaranello et al., 1/10). A Massachusetts General Hospital press release states the research "should help with the planning of expanded programs to prevent mother-to-child HIV transmission in sub-Saharan Africa and other areas with limited health resources" (1/10).

"Roughly 42 percent of all Indian children under age five suffer from malnutrition, a sobering reminder of the persistence of poverty and hunger in the world's largest democracy, according to a major report released" on Tuesday by the Naandi Foundation, an independent charitable organization, the New York Times reports. "Levels of malnutrition, while still high, have fallen by 20 percent in the last seven years," the newspaper notes (Yardley, 1/10). "The Hunger and Malnutrition Survey monitored over 100,000 children in 112 districts across nine states in the country from October 2010 to February of last year," the Associated Press writes (1/10).

"In just over two decades, global health has gained a political visibility and status that some authors have called a political revolution," Ilona Kickbusch, director of the Global Health Programme at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva, writes in a U.N. Chronicle opinion analysis. She reviews how the U.N. and its health agency, the WHO, have addressed global health issues, how funding for global health has increased but needs remain, and how the number of key players in the field has "increased considerably."

The Frontline Health Workers Coalition -- which consists of 16 major non-governmental organizations (NGOs) including the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Family Care International, the International Association of Physicians in AIDS Care, and RESULTS -- has launched "a new initiative to add one million health care workers in developing countries," VOA News reports, adding that the "Coalition says training more community-level workers is the most cost effective way to save lives, speed progress on global health threats and promote U.S. economic and strategic interests" (DeCapua, 1/11). "The Coalition, which launched today with the release of a new report (.pdf) focusing on the need for frontline health workers, is calling on the U.S. administration to train and support an additional 250,000 new frontline health workers -- and to better support the capacity and impact of existing workers where the need is greatest," a Coalition press release (.pdf) states (1/11).

"Responding to U.S. experiments that infected Guatemalans with syphilis and gonorrhea in the 1940s, the Obama administration announced Tuesday that it will spend $1 million to study new rules for protecting medical research volunteers," and "[a]n additional $775,000 will go to fighting sexually transmitted diseases in Guatemala," the Washington Post reports (Vastag 1,10). "President Barack Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius all have apologized for the research, hidden for decades until a Wellesley College medical historian uncovered the records in 2009," the Associated Press/Boston Globe notes (Pickler, 1/10).

Federal officials have asked the National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity (NSABB) "to review the state of the science looking at human transmission of deadly bird flu, says panel chief Paul Keim of Northern Arizona University," USA Today reports. "In December, the NSABB asked the journals, Science and Nature, to withhold details of studies that showed how to make the flu strain transmissible between ferrets, the closest mammal model for human-to-human transmission of the bug," the newspaper notes. "'We are now involved in a broader review,' Keim says. ... 'This research is valuable, but saying this is just "basic" research ignores that influenza is a very special pathogen,' Keim adds," according to the newspaper (Vergano, 1/10).

The International Herald Tribune's "Express Tribune" reports on a two-day HIV/AIDS awareness workshop held in Pakistan this week. Speaking on Monday at the inaugural session of the event, titled "The State of HIV in Pakistan-2011," Amir Maqbool, acting program manager of the National AIDS Control Program (NACP), stated that HIV/AIDS could not be controlled in the country without legislation and strong financial funding for prevention and control efforts, according to the newspaper. "In the aftermath of the devolution of the Ministry of Health, there is no mechanism to implement the legislation; something which previously fell under the purview of the Senate Standing Committee on Health," the newspaper notes. The article highlights findings from multiple studies presented at the workshop (Wasif, 1/10).

Nigeria's "The Nation" examines whether, with three years until the deadline for attaining the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), the country will be able to meet the targets of reducing maternal and infant mortality by one-third as set by the U.N. The newspaper provides statistics from UNICEF regarding maternal and infant mortality in the country and quotes a number of health experts, including Edamisan Temiye, chair of the Nigerian Medical Association (NMA), Lagos State Branch, who "said with the rate Nigeria is going, it may not realize its target of one-third reduction of maternal and infant deaths by 2015." According to the newspaper, Temiye cites a "virtually failed" immunization program, a high poverty level, and limited access to education, water, and housing as contributing factors to Nigeria's maternal and infant mortality rates (Adepoju, 1/10).

This slowing of health spending brought the rate of growth in line with that of the U.S. economy. The Obama administration pointed to the new figures as evidence that the health law isn't making health care more expensive.