Latest KFF Health News Stories
Physician Leader: Medical Resident Training Should Focus On Cost-Conscious Care
Medscape reports on an article in the Annals of Internal Medicine delving into issues of physician training.
Insurance Commissioners Plan To Challenge Efforts To Extract More Money From Medigap Plans
Members of NAIC are developing a letter they plan to send to members of Congress regarding this proposal, which the president currently supports for new enrollees.
Critics Complain About Changes In Mental Health Coverage In Iowa, Ariz.
Under Iowa’s new Medicaid rule, psychiatric patients can fill only 15 days’ worth of medications at a time. In Arizona, state officials say the mental health system has weathered deep cuts, but advocates see harm from the move.
State Roundup: Consumers Oppose Ga. Request To Ease Insurer Profit Rules
News outlets report on a variety of state health policy issues.
USA Today: Seniors Key To Fighting Medicare Fraud
Officials believe that “Senior Medicare Patrols” will help make sure criminals who are involved in this health care fraud will be caught.
‘ResistanceMap’ Tracks Antibiotic Resistance Online
“Extending the Cure,” a research project of the Center for Disease Dynamics, Economics & Policy that looks at antibiotic resistance, on Wednesday launched a map “designed to be a tool for public health, researchers, doctors, the media and the public to track resistant pathogens, which is a growing problem around the world,” the Washington Post’s “The Checkup” blog reports. The “ResistanceMap,” funded in part by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, “compiles data from a variety of sources,” including the CDC, FDA, European Antimicrobial Resistance Surveillance Network and Canadian Antimicrobial Resistance Alliance, the blog notes. “Among the trends the map illustrates is that Western Europe is doing a better job than the United States of controlling certain resistant microbes, … [t]he United States and Ireland have the highest rates of vancomycin-resistant enterococcus (VRE),” and “[t]he South has higher rates of resistance compared to the West or Northeast in the United States,” the blog writes (Stein, 9/21).
HHS Spending Bill Stalled By House Impasse
The Senate Appropriations Committee’s consideration of the spending measure will likely be largely symbolic and the actual spending it covers will be handled later this year. The appropriations process, however, has been used by Republicans to attack the health law’s funding.
President, Party Leaders Offer ‘Super Committee’ Conflicting Advice
The GOP leaders say new taxes should be unacceptable. The president says any cuts to Medicare without also increasing revenue would trigger a veto. And the House Majority Leader advises the panel to “think small.”
Four Insurers May Help Provide Answers To Health Cost Puzzle
Four major health insurers announced plans yesterrday to pool their health care claims data into a single database to enable researchers to mine for information about trends in costs, utilization and intensity of care.
Rockefeller: ‘Blended Rate’ Proposal Could Be End Of CHIP
Sen. John D. Rockefeller, D-W.Va., said Tuesday that the deficit plan announced this week by President Barack Obama would take a significant toll on states’ CHIP programs.
State-Federal Tensions Surround Plans For Health Exchanges
At a meeting this week, state regulators offered their objections to the Obama administration’s plans. One focus was the partnership model which would utilize joint state-federal operation of some exchanges. Meanwhile, in Minnesota, GOP lawmakers step-up their criticism of the state’s efforts.
Archbishop Tutu Calls On Obama To Lead The World In Expansion Of HIV Treatment
Nobel Peace Prize winner and human rights advocate Archbishop Desmond Tutu writes in a Washington Post opinion piece that President Barack Obama “is in a position to make a game-changing impact on the war against AIDS” and he “should lead the world in a massive effort to expand access to treatment and rid humanity of AIDS — the most devastating disease of our time.” However, “just as the end of AIDS has finally come within reach, we are witnessing an unprecedented drop in financial and political support for the cause,” he adds.
UNFPA Working To Ensure Health Of Future Generations In Dadaab Refugee Camps
The health care system in the refugee camps in Dadaab, Kenya, which were established “long ago,” are “currently challenged and stretched by the recent influx of refugees,” UNFPA Executive Director Babatunde Osotimihen writes in this BMJ Group Blogs entry, noting that efforts are underway “to strengthen the existing system with supplies [and] human resources at clinic and outreach levels” to increase access. UNFPA is working “to improve reproductive health care in Dadaab and in accessible parts of Somalia through the provision of related life-saving medical supplies and equipment, which will lead to a reduction in adult and child morbidity and death,” he writes.
Celebrating Partnerships That Lead To Sustainable, Locally Managed HIV/AIDS Response Efforts
Mary Fanning, South Africa’s country coordinator for PEPFAR, writes in a New Age guest column, “In the fight against HIV/AIDS, this is a time of hope. It’s also a time to celebrate the partnerships that are advancing this work and to recommit to a plan to ensure prevention, treatment and care for those infected and affected is sustainable and locally managed,” adding, “Ultimately, whether it’s putting more people on treatment, supporting HIV testing campaigns or leveraging mass media to drive the prevention message, the partnership between the U.S. and South African governments saves lives.”
Leaders Address Nutrition On Sidelines Of U.N. NCD Meeting
On the sidelines of the U.N. High-level Meeting on Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs) on Tuesday, “[r]epresentatives of governments, civil society and the private sector joined United Nations agencies … to emphasize the importance of good nutrition, which is vital not only for human health but also for national economic and social development,” the U.N. News Centre reports. The event “took place one year after the launch of the Scale Up Nutrition (SUN) Movement, a global initiative that aims to improve maternal and child nutrition,” the news service reports (9/20).
Health Officials In Africa Address NCDs In Addition To HIV/AIDS Epidemic
PlusNews examines how health officials are addressing non-communicable diseases (NCDs) in sub-Saharan Africa, where “[c]ountries grappling with HIV prevalence are now faced with rising epidemics of chronic diseases.”
USAID Launches ‘FWD’ Campaign To Raise Awareness Of Famine, Drought In Horn Of Africa
The PBS NewsHour blog “The Rundown” features an interview with USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah, in which he discusses a new website initiative called “FWD,” “aimed at giving viewers a better sense of the scope of the famine in the Horn of Africa — its worst in more than 60 years.” The site includes infographics and data maps “intended to contextualize the problem by showing the recent increase in food prices, where internally displaced peoples camps are located, and where various aid groups are operating,” according to the blog (Epatko, 9/20).
Indian Government Responds To New Avian Flu Outbreak
“Authorities in eastern India will start culling chickens and destroying eggs to contain a new outbreak of H5 bird flu, the government said in a statement on Tuesday, as a mutant strain of the virus is spreading elsewhere in Asia,” Reuters reports (Williams, 9/20). “A mutant strain of avian influenza — for which there is no vaccine — appeared recently in China and Vietnam. But Indian authorities did not specify which strain of the H5N1 virus had been detected in the West Bengal region, which has been a hot spot for avian flu in the past,” the Los Angeles Times’ “Booster Shots” blog reports. The blog provides a link to track the movement of bird flu on the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization’s avian influenza pages and a link for additional information on the virus from the CDC (9/20).
Polio Spreads From Pakistan To China; WHO Warns Of Further Spread
“Polio has broken out in China for the first time since 1999 after being imported from Pakistan, and there is a high risk of the crippling virus spreading further during the annual Haj pilgrimage, the World Health Organization said on Tuesday,” Reuters reports (9/20). Nine cases of wild poliovirus type 1 have been recorded in China’s western province of Xinjiang, which borders Pakistan, WHO spokesperson Oliver Rosenbauer said, according to Daily News and Analysis, GlobalPost notes (9/21). A genetic link has been confirmed between the virus detected in China and a strain circulating in Pakistan, according to the Associated Press/USA Today (9/20). BBC News reports that “Chinese authorities are now investigating the cases, and a mass vaccination campaign has been launched in the region” (9/20).
