Parsing Policy: Springing Forward Is Bad For Your Health; Opioid Crisis Only Getting Worse During Covid

Los Angeles Times: Time To Stop Messing Around With Time. Dump The Clock-Changing Foolishness, Already
It’s nearly that time of year again when Americans reset their clocks one hour ahead, grumble about losing an hour of sleep — and wonder why on Earth we keep observing the outdated tradition of tinkering with time twice a year. It’s a good question. There’s no practical benefit to the biannual clock-changing ritual beyond reminding people to check their smoke alarm batteries. But there are plenty of annoyances and maybe some health risks too. (3/12)

Boston Globe: Let’s Spring Forward — And Not Turn Back
It is never easy to give up an hour of sleep, and it will be even harder this weekend, after an exhausting year of dealing with a deadly global pandemic. But spring forward we must, as our cell phones automatically adjust to change time forward one hour Sunday morning, and we must fiddle with the coffee makers and desk clocks that require us to make the change manually. There is no better time for lawmakers to act on an issue that not only enjoys bipartisan support but will also literally allow them to bring more light into the lives of Americans: Pass the Sunshine Protection Act, and make this the last time we have to change time. (3/12)

Also —

Bloomberg: The Opioid Death Toll Is Rising Amid Covid-19 
Since 1999, when the unconstrained prescription of painkillers was beginning to emerge as a public-health crisis, more than 535,000 lives have been lost to opioid overdoses. If that grim number seems familiar, it’s just a bit higher than Covid-19’s toll of 527,000 deaths so far. Covid-19 and the opioid crisis are linked in other ways, too. The pandemic has driven an alarming increase in overdose fatalities over the past year, as people struggling to recover from opioid dependence have been undone by isolation, job loss and the added difficulty of getting support and treatment with social-distancing rules in effect. All this at a time when lethal illicit fentanyl is increasingly turning up in street narcotics, including counterfeit hydrocodone and oxycodone pills. The 12 months ending last July saw 61,000 deaths, a surge from the previous year — even though the period includes only the first five months of the pandemic. (3/10)

Stat: Reining In Drug Patents Isn't A Silver Bullet Against High Drug Prices 
It’s a laudable goal. High drug prices are a major public health concern; there is broad political support for reining in the cost of drugs; and Americans pay a lot for drugs. A recent pharmaceutical spending report from the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development found that U.S. residents spend roughly 50% more on drugs per person than residents of Switzerland, the second highest-spending country, and about twice as much as the median of its peer OECD countries. (Jacob S. Sherkow, 3/12)

Stat: Choosing The Right USPTO Director Can Help Lower Drug Prices 
As the Biden administration fills key Cabinet positions, its attention must turn to other critical areas of the U.S. government, like appointing a new director of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). This agency is unusual in the federal government because it operates solely on fees collected by its users and not on taxpayer dollars. The office has been working under an acting director, Drew Hirshfeld, since the previous director, Andrei Iancu, officially resigned on Jan. 19, 2021. The USPTO director that President Biden selects will provide important signal of the administration’s patent priorities and can have a positive impact at a time when patents are being abused to support high drug prices. (Matthew Lane, 3/12)

Boston Globe: A Long, Strange Trip To The Mainstream For Psychedelics 
Massachusetts General Hospital wouldn’t seem like a natural fit for a center devoted to mind-altering drugs. The Harvard-affiliated medical behemoth is the very definition of establishment. But this week, MGH launched the Center for the Neuroscience of Psychedelics to study the potential of psilocybin and other psychoactive drugs to treat conditions such as depression, addiction, trauma, and more. Forget the beads and bellbottoms: The new center at MGH signifies that the field of psychedelic therapy has arrived. (Renee Loth, 3/12)