Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Viewpoints: Demand Answers From Politicians On Common Sense Gun Laws; States Need Recovery Studies During Opioid Crisis
Houston Chronicle: Mass Shootings: It’s Not Guns. It’s Not Mental Health. It’s Both.
Not even mass shootings stay in the headlines very long with all the topsy-turvy news coming out of the White House every day. Unfortunately, the public seems to lose interest even faster when it’s reported that a shooter may have been mentally ill. Maybe that’s in part due to gun control advocates’ tendency to lower their volume when a mass gunman’s history of mental illness becomes known. That doesn’t invalidate their argument, but the gun lobby uses it as ammunition to steer the conversation from the need to further restrict the availability of guns that can kill or maim dozens of people in minutes. Instead of lowering their voices, gun control proponents should add them to the chorus of those similarly calling on politicians to close gaps in the mental health system that can lead to tragedies like Sunday’s mass shooting of 12 people at a video games tournament in Jacksonville, Fla. (8/29)
Stat: It's Time To Measure Addiction Recovery Rates, Not Just Addiction Rates
Lost among the headlines of opioid addiction and overdose deaths are the many quiet stories of recovery. An estimated 22 million Americans — that includes the three of us — are in recovery from opioid and other addictions. We say “estimated” because states and the federal government don’t track recovery like they track addiction rates or overdoses. (Robert D. Ashford, Olivia Pennelle and Brent Canode, 8/30)
The Wall Street Journal: How Air In The Pacific Northwest Became Dirtier Than Beijing’s
Crops are growing slower because of hazy skies, the Seattle Seahawks moved practice to an indoor facility, and people are showing up at hospitals and medical clinics with complaints of wheezing, shortness of breath and other ailments. Long-planned surgeries have been canceled because patients are too ill from the smoke. (Jim Carlton and Nour Malas, 8/28)
New England Journal of Medicine: The Supreme Court’s Crisis Pregnancy Center Case — Implications For Health Law
States frequently compel health professionals and commercial entities to disclose information relevant to patient or consumer decision making. For many years, such laws were presumed to be constitutional, despite the First Amendment’s protection of free speech. But after the Supreme Court’s decision in National Institute of Family and Life Advocates v. Becerra (NIFLA) in late June 2018, the status of such laws is an open question. (Wendy E. Parmet, Micah L. Berman and Jason A. Smith, 8/29)
WBUR: The Beauty Of 'Small Data' In Medicine, From Measuring Kids To Tumor Mutations
Small data is not in style these days, and I'm a big data practitioner myself, working at the intersection of data, computing and medicine as chair of Harvard Medical School's Department of Biomedical Informatics. So much the more reason, I think, to remember how much can be done with careful, meticulous consideration of data coming from a single patient. (Isaac Kohane, 8/29)
The Wall Street Journal: The Transgender Language War
If you want to control people’s thoughts, begin by commandeering their words. Taking this Orwellian lesson to heart, Virginia’s Fairfax County public school system recently stripped the phrase “biological gender” from its family life curriculum, replacing it with “sex assigned at birth.” Without permitting parents to opt out, public schools across the country are teaching children that “gender” is neither binary nor biological. It’s closer to a mental state: a question of how girllike or boylike you feel. Students will fall anywhere along a gender spectrum, according to these educators. (Abigail Shrier, 8/29)
New England Journal of Medicine: Personalized Hospital Ratings — Transparency For The Internet Age
As currently constructed, the weighting systems that underlie overall hospital performance ratings are expressions of the values, preferences, and tastes of their creators. Why not ask patients what’s important to them instead? (Juliet Rumball-Smith, Jill Gurvey, and Mark W. Friedberg, 8/30)
New England Journal of Medicine: Life Lessons From Paul In The Face Of Death
My brother Paul, a rabbi, died recently, just shy of 3 years after the diagnosis of widely metastatic colon cancer. The story of his diagnosis and treatment is all too familiar. An apparently healthy 64-year-old man has a sudden onset of lower abdominal pain. Imaging reveals an obstructing lesion. Surgery leads to the diagnosis of colon cancer, stage IV at diagnosis, with hepatic, peritoneal, and pulmonary spread. ...A rabbi is a teacher, and Paul taught us, his family and associates, three lessons during the time granted to him by medical science. (Jeffrey M. Drazen, 8/29)
San Antonio Press Express: High Eviction Rate Reflects On Community Shortcomings
Some San Antonio residents are finding it more difficult to maintain a roof over their heads as the affordable housing market shrinks, rents go up and safety nets disappear. ...San Antonio has a low cost of living, but many of its apartment dwellers are nonetheless what the federal government calls “cost burdened,” which means they spend more than 30 percent of their income on housing. (8/28)
Sacramento Bee: California Communities Are Thirsty For Justice
Our leaders should do what’s right and support Senate Bills 844 and 845 to finance the proposed Safe and Affordable Drinking Water Fund. The bills are modest in scope and cost, but will save lives. They will raise a small, dedicated amount of funding through new fees on agriculture and voluntary charges on water bills to help low-income communities afford ongoing operations and maintenance costs for water treatment. (Dolores Huerta and Tom Steyer, 8/28)
