Viewpoints: Heavy Drinking As A Public Health Crisis; Steps The Federal Gov’t Should Take To Curb Opioid Crisis

RealClear Health: Treat Heavy Drinking Like The Public Health Epidemic It Is
Excessive alcohol consumption is very common in America, but quality treatment is scarce. It’s time we transform our current treatment system into a modern one that can sufficiently respond one of the largest public health problems we face. At a time when government leaders show little interest in increasing commitments to health treatments, doing so requires that business leaders step in. (Mark Willenbring, 10/16)

JAMA: Ten Steps The Federal Government Should Take Now To Reverse The Opioid Addiction Epidemic
The United States is in the midst of the worst drug addiction epidemic in its history. Prescriptions for and deaths from opioids both quadrupled between 1995 and 2010. ... There are no simple solutions to ending this epidemic. Effective programs need to address 2 separate priorities: (1) prevention of addiction among people not currently addicted, and (2) treatment and risk reduction to prevent overdose and death among the millions of individuals in the United States now addicted. In this Viewpoint, we suggest 10 steps that could accelerate progress; national declarations, state-specific emergency declarations, or both could potentially facilitate implementation of these steps. (Andrew Kolodny and Thomas R. Frieden, 10/13)

RealClear Health: Mixing Agenda And Science: A Formula For Public Misconception
October is Breast Cancer awareness month—a time to remember friends and loved ones that have passed and promote cutting-edge research and early screenings that will prevent future deaths. However, many are pushing an alternative agenda. Activist researchers and a variety of media sources are focusing on the recently conjured connection between consuming the slightest amount of alcohol and breast cancer. (Sarah Longwell, 10/16)

Richmond Times-Dispatch: People In Mental Health Crisis Should Have Viable Alternative To Police Transport, Report Concludes
A state study released this month calls for the agency overseeing public mental health services in Virginia to establish a statewide alternative system of transportation, which could serve adult patients who are mobile and not considered by a magistrate to be a flight risk or pose a danger to themselves or others. About 40 percent of people mandated to receive care under the terms of a temporary detention order met those conditions during a pilot program conducted in five Southwest Virginia counties between Jan. 1, 2016, and March 13, 2017. (Burnell Evans, 10/13)

Miami Herald: Never Again Will A Lack Of A Generator Kill Nursing Home Residents In Florida
In September, elected officials, long-term care center administrators, advocates, and influencers stood together before a standing-room only crowd at a town hall meeting in North Miami Beach City Hall to take a solemn vow. We pledged that we would never allow our senior citizens to be subjected to catastrophic conditions like the ones that occurred when the Rehabilitation Center at Hollywood Hills lost power during Hurricane Irma’s passage. (U.S. Rep. Frederica Wilson, 10/14)

Arizona Republic: VA Failings To Treat Vets Continue To Outrage
Now we’re once again confronted with a revelation that the VA has been covering up the abuses of many of its own health-care practitioners who have badly served patients. A USA TODAY investigation found that the VA has not only failed to report many of its poorly performing medical providers to state licensing boards, it has stood by quietly as they have taken up new practices beyond the VA system. (10/15)

Hackensack (N.J.) Record/New Jersey.com: ‘Dangerous’ Doctors Have No Place Within The VA
When someone signs up to serve in the U.S. military, that person goes in with eyes open knowing they might be sent to a foreign field, unfriendly waters, or dangerous skies. These are our bravest citizens, and they go through extensive training. Still, once deployed they are never absolutely certain what challenge, obstacle or life-and-death circumstance awaits. That should never be the case when it comes to veterans and their health care. (10/11)

The New York Times: How To Win Against Big Soda
The soda industry won big in Chicago this week when county commissioners voted to scrap the 1-cent-per-ounce tax on sugary drinks that had been in place for just two months. This is a stark turn for the effort to tax these drinks, which has been making headway as voters and City Councils in at least a half-dozen other cities, including San Francisco and Philadelphia, in recent years approved measures in favor of soda levies. The sudden about-face in Chicago, after a battle in which both sides spent millions on TV and radio ads, offers an important lesson for advocates of these taxes, ourselves included, as the industry we call Big Soda takes aim at other communities: We can’t forget the grass roots. (10/15)