Viewpoints: Missourians Have Lengthy Wait For Medicaid; Ending Flavored Tobacco Sales Will Reduce Use In Kids

Kansas City Star: Missouri Waits Until October For Expanded Medicaid Coverage 
Medicaid remains unexpanded in Missouri, nine months after voters ordered lawmakers to provide the service, and one month after the state Supreme Court affirmed that order. The continuing delay is a failure of leadership that starts with Gov. Mike Parson and trickles all through the state bureaucracy. It ensures weeks of continued suffering for the working poor, who can’t get the coverage they need and are owed. Missouri must do more to get them a Medicaid insurance card. (8/25)

Newsweek: It's Time To End The Sale Of All Flavored Tobacco Products 
The tobacco industry has a decades-long history of deceiving the public about the health risks of their products and their marketing to kids. It's not surprising that the industry is now disseminating misleading information about e-cigarettes. It is especially irresponsible that the industry is downplaying the severity of youth e-cigarette use. From 2017 to 2019, e-cigarette use among U.S. high school students more than doubled, from 11.7 percent to 27.5 percent. While youth e-cigarette use declined in 2020, 3.6 million middle and high school students still used e-cigarettes—the same number that led the U.S. Surgeon General and FDA to declare an epidemic in 2018. (Matthew L. Myers, 8/24)

Stat: A Public-Private Partnership Is Needed To Develop New Antivirals 
The U.S. government’s announcement that it is investing $3 billion into research on antiviral medicines for Covid-19 is a step in the right direction and comes at a critical moment in the pandemic — though earlier, of course, would have been better. But based on my experience with drug development, in particular with antivirals, in both government and the private sector, I know that the process takes longer and is more expensive than anyone ever anticipates. (Armand Balboni, 8/25)