Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Viewpoints: Pandemic Slowed Basic Vaccination In Children Worldwide; Mississippi Tackling Abortion Rights
Stat: A Double Vaccine Crisis Is Endangering Millions Of Children
World health experts met recently to discuss an emerging global health crisis linked to the Covid-19 pandemic: plummeting rates of basic vaccinations among the world’s children. While many experts have been acutely aware of the pandemic’s impact on essential health services, startling new immunization data from the World Health Organization and UNICEF indicate that decades of progress against some of the world’s most dangerous diseases is being severely threatened. (Martha Rebour and Lori Sloate, 7/29)
The New York Times: Mississippi Explains All On Abortion
Attorney General Lynn Fitch of Mississippi made nationwide news last week when she asked the Supreme Court to overturn its two leading precedents on the right to abortion, Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey. I was puzzled by the treatment of this filing as news, unless the news was that a state finally came clean with the court and told the justices what it really wanted them to do. (Linda Greenhouse, 7/29)
Stat: Pharmacoequity: A New Goal For Ending Disparities In Health Care
The Covid-19 pandemic has brought to the public’s attention alarming racial disparities in health. According to new data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, life expectancy in the U.S. fell in 2020 by 1.5 years, the largest drop since World War II. The drop was far greater for Black and Hispanic Americans, who lost three years in life expectancy over the past year. (Utibe R. Essien, 7/28)
Newsweek: We Can End Hepatitis C. Why Aren't We?
This year, roughly 14,000 Americans will die from hepatitis C, an infectious disease that can be cured by a simple pill in a matter of weeks. It's infuriating that our government hasn't done more to end this highly infectious disease that disproportionately impacts minorities and people struggling with substance use disorder. Curative drugs first hit the market in 2013. But hepatitis C cases actually rose 63 percent between 2015 and 2019, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (Carl Schmid, 7/28)
The Boston Globe: How Do We Heal Our Loss And Trauma While The Pandemic Continues On?
I awoke with a start, fragments of my dream still tangled with my early morning consciousness. In the dream, I was traveling, but rather than being at the start of my travels or at my final destination, I was in transit. I had a plane to catch and, though I had left hours to get from one terminal to the next, my journey kept being waylaid and confused. The airplane terminals became long curving paths. There were somehow missed taxis along the way, and I was running at the end. In realizing that I had missed my connection I awoke, my heart pounding. As COVID-19 rates are rising again and the Delta variant is spreading at dramatic rates in largely unvaccinated American states, partially vaccinated countries, and globally where access to vaccines has been poor, the fantasy of arriving at our “final destination” — the post-COVID-19 world — appears to be quickly slipping away. (Katherine Gergen Barnett, 7/29)
Stat: Aduhelm: Following In The Footsteps Of Making Better Cancer Drugs
The Food and Drug Administration’s approval of Biogen’s Alzheimer’s drug Aduhelm has stirred intense controversy, with pundits launching attacks on multiple fronts. Professors focus on population outcomes rather than individual treatment responses; politicians worry about drug pricing rather than disease cost; critics pounce on the FDA’s narrowing of the drug’s label to reflect its clinical trial — all casting doubt on the drug’s effectiveness and value. What’s been lost in the flurry is an understanding of how progress against complex diseases advances — and the historic importance of Aduhelm as a first step in that process. (Andrew C. von Eschenbach, 7/29)
