Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Viewpoints: Serious Errors In Olympic Athlete Drug Testing; New FDA Chief Must Regain Public Trust
The New York Times: Antidepressants Almost Cost This Olympian Her Career
If you’re an elite athlete today and don’t want to risk being accused of doping, you might want to skip your medicine. Don’t eat liver the night before a race. In fact, consider dropping meat altogether. Maybe avoid sex, too. Tests required by the World Anti-Doping Agency are now so sensitive, they can pick up trace amounts of banned substances from unexpected sources. When Brenda Martinez, an Olympian and one of the top track and field athletes in America, tested positive for a banned substance in September 2020, the source was a prescription drug that is not athletically performance-enhancing or even prohibited: an antidepressant. Her pills were contaminated with a diuretic that was not listed on the label and is not allowed. The episode almost derailed her career. (Lindsay Crouse, 5/13)
The Baltimore Sun: New FDA Chief, When Chosen, Must Crack Down On Clinical Trial Transparency
The COVID-19 pandemic has reinforced the importance of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in instilling trust in authorized and approved therapies and vaccines. Recent, repeated missteps from AstraZeneca surrounding its characterization of COVID-19 vaccine trial results, as well as possible safety concerns, have led to a clamoring call for increased FDA scrutiny of and transparency around AstraZeneca’s clinical trial data. President Biden has yet to nominate a new FDA commissioner to take the helm of this critical agency. Whoever steps into this role should commit to enforcing clinical trial transparency. Doing so is simple, requires no congressional action and will meaningfully protect patients. ( Joe Rabinovitsj, Celine Rohr and Reshma Ramachandran, 5/13)
Modesto Bee: CA Must Decriminalize Psychedelics For Health Treatments
On Oct. 20, 2018, I took five grams of psychedelic mushrooms and experienced the Divine. I was 50-years-old, married, a businessman and a father of three. I felt it was my last chance to climb out of the sense of disconnection and emptiness I’d been experiencing since the death of my mother five years earlier. I’ve always been a good self-healer. The youngest of three children from a single mother in a Mexican American community, I’d seen more than my fair share of the trauma typical of the struggling communities of America — domestic abuse, violence, alcoholism, economic uncertainty and little to no stability. (Carlos Plazola, 5/13)
