Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Viewpoints: Social Media Giants Finally Get Smart, Block Dangerous Antivaccine Misinformation; Patients Needing Cheaper Insulin End Up Being Winners
The Philadelphia Inquirer/Philly.com: Facebook, Twitter Are Blocking Dangerous Antivaccine Posts. It’s About Time
In recent weeks, Pinterest, YouTube, Facebook, and Amazon have done something previously thought unimaginable—they’ve censored potentially dangerous health information, at last addressing a problem that started in the late 1990s. ...Although marginalized, activists haven’t given up, turning their attention from mainstream media to social media, where their misinformation continues to mislead the public and cause harm. It is here that the anti-vaccine groups have thrived. Antivaccine blogs, websites, books, live streamings, podcasts, chat rooms, and Facebook pages dominate the landscape. Recently, and surprisingly, social media outlets have started to push back. (Paul Offit, 3/4)
Bloomberg: Cheaper Insulin Is A Big Victory For Patients
The debate over drug pricing has featured complicated arguments over profit, innovation, and fairness. At the end of the day, it’s all about patients being able to afford medicine – and Monday brought one of the biggest victories yet on that front. Eli Lilly & Co. announced that it's launching an authorized generic version of its best-selling insulin Humalog and that the list price of the drug – the pre-discount sticker price of the medicine – will be 50 percent lower than the current prescription brand. A vial of the new cheaper product will cost $137.35. (Max Nisen, 3/4)
The New York Times: ‘Medicare For All’: The Impossible Dream
The Brits and Canadians I know certainly love their single-payer health care systems. If one of their politicians suggested they should switch to the American health care model, they’d throw him out the window. So single-payer health care, or in our case “Medicare for all,” is worth taking seriously. I’ve just never understood how we get from here to there, how we transition from our current system to the one Bernie Sanders has proposed and Elizabeth Warren, Kamala Harris and others have endorsed. (David Brooks, 3/4)
The Washington Post: Trump’s Unhinged CPAC Speech Should Concern Us All
The president of the United States gave a rambling and incoherent two-hour speech in which he raved like a lunatic and told crazy, self-serving lies from start to finish. If that no longer qualifies as alarming, we’re in serious trouble. (Eugene Robinson, 3/4)
The Hill: New Domestic Gag Rule Limits The Health Care Women Receive
Access to quality health care took a direct hit with the release of a new, finalized rule governing the Title X Family Planning Program — the nation’s only dedicated federal source of funding providing family planning services and supplies to low-income people. (Ginney Ehrlich, 3/4)
The Washington Post: Gun Reform Doesn’t Happen Because Americans Don’t Want It Enough
The gun-reform bills the House passed last week are likely not going to pass the Senate. And even if they do, the president won’t sign them. And why not? Because people don’t care enough about gun regulation. Of course, plenty of people support gun regulation. In fact, most people do. The vast majority of the U.S. public supports expanded background checks. And after the horrific shooting in Parkland, Fla., a little more than a year ago, support for stricter gun laws surged to close to 70 percent, including more than 50 percent of Republicans. (Robert Gebelhoff, 3/4)
The Wall Street Journal: What Your Doctor Isn’t Allowed To Tell You
It isn’t easy to ruffle my friend of 30 years, one of the best gastroenterologists in Boston, a town known for top-notch medicine. But he was ruffled when he told the story of giving a patient anesthesia and performing a medically unnecessary procedure—only he hadn’t known it was unnecessary because the patient’s electronic health record, or EHR, didn’t function as promised. If you’ve heard of EHRs, you know that many doctors consider them a pain in the neck. Not much is said, however, about the harm EHRs can cause to patients. There’s a reason for that: Gag clauses prevent EHR users from talking publicly about their specific problems. (John Levinson, 3/4)
Stat: Building A Diverse Company In Health Care Pays Off In Many Ways
Diversity and inclusion tend to get more lip service than action, often because business leaders don’t always recognize the connection between the two and company performance. That’s a mistake, because they are inextricably linked. In fairness, creating a diverse company can be a challenge if you’re leading a new company and don’t know where to start, or if you’re a more established leader whose company didn’t prioritize diversity early on. But it’s a challenge worth tackling head on: fostering a culture of diversity isn’t just the right thing to do for your people, it’s good business. (Jude Komuves, 3/4)
USA Today: We Have Duty To Dispose Of Leftover Pills Fueling Opioid Epidemic
The nation is awash in leftover prescription opioids. Approximately 1.4 billion opioid prescriptions were dispensed from 2012 to 2017. Of those, we know that up to 70% of opioids prescribed for post-surgical use were leftover and unused. A 2017 study published in JAMA found that among patients prescribed opioids following surgery, 67 percent to 92 percent reported having unused opioids. Its authors concluded that, “Unused opioids prescribed for patients after surgery are an important reservoir of opioids available for nonmedical use and could cause injuries or even deaths.” It is time for a nationwide intervention — one home at a time. (Mary Bono and Arthur Dean, 3/4)
The Houston Chronicle: The Health Care Crisis Texas Isn’t Talking About
Texas faces a fast-approaching health care crisis that no one is talking about: the expiration of an agreement with the federal government that would strip the state of $6 billion a year. Texas relies on this funding to care for Texans. It supports hospitals, especially in rural areas, and makes vital medical and behavioral health care more available throughout the state. (Doug Curran, Rebecca Hart, John Henderson and Ted Shaw, 3/4)
