Latest KFF Health News Stories
Examining The Need For WHO Today
Responding to an opinion piece published in Nature Medicine last week in which Tikki Pang, a visiting professor at the National University of Singapore and former director of research policy and cooperation at the WHO, and Laurie Garrett, a senior fellow for global health at the Council on Foreign Relations, argue the case for reforming and improving the WHO, KPLU’s Tom Paulson writes in a post on KPLU 88.5’s “Humanosphere” blog, “It’s a good overview of what’s wrong with the WHO and what these two think needs to change.” Paulson summarizes an email from Garret in which she says the WHO is the only international agency able to respond to drug resistance, drug safety and integrity, the threat of pandemic flu, health systems metrics development, and drug-resistant malaria (5/8).
HHS Awards 26 Innovation Grants
The grants, which were created by the 2010 health law, were made to support projects that aim to improve coordination of care and reduce health care costs. News outlets also offer a look at some of the programs that will receive a funding boost.
USAID Launches Five-Year Initiative In Nigeria To Strengthen HIV, TB Services
U.S. Ambassador to Nigeria Terence McCulley on Tuesday in Abuja, Nigeria, launched a five-year, $224 million USAID program, titled Strengthening Integrated Delivery of HIV/AIDS Services (SIDHAS), that aims to “increas[e] access to high-quality comprehensive HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis prevention, treatment, care and related services through improved efficiencies in service delivery,” the Daily Trust reports (Odeyemi/Odafor, 5/8).
Globe And Mail Examines Sustainability Of Sierra Leone’s Free Health Care System
The Globe and Mail examines the sustainability of Sierra Leone’s free health care system, writing, “The reform has been hugely successful and the death rate has dropped sharply. … [But t]he country’s hospitals are overwhelmed with new patients, the drug supply can’t keep up, the medical staff are overloaded, and it’s unclear if the $36-million program would survive without foreign donations.” According to the newspaper, “The principle of free health care is a sharp break from earlier ideology” that supported “‘cost recovery’ — a system of user fees in hospitals” — which leaders thought “would generate money to fix their badly underfunded health systems.” However, the user fees “were widely criticized, they failed to solve the funding problems, and they created a new barrier to health care” for many without the means to pay, the Globe and Mail writes.
Report Examines Foreign Affairs Budget Reforms In Light Of Austerity
“The United States should be more selective about where and how it spends foreign assistance,” according to a new report (.pdf), titled “Engagement Amid Austerity: A Bipartisan Approach to Reorienting the International Affairs Budget,” co-authored by John Norris of the Center for American Progress and Connie Veillette of the Center for Global Development (CGD), the CGD website notes. The report “identifies four flagship reforms that would help U.S. foreign affairs institutions to better reflect national interests and reduce ineffective spending,” including “[a]ccelerat[ing] cost-sharing arrangements with upper middle income recipients of” PEPFAR and “[o]verhaul[ing] U.S. food aid laws and regulations,” according to the website (5/8).
Increased Investment In Nurses Will Help Strengthen Health Systems Worldwide
“It is in poor countries and communities, where health needs are greatest and physicians are scarce, that nurses take an even greater role in health care delivery, often serving as the sole providers in rural villages or urban slums,” Sheila Davis, director of global nursing at Partners In Health, writes in a Huffington Post “Impact Blog” opinion piece, noting this is International Nurses Week. “But although nurses deliver 90 percent of all health care services worldwide, they remain largely invisible at decision-making tables in national capitals and international agencies. Their absence constitutes a global health crisis,” Davis continues.
NCATS Initiative To Use Abandoned Experimental Drugs For Other Uses ‘A Step In The Right Direction’
The National Institutes of Health’s (NIH) National Center for Advancing Translational Science (NCATS) — a new plan to help speed drug development by making abandoned experimental drugs available to researchers who can look for alternative uses — “is an indication that the Obama administration and the medical research enterprise are thinking out of the box,” Michael Manganiello, a partner at HCM Strategists, writes in a Huffington Post “Politics Blog” opinion piece. Manganiello — who says the drug AZT, which originally was developed to treat cancer, helped him live long enough to reap the benefits of new drugs developed in the mid-1990s to treat HIV infection — joined HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and NIH Director Francis Collins this week in launching the initiative, which he says “is a step in the right direction and it is critical that industry collaborate with patient groups and their constituents.”
Leishmaniasis Vaccine Trial Begins In U.S., India
“A vaccine against one of the most neglected yet fatal tropical diseases is being tested for the first time in a clinical trial in India and the U.S.,” IRIN reports. Visceral leishmaniasis (VL), “also called kala-azar or black fever, infects an estimated half million persons or more annually,” and “[i]t is found most commonly in India, Nepal, Bangladesh, Brazil and Sudan,” the news service notes. “A total of 72 volunteers are participating in the trial, but scientists say it will take years of testing to roll out an affordable vaccine to the 200 million people globally at risk of VL infection,” IRIN writes, adding, “The WHO has warned that VL is spreading to previously unaffected countries due to co-infections of HIV and leishmaniasis, while the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has said climate change can also spur the spread of the disease” (5/9).
In this Foreign Affairs essay, Thomas Bollyky, a senior fellow for global health, economics and development at the Council on Foreign Relations, examines the increase of non-communicable diseases (NCDs) in the developing world, writing, “When most people in developed countries think of the biggest health challenges confronting the developing world, they envision a small boy in a rural, dusty village beset by an exotic parasite or bacterial blight,” but “NCDs in developing countries are occurring more rapidly, arising in younger people, and leading to far worse health outcomes than ever seen in developed countries.” He notes, “According to the World Economic Forum’s 2010 Global Risks report, these diseases pose a greater threat to global economic development than fiscal crises, natural disasters, corruption, or infectious disease.”
In this post in the Huffington Post’s “Global Motherhood” blog, Jeffrey Sachs, director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University, Sonia Sachs, director of health at the Millennium Villages Project (MVP), and Prabhjot Singh, assistant professor of international and public affairs at the MVP, respond to a study on the MVP, published in the Lancet on Tuesday, writing, “These results … reinforce the global effort to build effective, low-cost, community-led health care systems that can end millions of deaths of young children and pregnant women each year.” They note, “Together with advances in food production and other related areas in the villages, the MV health system shares credit for the rapid gains reported.”
Huffington Post’s ‘Global Motherhood’ Section Features Opinion Pieces Leading Up To Mother’s Day
Leading up to Mother’s Day on May 13, the Huffington Post’s “Global Motherhood” section, in partnership with Mothers Day Every Day, an initiative of the White Ribbon Alliance and CARE, is publishing opinion pieces from a diverse group of people. The following are summaries of two of those opinion pieces.
Americans Have ‘Enduring Commitment’ To Respond To Crises, Help Those In Need
In this opinion piece in the Kansas City Star’s “As I See It,” Nancy Lindborg, USAID assistant administrator for democracy, conflict and humanitarian assistance and a guest speaker at this week’s International Food Aid and Development Conference in Kansas City, discusses food aid and highlights USAID’s response to last year’s food crisis in the Horn of Africa. She writes, “None of this would have been possible without the hard work and generosity of the American public, and especially the farmers, manufacturers and shippers that I am honored to meet with again this week in Kansas City.”
“Death rates among children under five at the [Millennium Villages Project (MVP)] — set up in Africa to demonstrate what is possible if health, education, agriculture, and other development needs are tackled simultaneously — have fallen by a third in three years compared with similar communities, according to the project’s first results,” published in the Lancet on Tuesday, the Guardian reports (Boseley, 5/8). The study “offers quantitative evidence of the success of the MVP model at nine Millennium Village sites in sub-Saharan Africa,” Nature News writes, adding, “Between 2006 and 2009, mortality in under-fives fell by an average of 22 percent, reaching a level roughly two-thirds of that in control villages not involved with the project, where child mortality seemed to rise.”
Treatable Infections Responsible For Nearly 2M Cases Of Cancer Globally Each Year, Study Suggests
“Bacteria, viruses and parasites cause around two million cases of cancer in the world each year, experts believe,” the Press Association/Guardian reports. According to the news service, “Scientists carried out a statistical analysis of cancer incidence to calculate that around 16 percent of all cancers diagnosed in 2008 were infection-related,” and “[t]he proportion of cancers linked to infection was three times higher in developing countries than in developed ones.”
Trends: Nonprofit Hospital Challenges, Rules At Hospitals With Religious Affiliations
Nonprofit hospitals face a range of challenges related to increasing costs and diminishing resources, while hospitals with religious affiliations play by rules that can affect the care they deliver.
Health Law Leaving Mark On Campaigns
Chamber of Commerce prepares ads in a variety of congressional races that hit Democrats for supporting health law, among other issues. Meanwhile, the Obama campaing releases Spanish-language ads in three battleground states promoting the health overhaul.
Chicago Mayor To Minnesota Attorney General: Step Back From Accretive Probe
In response to a letter from Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel written on behalf of Accretive Health Inc., a Chicago-based company, Attorney General Lori Swanson vowed to press on in her investigation. Meanwhile, Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., scolded the company for not yet answering questions he raised last month.
Obesity Report Proposes Sweeping Changes In Schools, Communities, Workplaces
The Institute of Medicine panel recommended five critical areas to focus on to lower obesity: physical activity, food and beverage, marketing, work and schools.
How Much Will A Retired Couple Spend On Health Care? $240,000
This estimate, released by Fidelity Investments, reflects a 4 percent increase over medical bill projections for a couple that retired last year. The amount doesn’t include long-term care costs or over-the-counter drug expenses, among other things.
States Grapple With Inadequacies In Mental Health Services
Advocates hope the fatal beating of a California homeless man by police, captured by a security camera, may spur changes. In the meantime, a D.C. report says thousands of children who need mental health services aren’t getting them, and New York state fines insurers over mental health notices.
