Latest KFF Health News Stories
Experts Debate Pros, Cons Of Sierra Leone’s Ban On Traditional Birth Attendants
The Guardian’s “Poverty Matters” blog asks whether Sierra Leone was right to ban traditional birth attendants (TBAs) from assisting deliveries 18 months ago, writing, “Although [TBAs] are often poorly trained and sometimes use unsafe delivery procedures, for most women in rural Sierra Leone they are a lifeline.” The blog writes that “some experts believe women are putting themselves at serious risk by relying on TBAs, who cannot handle obstetric complications such as hemorrhage, eclampsia and obstructed labor, conditions that account for three-quarters of maternal deaths,” but, “[i]n areas where dense jungle and impassable roads make travel nigh-on impossible, the TBAs may also be the only available helping hand.”
Community Health Workers Vital To Improving Health Care In Africa
Community health workers (CHWs) “are seen to be a key part of a functioning primary health system,” especially in African nations, Jeffrey Sachs, director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University, writes in a post on Huffington Post’s “Impact” blog. “This system should include a clinic within short walking distance, with supplies, a skilled birth attendant and other staff, electricity, and safe water; an ambulance for emergency transport; an emergency ‘911’ number; a policy of free care at the point of service (so as not to turn away the indigent); and trained and remunerated CHWs, taught also to treat diseases and save lives in the community,” he says.
Blog Covers USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah’s Comments At Country Ownership Roundtable
This post in the Ministerial Leadership Initiative’s (MLI) “Leading Global Health” blog is “the first of a series of perspective pieces on country ownership from the ‘Advancing Country Ownership for Greater Results’ roundtable organized last week by” MLI. “The first of four pieces covers the comments of USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah,” the blog writes, noting, “Shah opened MLI’s meeting by saying that the U.S. government was committed to country ownership, but that it needed to find ways to improve its support of country-led plans” (Donnelly, 1/17).
Assessing The Cost Of Polio Eradication Efforts
“After more than a century as a global scourge and hundreds of thousands lives lost, polio may now be on the verge of being the second human disease wiped off the face of the Earth,” Charles Kenny, senior fellow at the Center for Global Development, writes in his column for ForeignPolicy.com, “The Optimist,” and asks whether it is worth it to spend billions of dollars to wipe out the few remaining cases of the disease. Kenny discusses the cost-effectiveness of eradication efforts and writes, “In part because of the considerably greater complexity of the vaccination program, the cost of the polio eradication program is mounting.”
U.S. Ambassador To U.N. Warns Of Potential For Famine In Sudan
“The United States and Sudan traded accusations [on Tuesday] over the humanitarian situation in the [border] states of Blue Nile and South Kordofan, embattled since the north and south of Sudan split into two nations last summer,” the New York Times reports (MacFarquhar, 1/17). U.S. Permanent Representative to the U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice on Monday sent a letter to the U.N. Security Council warning that food security could decline to an emergency level and could result in famine if action is not taken by the government in Khartoum, according to VOA News (Besheer, 1/17). Speaking to reporters Tuesday, Rice said, “The proximate cause of the problem … is that the government of Sudan has deliberately denied access to international NGOs, the United Nations, and international humanitarian workers to the most affected populations in Southern Kordofan and Blue Nile” and called the situation “unconscionable and unacceptable,” according to a transcript (1/17).
Risks Of Modifying Flu Strains To Become Highly Transmissible In Humans Outweigh Benefits
In this Journal Sentinel Online opinion piece, Thomas Inglesby, chief executive officer and director of the Center for Biosecurity of UPMC in Baltimore; Anita Cicero, chief operating officer and deputy director of the center; and D.A. Henderson, a distinguished scholar at the center, comment on a recent announcement by scientists that they have genetically modified a strain of H5N1 bird flu that is “capable of spreading through the air between ferrets that were physically separated from each other,” indicating “it would be readily transmissible by air between humans.” They write, “We believe the benefits of [purposefully engineer(ing) avian flu strains to become highly transmissible in humans] do not outweigh the risks.”
Threefold Increase In Polio Cases In Afghanistan Concerns Experts
The New York Times examines how after years of decline, the number of recorded polio cases in Afghanistan tripled in 2011 to 76, following only 25 cases in 2010, raising concerns among international health experts that polio is seeing a resurgence, “particularly since some of the cases erupted far outside the disease’s traditional areas in Afghanistan.”
Are Health Law Backers Nervous About The High Court’s Review?
The Hill reports that some supporters have recently shifted their tone about the health law challenges being “frivolous,” acknowledging the Supreme Court wouldn’t allow so much time for arguments if the justices viewed the issues as “a waste of time.” Also, Politico explores the fate of the law’s Medicaid expansion in the context of the court challenge, and CQ HealthBeat reports on the addition of plaintiffs and more amicus briefs.
State Officials Seek ‘Clarity’ On High-Risk Pool 2013 Allocations
When some states exhausted their funding for the Pre-Existing Condition Insurance Plan, created by the health law, the federal response was to give them more — raising questions about whether other states may receive less. Alaska, which spends as much as $200,000 on each member, is an example of a high-spending state.
Questions Raised Over Accuracy Of Afghanistan Mortality Survey Data
“A U.S.-sponsored mortality survey released last year announced huge improvements in health across Afghanistan. But the gains are so great that experts are still arguing about whether it’s correct,” NPR’s All Things Considered reports. The 2011 $5 million Afghanistan Mortality Survey, which was funded by USAID with a contribution from UNICEF, showed huge gains in life expectancy and maternal and child mortality compared with data from 2004, NPR says, noting, “But believing the new numbers are accurate probably means accepting that the old numbers were way off, which makes it impossible to say exactly how much health has really improved.”
State Roundup:Calif. May Regain State Prison Health Care Control
A selection of health policy news from around the country.
New York Times Examines History Of Malaria Drug Artemisinin
The New York Times examines the history of the Chinese drug artemisinin, “hailed as one of the greatest advances in fighting malaria … since the discovery of quinine centuries ago,” noting the drug “is being talked about as a candidate for a Nobel Prize in Medicine.” However, “few people realize that in one of the paradoxes of history, the drug was discovered thanks to Mao Zedong, who was acting to help the North Vietnamese in their jungle war against the Americans. Or that it languished for 30 years thanks to China’s isolation and the indifference of Western donors, health agencies and drug companies,” the newspaper writes.
Estimating Number Of Births Without Skilled Birth Attendants In South Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa
Noting that the “fifth Millennium Development Goal target for 90 percent of births in low- and middle-income countries to have a skilled birth attendant (SBA) by 2015 will not be met,” researchers from University College London estimate “that there will be between 130 and 180 million non-SBA births in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa from 2011 to 2015 (90 percent of these in rural areas)” in this BioMed Central Pregnancy & Childbirth article. They conclude, “Efforts to improve access to skilled attendance should be accompanied by interventions to improve the safety of non-attended deliveries” (1/17).
Facilitating Low-Cost Innovations In, Increased Usage Of Health Care
The argument that “a country’s quickest way to better health for its people is economic development … is only one factor, and not the most important one, in explaining global health outcomes,” Charles Kenny, a senior fellow at the Center for Global Development, writes in a SciDev.Net opinion piece. “The challenge is to ensure that a cheap basic package of health interventions is available to — and is used by — all,” he continues.
U.S. Ambassador To U.N. Food Agencies, Ertharin Cousin, Appointed To Head WFP
Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization Director-General Jose Graziano da Silva on Tuesday announced the appointment of Ertharin Cousin, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N.’s Rome-based food agencies, to head the U.N. World Food Programme, the Associated Press/CBS News reports (1/17). “Cousin … will succeed Josette Sheeran, also of the United States, who has held the post since 2007,” Reuters notes.
CDC Reports Obesity Rates In U.S. Level Off
Recent steep increases in the number of overweight Americans plateaued, but the rates didn’t decrease either.
FDA, Pharmaceutical Industry Reach Agreement On User-Fee Plan For Generics
The Washington Post reports that the deal could result in the collection of hundreds of millions of dollars in new fees from drug companies to speed the review of generics.
Drug Benefit Managers Unveil Ads To Explain What They Do
The trade group for pharmaceutical benefit managers announced an advertising campaign about PBMs, while Congress and federal regulators weigh a $29 billion merger between Express Scripts and Medco.
Marilyn Tavenner, who has been nominated to head the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, has begun making courtesy calls to senators.
Examining Policy Positions For The GOP Presidential Field
The Associated Press offers a wide-ranging examination of issue stances — including on health care, abortion and budget policies — taken by the Republican presidential candidates.
