Latest KFF Health News Stories
Cain To Talk Health Policy On Capitol Hill
GOP presidential hopeful Herman Cain is scheduled today to give a Capitol Hill speech that is expected to focus on his health care policies and positions. Also in the news, a Washington Post fact-check examines claims by Mitt Romney, another GOP candidate, regarding health care subsidies.
Long-Term Care Insurance Gets Boost From Federal Workers
Although across-the-board interest in long-term care insurance policies has been low, the federal plan is the largest one in the nation – claiming 297,000 enrollees.
A selection of editorials and opinions on health policy from around the country.
State Roundup: N.Y. Autism Coverage; Wis. MLR Controversy
State stories today come from Wisconsin, Vermont, Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, Mississippi, Colorado and Florida.
State Medicaid Directors Seek To Sway Feds On Eligibility Rules
In a letter to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the state officials made recommendations about new regulations and asked for coordination between federal and state leaders.
Doctors Face Deep Medicare Pay Reductions
Without congressional intervention, physicians will face a 27.4 percent Medicare pay cut on Jan. 1. This reduction is slightly smaller than the earlier estimate of 29.5 percent.
Medicare Outpatient Care Fees To Go Up; Home Health Payments To Drop
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services also released the 2012 Medicare payment rates for dialysis facilities.
First Edition: November 2, 2011
Today’s early morning highlights from the major news organizations, including reports about Tuesday’s super committee hearing and the message communicated by bipartisan budget hawks to the panel — raise revenue and revamp health programs.
“The world’s population is expected to hit seven billion around October 31,” CNN’s Jaime FlorCruz reports in his column, “Jaime’s China.” This is a number that would have been reached five years earlier were it not for China’s family planning policy, according to Zhai Zhenwu, a professor at Renmin University School of Sociology and Population. FlorCruz writes that experts at the National Population and Family Planning Commission of China say “the policy has prevented more than 400 million births in the country.”
Lack Of Resources, Leadership Hindering Male Circumcision Campaign In Uganda, PlusNews Reports
“Ugandan men have been seeking medical male circumcision in droves since the government launched a national policy in 2010, but the health system is not equipped to handle the caseload, slowing down the potential HIV prevention benefits of the campaign,” PlusNews reports. A recent WHO report found that “just 9,052 circumcisions were carried out in Uganda in 2010, against more than four million men who would need to be circumcised for the country to reach its 80 percent target,” a goal that, if reached within five years, could potentially avert close to 340,000 new HIV infections, according to WHO estimates, the news service notes.
E.U., UNICEF Launch $430M Fund In Zimbabwe To Provide Medical Care To Children, Pregnant Women
“A $430 million fund which will give Zimbabwean children and pregnant women free medical care at public hospitals was launched Monday with the help of the E.U. and UNICEF,” Agence France-Press reports. “The Zimbabwe health care system which has collapsed from years of economic crisis requires $436 million over the next five years to improve capacity, particularly in the delivery of maternal care, according to UNICEF,” AFP notes.
Zanzibar’s Islamic Leaders Use Qur’an To Shift Attitudes About Sex, Contraception, HIV/AIDS
The Guardian’s “Poverty Matters Blog” examines how religious leaders on the island of Zanzibar, a semi-autonomous part of Tanzania, are using the Qur’an to shift attitudes about the issues of sex, contraception, and HIV/AIDS in an effort to reduce HIV infection, improve maternal health and curb rapid population growth. “Their aim is to shift deep-rooted views in their devout Islamic society that contraception is a sin,” according to the blog. “Compared with the Tanzanian mainland, Zanzibar has half the rate of use of contraception — just 13 percent in fertile women in 2011 — and more than double the proportion of Muslims, at 95 percent,” the blog notes, adding that imams’ work to educate the population is working, as “contraceptive use has crept up from nine percent to 13 percent in the past four years” (Carrington, 10/31).
In this Huffington Post opinion piece, Serra Sippel, president of the Center for Health and Gender Equity, examines the Pink Ribbon Red Ribbon partnership, which was launched last month by PEPFAR in conjunction with the George W. Bush Institute, Susan G. Komen for the Cure, and UNAIDS with the aim of “integrat[ing] cervical and breast cancer education, screening, and treatment with HIV services.” She continues, “Given that women living with HIV are at an increased risk of developing cervical cancer, it makes sense. It’s a logical and critical part of what PEPFAR is calling care and support services.” But while the initiative “has the potential to reduce the number of cancer deaths among women living with HIV and improve their overall health,” the fact “that planning a family and preventing further HIV transmission is not part of what PEPFAR is calling care and support” is “counter-intuitive and counter-productive,” Sippel writes.
World Population Reaches 7 Billion Amid Warnings About Health, Natural Resources
“Countries around the world marked the world’s population reaching seven billion Monday with lavish ceremonies for newborn infants symbolizing the milestone and warnings that there may be too many humans for the planet’s resources,” the Associated Press/MSNBC.com reports (10/31). “With the world’s population more than doubling over the last half century, basics like food and water are under more strain than ever, say experts, and providing for an additional two to three billion people in the next 50 years is a serious worry,” AlertNet/Reuters writes, adding that the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) says food production will have to increase by 70 percent to keep pace. “But climate change may be the greatest impediment to meeting this target, say experts,” the news agency notes (Kumar/Bhalla, 10/31).
“Genetically modified mosquitoes could prove effective in tackling dengue fever and other insect-borne diseases,” according to the results of a study by a U.K.-based scientific team published in the journal Nature Biotechnology on Sunday, BBC News reports (Black, 10/30). “In the 2010 trial, conducted on Grand Cayman island, researchers released 3.3 million male mosquitoes that had been genetically altered in such a way that they were born sterile, meaning they can’t have viable offspring,” which “triggered a population collapse,” the Wall Street Journal writes. “‘We saw an 80 percent reduction in the target area’ compared with the mosquito population in a similar zone where genetically tweaked males hadn’t been released, Luke Alphey, co-founder and chief scientist at Oxitec Ltd., the U.K. start-up behind the experiment, said in an interview,” according to the newspaper (Naik, 10/31).
Congress Should Grant PEPFAR Future Security Because Program Is ‘Desperately Needed’
In this CNN opinion piece, Julian Zelizer, an author and professor of history and public affairs at Princeton University, reports on how, “[a]s the super-committee deliberates over how to reduce the deficit and other congressional committees struggle to cut spending, the fate of important programs,” such as PEPFAR, “hangs in the balance.”
Industry Becoming More Involved In Ensuring Food Security, Conference Attendees Hear
“Food security concerns as the world’s population surpasses seven billion have prompted global companies to become more actively involved in ensuring future supplies, participants at an agricultural conference said on Monday,” Reuters reports. “The increased role has come at a time government involvement is hampered by the global financial crisis and led to fears a private sector-led expansion may focus on products with profit potential and neglect more effective alternatives,” according to the news agency. “‘We need to produce more food. The figures are debatable but we clearly need at least 50 percent more food in the next two or three decades,’ said Ian Crute, chief scientist at Britain’s Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board,” at the CropWorld 2011 conference (Hunt, 10/31).
Opinion Pieces Address World Population Of 7 Billion
Though demographers do not know exactly when the world’s population will hit seven billion, the U.N. symbolically marked the day on Monday with celebrations and warnings about safety, health and sustainability. The following is a summary of several opinion pieces published in recognition of the day.
