Latest KFF Health News Stories
“An experimental vaccine from GlaxoSmithKline halved the risk of African children getting malaria in a major clinical trial, making it likely to become the world’s first shot against the deadly disease,” according to a study “presented at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s Malaria Forum conference in Seattle and published simultaneously in the New England Journal of Medicine” on Tuesday, Reuters reports. Analysis of data from the first 6,000 children to participate in “a final-stage Phase III clinical trial conducted at 11 trial sites in seven countries across sub-Saharan Africa … found that after 12 months of follow-up, three doses of RTS,S reduced the risk of children experiencing clinical malaria and severe malaria by 56 percent and 47 percent, respectively,” the news service writes (Kelland, 10/18). The vaccine was developed by GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) in partnership with the PATH Malaria Vaccine Initiative, and the study was partially funded by the Gates Foundation, Inter Press Service notes (Whitman, 10/18).
Haiti Has Highest Rate Of Cholera Worldwide One Year After Disease Outbreak Began
Paul Farmer, a founder of Partners in Health (PIH) and U.N. deputy special envoy to Haiti, in an interview with the Associated Press/Washington Post “said cholera has sickened more than 450,000 people in a nation of 10 million, or nearly five percent of the population, and killed more than 6,000,” giving the Caribbean nation “the highest rate of cholera in the world a mere year after the disease first arrived” (10/18).
Gates Foundation Provides Funding For Relief Efforts In Horn Of Africa
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation “on Tuesday announced a $2.5 million grant to Mercy Corps to fund relief and longer-term recovery efforts in drought-stricken Wajir County on Kenya’s border with Somalia,” representing “more than 40 percent of the $5.4 million in private funds that Mercy Corps has raised to date for Horn of Africa relief efforts,” the Seattle Times reports. The Gates Foundation on Tuesday also “announced a $1.6 million grant to International Medical Corps to provide emergency food assistance and to help improve health, hygiene and sanitation in northern Somalia and eastern Ethiopia,” the newspaper writes (Bernton, 10/18).
HHS Issues Regs To Reduce Red Tape for Hospitals, Providers
The proposed changes could result in savings of an estimated $1 billion a year, according to the Department of Health and Human Services.
Viewpoints: Super Committee’s Secrecy; Alternatives To CLASS; Solving The Drug Shortage
A selection of editorials and opinions from around the country.
State Roundup: Calif. Revokes Medi-Cal Payments; Md. Hospital Sued By Feds
A selection of stories about health care in California, Michigan, Maryland, Kansas and Oregon.
JAMA Study: Heart Failure Hospitalization Rates Fall
The rate of hospital admissions for elderly patients in the U.S. fell by nearly 30 percent in the past decade, based on an analysis of Medicare data. This finding, being published today, is viewed as progress against cardiovascular disease and the costs associated with this illness.
UnitedHealth’s CEO Expresses Cautious Outlook
The comments from the health insurer’s CEO pointed to factors like costs pegged to the federal health law and also “a modest increase” in doctor’s office and outpatient visits, although health care usage remains below historical trends.
Health Law Buzz Words: Essential Benefits, MLRatio And Federal Exchanges
Officials from the Department of Health and Human Services are seeking input from stakeholders regarding how to structure the health law’s essential benefits package. Also, new documents detail the dynamics behind Florida’s MLR waiver request. Meanwhile, HHS signals that there will be a federal exchange.
Experts Recommending Fewer Cancer Screenings
New cervical cancer screening guidelines to be released today are the latest example of this emerging cautious view.
Report: U.S. Weak On Health Care Quality, Access, Affordability
The report concluded that these weaknesses in the American health system are having a “profound effect” on the overall health of the nation’s population.
Higher Medicare Premiums Will Undermine Social Security’s Raise
Social Security recipients are expected to get a 3.5 percent cost-of-living increase in January, but a boost in the cost of Medicare Part B premiums will likely offset some of the impact.
First Edition: October 19, 2011
Today’s early morning highlights from the major news organizations, including a report that health policy issues triggered “withering attacks” during last night’s Las Vegas GOP presidential debate.
Snowe Breaks From GOP Pack On Health Care Spending Issues
Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, is one of two Republicans who did not sign on to the Finance Committee GOP recommendations for the super committee. Snowe reportedly took issue with the calls to tighten Medicare eligibility requirements and to block grant the Medicaid program.
Confusion Reigns After Obama Administration Suspends CLASS
Even though the White House signaled that the long-term insurance program will not be implemented, President Barack Obama made clear yesterday that he is opposed to the measure’s repeal. Meanwhile, the decision to suspend the plan from going forward has left many experts to ask what’s next in the effort to address the nation’s long-term care issues.
Russia Pledges Money To Support HIV, TB Programs In Neighboring Countries
“Russia plans to step up its international role in fighting infectious disease across eastern Europe and central Asia, in what some observers see as the latest effort by the Kremlin to reassert its political influence over its former Soviet neighbors,” the Financial Times reports. “Arkady Dvorkovich, economic aide to President Dmitry Medvedev, pledged money for a new international development agency to support programs against HIV and tuberculosis (TB)” at the Millennium Development Goal 6 Forum hosted in Moscow last week, the newspaper notes.
Use Of Social Media To Fight Malaria Shows ‘Great Promise’
As the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation hosts the second international Malaria Forum in Seattle this week, Melinda Gates, co-chair of the Gates Foundation, in this entry in the Huffington Post’s “Impact” blog reflects on the advances made in the fight against malaria since the first Malaria Forum four years ago. She writes that “we’re seeing great promise using communications technologies in malaria endemic countries” and highlights social media campaigns conducted by Malaria No More and the U.N.’s social media advocacy group, Social Media Envoys. She concludes, “We have seen that everyone can make a difference, no matter their location. … The rest is up to you” (10/17).
CDC: Visits To Emergency Rooms On The Rise
The increased rates are leading emergency room docs to step up their interest in medical liability reform.
