Latest KFF Health News Stories
Ghana’s First Lady Launches International Campaign Against Maternal Mortality In Eastern Region
Ghana’s First Lady Ernestina Naadu Mills on Thursday launched the Campaign for Accelerated Reduction of Maternal Mortality (CARMMA), an international campaign aimed at fighting maternal mortality, in Koforidua in the Eastern Region of the country, the Ghana News Agency reports. “She said all stakeholders have a role to play to ensure that expectant mothers get to health facilities early enough to have a skilled delivery,” efforts that would help the nation meet the millennium development goals (MDGs) for maternal and child mortality, the news agency writes (9/30). According to the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation, Mills said the nation’s maternal mortality rate is 451 per 100,000 (9/29).
Research Roundup: What Older Patients Really Prize; DOD And The ACA
This week’s reports come from the Journal of the American Medical Association, the Archives of Internal Medicine, the Institute of Medicine, the RAND Corporation, The Kaiser Family Foundation and the Government Accountability Office.
Texas Data Breach Affects Medical Records Of 4.9 Million Patients
The breach, which involved the personal and medical records of military patients and their families, happened when backup tapes from an electronic health care record were stolen from a data contractor’s car.
State Highlights: Many States Moving Workers’ Children To CHIP Plans
News outlets report on a variety of state health policy issues.
A selection of opinions and editorials from around the country.
AP: Military Retirees To Experience Higher Health Premium Costs
Beginning Saturday, military retirees will pay more for their health coverage, and more cost increases are on the way.
Hospitals Confront Budget Strains, Debt, Market Pressure
News outlets offer a variety of reports on how hospitals are faring in the health care marketplace. The outlook is full of challenges.
Gingrich Unveils New ‘Contract With America’
The updated “Contract” makes priorities out of repealing the federal health care law and replacing it with a market-based program that includes tax breaks for those who purchase insurance. Meanwhile, the health care records of GOP presidential hopefuls Rick Perry and Mitt Romney draw a new round of barbs – from each other and the White House.
Calif. Medicaid Case Pits Top Democrats Against Obama Administration
The Supreme Court will hear arguments Monday on the case, which originated in California, and raises a central question: Do individuals have the right to sue a state for its administration of the Medicaid program?
CLASS Act Optimism; Essential Benefits Report Anticipation
News outlets report on these health law implementation topics, including news that some advocates say the Obama administration’s upcoming releasde of an analysis of the CLASS program is a positive sign. Meanwhile, the Institute of Medicine is expected to unveil its recommendations for medical coverage standards next week.
Hospital, Physician Groups Advance Interests In Deficit Reduction Debate
Hospital executives will lobby Congress next week to raise the eligibility age for Medicare instead of reducing payments to hospitals. Doctors are ginning up their grass-roots efforts to pressure the ‘super committee’ to repeal Medicare’s sustainable growth rate formula.
Supreme Court Refuses To Enforce Texas Sonogram Law
The legal wrangling comes as both cases continue in court. Meanwhile, groups supporting abortion rights filed suit to overturn a new North Carolina law restricting access.
First Edition: September 30, 2011
Today’s early morning highlights from the major news organizations, including reports about how new and old health policy positions are playing on the campaign trail.
“The Board of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria approved an action plan Monday in response to recommendations made recently by the High-Level Independent Review Panel on Fiduciary Controls and Oversight Mechanism (HLP),” the Center for Global Health Policy’s “Science Speaks” blog reports, adding, “The board stated that it accepts the underlying analysis made by the panel and that it ‘presents a compelling case for a rapid and urgent transformation of the Global Fund.'”
NGOs, Government Face Challenges In Preventing Fistula In DRC
Inter Press Service examines the challenges that non-governmental organizations and the government face in trying to prevent fistula among women in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where an estimated 12,000 cases are recorded annually because of sexual violence, early marriage and complications in childbirth, according to the Ministry of Public Health. Poverty, early pregnancy and marriage, sexual violence, and a lack of education and knowledge about the condition contribute to its prevalence, IPS reports (Chaco, 9/27).
GlobalPost Examines How Indian City Of Surat Cleaned Up After 1994 Plague Outbreak
GlobalPost reports how, spurred by an outbreak of the pneumonic plague in 1994, the Indian city of Surat “successfully went from one of the country’s dirtiest cities to one of its cleanest in 18 short months.” The news service writes that “after 54 residents died and some 300,000 fled to escape a possible quarantine, the people who stuck around were willing to get with the program — working to eliminate the tons of garbage and overflowing sewers that had inundated the city with disease-carrying rats.”
Increased Focus On Vaccine For Dengue Fever Is Critical To Curb Spread Of Disease
In this GlobalPost opinion piece, Zulfiqar Bhutta, Husein Laljee Dewraj professor and head of the Division of Maternal and Child Health at the Aga Khan University Medical Center in Karachi, Pakistan, and Ciro de Quadros, executive vice president of the Sabin Vaccine Institute and former director of the Division of Vaccines and Immunization at PAHO, examine the need for a dengue fever vaccine as Pakistan struggles to curb an outbreak of the disease that to date has killed 60 people and has infected more than 8,000. “The need for a dengue vaccine is clear,” and “[w]ithout a vaccine to prevent dengue, we must redouble our efforts to effectively treat this infectious threat, starting with improving diagnostics,” they write.
Food Aid Reaches Almost Half Of Somalis In Need But Threat Of Disease Looms, U.N. Agency Says
“The U.N. on Wednesday said food assistance has reached nearly half the Somalis in need, [and] it warned cases of diarrhea and cholera could spike with the seasonal rains expected in October,” the Associated Press reports (9/28). “However, the report released Tuesday by the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said that four million Somalis remain in crisis nationwide, and that 750,000 people risk death in the Horn of Africa nation within the next four months,” according to VOA News.
“The Microbicide Trials Network (MTN), which is funded by the U.S. National Institutes of Health, [on Wednesday] announced that it decided to stop one arm of a study involving more than 5,000 women in South Africa, Zimbabwe, and Uganda” after “an interim review of the ongoing trial by an independent monitoring board … found that the drug tenofovir when used as pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) had less effect in protecting women than anticipated,” Science Magazine’s “Science Insider” blog reports. “Although the board did not offer any specifics on how many women became infected on the drug versus placebo, they said continuing with the tenofovir arm was ‘futile’ as it would not yield meaningful results,” the blog writes.
