Health and Wellness

Personal health and fitness, health care legislation, Big Pharma, medical developments. Comprehensive coverage on Health and Wellness here.

Sarah Palin's Reckless Approach to Health Care
Posted by Julia Eisman, Stand Up for Health Care on September 7, 2008 at 4:15 PM.

On Wednesday, Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, a relatively unknown figure to a majority of Americans before last week, addressed the Republican National Convention and accepted her party's nomination for Vice President. But what do we know about the policies favored by this woman running for second in command (who could conceivably take the reins as POTUS)?  Primarily that she has done very little to stand up for the rights of health care consumers or the uninsured (even kids!).  Sarah Palin's silence on health care reform speaks loud and clear. Just like John McCain, she is business as usual by putting the private market interests before consumers.

For one, Palin ignored experts and lobbied to eliminate Alaska's Certificate of Need (CON) program which is designed to reduce costs by requiring that new health care facilities be pre-approved. There are a number of studies that show that CON programs do, in fact, reduce costs although Palin begs to differ in this op-ed. Rather, Governor Palin has aggressively supported a more free-market approach to health care reform, advocating for private market competition over reasonable regulation.  In January of this year when talking about the CON program, she was quoted as saying that

"Market mechanisms..." are the best way to ensure that "proper business decision-making guides the development of health care services." (Click here for original text.)

Palin's business model approach to our health care system is closely in-sync with Senator McCain's, who would rather see the private market control cost and access, with little protections for consumers.

Even her approach to children's health care leaves much to be desired. Although she signed a bill restoring eligibility levels for Denali KidCare (her state's version of CHIP) to 175 percent of poverty, Alaska is still one of only seven states with eligibility levels below twice the poverty level. In 2006, 22,227 Alaskan children received coverage through Denali KidCare, while 21,197 kids remained uninsured.

The icing on the cake: Palin did not once mention health care in her speech. Here is a transcript.

How Effective Is the HPV Vaccine?
Posted by Lucinda Marshall, Feminist Peace Network on August 26, 2008 at 2:29 PM.

When Merck and Co. introduced Gardisil, the media acknowledged that there were some concerns about the safety, effectiveness and cost of the vaccine, but the concern quickly died, and the media for the most part allowed itself to be sucked up into the excitement that finally there was a vaccine that could prevent cancer. After I wrote a piece addressing the issues mentioned above as well as Merck's lobbying and marketing blitz ("Making the HPV Vaccine Mandatory is Bad Medicine") along with several blog posts here (see below for links), I took a great deal of flak, much of it from feminist friends who wondered how I could possibly bad-mouth this pharmaceutical wonder that might save so many lives.

The answer quite bluntly had to do with looking beyond the very well-funded Merck hype and examining the facts. But beyond myself and a few others, the media did not make much effort to investigate whether the hype was justified or appropriate.

Last week however, The New York Times ran several articles by Elizabeth Rosenthal (here and here) that finally address the points that I had raised. Rosenthal writes that, according to the New England Journal of Medicine,

"Two vaccines against cervical cancer are being widely used without sufficient evidence about whether they are worth their high cost or even whether they will effectively stop women from getting the disease."

Read the rest of the post on the flip side »

How Do Obama and McCain Compare on Health Care?
Posted by Julia Eisman, Stand Up for Health Care on August 19, 2008 at 8:56 AM.

If Senators McCain and Obama can agree on one thing, it's that we need health reform.  While the plans have some commonalities, there are also significant differences.

According to our recent 501 (c)4 report, Health Care and the 2008 Election:  Comparing the Candidates' Positions on Health Care, "Senator McCain offers a radical restructuring of America's health care system" while "Senator Obama's proposal builds on our current system of health coverage, preserving what works and strengthening aspects of the system that need improvement."

For example, McCain's proposal:

Seeks to move Americans from group coverage-especially the employer-based coverage they have today-to individual coverage, so that each individual has to negotiate directly with insurance companies over premium prices and benefits. Senator McCain's proposal also includes tax code changes that will weaken existing employer-based coverage.

Meanwhile, Obama's proposal:

Allows workers to keep the group coverage they now have through their jobs. Employers help 180 million workers and their dependents obtain coverage today, and Senator Obama recognizes the importance of this financial support. His proposal strengthens the employer or group-based insurance system, rather than moving toward individual insurance, since groups have more clout in bargaining for lower premiums and better benefits.

In this analysis, we ask ten important questions about the candidates' plans. For example, will the candidate prohibit insurance companies from "cherry-picking" only the young and healthy? Will the candidate prohibit insurance companies from charging exorbitant premiums to people with pre-existing conditions or family histories of health problems? Will the candidate's plan protect employer-based health coverage?

Find answers to these questions, and more here.

Gaps in McCain's Health Plan
Posted by Kathleen Stoll, Stand Up for Health Care on August 18, 2008 at 5:05 PM.

Presidential hopeful John McCain recently addressed the LIVESTRONG Summit in Columbus, Ohio, speaking supportive words about cancer research and the need for health care reform. His speech was nice enough, but will Senator McCain's plan really help people with cancer?

One of the major features of the McCain proposal is allowing individuals to use a tax credit to purchase their own private health coverage. This tax credit would be available if you buy coverage in the individual market. According to Senator McCain, free market competition and the individual market is the path to consumer control over choice of plans:

The health plan you choose would be as good as any that an employer could choose for you, or even better....

Come again? First of all, I am not sure I can bargain one-on-one with an insurance company. Second, the size of the tax credit would be a fixed amount, even though insurers can charge premiums up to 10 times higher for some people compared to others-for the exact same health insurance plan.

Read the rest of the post on the flip side »

Health Care or Offshore Drilling? You Decide
Posted by Jane Hamsher, Firedoglake on August 13, 2008 at 12:43 PM.

Well you have to say something for the #Dontgo twits -- they know how to carry Big Oil's water and back down the Democrats. Now Nancy Pelosi says that she's open to having a vote in September on mo' drilling, despite the fact that a majority of Americans think it is "more likely to enrich oil companies than to lower gas prices for American consumers."

I guess we have to take it off the table as an issue in November to insure we get subpoena power. Or more and better parking spaces for Democrats, I'm not sure which.

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President Poised to Ban Toxic Chemicals in Kids' Toys
Posted by Heather Gehlert, AlterNet on August 7, 2008 at 4:34 PM.

In the next few weeks, President Bush is expected to sign into law the Consumer Product Safety Commission Reform Act, long-awaited legislation that would ban toxic chemicals called phthalates from children's toys and other products. The Senate voted to approve the bill last week in the face of growing pressure from concerned parents and public health advocacy groups like the Breast Cancer Fund.

"This is a David and Goliath victory," Janet Nudelman, director of program and policy for the Breast Cancer Fund, said in a statement. "Public health advocates and parents were up against big oil and the chemical industry, and we won. This should serve as a wake-up call to industry: chemicals linked to cancer and birth defects have no place in children's products."

To find out more about phthalates or the much-needed regulation of the chemical industry, visit http://www.breastcancerfund.org.

Taking on the Health Insurance Industry, One State at a Time
Posted by AlterNet Staff, SEIU on August 4, 2008 at 5:14 PM.

Editor's Note: The following is a press release from Service Employees International Union (SEIU).

With a series of events in states across the country, SEIU will call attention to health care insurance industry tactics that do more to ensure profits than insure patients.

On Tuesday, August 5, SEIU members and other health care consumers will hold events targeting the insurance industry in Iowa, New Hampshire and Oregon. Participants will distribute information to the media, provide first-hand accounts, and demand answers from the companies. In the coming weeks, additional events will be held in Colorado, Rhode Island, Washington, Missouri and other states. Details on Tuesday’s events can be found below.

“Big oil isn’t the only industry making record profits while consumers struggle to keep up with rising prices,” said SEIU President Andy Stern. “Insurance companies are charging more, covering less, and getting rich in the process. And it’s the American people who are paying the price.”

According to a new report examining financial trends in the insurance industry, the combined profits of the nation’s largest insurance companies and their subsidiaries increased by over 170 percent between 2003 and 2007. The report, which is available in full at www.nwfco.org, adds to already compelling evidence that the insurance industry is using deliberate tactics designed to maximize profits by raising premiums, co-pays and deductibles; refusing coverage or charging exorbitant rates to people with pre-existing conditions; and even retroactively denying coverage to people with insurance. Here are the facts:

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Insurance Industry Accesssing Consumer Databases to Run Health "Credit" Checks
Posted by AlterNet Staff, The Washington Post on August 4, 2008 at 6:31 AM.

Ellen Nakashima, writing in the Washington Post, reports:

Health and life insurance companies have access to a powerful new tool for evaluating whether to cover individual consumers: a health "credit report" drawn from databases containing prescription drug records on more than 200 million Americans.

Collecting and analyzing personal health information in commercial databases is a fledgling industry, but one poised to take off as the nation enters the age of electronic medical records. While lawmakers debate how best to oversee the shift to computerized records, some insurers have already begun testing systems that tap into not only prescription drug information, but also data about patients held by clinical and pathological laboratories.

Traditionally, insurance companies have judged an applicant's risk by gathering medical records from physicians' offices. But the new tools offer the advantage of being "electronic, fast and cheap," said Mark Franzen, managing director of Milliman IntelliScript, which provides consumers' personal drug profiles to insurers.

The trend holds promise for improved health care and cost savings, but privacy and consumer advocates fear it is taking place largely outside the scrutiny of federal health regulators and lawmakers.

Read the rest of the post on the flip side »

How Toxic Is Your Car?
Posted by Heather Gehlert, AlterNet on July 26, 2008 at 3:40 PM.

The average American spends an hour and a half in a car every day, and may be at risk for long-term health problems from toxic chemicals inside the vehicle, a new report from the Ecology Center found.

The report, released this week, shows that most vehicles' seats, carpet, armrests, steering wheel, dashboard and other parts all give off potentially harmful chemicals, including bromine, chlorine and lead.

The Ecology Center tested more than 200 popular 2008- and 2009-model vehicles as well as over 60 child car seats.

Among the worst vehicles were the VW Beetle convertible, Lincoln Navigator SUV and Suzuki Forenza. Among the best were the Toyota Camry Solara, Chevy Cobalt and Honda Accord.

You can find out how safe your car is or learn more about toxicity in car seats by visiting healthycar.org.

Pushing Prescriptions: How the Drug Industry Sells Its Agenda at Your Expense
Posted by Heather Gehlert, AlterNet on July 18, 2008 at 2:27 PM.

The drug industry, Washingtons's largest lobby, spent more than $189 million on lobbying last year, a recent investigation from the Center for Public Integrity shows. That's up 32 percent since 2006 and -- get this -- nearly three times the amount they spent on lobbying in 1998, the first for which year complete data is available.

CPI's report, Pushing Prescriptions: How the Drug Industry Sells Its Agenda at Your Expense, also shows that Big Pharma has significantly upped its campaign contributions to Democrats since their November 2006 win. Nearly half of that money went to members of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, House Committee on Ways and Means, and Senate Committee on Health, Education and Labor -- all of which are supposed to regulate the pharmaceutical industry.

Apparently, all that cash did the trick. The drug companies' intense lobbying -- I wish we could just say "bribing" and call it what it really is -- has sped up the drug approval process (arguably decreasing the attention given to drug safety), delayed the entry of lower cost generic drugs to the market, increased direct-to-consumer advertising (which has risen 20-fold in the last 10 years), created incentives for performing drug testing on kids, and resulted in a serious conflict of interest by "making the FDA dependent on the industry it regulates for budgetary resources."

Read the full report here.

Ban on HIV+ Visitors and Immigrants in the U.S. is One Step Closer to Being Repealed
Posted by Melissa McEwan, Shakesville on July 17, 2008 at 2:00 PM.

Hello, Progress -- nice to see you again:

The U.S. Senate has approved repeal of a law barring HIV-positive visitors and immigrants from entering the country. The measure was included in legislation reauthorizing PEPFAR, the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief.

The ban repeal measure was tacked onto the bill by Sens. John Kerry (D-MA) and Gordon Smith (R-OR) despite an effort by Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) to block it.

PEPFAR passed the Senate with the Kerry-Smith provision by a vote of 80 to 16 and now moves to conference committee before being sent to the President.

…Gay and HIV/AIDS rights advocates have been fighting for repeal of the ban for more than a decade. The battle now focuses on keeping the language intact while PEPFAR moves through conference.

"We call on the leaders of the House and Senate to retain the Kerry-Smith provision in conference and ensure it is included in the final legislation sent to the President’s desk," said Human Rights Campaign President Joe Solmonese.

Aside from its intrinsic and immediate value if the repeal is signed into law, it's also a good first step toward undoing the immigration policy that prevents HIV+ foreign nationals from obtaining legal permanent residency in the US -- which itself is necessarily tied to any reform of the fiancée/marriage visa laws to include same-sex couples.

Big Oil Wants to Keep Toxins in Your Child's Toys
Posted by Heather Gehlert on July 11, 2008 at 4:17 PM.

Far too many children's toys contain phthalates -- chemicals that help make plastic toys soft and flexible but also have known links to birth defects, fertility problems, early puberty, and breast and testicular cancer. A Congressional conference committee is considering banning the toxins, but Exxon Mobil, which manufactures one of the primary phthalates in toys, is using its millions of dollars in lobbying power to put up a fight. Four members of the Congressional committee are undecided. Help them make up their minds by writing them and encouraging them to vote "yes" on this amendment.

For more information about the amendment or phthalates, visit the Breast Cancer Fund.

John McCain Befuddled By Birth Control
Posted by Matt Corley, Think Progress on July 10, 2008 at 8:26 AM.

Earlier this week, one of Sen. John McCain’s (R-AZ) top advisers, Carly Fiorina, argued for McCain’s free-market approach to health care by noting that “there are many health insurance plans that will cover Viagra but won’t cover birth-control medication” and that many “women would like a choice.” But, as ThinkProgress noted, Fiorina’s argument was undermined by McCain’s 2003 vote against legislation that would have required insurance coverage of prescription birth control. When asked about the disconnect on his campaign bus today, McCain nervously replied, “I certainly do not want to discuss that issue“:

Q: Earlier this week Carly Fiorina was meeting with a bunch of reporters and talked about it being unfair that insurance companies cover Viagra but not birth control. And -

McCain: I certainly do not want to discuss that issue. (uneasy laughter)

Q: But apparently you’ve voted against (McCain laughter continues)

McCain: I don’t know what I voted -

Q: Voted against coverage of birth control, forcing health insurance companies to cover birth control in the past. Is that still your position?

McCain: I’ll look at my voting record on it, but I have, uh, (5 second pause) , I don’t recall the vote right now. But I’ll be glad to look at it and get back to you as to why, I don’t -

Q: I guess her statement was that it was unfair that health insurance companies cover Viagra but not birth control. Do you have an opinion on that?

McCain: (after 8 second pause) I don’t know enough about it to give you an informed answer because I don’t recall the vote, I’ve cast thousands of votes in the Senate. I will respond to - it’s a, it’s a (nervous)

McCain’s stumbling answer is reminiscent of when he was asked in March 2007 about public funding for contraceptives and he could only reply, “whether I support government funding for them or not, I don’t know.”

McCain Jokes About Killing Iranians With American Tobacco Exports
Posted by Satyam Khanna, Think Progress on July 9, 2008 at 7:57 AM.

Last year, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) joked about bombing Iran to the theme of the Beach Boy’s “Barbara Ann.” McCain was widely criticized for the remark, but simply told critics to “lighten up and get a life.” The Washington Post notes that McCain tried joking about “killing” Iranians again today:

Responding to a question about a survey that shows increased exports to Iran, mainly from cigarettes, McCain said, “Maybe thats a way of killing them.” He quickly caught himself, saying “I meant that as a joke” as his wife, Cindy, poked him in the back.

According to a report released today, U.S. exports to Iran “grew more than tenfold during President Bush’s years in office even as he accused Iran of nuclear ambitions and helping terrorists. America sent more cigarettes to Iran, at least $158 million worth under Bush, than any other products.”

CNN Spreading Innacurate Info on Cervical Cancer Vaccine
Posted by , Feministe on July 8, 2008 at 12:00 PM.

By Habladora

I can’t decide if this is an example of careless reporting, or of intentional fear-mongering. While there is no solid evidence that Gardasil is dangerous, CNN’s article “Should parents worry about HPV vaccine?” seems to be written with the aim of confusing the public into believing otherwise:

Gardasil has been the subject of 7,802 “adverse event” reports from the time the Food and Drug Administration approved its use two years ago, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Girls and women have blamed the vaccine for causing ailments from nausea to paralysis — even death. Fifteen deaths were reported to the FDA, and 10 were confirmed, but the CDC says none of the 10 were linked to the vaccine. The CDC says it continues to study the reports of illness.

While the idea that the HPV vaccinations might be unsafe is scary, at this point in CNN’s article I’m most appalled by a major news organization’s apparent lack of interest in conveying any real information to readers about an issue that concerns the safety of women and girls, and that could impact people’s decisions on whether or not to get vaccinated.

Let’s start with the first statement - that 7,802 “adverse event” reports have been filed. The obvious follow-up question that should occur to any reporter is “well, how many of these adverse events have actually been linked to Gardasil?” One might also wonder what the average adverse event report rate is for any vaccine, and if those reports decline after the vaccination is proven to be safe. Readers naturally want to know, after such a sensational headline, well - should we be worried, or are people drawing connections between illnesses and the vaccine where none actually exist?

The article’s second sensational statement, that “[f]ifteen deaths were reported to the FDA,” immediately looses its steam when we realize that none of those deaths have been linked to Gardasil. At this point in my reading, I began to doubt CNN’s motives - they wouldn’t strum-up fear just because it’s good for ratings, would they?

Finally, CNN presents us with the terrifying story of a teenager who developed pancreatitis not long after taking the vaccine. While I am not insensible to how horrifying such a serious illness would be for a young girl and her family, it should be CNN’s responsibility to verify whether or not her fear that it was related to the vaccine could be founded - by researching how many of those incident reports dealt with pancreatitis, for example, or other autoimmune diseases. This type of reporting is important, after all, since it could impact women’s decisions and, consequently, their health.

Read the rest of the post on the flip side »