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Closing the 'cancer divide' between developing and developed countries

Noting "there is a huge 'cancer divide' between rich and poor," with more than half of new cancer cases and almost two-thirds of all cancer deaths occurring in developing countries, this year's World Cancer Day theme, "Together It Is Possible," "calls on all individuals, organizations and governments to do their part to reduce premature deaths from cancers by 25 percent by 2025," Felicia Knaul, secretariat for the Global Task Force on Expanded Access to Cancer Care and Control in Developing Countries, and Jonathan Quick, president of Management Sciences for Health, write in a Huffington Post opinion piece.

7 Feb 2012

How 'observation care' status can drive up patients' hospital bills

News outlets report that this kind of status is leading some Medicare beneficiaries to be surprised by the size of hospital bills because, ultimately, the services they received were not classified as inpatient care.

7 Feb 2012

Viewpoints: Religious freedom and insurance coverage for contraception

In an election-year hothouse, the issue has quickly become caricatured as the Obama administration's "war on Catholics" versus the Republicans' "war on contraception." It is neither. The administration tried to strike a balance and simply failed. The First Amendment's guarantee of religious freedom deserves more weight than the administration allowed.

7 Feb 2012

WHO disputes study's claims that global malaria deaths are double current estimates

The WHO has disputed a study published last week in the Lancet "that claims nearly twice as many people are dying of malaria than current estimates," VOA News reports.

7 Feb 2012

Supporting scientific evidence under PEPFAR to end AIDS

On Wednesday, several HIV experts spoke at a Capitol Hill briefing "supporting the U.S. President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) program's reliance on scientific evidence to drive its work to end AIDS," the Center for Global Health Policy's "Science Speaks" blog reports.

7 Feb 2012

Sugar poses significant health risks, should be regulated like alcohol, U.S. researchers say

"Sugar poses enough health risks that it should be considered a controlled substance just like alcohol and tobacco, contend a team of researchers from the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF)," in an opinion piece called "The Toxic Truth About Sugar," published in the journal Nature on Wednesday, TIME's "Healthland" blog reports.

7 Feb 2012

Komen Foundation works to regain balance in the wake of Planned Parenthood funding flap

News outlets parse different angles of this story -- which broke last week -- including how the Web and social media affected it and how Komen is working to rebuild its donor list.

7 Feb 2012

Mental health system changes readied in La., Iowa, Texas

Louisiana, Iowa and Texas are facing major changes to their mental health systems. In other news, college students and inmates often face obstacles in getting mental health treatment.

7 Feb 2012

Dispute over malaria figures highlights lack of certainty in data in age of 'information overload'

In this post in TIME World's "Global Spin" blog, TIME's Africa bureau chief Alex Perry examines questions surrounding an Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) study published in the Lancet on Friday that suggests "malaria kills almost twice as many people a year as previously believed."

7 Feb 2012

GOP candidates: Santorum backs 'discredited' stroke claim, he and Gingrich continue attacks on 'Romneycare'

As the GOP presidential hopefuls continue sparring on the campaign trail, The Associated Press takes a look at the "influence game" and tracks how big donors pursue their policy desires. Meanwhile, House Democrats are betting that Medicare will be the issue that wins them control of their chamber.

7 Feb 2012

Minnesota medical board comes under scrutiny

The Minnesota Board of Medical Practice, responsible for protecting the public from physician errors or misconduct, often shies away from punishing doctors whose mistakes harm patients or who demonstrate a pattern of substandard care, a Star Tribune investigation has found. Since 2000, at least 46 Minnesota doctors escaped board discipline after authorities in other states took action against their licenses for such missteps as committing crimes, patient care errors or having sexual or inappropriate relationships with patients.

7 Feb 2012

Economic transformation in Latin America an opportunity to improve NTD strategies, DNDi regional director says

"The rise of emerging economies in Latin America is an opportunity to improve strategies for fighting neglected illnesses and increase the region's contribution to the global struggle against them, says" Eric Stobbaerts, the Latin America director of the independent Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative (DNDi), Inter Press Service reports.

7 Feb 2012

New ACCP guidelines address DVT/PE risk factors for long-distance travel

New evidence-based guidelines from the American College of Chest Physicians (ACCP) address the many risk factors for developing a deep vein thrombosis (DVT), or blood clot, as the result of long-distance travel.

7 Feb 2012

New report on state of health insurance in California

Hard hit by one of the worst recessions in nearly a century, hundreds of thousands of Californians lost insurance coverage across the state as employers shed jobs and the health plans that came with those jobs, according to a new report from the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research.

6 Feb 2012

Viewpoints: Komen's retreat; Romney's selected support of Medicare cuts; Heritage refuses blame for individual mandate

A group like Komen only has the quality service it provides and goodwill garnered over the years to encourage donations and support. Its trademark pink is not as bold as before. For the moment, it seems drab and faded.

6 Feb 2012

Emergency time reduced by 4 hours could save 80 lives a year: Study

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6 Feb 2012

Chances dim for live broadcast of health law arguments before the Supreme Court

In other news related to the legal challenges, the parties involved in the lawsuits differ not only on questions related to the overhaul, but also on the allocation of time for arguments.

6 Feb 2012

Panel discussion shows heated controversy over H5N1 research

"The controversy over research about potentially dangerous H5N1 viruses heated up [Thursday night] in a New York City debate that featured some of the leading voices exchanging blunt comments on the alleged risks and benefits of publishing or withholding the full details of the studies," CIDRAP News reports.

6 Feb 2012

Establishing clean water, sanitation in Liberia

In this Guardian analysis, journalist and author Rose George describes a recent trip to Liberia with the organization WaterAid, during which she discussed sanitation with President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and visited two towns with the aim of learning more about their access to clean water and sanitation.

6 Feb 2012

World Cancer Day highlights importance of detection, prevention

"Early diagnosis is the key to reducing the nearly eight million deaths caused by cancer across the globe annually, the United Nations World Health Organization (WHO) said" on Saturday to mark World Cancer Day, "stressing the importance of screening programs for healthy people to detect the disease promptly for easier treatment," the U.N. News Centre reports (2/3).

6 Feb 2012