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Haiti passed up cholera vaccine offer, Crucell CEO says

Ronald Brus, CEO of the Dutch vaccine maker Crucell, said Haiti did not accept an offer of tens of thousands of cholera vaccine doses late last year, the Financial Times reports.

12 Jul 2011

USAID, NSF launch science research grant program to support development goals

USAID and the National Science Foundation on Thursday launched the Partnerships for Enhanced Engagement in Research initiative to "provide grants to developing world partners of NSF U.S. grantees," with the goal of supporting "applied research - science in support of development - in areas of global concern such as climate change, biodiversity, water issues, agriculture, seismic hazards and deforestation," SciDev.Net reports.

12 Jul 2011

Sevocity's EHR v11.1 achieves CCHIT 2011 certification

Sevocity, the leader in cloud-based Electronic Health Records, today announced that Sevocity v11.1 has achieved full certification through the Certification Commission for Health Information Technology (CCHIT) and is a CCHIT Certified 2011 Ambulatory EHR.

12 Jul 2011

Type-3 polio virus case in Pakistan raises concerns of disease spreading, WHO says

Pakistan has reported the first case of the type-3 wild polio virus in six months, raising concerns that the disease may spread to other parts of Asia and beyond, the WHO said on Thursday, Bloomberg/San Francisco Chronicle reports.

12 Jul 2011

Factors leading to drought are varied

In addition to "ecological factors," "long and recurrent conflicts, poor infrastructure, misguided policy options, weak market system and seasonal migration patterns account to the ever-increasing drought problems" in the Horn of Africa, Abeje Chumo, an international law expert and editor of the Horn of Africa blog for the Foreign Policy Association, writes in a post on the Foreign Policy Blogs Network.

12 Jul 2011

NY Times: Medical schools are adjusting their interest in 'people skills'

Doctors save lives, but they can sometimes be insufferable know-it-alls who bully nurses and do not listen to patients. Medical schools have traditionally done little to screen out such flawed applicants or to train them to behave better, but that is changing.

12 Jul 2011

Viewpoints: N.Y. health exchange stalemate; Dick Cheney's heart; vaccine debate refuses to die

Just in case you hadn't noticed, no one has elected Grover Norquist to anything. Still, he looms as a major obstacle to Congress reaching a deficit-reduction agreement needed to raise the federal debt ceiling. … what's revealing about Norquist's passionate advocacy against taxes is that it virtually ignores the main causes of bigger government: Social Security and Medicare.

12 Jul 2011

Drug makers seek to block deficit-talk demands for discounts

Also, The Wall Street Journal reports that the pharmaceutical industry's pipeline is showing a reinvigorated level of energy.

11 Jul 2011

Opponents ask Colo. Attorney General to intervene on hospital sale

Opponents mount a challenge to the planned sale of Denver's largest hospital group to a for-profit chain while hospitals in Massachusetts report difficult economic conditions and a California facility is expanding.

11 Jul 2011

Parallels, Microsoft partner to deliver complete cloud automation solution for health community

At the Microsoft World Wide Partner conference, Parallels today announced a two-year strategic relationship with Microsoft to deliver a complete cloud automation solution focused on meeting the needs of the health industry around the world.

11 Jul 2011

New gonorrhea strain resistant to all antibiotics isolated in Japanese woman

A new strain of the sexually transmitted disease gonorrhea that is resistant to all known antibiotic treatments has been isolated from a female sex worker in Japan, according to Magnus Unemo of the Swedish Reference Laboratory for Pathogenic Neisseria, Reuters reports. Unemo is set to present his findings at a conference of the International Society for Sexually Transmitted Disease Research in Quebec on Monday.

11 Jul 2011

Deal in debt talks still elusive as Aug. 2 deadline looms

Issues related to trimming entitlement programs such as Medicare and Medicaid, as well as revamping the tax code, continue to be difficult to tackle.

11 Jul 2011

Different hunger calculation approach could help use resources more effectively

In a New York Times opinion piece, Robert Jensen, an associate professor of public policy at the University of California, Los Angeles, and Nolan Miller, a professor of finance at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, suggest an alternate strategy for measuring hunger, called the "staple-calorie-share approach," which "can give us a radically different view of who is hungry and who is not."

11 Jul 2011

RyMed's InVision-Plus Intraluminal Protection System effective against catheter-related bloodstream infections

Denise Macklin, BSN, RNC, representing the research team of Dr. Cynthia C. Chernecky Ph.D., RN, AOCN, FAAN, Dr. Jennifer Waller, Ph.D., both from Georgia Health Sciences University; and Dr. William Jarvis M.D., Jason & Jarvis Associates, exhibited a poster at the recent APIC 2011 (Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology) conference in Baltimore, titled "Clinical Comparisons of Split Septum, Positive and Negative Mechanical Valve Intravenous Connectors to an Intraluminal Protection Connector on Infection Rates."

11 Jul 2011

Governors oppose Medicaid cuts in debt-ceiling efforts

One approach being discussed would lower federal payments to states for Medicaid and the CHIP program — which as analysis says would lead to even more budget burdens for already cash-strapped states.

11 Jul 2011

Slow economic recovery slows tally of new health care jobs

Health care employment, which defied the economy by adding jobs through the 2007-09 recession, is looking less robust. The sector is starting to come under pressure as the weak recovery coupled with state budget cuts and uncertainty about the financial effects of the health care overhaul are pushing hospitals and health systems to cut costs.

11 Jul 2011

UNFPA launches 7 Billion Actions campaign

The U.N. Population Fund (UNFPA) on Monday, World Population Day, launched the 7 Billion Actions campaign to "promote dialogue on what it means to live in a world with so many people and encourage action on issues that affect us all.

11 Jul 2011

Exchange rule likely today

In other health reform coverage, news outlets report on the divisive impact IPAB is having among Democrats, how health care is playing among GOP presidential hopefuls and what might happen in the legal challenge to the health law.

11 Jul 2011

State roundup: Recurring SustiNet rumors in Conn.

The tentative concession deal negotiated between Gov. Dannel P. Malloy's administration and state employee unions is dead. But suspicions it was linked the SustiNet plan to create state-run insurance live on, complicating chances of striking a new deal to avert up to 6,500 layoffs. ... One simple, incontrovertible fact is that there is no SustiNet coverage plan into which state employees can be enticed or forced. But from there, the picture gets fuzzy.

11 Jul 2011

First Edition: July 11, 2011

In today's health policy headlines, more reports on the challenges President Barack Obama and congressional leaders are facing in the ongoing debt reduction negotiations.

11 Jul 2011