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Fla. squeezes Medicaid spending; Colo. dispute threatens budget

Republican Gov. Rick Scott this week proposed to slash Florida's spending in the joint state-federal health insurance program for the poor by $2 billion, in part to add $1 billion to education in the next fiscal year.

13 Dec 2011

Only with universal access will power of vaccines be fully harnessed

In this entry in the Huffington Post's "Impact" blog, Orin Levine of the Department of International Health at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and executive director of the International Vaccine Access Center (IVAC) recounts recent progress in expanding vaccine access to the world's poor and highlights current and recent vaccine access projects led by the GAVI Alliance and IVAC.

13 Dec 2011

Book on hot health topics

The intersection of health care, politics and policy is a controversial one. A new book of lively essays takes on all of today's hot health topics: alternative medicine, swine flu, health care reform, screening mammograms, taxes to decrease soda consumption, gun control and many more.

13 Dec 2011

First Edition: December 13, 2011

Kaiser Health News staff writer Phil Galewitz talked with former Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator Donald Berwick, who defended these federal health programs, but said they are trapped in a U.S. health system that promotes wasteful spending and inefficient care.

13 Dec 2011

Millions of people in African Sahel need food assistance, U.N. agencies say

"Millions of people in Africa's Sahel region need urgent help to cope with food shortages brought on by erratic rainfall and drought, and at least one million children in the area face malnutrition next year, U.N. agencies warned," AlertNet reports.

13 Dec 2011

Nigeria, Cameroon, Chad to introduce new meningitis vaccine

"The World Health Organization (WHO) on Friday said that Nigeria, Cameroon and Chad, who are in the 'meningitis belt' stretching across Africa, will this month introduce a new vaccine designed to eliminate a particular strain of the often deadly disease," Afrique en ligne reports.

13 Dec 2011

Many parents do not think their teens are at risk for noise-induced hearing loss

National data demonstrate that 1 in 6 U.S. adolescents has high-frequency hearing loss. A new report from the University of Michigan C.S. Mott Children's Hospital National Poll on Children's Health shows that many parents don't think their teens are at risk.

13 Dec 2011

GOP candidates dispute Gingrich, Romney records on individual mandate (video)

This Kaiser Health News video clip highlights parts of Saturday night's debate in Des Moines in which the GOP presidential candidates spent a considerable amount of time discussing the 2010 health law. In the debate's most talked-about moment, Mitt Romney offered to bet Rick Perry $10,000 that what Perry was saying about Romney's book wasn't correct.

13 Dec 2011

Retiree health funds run low, program to close early

A notice in Friday's Federal Register made clear that the fund designed to help cover health insurance for early retirees would stop taking claims for expenses incurred after Dec. 31.

13 Dec 2011

Malawi to review laws banning homosexuality, according to news reports

"Malawi is to review laws banning homosexuality in response to public opinion, according to reports," the Guardian writes.

13 Dec 2011

Poll investigates the impact of unemployment

About half of the long-term unemployed and under-employed in a poll said they currently have no health insurance and 56 percent said they've put off getting health care that they needed.

13 Dec 2011

PlusNews examines African government funding for, engagement in HIV research

"Unless African governments increase their funding for and engagement in HIV research, the continent cannot hope to attain equal status in determining its research agenda and priorities, speakers said at the 16th International Conference on AIDS and Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs) in Africa," PlusNews reports.

13 Dec 2011

What does the health system's future hold?

In a pair of articles, The Wall Street Journal examines the future of the American health care system and finds that many experts think there is little new in strategies to squeeze costs and improve quality.

13 Dec 2011

Pulitzer Center announces launch of collaborative reproductive health reporting project

The Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting "launched its collaborative reproductive health reporting project last week at the International Family Planning Conference (IFPC) in Dakar, Senegal," according to a post on the Center's website.

13 Dec 2011

'Twinning' team approach improves pediatric lymphoma outcomes

In an African county lacking any specialists in children's cancers, a team approach that "twins" Rwandan physicians with Boston-based pediatric oncologists has shown it can deliver expert, curative care to young patients stricken with lymphoma.

13 Dec 2011

House 'doc fix' proposal provides temporary relief to physicians, draws hospital concern

The "payment patch" would largely be paid for by charging higher Medicare premiums to affluent seniors and by cutting hospital payments.

13 Dec 2011

U of A creates 'conversation cards' for pediatric weight management

Medical researchers at the University of Alberta have created a deck of cards with conversation starters about sensitive and informational topics related to weight, that parents can use to guide their discussions when talking about their child's weight management with health professionals.

13 Dec 2011

Globe and Mail reports on potential factors leading to increasing HIV incidence in Uganda

After experiencing a decline in the number of new HIV infections in the 1990s, Uganda's "HIV incidence rate is creeping back up again. New infections are increasing, and the sense of urgency has vanished," the Globe and Mail reports.

13 Dec 2011

Single rooms in hospitals is not enough to prevent gastroenteritis

To offer patients single rooms in hospitals is not enough to prevent gastroenteritis. That is shown in a master thesis at Nordic School of Public Health NHV.

13 Dec 2011

NIH, Autism Speaks announce addition of AGRE as data federation site for NDAR

Autism Speaks - North America's largest autism science and advocacy organization - joins the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in announcing the addition of Autism Speaks Autism Genetic Resource Exchange (AGRE) as a data federation site for the National Database for Autism Research (NDAR). The addition of AGRE data will help create the largest multidisciplinary source of autism research data to date.

13 Dec 2011