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Iowa: GOP presidential debate turns up campaign heat

With the Iowa caucuses fast approaching, new political ads are hitting the airwaves, and Saturday night's debate draws lots of fact-checking by news organzations.

13 Dec 2011

Fred Kavli Public Symposium discusses about 'The Brain on Trial'

How should insights about the brain affect the course of a criminal trial, from the arguments in a courtroom to the issuing of a sentence?

13 Dec 2011

Lawmakers move closer to completing legislative to-do list

Still remaining on the list, however, is action to prevent a scheduled reduction in Medicare payments for physicians. A proposal to avert this cut is included in a broader measure that would extend the payroll tax break.

13 Dec 2011

Reuters examines maternal mortality in Afghanistan

"An Afghan woman can expect to have an average 5.1 babies in her lifetime, the highest fertility rate in Asia," Reuters writes in the first of two articles examining childbirth and maternal mortality in Afghanistan. The news service adds that "giving birth a common, and frequent experience -- but mothers say it is too often also hard, lonely and frightening."

13 Dec 2011

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