Medi-Cal, the Medicaid program in California relies on prison labor to manufacture eyeglasses for beneficiaries. A recent LA Times article (also appearing in Kaiser Health News) deemed that program “short-sighted,” no pun intended. The eyeglasses are made by the California Prison Industry Authority, or CALPIA, whose contract with Medi-Cal dates back to 1988.
Author: Devon Herrick
Medical Debts Have Many Causes; Not Always a Lack of Money
An article in Medical Economics broke down the data from a recent survey by Kaiser Health News on medical indebtedness. Why don’t patients pay their medical bills? It’s not just a lack of money. Of consumers with medical debt, about two-thirds (67%) said they did not fully pay a medical bill due to a lack of money. However, a similar proportion (68%) didn’t pay it because they expected their health plan to pay it. Meanwhile 44% didn’t fully pay their bills because they thought them inaccurate.
Drug Maker Applies to Sell The Pill Over the Counter without a Prescription
According to the New York Times the US Food and Drug Administration has received an application by a drug company to switch a prescription birth control pill to over-the-counter status. A Paris-based company, HRA Pharma asked the FDA to make its pill legal to sell without a prescription. That move is controversial, not just because of the recent Supreme Court ruling on Roe v Wade. Another pill manufacturer, Cadence Health, is also preparing to submit an application to switch its pill to OTC as well.
JAMA: Tool Used to Ration Scarce Hospital Beds During Covid was Racially Biased
Racial bias in medicine takes many forms. It occurs when an older black guy sees his doctor, who doesn’t bother to prescribe drugs for hypertension because he assumes his patient will be noncompliant. Maybe it’s when a doctor doesn’t try to counsel her patient with high cholesterol because she assumes Hispanics suffer from with high cholesterol due to deeply entrench lifestyle behaviors. There are even debates that some treatment algorithms used in hospitals are biased due to biased programming.