Saturday Links

More evidence that genes trump social factors in explaining behavioral outcomes.

CDC:  The new Covid vaccine is 54% effective.

Len Schaeffer:

The level of variation in our health care system is unbelievable.  You could be hospitalized for nine days in New York and for three days in California with the same diagnosis—and those differences would have no impact on outcomes. There is no other industry in the world that uses so many different approaches to the same thing and in which these differences don’t relate to better results. (Article is interesting throughout)

“Imagine an integrated device that includes an insulin pump, a glucometer, and software that uses photos from a smartphone to carb count your food and dose insulin…  The FDA’s regulatory framework is ill-equipped to deal [with this].”

Is there a relationship between Medicaid expansion and the opioid crisis?

The US has 36 million Health Savings Accounts, covering 72 million people.