- The latest on Fentanyl deaths.
- “Using published data from the Netherlands and Belgium, where medically assisted death is legal, we estimated that…Medical assistance in dying could reduce annual health care spending across Canada by between $34.7 million and $138.8 million, exceeding the $1.5–$14.8 million in direct costs associated with its implementation.”
- Why are we still funding the WHO?
- Why we need “right to try”: family had to travel to Italy for life saving drug for their daughter that the FDA was slow to approve in the US.
- More than half of eligible physicians received a payment from a pharmaceutical drug or device maker over 10 years.
Category: Drug Prices & Regulations
Wednesday Links
- Cancer phobia: In 2017, 21.3 million American women had cancer screening tests even though they were outside the age ranges for recommended screening. 10.1 million men outside the recommended age ranges had a PSA test.
- People with Obamacare health insurance are being switched to other plans without their knowledge or consent by rogue agents.
- Why are expensive cancer treatments excluded from Medicare’s price negotiations?
- Henry Miller: “The vaccines saved 2.9 million lives, prevented 12.5 million hospitalizations, and saved $500 billion in hospitalization.”
Medicare to Cover Some Costly Weight-Loss Drugs (that’s both good and bad)
The first Medicare health plans announced they will cover the weight-loss drug, Wegovy for certain patients with heart disease. By law, Medicare is not allowed to cover drugs solely for weight loss. Elevance (operates many Blue Cross and Blue Shield health plans), Kaiser Permanente and CVS Health are the first Medicare plans to cover weight loss drugs for health reasons, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Friday Links
- California had the worst job growth of any state.
- How Medicare pays providers: for the fiscal year that began on October 1, the new rule for hospital inpatient care is just short of 800 pages, with three columns of text for most of the published pages. The physician fee schedule and skilled nursing facilities rules for 2024 run 1227 and 147 pages, respectively.
- Other things equal, 3 psychological traits (competitiveness, risk tolerance, and confidence) lead to higher incomes.
- The Institute for Clinical and Economic Review determined that a cost-effective price for the newly approved gene therapy Lenmeldy is between $2.3M and $3.9M. Orchard Therapeutics, will be asking $4.25M.
- Why is colon cancer rising among young adults, but falling for seniors?