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Veterans Affairs Department Expands Coverage Amid Patient Safety Concerns
The Associated Press reports that the VA "opened the doors of its health care system Monday to about 266,000 nondisabled veterans with moderate incomes, some of whom have been shut out of those benefits. The veterans eligible are from a category known as "Priority 8." They have no illnesses or injuries attributed to their military service, and they earn more than the average wage in their communities." The AP notes that such veterans were previously denied enrollment because of a cost-savings move in 2003, but the VA is expanding eligibility by raising income restrictions from about $29,000 to $32,000, which is adjusted for the cost of living. The effort represents part of President Barack Obama"s campaign promise to bring all veterans into the VA"s system. The AP notes that: "In 1996, Congress ordered the agency to open health care to nearly all veterans, but lawmakers also gave the VA secretary the authority to suspend enrollments" (Hefling, 6/15).

Alzheimer's Society Puts Best Foot Forward With Dunwoody
This Friday 26 June, Alzheimer"s Society representatives and sports personality Micky Quinn will join Richard Dunwoody, in his quest to walk 1,000 miles in 1,000 hours.
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Cytokinetics Announces The Initiation Of A First-Time-in-Humans, Phase I Clinical Trial Of CK-2017357
Cytokinetics, Incorporated (NASDAQ: CYTK) announced that the company has initiated a first-time-in-humans, Phase I clinical trial of CK-2017357 in healthy male volunteers. CK-2017357 is a fast skeletal muscle troponin activator and is the lead drug candidate that has emerged from the company"s skeletal sarcomere activator program. CK-2017357 selectively activates the troponin complex and increases its sensitivity to calcium, subsequently leading to an increase in skeletal muscle force. This mechanism of action has demonstrated encouraging pharmacological activity in preclinical models that may relate to the potential treatment of diseases associated with aging, muscle wasting, and neuromuscular dysfunction.
Oncology

Ongoing Refugee Crisis In Pakistan Overwhelms Health System

The AP/Washington Post examines how the millions of Pakistani refugees fleeing from the army"s offensive against the Taliban in the northwest of the country are overwhelming the country"s health care system. "The crisis has exhausted doctors, used up limited supplies of medicines and buried hospitals in a mountain of red tape as they try to get money and medicine for the crisis" pushing the entire health system to the brink of collapse, the AP/Washington Post writes. "[E]very smaller hospital is overloaded with displaced people and our district hospital in Mardan is collapsing," said Arshad Khan, who the AP/Washington Post writes is "the health ministry"s top man in Mardan, which is the epicenter of the refugee onslaught because it borders the battlezone." Despite recent government action to provide "one million rupees ($12,500) for medicine for the refugees ò€¦ Khan says it will be months before the refugees see any because of bureaucratic hurdles attached to the money," according to the AP/Washington Post. While "Khan says international charities have provided medicines and field hospitals in refugee camps ò€¦ only about 20 percent of the 2 million refugees are in camps. The rest are scattered throughout the frontier province, as well as other provinces in Pakistan," the AP/Washington Post writes Even before the refugee crisis, health was not a national priority, said Khan. According to the AP/Washington Post, Pakistan is expected to spend $300 million on health care next year, compared to $3.65 billion on defense. "There are only 12 doctors to every 10,000 people in Pakistan and 10 hospital beds to every 10,000 people," according to the WHO, compared to "22 doctors and more than 30 hospital beds in the United States," write the AP/Washington Post (Gannon, AP/Washington Post, 6/6). The Los Angeles Times explores how the people"s support of the military offensive against the Taliban hinges on how the government "manages the massive humanitarian crisis created by the war"s displacement of an estimated 3 million Pakistanis." According to the Los Angeles Times, "About 200,000 of the displaced people, nearly all ethnic Pashtuns, are crammed into sprawling tent camps in Mardan and elsewhere in the country ò€¦ At Sheikh Yaseen, more than 7,600 people live in 1,485 tents." The article examines the conditions of the refugee camps, described as "sweltering heat in cramped tent cities with little sanitation and bare-bones health care" (Rodriguez, Los Angeles Times, 6/7). Health officials are concerned about the insufficient numbers of female doctors needed to help treat the health conditions of Pakistani refugees, International News reports. About 90 percent of female patients in refugee camps avoid examination by male doctors, said Shafiq Sarwar, chairman of Rawalpindi Medical College and Allied Hospitals task force on medical assistance to the internally displaced persons (IDPs) in NWFP . "We can not convince them, the female IDPs, to get examined by male doctors. The only thing we can do is to arrange female doctors for them," Sarwar said (Qasim, International News, 6/6). This information was reprinted from globalhealth.kff.org with kind permission from the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. You can view the entire Kaiser Daily Global Health Policy Report, search the archives and sign up for email delivery at globalhealth.kff.org. © Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. All rights reserved.


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