About Covid-19
The Delta Variant Will Drive A Steep Rise In U.S. COVID Deaths, A New Model Shows: “The current COVID-19 surge in the U.S. — fueled by the highly contagious delta variant — will steadily accelerate through the summer and fall, peaking in mid-October, with daily deaths more than triple what they are now.
That's according to new projections released Wednesday from the COVID-19 Scenario Modeling Hub, a consortium of researchers working in consultation with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to help the agency track the course of the pandemic.”
Biden administration sends more cash to hard-hit areas as Delta variant surges: “The White House is directing $100 million of additional spending and deploying dozens of federal health workers to shore up vaccine outreach and Covid-19 tracking in rural and heartland states as the Delta variant continues to surge.
The new steps come as new cases and hospitalizations continue to spike while vaccination rates have stalled at 68 percent of adults, with uptake far lower in some parts of the South. The more transmissible Delta variant now accounts for 83 percent of cases nationwide.”
US hospitals in scramble to make room amid rising COVID-19 case count, dwindling bed capacity: The article has snapshots from four states where some facilities are facing capacity strains.
Study Claims J&J Vaccine Much Less Effective Against Delta, Lambda Variants: “Johnson & Johnson’s (J&J) single-dose vaccine is far less effective against the Delta and Lambda strains of the SARS‑CoV‑2 virus than against the original coronavirus, researchers at New York University (NYU) reported.”
3 states responsible for 40% of COVID-19 cases: “Florida, Texas and Missouri accounted for 40 percent of new COVID-19 cases reported nationwide this week, Jeff Zients, the White House's COVID-19 response coordinator, said July 22.
’The data is clear: The case increases are concentrated in communities with low vaccination rates,’ Mr. Zients said during a news briefing, pointing to the three states.”
About the public’s health
Mississippi's attorney general asks Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade: “Mississippi’s attorney general urged the Supreme Court in a Thursday brief to overrule Roe v. Wade next term when the justices review Mississippi’s ban on virtually all abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy.
Calling the court’s precedent on abortion “egregiously wrong,” Attorney General Lynn Fitch (R) explicitly set the dispute over Mississippi’s restrictive law on a collision course with the landmark 1973 decision in Roe that first articulated the constitutional right to abortion.”
Superbug’ fungus spread in two cities, health officials say: “U.S. health officials said Thursday they now have evidence of an untreatable fungus spreading in two hospitals and a nursing home.
The ‘superbug’ outbreaks were reported in a Washington, D.C, nursing home and at two Dallas-area hospitals, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported. A handful of the patients had invasive fungal infections that were impervious to all three major classes of medications…
The fungus, Candida auris, is a harmful form of yeast that is considered dangerous to hospital and nursing home patients with serious medical problems. It is most deadly when it enters the bloodstream, heart or brain. Outbreaks in health care facilities have been spurred when the fungus spread through patient contact or on contaminated surfaces.”
About pharma
Pfizer Drops Lawsuit Against J&J Over Remicade Biosimilar Coverage: “Pfizer withdrew a 2017 lawsuit against Johnson & Johnson (J&J) that alleged the company used anticompetitive practices to stop insurance companies from covering Pfizer’s biosimilar of rheumatoid arthritis drug, Remicade (infliximab).
Pfizer alleged that J&J violated antitrust laws by telling insurers it would withhold certain rebates on Remicade unless they limited their coverage of Pfizer’s biosimilar, Inflectra, which allowed J&J to corner the market on the drug.”
I wonder if President Biden’s pro-generic stance and fight against anti-competitive actions contributed to this decision.
About diagnostics
European Commission launches months-long antitrust investigation into Illumina’s $8B bid for Grail: “The European Commission has opted for a deeper probe into the DNA sequencing giant’s $8 billion proposal for the cancer blood test maker Grail, citing concerns that the vertical takeover of its former spinout could harm R&D efforts at competing diagnostic companies.”
About health insurance
Humana, Centene opioid recovery drug suits dismissed: “A district judge dismissed a pair of lawsuits from Humana and Centene against Indivior over alleged attempts to suppress competition of Suboxone, its opioid recovery drug.
The lawsuits were thrown out because both insurers were considered indirect purchasers of Suboxone, voiding their standing to sue via the Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, according to the court opinion.”
Out-of-pocket [OOP] costs for preventive care persist almost a decade after the Affordable Care Act: “We found that in addition to premium costs meant to cover preventive care, Americans with employer-sponsored insurance were still charged between $75 million and $219 million in total for services that ought to be free to them ($0.50 to $1.40 per ESI-covered individual and $0.75 to $2.17 per ESI-covered individual using preventive care). However, some enrollees still faced OOP costs for eligible preventive services ranging into the hundreds of dollars. OOP costs are most likely to be incurred for women's services (e.g., contraception) and basic screenings (e.g., diabetes and cholesterol screenings), and by patients in the South or in rural areas.”
UnitedHealthcare awarding $11.4M to social determinants programs in 18 states: ”The insurer first launched its Empowering Health program in 2018 and has since then awarded more than $40 million in grants, establishing partnerships with community organizations across 26 states.
UnitedHealthcare said that these investments have reached more than 6 million people.
The insurer will award $1 million to organizations in four states: Indiana, New York, Nevada and Mississippi. $900,000 will be made awarded to groups operating in Virginia, UnitedHealthcare said.”
As the Pandemic Eases, What Is the State of Health Care Coverage and Affordability in the U.S.?: A really good review of this topic from the Commonwealth Fund. For a quick overview of the results, scroll down and check the chart pack links on the left.