About Covid-19
COVID DATA TRACKER WEEKLY REVIEW “This week, the U.S. COVID-19 Vaccination Program marks two milestones: 500 days since the first COVID-19 vaccine was approved for use in the United States, and 100 million first booster doses administered. While 100 million boosters is certainly something to celebrate, the fact remains that half of those eligible for a COVID-19 booster shot—about 91 million people—have not yet received one…
As of April 27, 2022, the current 7-day moving average of daily new cases (53,133) increased 25.2% compared with the previous 7-day moving average (42,427). A total of 81,028,797 COVID-19 cases have been reported in the United States as of April 27, 2022.”
Paxlovid fails in study for post-exposure prophylactic use While useful for treating those who become infected with SARS CoV-2, Paxlovid does not work for post-exposure prophylaxis.
Trump officials muzzled CDC on church covid guidance, emails confirm “Trump White House officials in May 2020 removed public health advice urging churches to consider virtual religious services as the coronavirus spread, delivering a messaging change sought by the president’s supporters, according to emails from former top officials released by a House panel on Friday.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention sent its planned public health guidance for religious communities to the White House on May 21, 2020, seeking approval to publish it. The agency had days earlier released reports saying that the virus had killed three and infected dozens at church events in Arkansas and infected 87 percent of attendees at a choir practice in Washington state, and health experts had warned that houses of worship had become hot spots for virus transmission.”
Big Three COVID-19 Vaccine Maker Shareholders Vote No on Sharing Intellectual Property With LMICs “Shareholders of the U.S.’ big three COVID-19 vaccine makers have voted no on proposals asking the companies to share their intellectual property with low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) so that those countries could make their own versions of the vaccines.”
About health insurance
CY 2023 Medicare Advantage [MA] and Part D Final Rule (CMS-4192-F) “This final rule revises the MA and Part D regulations related to marketing and communications; the criteria used to review applications for new or expanded MA and Part D plans, including compliance with MA provider network adequacy requirements; quality ratings for MA and Part D plans; medical loss ratio reporting; special requirements during disasters or public emergencies; how MA organizations calculate attainment of the maximum out-of-pocket (MOOP) limit for Parts A and B services; and the use of pharmacy price concessions to reduce beneficiary out of pocket costs for prescription drugs under Part D. This final rule also revises regulations for D-SNPs [MA dual eligible special needs plans] and in some cases, other special needs plans, related to enrollee advisory committees, health risk assessments, and ways to improve integration of Medicare and Medicaid. Many finalized policies are based on lessons learned from the Medicare-Medicaid Financial Alignment Initiative.”
Each of these items is briefly explained.
Feds Block Georgia's Plan to Have Private Sector Handle ACA “President Joe Biden's administration on Friday halted Gov. Brian Kemp’s plan to have the private sector, not the government, engage in outreach to get state residents to sign up for insurance under the Affordable Care Act.
Kemp, a Republican, had planned to bypass healthcare.gov and have residents shop for federally subsidized health insurance through private agents. Former President Donald Trump’s administration approved that plan in 2020, and state officials had touted it as a way to boost insurance coverage.”
Health Coverage Changes Under the Affordable Care Act: End of 2021 Update “KEY POINTS:
Newly-released data from the National Health Interview Survey shows that the uninsured rate for the U.S. population was 8.8 percent in Q4 2021 (October – December 2021), down 1.5 percentage points from 10.3 percent in Q4 2020. This reflects approximately 4.9 million people gaining health coverage since the end of 2020.
Individuals with incomes below 200 percent of the Federal Poverty Level experienced larger decreases in the uninsured rate than higher income households.
Coverage gains for adults ages 18-64 from the second half of 2020 to the second half of 2021 occurred across all racial and ethnic groups reported in the new data, with the uninsured rate declining by 3.5 percentage points among Latino adults, 1.8 percentage points among Black adults, and 0.5 percentage points among White adults.
Meanwhile, administrative data from late 2021 and early 2022 show a record-high number of people with coverage related to the Affordable Care Act (ACA) – with more than 35 million people estimated to be enrolled in the Medicaid expansion, Basic Health Program, or Marketplace coverage.
These data suggest that policies including the American Rescue Plan, new state Medicaid expansions, and the 2021 Marketplace Special Enrollment Period, in addition to the economic recovery, have helped Americans gain insurance coverage during the COVID -19 public health crisis.”
A reduction in Medicare Part B premiums remains in play. Here’s where things stand “More than three months after Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra ordered a reassessment of this year’s $170.10 standard monthly premium — a bigger-than-expected jump from $148.50 in 2021 — it remains uncertain when a determination will come and whether it would affect what beneficiaries pay this year…
About half of the larger-than-expected 2022 premium increase, set last fall, was attributed to the potential cost of covering Aduhelm — a drug that battles Alzheimer’s disease — despite actuaries not yet knowing the particulars of how it would be covered because Medicare officials were still determining that…
Several weeks ago, CMS officials announced that the program will only cover Aduhelm for beneficiaries who receive it as part of a clinical trial. Additionally, the per-patient price tag that actuaries had used in their calculation last year was cut in half, effective Jan. 1, by manufacturer Biogen — to $28,000 annually from $56,000.”
About hospitals and healthcare systems
At US Hospitals, a Drug Mix-Up Is Just a Few Keystrokes Away “More than four years ago, Tennessee nurse RaDonda Vaught typed two letters into a hospital’s computerized medication cabinet, selected the wrong drug from the search results, and gave a patient a fatal dose.
Vaught was prosecuted this year in an extremely rare criminal trial for a medical mistake, but the drug mix-up at the center of her case is anything but rare. Computerized cabinets have become nearly ubiquitous in modern health care, and the technological vulnerability that made Vaught’s error possible persists in many U.S. hospitals.”
This KFF report provides suggestions to address this problem.
Ascension posts $884M quarterly loss “St. Louis-based Ascension reported higher expenses in the three months ended March 31 and ended the quarter with a loss, according to financial documents filed April 29.
The 143-hospital system reported operating revenue of $6.69 billion in the first three months of this year, up from $6.56 billion in the same period of 2021.
Ascension's operating expenses climbed to $7.34 billion in the first three months of 2022, up from $6.59 billion in the same period a year earlier. The increase was attributed to several factors, including higher salaries, wages and supply expenses.”
IU Health reports $358M net loss as labor expenses climb 25% “Indianapolis-based Indiana University Health reported a net loss of $358.54 million for the first quarter of 2022 as its labor expenses soared, according to its financial results released April 28. The system had a net income of $330.5 million for the same period last year.
IU Health, a 16-hospital system, had $1.93 billion in revenue for the three months ended March 31, a 2.9 percent increase year over year from $1.87 billion. Its largest source of revenue was patient services, which rose 6.6 percent year over year to $1.79 billion for the first quarter of 2022 from $1.68 billion last year.
The system's expenses climbed 16.4 percent, to $1.96 billion, for the first quarter of 2022, compared to $1.68 billion for the same period last year.”
About pharma
Biotech Stocks Set for More Pain After Worst April in Decades “
”Biotech stocks closed out “their worst April since at least 1997, with the sector having tumbled more than 60% from its February 2021 peak and sinking 19% in April alone…
Jefferies strategist Will Sevush notes that the 2000 tech crash was similarly led by companies at an early stage of development with little to show in the way of revenue. He pointed out that retail traders also spurred the exuberance that drove both sectors to all-time highs.”
Novo Nordisk reaches primary endpoint in phase III of once-weekly insulin “Danish diabetes care giant Novo Nordisk (NOV: N) today announced headline results from the ONWARDS 2 trial, a Phase IIIa, 26-week efficacy and safety treat-to-target trial investigating once-weekly insulin icodec versus insulin degludec in 526 people with type 2 diabetes switching from daily insulin.
The trial achieved its primary endpoint of demonstrating non-inferiority in reducing HbA1c at week 26 with insulin icodec compared to insulin degludec.”
”Basal” insulin may go from being dosed daily to weekly.
About the public’s health
American Academy of Pediatrics Calls for Elimination of Race-Based Medicine “In a new policy statement, “Eliminating Race-Based Medicine,” pre-published online May 2, 2022, in Pediatrics, the AAP observes that race is a historically derived social construct that has no place as a biologic proxy. Over the years, the medical field has inaccurately applied race correction or race adjustment factors in its work, resulting in differential approaches to disease management and disparate clinical outcomes.”
Disparities in Health Care in Medicare Advantage by Race, Ethnicity, and Sex “This report presents summary information on the quality of health care reported in 2021 by Medicare Advantage (MA) enrollees nationwide. Two types of quality-of-care data are presented: (1) measures of patient experience [from the HCAPS reports], which describe how well the care that patients receive meets their needs for such things as timely appointments, respectful care, clear communication, and access to information; and (2) measures of clinical care, which describe the extent to which patients receive appropriate screening and treatment for specific health conditions. In 2021, 42 percent of all people with Medicare were enrolled in MA [from the HEDIS reports]…”
Among the findings: ”Racial and ethnic differences were evident more often for the 36 clinical care measures presented in this report than for the patient experience measures…”
About healthcare IT
1.1M health records breached in April: 5 biggest cyberattacks The article has more details.
As Teladoc shares tumbled after dismal Q1 earnings, analysts question telehealth giant's growth strategy “Shares of Teladoc plunged more than 45% Thursday after the telehealth giant reported disappointing first-quarter results.
The company reported earnings in the first quarter that missed on both the top and bottom lines. Teladoc's revenues grew 25% year over year to $565.4 million, below the $568.9 million that analysts were expecting. Earnings per share came in at a loss of $41.58, well below the loss of 62 cents expected, largely due to a write-down of assets related to its acquisition of Livongo in 2020. The company's sizable net loss included a noncash goodwill impairment charge of $6.6 billion, or a loss of $41.11 per share.”
About healthcare personnel
Use of Preventive Care Services Associated with Patient-Provider Sex Concordance in the US
“Key Points:
For women, having a female physician was related to greater use of multiple preventive services.
Sex concordance was not associated with greater use of preventive care services for men.
Men’s use of preventive care services increases with age at a greater rate relative to women. However, use of preventive care services by women is higher than for men to begin with.”
About health technology
Predicting pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma using artificial intelligence analysis of pre-diagnostic computed tomography images “A set of 108 retrospective CT scans (36 scans from each healthy control, pre-diagnostic, and diagnostic group) from 72 subjects was used for the study. Model development was performed on 66 multiphase CT scans, whereas external validation was performed on 42 venous-phase CT scans…
The system achieved an average classification accuracy of 86% on the external dataset.”
Use of such AI can identify tumors before thy become symptomatic. The problem is identifying those who need to be screened.
Guardant debuts first cancer screening blood test for catching colorectal tumors “Guardant’s Shield test, meanwhile, is intended for adults over age 45 who have an average risk for colorectal cancer and show no symptoms..
The test searches for early signs of colorectal cancer from pieces of tumor DNA found floating in the bloodstream. In a clinical study of about 300 samples, the assay showed 91% sensitivity in detecting positive cases, including 90% for people with early, stage I cancers, 97% for stage II and 86% for stage III. Shield also demonstrated a low rate of false positives, at 8%, but the company said that a negative result does not fully rule out the presence of cancer.”