Saxes, taxes, vaping, flu, and measles… and more

Georgia continues to drop in health rankings

The state is now ranked #40 in the latest “America’s Health Rankings Annual Report” from United Health Foundation. It’s the lowest Georgia has been in the 30 years the rankings have been published.

The biggest causes: Too many people without health coverage, low immunization coverage among children, many low-birth-weight children, increasing obesity and diabetes, and several other factors. In the state’s favor: “low prevalence of binge drinking and low death drug rate.”

Mississippi and South Carolina were ranked worst in the country; Vermont and Massachusetts the best.

Georgia’s measles outbreak

Cobb County’s outbreak was started with one unvaccinated family whose physician didn’t report it. They then exposed at least 2,500 others to the disease — including 50 infants too young to be vaccinated yet. Good job. The good news: Health officials say the outbreak has now been contained.

Student pharmacists: Your Day at the Dome is here!

It’s time to sign up to head down to the Gold Dome for GPhA’s 2020 Days at the Dome!

What’s that? It’s when hundreds of student pharmacists join GPhA’s legislative staff to meet with lawmakers’ about the biggest issues in pharmacy facing the state.

This is an incredible opportunity to see (and be part of) this other side of the pharmacy profession: where the laws are made, and how you can affect them.

Help GPhA flex its political muscle by filling the halls of the state capitol — find your date and register now at GPhA.org/dayatthedome!

Purdue Pharma files for bankruptcy

The company is trying to shield its stockholders from the hit of more than 2,600 state and federal lawsuits over its role in the opioid crisis. Although this is meant to be part of an overall settlement, not all states are on board; notably both New York and Massachusetts want the billionaire Sackler family, which controlled the company, to be on the hook as well.

Vaping news

The FDA can regulate electronic cigarettes, according to the U.S. Court of Appeals. It can treat them as tobacco products, it can ban distribution of free samples, and it can require manufacturers to disclose ingredients and show that they are safe.

And…

To discourage teens from taking up vaping, states are using taxes as a disincentive. (Efforts to create a federal tax have failed, so it’s up to individual states.)

The World Health Organization estimates that a 10% rise in prices causes overall smoking rates to drop about 4% in high-income countries. Some states are relying on this strategy to work again ― this time to discourage consumers, especially teenagers and young adults, from using e-cigarettes and vaping products.

How’s your sax life?

It seems that playing in a brass band could be good for your health. (Breath control and more social interaction, that’s why.)

Flu: Being prepared

HHS is setting aside about $36 million a year for the next six years to prepare the country for the next flu pandemic. The money will go to the French company Sanofi Pasteur, which will work with HHS to “modernize influenza vaccines and technologies.”

Earn your MTM certificate

APhA’s Delivering Medication Therapy Management Services: A Certificate Training Program for Pharmacists offers a full-day of training on medication therapy management, from soup to nuts: developing a program, implementing it, marketing it, delivering it, and sustaining it.

Whether you’re an owner or an employee, this course will give you critical information (and 21 hours of CPE) to help you serve your patients.

MTM Certificate Training
Sunday, January 12, 2020; 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.
GPhA Headquarters in Sandy Springs (map).

GPhA members: $349
Non-members: $499

CLICK HERE FOR MORE INFO!

Medical costs: same old song

The latest figures from Gallup show that a record number of Americans — 33 percent (!) — have put off treatment for a medical condition because of costs. That includes one in four who have delayed treating a serious condition.

And in households earning less than $40,000 per year, that jumps to a whopping 36 percent who couldn’t afford to treat something serious — up 13 percent from the year before.

“Risk corridor” suit at SCOTUS

The Affordable Care Act promised insurers $12 billion to offset their losses in the early days of Obamacare; it was one of the reasons the industry didn’t fight the law and signed on to provide policies through the exchanges. But then a new Congress decided not to appropriate the money for that — effectively refusing to pay what was agreed. So insurers sued, and now that case is at the Supreme Court.

Leave it

The U.S. might soon join the rest of the developed world by offering workers — well, federal workers —a guaranteed 12 weeks of paid leave for the birth, adoption, or foster care of a child. (The U.S. currently ranks worst among rich nations — the only one not requiring any paid leave for new parents.)