‘Right To Try’ Measure Loosening Experimental Drug Access Sails Through House On Second Attempt
The legislation gives terminal patients a chance to try experimental drugs, but critics say that it undermines patient safety standards without actually increasing access to lifesaving drugs and gives patients "false hope."
The New York Times:
House Passes Bill That Would Give Patients Access To Experimental Drugs
The House, spurred on by President Trump, passed a bill on Wednesday that would give patients with terminal illnesses a right to try unproven experimental treatments. The measure, which was approved by a vote of 267 to 149, appears to have a good chance of becoming law. The Senate approved a similar proposal last year. (Pear, 3/21)
In other national health care news —
Reuters:
Federal Prosecutors Told To Seek Death Penalty In Drug Cases
U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions instructed federal prosecutors on Wednesday to seek the death penalty in drug-related cases whenever it is "appropriate," saying the Justice Department must boost efforts to counter America's epidemic of opioid abuse. His mandate to prosecutors followed a plan announced by President Donald Trump earlier this week that called for executing opioid dealers and traffickers, and for stiffer sentencing laws for opioid trafficking. (Lynch, 3/21)
The Hill:
Watchdog: Bisexual And Lesbian Health Information Removed From HHS Website
Information about LGBT health was removed from a Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) website last fall, according to new reports from a watchdog group. The HHS Office of Women’s Health (OWH) removed a webpage with extensive information about lesbian and bisexual health, and links that correspond to that webpage, according to reports the Sunlight Foundation released Wednesday. (Weixel, 3/21)
The Wall Street Journal:
IVF Testing Spurs A Debate Over ‘Mosaic’ Embryos
It was her last chance.MaryJo Dunn had been trying to get pregnant through in-vitro fertilization for 20 months. At age 45, she expected it to be challenging. But giving up wasn’t easy. She and her husband had lost their only child, a 17-month-old son, two years earlier to a rare type of cancer. The Dunns were running out of time and money. They had already spent more than $70,000 on fertility treatments and taken out a loan. But the doctor recommended against implanting Ms. Dunn’s two remaining embryos, she recalls, because of the results of genetic tests on them. (Reddy, 3/21)
The Washington Post:
Woman Dies After ‘Acupuncture’ Session That Used Live Bees Instead Of Needles
A woman in Spain died after undergoing a supposedly routine “bee acupuncture” treatment and then suffering an allergic reaction that put her in a coma. The alternative medicine procedure is more or less what its name conjures up: Instead of a needle, an acupuncture practitioner injects bee venom into the body at certain points. In some instances, live bees are used to sting and inject venom into the person directly. (Wang, 3/21)
NPR:
HIV Vaccine Needed To Stop AIDS
When Health and Human Services Secretary Margaret Heckler announced that scientists had discovered the virus that caused AIDS at a press conference in 1984, the disease was still mysterious and invariably fatal. Perhaps with a vaccine, AIDS could be ended like smallpox or contained like polio, two scourges that yielded to intense public health interventions. Heckler suggested that experimental vaccine trials were just two years away. (Fitzsimons, 3/21)
