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Why isn’t alcohol taxed more?
Overwhelming evidence shows that increasing the price of alcohol — which contributes every year to a substantial number of injuries, diseases, and deaths — can decrease all related types of disasters, from car crashes to violence and sexually transmitted infections. But every time a state tries to raise taxes on these products, the effort is thwarted.
The alcohol industry is a vast and powerful coalition of corporate conglomerates, mom-and-pop producers, retail stores, hospitality workers, trade associations and their lobbyists that exerts influence in statehouses and political campaigns. The proof? One glass of the cheapest spirit cost the average worker less in 2011 than it had for 60 years previously.
“The result is a population with mounting alcohol-related woes and an ever-cheaper, more accessible supply of drink,” my STAT colleague Isa Cueto writes in her latest story. Read more in her deep dive on drinking, levies, and loopholes. Isa has done a lot of excellent reporting on alcohol this year. Check out her previous stories that explore the numbers on how much Americans drink, dietary guidelines, and warning labels for alcohol.
From a premed adviser at a historically Black school
“‘Come to our school. We want Black people.’ … But you [primarily white institutions] want the ones that everybody wants. The one with that MCAT that’s way up there, 90th percentile, you want that person. Everybody’s vying for that one person. No, we’ve got to think about this differently if we’re really committed to increasing numbers of underrepresented minorities, especially Black students.”
That’s from a study published yesterday in JAMA Network Open that involved interviews with more than two dozen premedical student advisers at historically Black colleges and universities. Read more from STAT on why there are so few historically Black med schools and what the end of affirmative action meant to one Black students.
New data on a retinal implant to restore vision
Twenty million people in the U.S. have age-related macular degeneration — a blurring of one’s vision when looking straight ahead or reading. Yesterday, Science Corporation published preliminary data from a clinical trial that aims to address this common condition. In a study of more than 30 participants, scientists were able to help people read, on average, nearly five more lines down the classic eye chart (you know the one).
Here’s how it worked: A camera mounted on a pair of glasses gathers infrared light from the person’s surroundings, then beams it onto an implant in their retina. That prosthetic then stimulates the retina with electrical impulses that get sent straight to the brain.
Cool, right? Read more from STAT’s Timmy Broderick.
Everything you need to know about health policy ahead of the election
I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again: Nobody does it like STAT’s DC team. Sign up for their newsletter DC Diagnosis to keep up with all the health politics and policy news ahead of — and in the wake of — the election. It comes out on Tuesdays and Thursdays, but there’ll be an extra election edition next week. In the meantime, here’s a sneak peak at some of the great stories the team published today:
- What would a Kamala Harris presidency change for health care? STAT’s Rachel Cohrs Zhang rounded up the top health policy priorities Harris has run on during her campaign, and how a victory could affect Americans. Read more on where she stands on drug pricing, Medicare, the ACA, medical debt, surprise billing, and more.
- Key state ballot measures to watch: The presidential race is dominating the headlines right now, but there’s a long list of state health care proposals that could shape health policy. STAT’s Sarah Owermohle reviews what’s at stake on abortion initiatives, weed, psychedelics, Medicaid, medically-assisted suicide, and more.
- How Trump and Harris both weaponize mental health: As a physician and news reporter, Lawrence Altman spent decades speaking with presidential candidates about their health. Earlier this year, he wrote about the conundrum of old age in a presidential election. Today, he argues in a First Opinion essay that when each candidate uses vitriolic rhetoric around mental health when talking about the other, it trivializes a much larger issue. Read more.
Some people should get two Covid shots per year, CDC committee says
Older adults and people who are moderately or severely immunocompromised who are trying to figure out how to time their Covid shots have new information to add to their calculus. The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, which advises the CDC on vaccination policy, now says people in both these groups should get two shots this year, ideally at an interval of six months — and no fewer than two months — between shots. Furthermore, people in the second category can get additional shots, if recommended by their doctors. The recommendations for people who are immunocompromised pertain to anyone who is 6 months of age or older.
For the past couple of years, the ACIP has voted to allow people in these groups to get additional shots, if they wished. But both the public and health care providers found the wording of those earlier recommendations — which said that people “may” get an additional shot — confusing. In a meeting Wednesday, the ACIP unanimously voted that people in these two groups should get two shots this year.
— Helen Branswell, senior writer on infectious diseases
What we’re reading
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US study of puberty blockers goes unpublished because of politics, doctor says, New York Times
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McDonald’s tries to reassure customers after deadly E. coli outbreak, AP
- Novo asks FDA to bar compounders from making Ozempic copies, STAT
- It’s not just the bombs that could kill us in Gaza, Slate
- ‘Do no harm’ is hurting 400 million long Covid patients worldwide, STAT