Health Insurance Marketplaces Under the Affordable Care Act Open Today in Every State
Health insurance marketplaces, also known as health insurance exchanges, open today in every state under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, which was signed into law three years ago. Coverage obtained through the exchanges gives purchasers guaranteed access to health care and a range of preventive services, including cancer screenings; vaccinations; care for managing chronic diseases; and mental health and substance use services. “Most importantly…coverage will translate into more opportunities to live longer, healthier and fuller lives,” saidRisa Lavizzo-Mourey, president and CEO of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, which has launched a comprehensive resource site to help individuals, families and small businesses learn about coverage options available to them, and enroll. Read more on the Affordable Care Act.

2010 California Pertussis Outbreak Linked to ‘Personal Belief Exemptions’ to Vaccines
Researchers have linked the 2010 California pertussis—or “whopping cough”—outbreak to parents who refused to have their children vaccinated for other than medical reasons. During the outbreak, 9,120 people became sick and 10 infants died. The study, which was published in the journal Pediatrics, looked at both outbreaks and filed personal belief exemptions, finding that people who lived in areas with high rates of such exemptions were about 2.5 times more likely to live in an area with many cases of pertussis. Approximately 95 percent of a population must be vaccinated in order for it to maintain herd immunity. Read more on vaccines.

Study: Against Medical Advice, 14 Percent of Infants Sleep in the Same Bed as Parents, Caregivers
Despite the associated risks, many infants still sleep in the same bed as parents, other adults and or children, according to a new study in the journal JAMA Pediatrics. The rate has more than doubled since the early 1990s and now stands at about 14 percent. Such sleeping arrangements increase the risk of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) or death from other sleep-related causes. Study co-author Marian Willinger, special assistant for SIDS at the U.S. National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, said it is important for doctors to discuss proper sleep-time habits with new parents; the study found that parents who receive advice against sleeping in the same bed as infants are 34 percent less likely to do so. Read more on maternal and infant health.

New NIH Study to Look at House-to-House HIV Testing, Other Measures, to Reduce HIV Burden in Africa
A study in South Africa and Zambia is assessing whether house-to-house voluntary HIV testing and prompt treatment of HIV infection, along with other proven HIV prevention measures, can substantially reduce the number of new HIV infections across communities. The trial is funded primarily by the U.S. President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), administered by the Office of the Global AIDS Coordinator. “Through this new study, we aim to learn whether the treatment of HIV-infected individuals as a form of HIV prevention, an approach previously tested in roughly 1,800 heterosexual couples where one partner was infected, will be just as effective when implemented across an entire adult population,” said NIAID Director Anthony S. Fauci, MD. “The study also will tell us whether this method of delivering population-wide HIV treatment as prevention is feasible and cost-effective.” The trial is being conducted in South Africa and Zambia because the HIV prevalence in those countries is among the highest in the world. An estimated 12.5 percent of adults in Zambia and 17.3 percent of adults in South Africa are infected. The study team will measure the impact of the two HIV prevention packages by determining the number of new HIV infections among a representative sample of 52,500 adults drawn from the 21 study communities and followed for three years. The study is expected to end in 2019. Read more on AIDS.

Study: Better Awareness Likely Reason for Increase in ER Visits for Youth Concussions
Improved awareness of the signs and symptoms of traumatic brain injuries (TMI)—such as concussions—is likely the cause of a noticeable increase in TMI-related emergency department visits by children, according to a new study from doctors at the Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center. The study appeared in the journal pediatrics. Visits for these types of injuries climbed about 92 percent from 2002 to 2011, while the overall severity of the injuries decreased and the hospitalization rate remained at around 10 percent. "We are doing a better job at educating ourselves and educating the public about concussion," said Dr. Holly Hanson, lead study author and an emergency medicine fellow. "People and doctors are recognizing sports-related concussions more. People are recognizing the signs and symptoms. People are more aware of the complications. So people are coming in more." According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevent, each year TMI accounts for about 630,000 emergency department visits, 67,000 hospitalizations and 6,100 deaths in children and teens annually. Read more on injury prevention.

HHS Developing New Burn Treatments to Improve Disaster Response, Daily Care
Through its Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA), the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HUD) is working to develop five new types of burn treatments for disaster response and daily emergency medical care. The thermal burn medical countermeasures—which could take the form of drugs, vaccines or medical products—will be for chemical, radiological or nuclear incidents. Developing new measures is critical, because with only 127 burn centers in the country, a mass casualty event could quickly overwhelm the public health response. “Sustainability of these medical countermeasures for thermal burns is critical for their availability when they are needed most,” said BARDA Director Robin Robinson, PhD. “Our repurposing and multi-purpose strategy facilitates development, ensures availability, and reduces overall costs for thermal burn medical countermeasures.” Read more on disasters.

Even Healthy Weight Adults with High Body Fat at Increased Risk of Heart Disease
Even older adults with healthy body weights can be at increased risk of cardiovascular diseases if they have high percentages of body fat, according to a new study The American Journal of Cardiology. "Just because someone has a normal BMI does not necessarily mean they are metabolically normal," said lead researcher Dr. John Batsis, a geriatrician at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center in Lebanon, New Hampshire. The study found that women with excess body fat (above 35 percent) were 57 percent more likely to die from heart-related causes within 11 years than were women with healthy body fat levels. Javier Salvador, MD, an endocrinologist at the University Clinic of Navarra in Pamplona, Spain, who was not involved in the study, said the findings demonstrate the limits of body mass index (BMI), which measures weight in relation to height. Read more on heart health.

‘Image Discrepancies’ of Job Roles Can Hurt Job Satisfaction, Performance and Pay
The lack of client understanding of the actual job roles of nurse practitioners and other professionals can negatively impact job satisfaction, performance and pay, according to a recent study in the Academy of Management Journal. "If people don't understand what you do, they tend to devalue what you do," study co-author Michael Pratt, a professor of management and organization at Boston College. "They don't understand why you're making all this money—'Why should I pay you all this money?' is a common question these professionals keep hearing." The study looked at “image discrepancies” in four professions—nurse practitioners, architects, litigation attorneys and certified public accountants—finding a noticeable and negative lack of understanding by clients for each. For example, many patients don’t realize that nurse practitioners can examine patients and prescribe medicine, and instead insist on seeing a doctor. "I assumed professionals would actually get over it, that there would be frustration, it would be an interpersonal problem, and that would be the extent of it," Pratt said. "I didn't think it would have such a big impact on how they did their job, how it affected their pay and how they performed. I was surprised at the depth of how this affected job performance. It's not simply annoying -- it has real impact.” Read more on mental health.

CDC Emphasizing Electronic Laboratory Reporting to Improve Public Health’s Response to Disease Outbreaks
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) emphasis on the widespread adoption of electronic laboratory reporting (ELR) has helped improve public health’s response to dangerous infections, according to data from CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR). ELRs enable labs to report disease outbreak information quickly and in a usable format. The number of labs that utilize ELRs has more than doubled since 2005, and CDC has helped fund their increased use since 2010 in 57 state, local and territorial health departments. Current estimates are that about 62 percent of lab reports were received electronically. “Electronic laboratory reporting can give health officials better, more timely and complete information on emerging infections and outbreaks than they have ever received before,” said Robert Pinner, MD, associate director for surveillance, programs and informatics in CDC’s National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Diseases. “Implementing these systems is a complex task that requires substantial investment, but ELR will provide health departments the tools they need to quickly identify and respond to disease threats and monitor disease trends now and in the future.” Read more on technology.

Average Monthly Cost of Mid-tier Insurance Under Affordable Care Act Estimated at $328
The average monthly cost of a mid-tier health insurance plan under the Affordable Care Act will be $328, and government subsidies will also help reduce that cost for most Americans, according to a new report from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The health exchanges open for enrollment next week and the federal government hopes to enroll as many as 7 million people within the first year. The cost varies from state to state, with Minnesota projected to have the least expensive plan at $192 per month and Wyoming projected to have the highest at $516. Read more on access to health care.

NIH Initiative Will Help Move Science from the Laboratories to the Commercial Sector
The U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) has awarded $31.5 million in grants to establish three inaugural NIH Centers for Accelerated Innovations that will work to improve how basic science discoveries move from laboratories to commercial products. The Centers are funded by NIH’s National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute (NHLBI) and will focus on technologies to improve the diagnosis, treatment, management and prevention of heart, lung, blood and sleep disorders and diseases. “These centers essentially will offer a one-stop shop to accelerate the translation of early-stage technologies for further development by the private sector and ultimate commercialization,” said Gary H. Gibbons, MD, director of NHLBI. As a result, the public will gain access sooner to new biomedical products that improve human health while also benefiting from the economic growth associated with the creation of new companies and the expansion of existing ones.” Read more on research.

‘Cycling’ Drugs Could Help Combat Antibiotic-resistant Bacteria
“Cycling” between antibiotics may extend their life and effectiveness, while also enabling doctors to stay ahead of drug-resistant bacteria, according to a new study in the journal Science Translational Medicine. "You cycle between drugs that have reciprocal sensitivities," said study co-author Morten Sommer, a lead researcher with the Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Biosustainability at the Technical University of Denmark. "If you become resistant to drug A, you will become more sensitive to drug B. That way, you can cycle between drug A and drug B without increasing resistance in the long term.” With the increased use—and overuse—of antibiotics, antibiotic-resistant bacteria are becoming an increasingly serious public health problem, leading researchers and health care professionals in search of new ways to combat the problem. More than 2 million people are made ill and more than 23,000 people die every year in the United States due to antibiotic-resistant infections, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Read more on prescription drugs.

State AGs Urge FDA to Adopt New Regulations Covering E-cigarettes
The Attorneys General of 41 states are urging the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to follow through on a pledge to issue regulations that would expand its oversight to include e-cigarettes. In a letter to FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg, they asked “the FDA to move quickly to ensure that all tobacco products are tested and regulated to ensure that companies do not continue to sell or advertise to our nation's youth.” The FDA was given authority to regulate cigarettes, cigarette tobacco and roll-your-own tobacco in 2009, as well as the authority to expand its authority after it issued new regulations. Last week a similar plea related to FDA authority was made to President Obama by the American Academy of Pediatrics and 14 other public health organizations, including the American Lung Association and American Heart Association. E-cigarettes continue to increase in sales (a projected $1.7 million in 2013) even while dropping in price. At the same time, there are no advertising restrictions for e-cigarettes. "Consumers are led to believe that e-cigarettes are a safe alternative to cigarettes, despite the fact that they are addictive, and there is no regulatory oversight ensuring the safety of the ingredients in e-cigarettes,” according to the Attorneys General’s letter. Read more on tobacco.

Expert: People Should Get Now-available Flu Vaccine As Soon As Possible
This season’s influenza vaccine is now available and people shouldn’t hesitate to go ahead and get it, according to Stephen Russell, MD, associated professor in the general internal medicine division at the University of Alabama at Birmingham and a lead physician at the university’s Medicine Moody Clinic. This year’s vaccine protects against four types of flu viruses (as opposed to the three of previous vaccines) and comes as either a traditional shot or a nasal spray. "Contrary to some beliefs, getting the flu shot in September is a good thing and will offer protection for the entirety of the flu season," he said. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends the vaccine for people ages 6 months and older, particularly for seniors, pregnant women, caregivers and people with chronic medical conditions. "Many people will say they do not need the vaccine, as they have never had the flu before, but that is like saying you don't need to wear your seatbelt because you have never had a wreck," Russell said. "You may have been fine in the past, but that should not offer security or protection for future exposures to the flu." Read more on influenza.

Study: Losing 10 Percent of Weight Can Greatly Reduce Arthritic Knee Pain, Put Off Knee Replacement
Losing just 10 percent of their weight could go a long way toward easing the knee pain from osteoarthritis in overweight and obese people ages 55 and older, according to a new study in the Journal of the American Medical Association. That would mean better knee function, improved mobility, enhanced quality of life…and reducing the odds of needed a knee replacement. "We've had a 162 percent increase in knee replacements over the last 20 years in people 65 and over, at a cost of $5 billion a year," said lead author Stephen Messier. "From our standpoint, we think this would be at least a good way to delay knee replacements and possibly prevent some knee replacements." The study tracked 454 overweight and obese people in three groups—diet-only, exercise-only and a combination—finding that people who did the combination were the most successful at losing weight and thus reducing knee pain. "We're not talking about people getting down to ideal body weight," said Patience White, MD, the Arthritis Foundation’s vice president of public policy and advocacy. "They just have to lose 10 percent of their total weight. Someone who is 300 pounds only needs to lose 30 pounds. I think that's within reach for people." Read more on obesity.

A key panel discussion during the National Health Impact Assessment (HIA) meeting will be on perspectives on health impact assessments with policymakers. Ahead of the meeting, NewPublicHealth spoke with State Representative Denise Provost (D), of Somerville, Mass., who will be one of the panel members.

NewPublicHealth:  How does it value governing, communities and population health by factoring health into policies made in other sectors?

Denise Provost: Governance should always take consideration of health. Legislators should actually embrace the first principle of the Hippocratic Oath, which is “first do no harm.” Sometimes by action or inaction we, as a nation, have pursued policies which we’ve discovered are not so good for health. Some are market forces that end up being reinforced by the actions of government. Looking out for the health impact on the population needs to be part of the long-term view of what we do. The particular discipline of looking at health through a health impact assessment is valuable for government because policy makers are often disparaged by scientists for governing by anecdote and that’s a real danger in the absence of quantitative analysis based on peer reviewed studies. The HIAs I’ve seen employ that kind of methodology.

The value of HIAs to communities is that they will in the long term—and even in the short- or middle-term—enjoy better health and fewer negative health effects from government decisions or government failure to reign in market forces that result in conditions that cause bad health as part of their business model.

NPH: Can you give us examples of HIAs in your community that have been innovative and beneficial?

Provost: We’re still in early days with HIAs but one, as contemplated by our 2009 transportation reform bill, has some fairly groundbreaking language in it that requires our secretaries of transportation, health and the environment to convene regularly and look at healthy transportation projects very broadly. They’re also charged with developing tools such as HIAs for use in the evaluation of transportation projects.

Study: 40 Percent of Antibiotics Released from 1980-2009 Withdrawn from Market
Safety concerns, lack of effectiveness when compared to existing drugs and weak sales led more than 40 percent of the antibiotics released between 1980 and 2009 to be withdrawn from the market, according to a new study in the Journal of Law, Medicine and Ethics. The rate was three times as high as that for any other type of drug. “This study raises the question whether or not money would be better spent on higher quality antibiotics, rather than a larger quantity” and whether “approving a flood of new lower-quality antibiotics might actually trigger much higher levels of resistance,” said author Kevin Outterson, JD, LLM, professor at Boston University School of Law and co-director of the Boston University Health Law Program. Antibiotic use can lead to bacteria becoming resistant to a strain. A recent report from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that as many as 50 percent of prescriptions for antibiotics are either not needed or prescribed inappropriately. Antibiotic-resistant infections sicken more than two million Americans each year, killing more than 23,000 in the process. Read more on prescription drugs.

Locations of Drinking Can Influence Types of Partner Violence
Where and when a person drinks can affect the type of partner violence that can follow, according to a new study from the journal Addiction. The study looked at six drinking locations: restaurants, bars, parties at someone else's home, quiet evenings at home, with friends in one's own home and in parks/other public places. Researchers from the Prevention Research Center in California and Arizona State University found that men drinking in bars and at partners away from home and women drinking in parks/other public places were linked with an increased rate of male-to-female violence. They also found that men drinking during quiet evenings at home was associated with increased female-to-male violence. The findings could help prevent partner violence by encouraging people in risky relationships not to drink in particular places/situations, which could prove more effective than counseling people simply to drink less. Read more on alcohol.

Multiple Myeloma Group Hopes Opening Records to Hundreds of Patients Will Advance Research
The Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation's (MMRF) Researcher Gateway is opening global online access to genetic and research data on hundreds of patients in an effort to help identify biological targets for future treatments, improve enrollment in studies by pairing them with the right patients and enhance researcher collaboration. The MMRF Research Gateway is a $40-million program funding by the foundation and drug company partners. The main component of the effort will be the Commpass study which will enroll 1,000 new multiple myeloma patients and monitor them throughout the course of the disease; cancer tissue banks typically include only one sample per patient. "There is going to be new information generated there that you would never get unless you followed patients through first relapse and second relapse and beyond," said George Mulligan, director of translational medicine for Millennium Pharmaceuticals, Japan's Takeda Pharmaceutical Co.’s oncology unit, which is one of the co-sponsors. "The size of it in patient numbers and the breadth and richness of it on a biological level, it's going to grow over time and mushroom into something that's going to be really special.” About 86,000 people are diagnosed with multiple myeloma each year, with about 20,000 of those from the United States. Read more on research.

GUEST POST by John Skendall, Manager, Web and New Media at the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials (ASTHO).

“How much are we really doing in the area of worksite wellness? Are we walking the talk and serving our employees the way we should?” This question was posed by Paul Jarris, executive director of the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials (ASTHO), in a session on workplace wellness at the organization’s annual meeting last Friday in Orlando.

Jarris said that health departments can do more to foster wellness among employees in the states and territories. “We in public health are not leading in this area,” he said. “We are the laggards.”

>>Follow continued ASTHO Annual Meeting coverage on NewPublicHealth.org.

Terry Dwelle, state health official for the North Dakota Department of Health and moderator of the session, agreed. “Health departments must have a worksite wellness program. We need to practice what we preach,” said Dwelle. He also said that the business case for worksite wellness needs to be made to convince employers of the value of investing in wellness.

UN: Improved Access to HIV/AIDS Treatment Reduces Number of AIDS-related Deaths
The United Nations’ annual report on HIV infections and AIDS related-deaths around the world concluded that increased access to treatment in poorer and middle-income countries has led to positive health outcomes. “AIDS-related deaths in 2012 fell to 1.6 million, down from 1.7 million in 2011 and a peak of 2.3 million in 2005. And the number of people newly infected with the disease dropped to 2.3 million in 2012 down from 2.5 million in 2011.” The executive director of UNAIDS, Michel Sidibé, said that the international community is well on its way to surpass the 2015 goals of expanding access to treatment. Read more on the public health impact of AIDS.

Racism Leads to Negative Effects on Mental Health of Children and Teens
A new report published in the journal Social Science & Medicine examines the link between the mental health and well-being of youth ages 12-18 and racism. The review shows that being a victim of racial discrimination can lead to low self-esteem, reduced resilience, and increased behavior problems. There was also evidence of increased risk of poorer birth outcomes for children when mother experienced racism while pregnant. These types of detriments to children and teen’s mental health and well-being can lead to larger problems in terms of engagement in education and employment later in life, according to study authors. Read more on health disparities.

Positive Relationships May Help Break the Cycle of Maltreatment
In a special supplement released by the Journal of Adolescent Health, investigations on the effects of safe, stable, nurturing relationships found that these types of relationships could help break the cycle of child maltreatment that is often passed along from parents to children. Findings also showed that supportive and nurturing relationships between adults can help protect children as well. This study can provide helpful prevention strategies for breaking the cycle of maltreatment and promoting improved health in the long term. Read more on violence prevention.

CDC: ‘Tips From Former Smokers’ Campaign Created Spikes in Quitline Calls, Website Visits
An additional 150,000 U.S. smokers called the tobacco cessation helpline 1-800-QUIT NOW as a direct result of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) 2013 “Tips From Former Smokers” campaign, which ran for 16 weeks, according to CDC’s latest Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. That’s an increase of about 75 percent. It also generated approximately 2.8 million visits to the campaign website, or a nearly 38-fold increase. "The TIPS campaign continues to be a huge success, saving tens of thousands of lives and millions of dollars; I wish we had the resources to run it all year long," said CDC Director Tom Frieden, MD, MPH. "Most Americans who have ever smoked have already quit, and most people who still smoke want to quit. If you smoke, quitting is the single most important thing you can do for your health – and you can succeed!" A recent study in The Lancet concluded that the campaign helped as many as 100,000 people quit smoking permanently. Read more on tobacco.

FDA, NIH Award as Much as $53M for 14 Tobacco Regulation Research Centers
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) have joined together to award as much as $53 million in funding to create 14 Tobacco Centers of Regulatory Science (TCORS). The first-of-its-kind program will bring together a diverse array of scientists, public health experts, communications veterans and marketing experts to generate research to inform the regulation of tobacco products to protect public health. “While we’ve made tremendous strides in reducing the use of tobacco products in the U.S., smoking still accounts for one in five deaths each year, which is far too many,” said NIH Director Francis S. Collins, MD, PhD. “FDA/NIH partnerships like the Tobacco Centers of Regulatory Science keep us focused on reducing the burden and devastation of preventable disease caused by tobacco use.” Read more on research.

Overweight, Underweight Pregnant Women See More Complications and Longer Hospital Stays
Pregnant women who are either too thing or too heavy as measured by body-mass index (BMI) are at increased risk for complications and additional hospitalization, according to a new study in BJOG: An International Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology. Women with higher BMIs saw increased complications; severely obese women were three times as likely as normal weight women to have high blood pressure and gestational diabetes, as well as longer overall hospitalizations. Lower-weight women also had higher rates of additional hospitalization (8 percent) compared to normal-weight women, though not as high as the rates for overweight and obese women. The findings indicate the need to fine and implement new approaches to combating obesity. "Longer-term benefits of reducing maternal obesity will show improvements, not only in the health outcomes of mothers and their babies, but the workload and cost to current maternity services," said study co-author Fiona Denison, MD, of Queens's Medical Research Institute in Edinburgh. Read more on maternal and infant health.