Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Viewpoints: What 25 Years Of Mifepristone In The US Has Brought; Actions That Will Lower Drug Costs
When the Food and Drug Administration approved mifepristone, the abortion pill, on Sept. 28, 2000, none of us working on expanding access to reproductive health care could have imagined the future we find ourselves in 25 years later. From the fall of Roe in 2022 and the subsequent banning or restriction of abortion in 19 states, to South Carolina鈥檚 recent efforts to include some forms of birth control in its total abortion ban, access to the basic medical care and medications that allow us to control our reproductive destinies is hanging by a thread. In the midst of this reproductive health care apocalypse, mifepristone is proving itself to be a hero in the fight for abortion access. (Elisa Wells, 9/28)
The biopharmaceutical industry is responding to Trump鈥檚 call to put America first by announcing three major actions to lower drug costs for patients, protect medical innovation and strengthen the nation鈥檚 leadership in life sciences. (Steve Ubl, 9/29)
President Donald Trump鈥檚 鈥淏ig Beautiful Bill鈥 is anything but for the nation鈥檚 poorest families. Among the numerous cruel elements to the new spending plan are food-program cuts that are expected to increase 鈥渇ood insecurity鈥 鈥 also known as hunger 鈥 for millions of Americans, including children. What terrible optics going into the midterm election season. But no worries. Trump鈥檚 administration this month announced how it intends to address the politically inconvenient specter of coddling billionaires at the expense of impoverished Americans who will go hungry: It鈥檚 ending the longstanding hunger survey that counts them. (9/28)
The Trump administration鈥檚 targeting of women鈥檚 behavior as the basis for autism evokes the disgraceful mid-20th-century era of so-called refrigerator mothers, when the medical establishment widely believed and falsely claimed that autism in children was caused by cold and emotionally distant mothers. (Renee Graham, 9/28)
America鈥檚 role in advancing science, investing in domestic manufacturing, and protecting public health is at a pivotal moment. Scientific discoveries are creating unprecedented opportunities, and the choices government agencies make today will determine how quickly those innovations reach patients. By modernizing how we develop and manufacture lifesaving therapies here at home, we can bet on ourselves and accelerate delivery to the people who need them most. (Jeffrey Francer and Victor Cruz, 9/29)
