Category Archives: Health care

Cotton goes to war against a virus

By Steve Brawner, © 2020 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

Feb. 4, 2020

Sen. Tom Cotton, the ex-combat infantryman, tends to see the world – and describe it – in terms of threats and adversaries: Iran, terrorists, illegal immigrants, legal immigrants who take Americans’ jobs, the Chinese telecommunications firm Huawei, President Obama and other Democrats, etc. He often uses strong, uncompromising language.

Lately, he’s focused on a new, developing threat, the coronavirus that China says has killed more than 400 of its people, and which has started spreading to other countries. As of Monday, there were 11 confirmed cases in the United States.

On Jan. 30, Cotton said in a Senate Armed Services Committee meeting that the coronavirus is “the biggest and most important story in the world” and something that “could result in a global pandemic.” He called for banning all commercial air travel between China and the United States and for a “Manhattan Project-level effort” to develop a vaccine. The Manhattan Project created the atomic bomb in World War II.

Cotton’s remarks are notable because this time the threat he’s talking about isn’t a person or group of people, but a virus.

Viruses are microorganisms that invade the body and reproduce by attaching to cells and reprogramming them to create more viruses. They can mutate, frustrating our efforts to stop them. Continue reading →

As flu season nears, officials say shots help

By Steve Brawner, © 2019 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

You think your job is hard? Dr. Nathaniel Smith is trying to convince 3 million Arkansans to let someone stick a needle in their arm – or use a mist – to fight the flu.

Smith, Arkansas’ secretary of health, and Dr. Jennifer Dillaha, the Department of Health’s medical director for immunizations, held a moderately attended press conference last Monday. He got better coverage this week when he and Gov. Asa Hutchinson publicly received their flu shots.

Last year, 48.8% of Arkansans ages six months and older and 49.2% of Americans were vaccinated.

There were 113 reported influenza deaths in Arkansas last flu season and 228 the season before, which was a really bad one that saw 79,400 die nationwide. Most Arkansans who died last flu season were age 65 and older. Two were children. Five children died the previous season.

Continue reading →

Everyday low doctor bills at Walmart

By Steve Brawner, © 2019 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

Neither lawmakers nor insurance companies apparently can (or will) find a way to control health care costs, so now we’ll see if the company founded by Sam Walton can help.

Walmart on Sept. 13 opened its first Walmart Health clinic in Georgia, offering primary care, mental health, dental, optical and hearing services. More clinics are coming.

The company that promises “everyday low prices” in its stores says the clinics will offer more affordable health services with upfront costs. Located beside a Walmart Supercenter, the Georgia clinic offers services such as adult physicals for $30 and dental exams with X-rays for $25, as reported by the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Patients are told roughly what their visit will cost when they make the appointment.

The nation’s largest private-sector employer, which already subsidizes business and technology college degree paths for employees, also will help them earn health care-related degrees and diplomas. Some of those employees eventually will staff those clinics.

Walmart exists to make money, and there’s a lot to be made in health care. Continue reading →

What to do about teen vaping?

By Steve Brawner, © 2019 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

After decades of winning young people’s hearts and minds in the war against nicotine, all of a sudden we’re losing, so now what do we do about it?

Last month, the National Institutes of Health said teen use of vaping products, or e-cigarettes, has doubled in the past two years, according to a survey of eighth, 10th and 12th graders. One in four seniors has vaped in the last month. While cigarettes are no longer cool, vaping apparently is.

The vaping industry says its products are a safer alternative to cigarettes and are even a smoking cessation tool, which is true for some.

However, many vape users are simply moving from cigarettes to vapes, which contain nicotine and other chemicals. We don’t know what vaping’s long-term consequences are. Meanwhile, hundreds of severe lung illnesses leading to six deaths have been reported nationwide, often as a result of people misusing the product. Nine Arkansas cases resulting in eight hospitalizations have been confirmed or are being investigated. At least four involved users inhaling THC, the compound in marijuana that makes people high. Continue reading →

Opioids and those down-ballot coroners

By Steve Brawner, © 2019 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

In Arkansas, 434 people died of a drug overdose in 2018. The year before, 429 died, and 188 of those involved opioids.

Well, about that many. All of those probably should be higher. The Centers for Disease Control and other government agencies don’t have great numbers because they aren’t reported uniformly and aren’t compiled in a timely manner.

Moreover, Arkansas’ numbers often depend on the judgments of 75 county coroners, all but two of them elected, whose only qualifications are that they be 18, registered to vote, residents of their counties, and not felons. Training is offered and encouraged, but they are not required to complete it because they are constitutional officers. (However, under a law passed this year, training is required for their deputies, if they have them.)

Also, sometimes families ask coroners to assign an opioid death’s cause to, say, a heart attack, which sounds better and technically is correct but doesn’t tell the whole story. Continue reading →