Q&A
Walgreens chief clinical trial officer on work to diversify clinical trials
Courtesy Walgreens
For the past two years, Walgreens has been working to get its customers to enroll into clinical trials, with the goal of enhancing diversity in drug studies. While competitors — Walmart, CVS — that had entered the clinical trials business left it rather rapidly, Walgreens intends to double down, said its chief clinical trial officer Ramita Tandon in a conversation with my colleague Nick St. Fleur.
As a Southeast Asian woman, said Tandon, she is keenly aware of the lack of representation in clinical trials, and she hopes the community presence of Walgreens will allow people who are traditionally left out of research to participate. Read more about the company's progress, its use of AI, and what Walgreens thinks of its competitors' failures.
first opinion
To promote vaccines, tell new stories
Childhood vaccinations are still pretty popular in the U.S. — nine out of ten Americans believe them to be important, according to data from the Pew Research Center. But the climate has changed in the past few years, and several states have tried to pass laws that roll back school vaccine protections. Public health needs to update its storytelling to keep up with the politicization, writes Julie Sweetland, a senior advisor at the FrameWorks Institute, in a new First Opinion.
Traditional framings that talk about vaccines as safe and effective, or that remind parents that vaccines protect their children against disease, are not as successful as they once were, Sweetland writes. Instead, research shows parents are responding better to campaigns that highlight how boosting their immune systems helps them grow, learn, and play without the limitations of disease. Read more.
telehealth
ADHD telehealth company's leadership arrested on fraud charges
During the pandemic, some telehealth companies took advantage of loosened regulations to prescribe controlled substances online, including stimulants like Adderall used to treat ADHD. Now, the leaders of Done, one of those companies, have been arrested, charged with an alleged scheme to distribute the controlled substances and submit fraudulent reimbursement claims.
Done's leaders "exploited the COVID-19 pandemic to develop and carry out a $100 million scheme to defraud taxpayers and provide easy access to Adderall and other stimulants for no legitimate medical purpose," Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a release. The indictment could impact tens of thousands of patients, the CDC said in a health advisory yesterday, as they seek out unregulated sources of the stimulants in the face of care disruptions. Read more from STAT's Mohana Ravindranath and Katie Palmer.
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