A kumbaya moment for former CDC directors

Eight former CDC directors, including officials who served in the Biden and Trump administrations, are taking aim at recent proposals by Republicans to pare back the agency in a new STAT First Opinion piece.

They push back on the idea that the agency should be exclusively focused on its "core mission" of combating infectious disease, arguing that the agency's remit should also include public health issues like cancer, environmental risks, and other health protection programs.

"Limiting our health defense to just some threats would be like allowing our military to protect us from only some types of attack, telling the National Weather Service to warn people about tornadoes but not hurricanes, or allowing doctors to treat only some diseases," they write in the full piece.

agency watch

No crying over spilled (dairy) milk

As the August recess ends and Congress hurtles toward a government funding deadline at the end of the month, lawmakers will be back in Washington. That means more hearings, including a chance for the House Energy & Commerce Committee to grill some top FDA officials in charge of regulating food and tobacco.

The agenda will include questioning Jim Jones, the agency's deputy commissioner for human foods, and Brian King, director of the Center for Tobacco Products, on topics ranging from infant formula shortages, to lead poisoning in applesauce, to "an onslaught of illegal Chinese vapes" the panel's Republican leadership announced.

Besides the official testimony, bills slated for the hearing include hot-button issues such as the Defending Domestic Orange Juice Production Act, the so-nicknamed DAIRY PRIDE Act, the Laws Ensuring Safe Shrimp Act, and the Honey Identification Verification and Enforcement (yes, the acronym is HIVE) Act.

Capitol hill

Congress gears up for "China week"

The House is expected to vote on several China-related bills, including the BIOSECURE Act, when lawmakers return next week. The bill barring federal contracts with certain Chinese biotech companies is on leadership's suspension schedule for the first week of their return.

BIOSECURE is expected to pass, John Wilkerson reports. It has strong bipartisan support, and floor debate will be limited on it and the many other bills designed to slow investment in the second largest economy in the world.

The prospects of the bill's passage dimmed a bit when it was left out of the National Defense Authorization Act, but House passage next week might set it up to be included in a government funding bill either at the end of this year or early next year.

drug pricing

What's in a $6 billion number?

Medicare officials boasted last month that if newly negotiated prices for 10 drugs had been in effect last year, it would have saved the program $6 billion off of the net prices the program pays now. Researchers led by Inmaculada Hernandez, a professor at the University of California San Diego, unpack those numbers a bit more in a new Health Affairs piece.

The researchers found that of that $6 billion estimate, $4.3 billion would have come from four drugs: Bristol Myers Squibb's blood thinner Eliquis, Novartis' heart failure treatment Entresto, J&J's anti-inflammatory medicine Stelara, and AbbVie's blood cancer treatment Imbruvica.

The researchers also lay out two big reasons why using 2023 numbers isn't a perfect prediction of what savings on these drugs will look like in 2026, when the negotiated prices actually go into effect. Their full article is worth a read.

business

Subpoena showdown

Steward Health Care CEO Ralph de la Torre has ratcheted up his showdown with the Senate by refusing to comply with the Senate health committee's subpoena, Dana Gerber at the Boston Globe reports.

Massachusetts Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey called for the executive to be held in contempt of Congress if he fails to appear. For his part, de la Torre is arguing that he can't appear because he's restricted from talking about the system's bankruptcy proceedings.

The committee chair, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), called on him to "get off of his yacht" and testify. Time is ticking with only a few months left in this Congress, so this will be a fight to watch.

More around STAT

Check out more exclusive coverage with a STAT+ subscription

Read premium in-depth biotech, pharma, policy, and life science coverage and analysis with all of our STAT+ articles.

What we're reading

The state that chose to cover obesity drugs for its poor, but not its own employees, The New York Times
Trying to time your vaccines just right? There are no easy answers, but here are some factors to consider, STAT
US will still pay at least twice as much after negotiating drug prices, Reuters
Moderna reports encouraging results on its mpox vaccine, as outbreaks in Africa spread, STAT