Tough love?

STAT's Lev Facher examined Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s past statements on drug use and his personal recovery from drug and alcohol misuse. His philosophy toward addiction policy is inconsistent, but one thing that stands out is that Kennedy believes the country should turn to law enforcement, jailing those who fail to recover.

Kennedy's tough-love approach runs counter to the Biden administration's emphasis on harm reduction. He also says people may need to "hit bottom" before recovering.

Kennedy's personal life story is probably part of the reason for his tough love approach, Lev writes. His recovery from addiction started after being busted for heroin.

addiction treatment policy

Biden administration takes credit for drop in drug deaths

Drug overdose deaths have been rising at an alarming rate for several years, so it's great news that this year overdose mortality fell.

But more than 90,000 Americans still die each year from overdoses, so it came as a bit of a surprise to some experts that the Biden Administration is taking credit for the decline, Lev tells us. White House officials credited the decline to the administration's efforts to increase the availability of addiction treatment, the overdose-reversal medication naloxone, and harm-reduction services such as test strips used to detect fentanyl or xylazine.

But it's too early to tell what led to that decline. Government interventions might be the reason, but so too might forces outside the Biden administration's control.

the health care industry

Finger in the dike

I've read too much about it and talked about it to everyone: with my family over dinner, to the barkeep at my local watering hole, and even to a room full of lawyers at an American Bar Association conference. I still don't know what to make of the callous reaction to UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson's murder or whether it will eventually be seen as a turning point in health insurance policy.

Wendell Potter, a former corporate communications VP for Cigna, and publisher of HEALTH CARE un-covered, wrote a First Opinion piece for STAT to help make sense of the situation. He said our surprise is understandable, given how much money the health insurance industry has devoted to convincing the public that we're happy with our health care system.

Potter describes a dike that industry has erected and reinforced for decades to hide the public's disdain for private health insurers and keep reforms at bay. But the public is starting to realize the consequences of that system, he said.

"If their rage can be harnessed and channeled, that dike the industry built might just give way," he warns

disability rights

Electric shock devices still in use

After years of regulatory and legal wrangling, the FDA is on the verge of banning devices that shock patients to stop self-injurious or aggressive behavior. But advocates for patients with autism worry the change in the administration may delay the ban, STAT's Timmy Broderick reports.

Shortly before Trump took office for his first term, the FDA proposed banning shock devices for this purpose, and in 2020 the agency finished that rule, but a federal appeals court blocked it.

The FDA went back to the drawing board, and the new final rule is due in September of next year. Advocates for patients with autism are urging the agency to speed that up. HHS Secretary nominee RFK Jr. hasn't publicly commented on the proposed ban, but his promotion of disinformation about autism and his desire for the FDA to prioritize potentially dangerous treatments such as chelation therapy has disability advocates worried about the fate of the rule.

pharmacies

Immaterial threat

Ed Silverman collected analysts' reactions to proposed legislation that would force health insurers and pharmacy benefit managers to sell their pharmacies.

The bill, by Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), responds to concerns that insurers and PBMs steer patients to the pharmacies they own, running independent pharmacies out of business and leading to higher prices for patients.

Stock prices for the companies that run the biggest PBMs fell on news of the bill, but Wall Street analysts doubt it'll pass.

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What we're reading

Suspected killer of UnitedHealthcare CEO cites prominent U.S. health care critics in manifesto, STAT
RFK Jr. heads to the hill, Politico
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How UnitedHealthcare became the face of a broken health care system, Vox
Spending less, living longer: What the U.S. can learn from Portugal's innovative health system, STAT