Health and Science

"EPA will not wait to take action to protect the public from PFAS exposure. The agency will be actively engaging with its partners regarding PFOA and PFOS in drinking water, including supporting their monitoring and remediation efforts. Importantly, the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, signed by President Biden on November 15, 2021, invests $10 billion to help communities test for and clean up PFAS and other emerging contaminants in drinking water and wastewater, and can be used to support projects in disadvantaged communities" more »

Policymakers could provide support for public-private partnerships to strategically address potential pandemic pathogens identified as priorities. These partnerships could, for example, develop and test vaccine candidates that may provide protection from pathogens with pandemic potential. This early development could provide a coordinated foundation that can be mobilized in an emergency. Such an approach could speed vaccine development as well as potentially reduce risk for vaccine researchers and developers concerning questions of safety, efficacy, and manufacturability. The lack of certainty of the commercial market and government funding for vaccines against pathogens with pandemic potential may be too risky for the private sector to undertake. more »

A large, long-term study of the impacts of COVID-19 on children has enrolled its first participant at the National Institutes of Health’s Clinical Center in Bethesda, Maryland. The study, which is supported by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health, will track up to 1,000 children and young adults who previously tested positive for COVID-19 and evaluate the impact of COVID-19 on their physical and mental health over three years. The study is expected to yield a detailed picture of COVID-19’s effects on the overall health of children, their development and immune responses to infection, and their overall quality of life in the years following infection. more »

"In California, reports of deceptive sales practices for Medicare Advantage and drug plans have been the top complaints to the state Senior Medicare Patrol for the past two years, said Sandy Morales, a case manager for the group. The patrol is a federally funded program that helps seniors untangle insurance problems." "Nationwide, the Senior Medical Patrol has sent 74% more cases in the first nine months of this year than in all of 2020 to CMS and the Health and Human Services Inspector General for investigation, said Rebecca Kinney, director of the Administration for Community Living’s Office of Healthcare Information and Counseling at HHS, which oversees the patrols. She expects more complaints to come in during Medicare’s open-enrollment period. And last month, CMS officials warned the private insurance companies selling Medicare Advantage and drug plans that federal requirements prohibit deceptive sales practices." more »