The 2024 'winners' of the annual Shkreli awards, given each year to perpetrators of the most egregious examples of profiteering and dysfunction within the healthcare industry, have been released from the Lown Institute. In a highly competitive year, the top spot went to Steward Health Care, whose CEO, Ralph de la Torre, is accused of prioritizing private-equity profits over patient care. His financial scheming led to bankruptcy, leaving hospitals in shambles, employees laid off and communities with less healthcare access.
America's top doctor is calling for cancer warnings on alcohol after a report cites studies linking alcoholic beverages to more than a half-dozen malignancies, including breast cancer. On Friday, U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy released a new Surgeon General's Advisory on Alcohol and Cancer Risk, outlining the direct link between alcohol consumption and increased cancer risk. According to the CDC, alcohol consumption is the third leading preventable cause of cancer in the United States, after tobacco and obesity. And according to the report released by Muthy's office it increases the risk for at least seven types of cancer. "While scientific evidence for this connection has been growing over the past four decades, less than half of Americans recognize it as a risk factor for cancer," Murthy's office said. The advisory includes a series of recommendations, including updating the existing Surgeon General's health warning label on alcohol-containing beverages to now include cancer risk. In a post on X, Murthy wrote alcohol contributions to about 100,000 cancer cases and 20,000 cancer deaths annually.
The former Steward Health Care hospitals have transitioned to new owners who are not affiliated with the Catholic Church and won't abide by Catholic doctrine on abortion, in vitro fertilization, contraception, and other matters. As a result, the Boston Archdiocese is demanding the hospitals change their names and return religious items, including crosses and statues.
Walgreens plans to close about 1,200 locations over the next three years as the drugstore chain seeks to turnaround its struggling U.S. business. The company said Tuesday that about 500 store closures will happen in its current fiscal year and should immediately help adjusted earnings and free cash flow. The company, like its competitors, has been struggling for years with tight reimbursement for the prescriptions it sells as well as other challenges like rising costs to operate its stores.
Philadelphia-area hospitals are rallying patients and staff to register to vote ahead of a high-stakes presidential election in which Pennsylvania has become a critical battleground. Hospitals say the initiative is not about playing partisan politics, but rather to address the ways social and economic factors, such as violence, pollution, housing can profoundly affect health. Hospitals from University City to the Philadelphia burbs have set up information tables alongside cafeteria checkout counters, given staff lanyard badges with a QR code linked to a voter registration website, and changed the computer screensavers to a message reminding them to vote. Such efforts are being organized nationally through groups like Vot-ER, which describes itself as a nonpartisan voter registration nonprofits, but has drawn criticism from the Republican National Committee and other conservatives for having ties to Democrats.
The U.S. ranks as the worst performer among 10 developed nations in critical areas of healthcare, including preventing deaths, access (mainly because of high cost) and guaranteeing quality treatment for everyone, regardless of gender, income or geographic location, according to the report, published Thursday by The Commonwealth Fund. Based on the new findings, people in the U.S. die the youngest and experience the most avoidable deaths, even though the country spends nearly twice as much — about 18% of gross domestic product — on healthcare than any other nation ranked. Thursday's findings show, the researchers say, that the U.S. spends the most but gets the least from its investment. Ironically, the steep price people pay doesn’t guarantee superior care. The findings were based on tens of thousands of survey responses from primary care physicians and residents in high-income countries collected over the last three years.