Tag: CARES act

President Joe Biden at desk in Oval Office.

Federalizing Public Health

The Petrie-Flom Center Staff Leave a comment

By Elizabeth Weeks

The most promising path forward in public health is to continue recognizing federal authority and responsibility in this space. I carefully choose “recognizing,” rather than “expanding” or “moving” because it is critical to the argument that federal authority for public health already exists within the federalist structure and that employing federal authority to address public health problems does not represent a dimunition of state authority. Rather than a pie, of which pieces consumed at the federal level necessarily reduce pieces consumable at the state level, we should envision the relationship as a Venn diagram, where increasing overlap strengthens authority for promoting and protecting public health broadly.

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Close-up Of Stethoscope On Us Currency And American Flag.

America’s Underinsurance Crisis in the Age of COVID-19

The Petrie-Flom Center Staff Leave a comment

By Dessie Otachliska

The COVID-19 pandemic has shone a light on the underinsurance crisis that has long kept millions of Americans on the precipice of financial disaster — just one unexpected illness or injury away from bankruptcy.

A 2019 Gallup poll showed that 25% of Americans reported delaying treatment for serious medical conditions due to cost concerns — the highest proportion since Gallup first began asking the question in 1991. Even during the pandemic, when medical treatment could mean the difference between life and death, studies show that nearly 1 in 7 Americans would avoid seeking medical care if they experienced key COVID-19 symptoms because of fears associated with the cost of treatment.

These statistics are unsurprising, and the concerns they underscore well-founded: the average treatment costs for COVID patients with symptoms serious enough to require inpatient hospital stays range from $42,486 for relatively mild cases to $74,310 for patients with major complications or comorbidities.

In the pandemic context, hesitance to seek medical treatment due to fear of the associated cost has proved tragically fatal. Darius Settles died after being dissuaded from seeking further COVID-19 treatment due to his uninsured status. The Nashville, TN hospital where Settles originally received care had failed to disclose the possibility that his medical costs would be covered by the federal government. And, despite the availability of reimbursement funds, the hospital nonetheless sent his widow a bill for a portion of his treatment costs.

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Minneapolis, MN / USA - May 26 2020: Black Lives Matter, "I Can't Breathe" Protest for George Floyd.

Expendable Lives and COVID-19

The Petrie-Flom Center Staff Leave a comment

By Matiangai Sirleaf

Two French doctors recently appeared on television and discussed using African subjects in experimental trials for an antidote to the novel coronavirus (COVID-19).

“Shouldn’t we do this study in Africa, where there are no masks, no treatment, no resuscitation, a bit like some studies on AIDS, where among prostitutes, we try things, because they are exposed, and they don’t protect themselves. What do you think?” asked Jean-Paul Mira, head of the intensive care unit at the Cochin Hospital in Paris on April 1, 2020.

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Syringe and vials of vaccine.

Racial Inclusivity in COVID-19 Vaccine Trials

The Petrie-Flom Center Staff Leave a comment

By Colleen Campbell

Recent calls for racial inclusivity in vaccine trials, which often rely on genetic rationales while emphasizing medical distrust among African Americans, unfortunately lack an equally robust critique of medical racism and the ongoing reasons for this distrust.

Even though race lacks genetic meaning, the COVID-19 discourse is rife with biological notions of race. Because of “[g]enetics related to racial differences” African Americans must be involved in clinical trials, said Dr. Larry Graham in an NBC News article. He continued: “We must be sure it works in Black folks.” For this reason, companies like biotech firm Moderna are enlisting Black religious leaders to heavily recruit African American participants. They are also exploiting networks previously used for HIV clinical trials.

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New York City, New York / USA - June 13 2020 New York City healthcare workers during coronavirus outbreak in America.

COVID-19 and the ‘Essential’ Yet Underappreciated Front-Line Health Care Worker 

The Petrie-Flom Center Staff Leave a comment

By Kimani Paul-Emile

When considering those on the front lines of the coronavirus pandemic response, most people likely envision doctors and nurses. However, there is an often forgotten, front-line workforce comprised of orderlies, nursing facility workers, and nursing assistants (“NAs”) that earns very little money, has few protections, and is largely Black and Brown and female. Many individuals in this group are also subject to a unique form of discrimination: rejection on the basis of their race or ethnicity by some of the very patients they are assigned to aid.

The millions of people who make up this group of essential workers constitute a substantial portion of the health care workforce and earn an average of $13.48 per hour despite the risks they take. Their work, which involves bathing, dressing, and feeding patients; brushing their teeth, and assisting with their use of the toilet, puts these workers at high risk of contracting COVID-19. Nevertheless, early in the pandemic, many of these workers lacked or had inadequate personal protective gear due to the tiered system used for distributing this equipment. Doctors and nurses were first in line for smocks, masks, and other essential gear; last were members of this underappreciated group of front-line health care workers.

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TWIHL 212: Substance Use Privacy Before and After CARES

Nicolas P. Terry Leave a comment

By Nicolas Terry

In this episode, I welcome back Kirk Nahra, a partner and Co-Chair of the Cybersecurity and Privacy Practice at Wilmer Hale in DC. He has been a leading authority on privacy and cybersecurity matters for more than two decades. Mr. Nahra counsels clients across industries, from Fortune 500 companies to startups, on implementing the requirements of privacy and data security laws across the country and internationally.

And, after all this time, finally I welcome Melissa Goldstein, Associate Professor in the Department of Health Policy and Management at the Milken Institute School of Public Health at the George Washington University, where she teaches courses in bioethics (including genomics, reproductive ethics, end-of-life, and research ethics issues), health information technology policy, and public health law and conducts research on health information privacy and the legal and policy aspects of health information technology. Our excuse for getting together is that we recently co-authored a piece on the Health Affairs blog titled COVID-19: Substance Use Disorder, Privacy, And The CARES Act.

The Week in Health Law Podcast from Nicolas Terry is a commuting-length discussion about some of the more thorny issues in health law and policy. Subscribe at Apple Podcasts or Google Play, listen at Stitcher Radio, Spotify, Tunein or Podbean.

Show notes and more are at TWIHL.com. If you have comments, an idea for a show or a topic to discuss you can find me on Twitter @nicolasterry or @WeekInHealthLaw.

Health care workers in personal protective equipment attend to a patient.

How Much Help Do Health Care Systems Need to Survive Coronavirus?

The Petrie-Flom Center Staff Leave a comment

By Michael Simkovic and Laleh Jalilian

Coronavirus has caused health care institutions’ precariously balanced finances to deteriorate by requiring the suspension of elective procedures in order to mitigate the spread of disease.

One of us has previously noted that less than 8% of the CARES Act stimulus package may reach the health care system, although there are options available to state governments and the U.S. Secretary of the Treasury to increase this amount. How much additional funding would it actually take to enable the health care system to continue functioning at close to normal capacity?

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