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Thursday, January 25, 2018





[Morning Rounds by Megan Thielking]





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Happy Thursday, everyone! I'm here to get you ahead of the day's news in science and medicine.





Senate confirms Alex Azar as new health secretary



We are finally getting a federal health secretary. The Senate confirmed<https://statnews.us11.list-manage.com/track/click?u=f8609630ae206654824f897b6&id=6078925ed5&e=4aad33fd68> Alex Azar, President Trump’s pick to run HHS, in a 55-43 vote yesterday. During his confirmation hearings, the former Eli Lilly exec promised to bring down rising prescription drug prices. Azar has suggested he’d be open to addressing the list prices that drug makers charge and encouraging generic drug development. Azar’s confirmation vote comes nearly four months after former HHS secretary Tom Price resigned, facing fierce criticism for taking chartered flights paid for with taxpayer dollars.





Fentanyl sellers in China use USPS to carry illicit cargo



A bipartisan Senate investigation has found that hundreds of millions of dollars worth of fentanyl is flooding into the U.S. through international mail — and the federal government isn’t equipped to track the shipments or stop the deluge of illicit drugs. The report — the product of a nearly yearlong inquiry by the Senate’s permanent committee on investigations — looked at six online fentanyl sellers found through a simple Google search. Five are based in China; investigators weren’t able to confirm the location of the sixth. The vendors sent hundreds of packages to more than 300 people in the U.S., and more often than not, they used the U.S. Postal Service to carry the cargo.



“We now know the depths to which drug traffickers exploit our mail system to ship fentanyl and other synthetic drugs into the United States,” Sen. Rob Portman, who chairs the committee, said in a statement. “The federal government can, and must, act to shore up our defenses.” The Senate committee is discussing its findings in a hearing <https://statnews.us11.list-manage.com/track/click?u=f8609630ae206654824f897b6&id=7d6de9bb46&e=4aad33fd68> this morning. More from STAT's Erin Mershon here<https://statnews.us11.list-manage.com/track/click?u=f8609630ae206654824f897b6&id=c54c0ab4ae&e=4aad33fd68>.





Planned Parenthood's longtime leader is stepping down



Cecile Richards is planning to step down from her role at the helm of Planned Parenthood, Buzzfeed reports. Richards has led the country’s most prominent reproductive rights group — which includes both a health care organization and a lobbying arm — since 2006. Planned Parenthood has grown more prominent under Richards’s leadership, but it’s also been a continued target for Republican lawmakers and anti-abortion activists. Last year, GOP members of Congress voted to roll back an Obama-era rule that protected state funding for health clinics like Planned Parenthood. They also unsuccessfully pushed to strip the organization of its federal funding during the party’s failed attempts to repeal Obamacare last year.











Sponsor content by MilliporeSigma



How deep learning is poised to transform the life sciences and healthcare



Deep-learning algorithms have begun to make their mark on the life sciences and healthcare space, though we have a long way to go to realize their seemingly limitless potential. Learn about some of the most promising applications of this tantalizing technology. Watch here.<https://statnews.us11.list-manage.com/track/click?u=f8609630ae206654824f897b6&id=e4b57f19f9&e=4aad33fd68>













Inside STAT<https://statnews.us11.list-manage.com/track/click?u=f8609630ae206654824f897b6&id=3f920b98cc&e=4aad33fd68>: Why are hospital gowns still so bad?



[87396691-e5ca-4560-8a09-e04a5b7a5bdb.png]<https://statnews.us11.list-manage.com/track/click?u=f8609630ae206654824f897b6&id=d2d95109ba&e=4aad33fd68>



(Dominic smith / stat)



Every decade or so, the hospital gown gets a makeover, each redesign aiming to fix its infamous butt-baring flaws. But if everyone agrees the tie-in-the-back johnnies are terrible, and if fashion designers have created better gowns with the help of doctors and nurses, why aren’t hospitals using them? Higher cost is a big reason, and some fans of the traditional gowns say the new designs aren’t as patient-friendly. But there’s still hope for patients who feel like the health care system leaves them flapping in the wind — hospitals are increasingly paying attention to the patient experience, including gowns. STAT’s Bob Tedeschi has the story here<https://statnews.us11.list-manage.com/track/click?u=f8609630ae206654824f897b6&id=9b5616b699&e=4aad33fd68>.





Lab Chat: Making cancer-killing viruses better at attacking tumors



Scientists looking to make cancer-killing viruses more effective say a drug that’s already on the market might help — at least in petri dishes and a mouse model. Here’s what scientist Jean-Simon Diallo of Ottawa Hospital Research Institute told me about the work<https://statnews.us11.list-manage.com/track/click?u=f8609630ae206654824f897b6&id=e808610133&e=4aad33fd68> on oncolytic viruses.



What are the shortcomings of oncolytic viruses?



Oncolytic viruses work by directly killing cancer cells and generating an immune response against the tumors. But only a subset of patients respond. In order for the therapy to work, the tumor needs to be sufficiently infected by the virus, but a substantial amount also have the capacity to ward off the viruses. We’ve been trying to render tumors that don’t get infected infectable.



What happened when you added in this drug, DMF?



It’s an approved drug that’s currently used for multiple sclerosis and psoriasis, and we found that it works by targeting a factor that’s involved in both development of cancers and the defense against viruses. We gave the drug first, and then we infected with the virus. The drug sensitizes cells to the virus, and we started to see delayed tumor progression and, in some cases, curative potential.





The malaria elimination effort gets a $180 million boost



Some global health news out of the World Economic Forum in Davos this week: Three groups are pouring $180 million into a new initiative to help eight countries eliminate malaria by 2020. Deaths due to mosquito-driven disease dropped 60 percent worldwide between 2000 and 2015 . The donors — the Gates Foundation, the Inter-American Development Bank, and the Carlos Slim Foundation — are targeting the Dominican Republic and seven countries in Central America, where malaria cases have been reduced but not totally eliminated. It's proven particularly hard to find and treat the last case in those countries.





What to read around the web today

§  Trump's 24-year-old drug policy appointee to step down by month's end. Washington Post<https://statnews.us11.list-manage.com/track/click?u=f8609630ae206654824f897b6&id=7436a5745a&e=4aad33fd68>

§  New findings could save lives of more stroke patients. New York Times<https://statnews.us11.list-manage.com/track/click?u=f8609630ae206654824f897b6&id=01ce247a4c&e=4aad33fd68>

§  What's next for 'safe injection' sites in Philadelphia? WHYY<https://statnews.us11.list-manage.com/track/click?u=f8609630ae206654824f897b6&id=3d34de2e8b&e=4aad33fd68>





More reads from STAT

§  In a scientific first, cloned monkeys are born<https://statnews.us11.list-manage.com/track/click?u=f8609630ae206654824f897b6&id=66213079c8&e=4aad33fd68>.

§  An ultrasound on Instagram suggested the baby could be in danger<https://statnews.us11.list-manage.com/track/click?u=f8609630ae206654824f897b6&id=d5b17ac1cf&e=4aad33fd68>. Does a physician have a duty to warn?

§  Flu infection raises risk of heart attack <https://statnews.us11.list-manage.com/track/click?u=f8609630ae206654824f897b6&id=de277997e6&e=4aad33fd68> in week after diagnosis.





The latest from STAT Plus

§  What can we learn from the latest Alzheimer’s drug failure<https://statnews.us11.list-manage.com/track/click?u=f8609630ae206654824f897b6&id=50e559ca70&e=4aad33fd68>?

§  Drug makers are offering bigger discounts <https://statnews.us11.list-manage.com/track/click?u=f8609630ae206654824f897b6&id=23746de086&e=4aad33fd68> than ever before.









Thanks for reading! More tomorrow,

[Megan]















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