* An Associated Press story that appeared in numerous publications last week discussed the American Medical Association’s position on a tobacco bill currently before Congress. The bill would, among other things, ban flavors in cigarettes. Marketing campaigns for flavored cigarettes (such as mint, clove and vanilla cigarettes) usually target young people, and by banning the use of these flavors, Congress hopes to decrease smoking among youths. However, the AMA is supporting the menthol exemption that the tobacco industry pushed. African-American smokers typically prefer menthol-flavored cigarettes, and menthol cigarette advertising campaigns have traditionally targeted black communities. The AMA has been criticized for supporting the exemption, since it leaves African-American smokers subject to manipulative marketing strategies:
Menthol cigarettes such as Kool were marketed during the 1960s in advertising campaigns targeting urban blacks, according to the National African American Tobacco Prevention Network. That group withdrew its support from the tobacco control bill last month over the menthol exemption and found allies in the former health secretaries.
The exemption harms the black community, said Robert McCaffree of the American College of Chest Physicians, the group that introduced the AMA proposal.
* A recent posting on DMI Blog addresses the importance of making health equity a central focus of health care reform, particularly in the 2008 Presidential election. If political leaders do not pay attention to the equality element of health care reform, the disparities in health care access and quality will not be dealt with:
It’s a painful fact: people of color in the United States live sicker and die quicker–from the premature cradle to the early grave. According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS), African Americans can still expect to live 6-10 fewer years than their white counterparts, and they have the highest rates of death due to diabetes; heart disease; and breast, lung, and colon cancer than any other ethnic group. The numbers are similarly grim for Latinos and other minority groups.
- Yesterday’s posting on The Health Care Blog brings up the similarities between the U.S. health care system and the Dutch health care system, and the notion that the U.S. could learn from the Dutch in its health care reform efforts.
- Another posting on The Health Care Blog mentions The Talking Cure, the “Healthy Conversations” project that the research organization Demos has launched. The project is designed to engage stakeholders in and outside of the National Health Service and discuss how to improve health care in the UK.
- Thursday’s New York Times had a story on a government proposal to facilitate improved access to prescription drugs for low-income Medicare beneficiaries. The Bush Administration introduced the proposal as part of the settlement in a national class action lawsuit brought by people who are unable to get access to the drugs they need:
Under the proposed settlement, filed Thursday with the United States District Court in San Francisco, federal Medicare officials promised to speed up the process of providing extra help to low-income people, who now could qualify within days, rather than weeks or months.