THIS ISSUE AVAILABLE ONLINE WITH EXPANDED INFORMATION AND PHOTOS AT:
http://www.hhs.gov/news/newsletter/weekly
IN THIS ISSUE:
1) New Surgeon General's Report Expands List of Diseases Caused by Smoking
2) HHS Awards $498 Million to States to Improve Hospitals' Response to Bioterror and Other Disasters
3) PREVENTION: HHS Will Launch New Program Supporting Physical Activity for Children and Youth with Disabilities
4) Science in the News: Combination Therapy Dramatically Improves Function After Spinal Cord Injury In Rats
5) Medicare Minute: Medicare-Approved Drug Discount Cards Provide Mail-Order And Internet Savings That Are Lower Than Costco.Com And Drugstore.Com Prices
6) Secretary Thompson's Public Schedule
New Surgeon General's Report Expands List of Diseases Caused by Smoking
U.S. Surgeon General Richard H. Carmona Thursday released a new comprehensive report on smoking and health, revealing for the first time that smoking causes diseases in nearly every organ of the body. Published 40 years after the surgeon general's first report on smoking -- which concluded that smoking was a definite cause of three serious diseases -- this newest report finds that cigarette smoking is conclusively linked to diseases such as leukemia, cataracts, pneumonia and cancers of the cervix, kidney, pancreas and stomach.
"We've known for decades that smoking is bad for your health, but this report shows that it's even worse than we knew," Dr. Carmona said. "The toxins from cigarette smoke go everywhere the blood flows. I'm hoping this new information will help motivate people to quit smoking and convince young people not to start in the first place."
According to the report, smoking kills an estimated 440,000 Americans each year. On average, men who smoke cut their lives short by 13.2 years, and female smokers lose 14.5 years. The economic toll exceeds $157 billion each year in the United States -- $75 billion in direct medical costs and $82 billion in lost productivity.
"We need to cut smoking in this country and around the world," HHS Secretary Tommy G. Thompson said. "Smoking is the leading preventable cause of death and disease, costing us too many lives, too many dollars and too many tears. If we are going to be serious about improving health and preventing disease we must continue to drive down tobacco use. And we must prevent our youth from taking up this dangerous habit."
Statistics indicate that more than 12 million Americans have died from smoking since the 1964 report of the surgeon general, and another 25 million Americans alive today will most likely die of a smoking-related illness.
The report concludes that smoking reduces the overall health of smokers, contributing to such conditions as hip fractures, complications from diabetes, increased wound infections following surgery, and a wide range of reproductive complications. For every premature death caused each year by smoking, there are at least 20 smokers living with a serious smoking-related illness.
Another major conclusion, consistent with recent findings of other scientific studies, is that smoking so-called low-tar or low-nicotine cigarettes does not offer a heath benefit over smoking regular or "full-flavor" cigarettes.
Copies of the full The Health Consequences of Smoking: A Report of the Surgeon General and related materials are available from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Office on Smoking and Health, 1-800-CDC-1311, www.cdc.gov/tobacco and on the surgeon general's Web site at www.surgeongeneral.gov.
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HHS Awards $498 Million to States to Improve Hospitals' Response to Bioterror and Other Disasters
HHS Secretary Tommy G. Thompson on Monday, May 24 announced $498 million in awards to states, territories and four major metropolitan areas to strengthen the ability of hospitals and other health care facilities to respond to bioterror attacks, infectious diseases, and natural disasters that may cause mass casualties.
"These grants are an important addition to national security because hospitals play such a critical role in identifying and responding to a terrorist attack, an infectious disease outbreak, and natural disasters," Secretary Thompson said. "States and communities can use these funds to improve emergency care in any health crisis, whether the source is a bioterror attack or other infectious disease outbreaks like SARS or West Nile virus, or any natural disaster like a flood or hurricane."
Health departments in the states, territories and metro areas (New York City, Chicago, Los Angeles County and Washington, D.C.) receiving the federal funds will use them to improve the readiness of hospitals and other health care entities in their jurisdictions in dealing with large numbers of casualties. Recipients also will use the funds to increase coordination on disease reporting among hospitals and local and state health departments, enhance such coordination between public health laboratories and hospital-based laboratories, and harmonize the communications capabilities of these entities. Other uses for these program funds include providing behavioral health services and trauma and burn care and buying communications equipment and personal protective gear.
This is the third consecutive year that HRSA has provided funding to increase hospital preparedness, totaling more than $1.5 billion. In addition, HHS' Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) will soon announce its latest round of grants, estimated to be at least $844 million, bringing the total HHS investment to aiding state preparedness to more than $3.7 billion since Sept. 11, 2001.
"Hospitals will use the funds they receive from states to effect a rapid temporary expansion of bed capacity to accommodate mass casualties, increase isolation and decontamination capacity, identify qualified volunteer healthcare workers to augment hospital staff to deal with mass casualties, and plan for hospital-based and community ready pharmaceutical caches," noted Elizabeth M. Duke, Ph.D., administrator of HHS' Health Resources and Services Administration, which oversees the program.
FY 2004 awards from the Hospital Preparedness Program, created after the terrorist attacks of Sept.11, 2001, can be viewed at: http://www.hhs.gov/news/press/2004pres/20040524.html
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PREVENTION
HHS Will Launch New Program Supporting Physical Activity for Children and Youth with Disabilities
HHS Secretary Tommy G. Thompson on Wednesday launched the “I Can Do It, You Can Do It” initiative, a new program to support good health and physical activity for the 6 million American children and youth who have disabilities. Joined by more than 50 participating national organizations, the initiative is being led by HHS’ Office on Disability and the President’s Council on Physical Fitness and Sports.
“Everyone knows that physical activity is one of the essential keys to good health, and anyone who has ever seen the Paralympic Games knows that people with disabilities can be capable of remarkable physical achievements,” Secretary Thompson said. “Yet we have been too slow to embrace and accommodate the needs of people with disabilities as we promote physical activity for all Americans. This initiative will be an important step in helping young Americans with disabilities develop the same lifelong good habit of physical activity that we wish for all Americans.”
The initiative celebration was led by the Surgeon General and featured Americans with disabilities who have successfully put physical activity into their lives. The ceremony also featured special activity exhibits, including a climbing wall with adaptive equipment for children with different kinds of disabilities, a wheelchair obstacle course, table tennis and golf for children with disabilities and bowling for children with physical limitations, including those who are blind.
“Young people with disabilities are at extra high risk for many of the complicating diseases and conditions that can come with inactivity,” Dr. Carmona said. “It’s especially important for us to reach out and help these young people finds ways to get active and develop good nutritional habits.”
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Science in the News: Combination Therapy Dramatically Improves Function After Spinal Cord Injury In Rats
A combination therapy using transplanted cells plus two experimental drugs significantly improves function in paralyzed rats, a new study shows. The results suggest that a similar therapy may be useful in humans with spinal cord injury. The study was funded in part by the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS), part of the National Institutes of Health, and appears in the June 2004 issue of Nature Medicine.
About 10,000 people in the United States suffer spinal cord injuries each year. Studies in animals during the past decade have shown that supporting cells from nerves outside the brain and spinal cord, called Schwann cells, can be used to make a "bridge" across the damaged spinal cord that encourages nerve fibers to regrow. Other research has suggested that a substance called cyclic AMP (cyclic adenosine monophosphate) can turn on growth factor genes in nerve cells, stimulating growth and helping to overcome signals that normally inhibit regeneration. This study is the first to try a combination of the two approaches in an animal model of spinal cord injury.
In the new study, Mary Bartlett Bunge, Ph.D., Damien Pearse, Ph.D., and colleagues at the Miami Project to Cure Paralysis at the University of Miami School of Medicine, found that spinal cord injury triggers a loss of cAMP in the spinal cord and in some parts of the brain. They then transplanted Schwann cells into the spinal cords of rats in a way that bridged the damaged area. The researchers also gave the rats a form of cAMP and a drug called rolipram, which prevents cAMP from being broken down.
Treatment with the triple-combination therapy preserved and even elevated cAMP levels in nerve cells after injury. It also preserved many of the myelinated nerve fibers in treated animals, compared to untreated rats and those that did not receive the triple combination, the researchers found. Myelin is a fatty substance that insulates the nerve fibers and improves transmission of signals. The treated rats also grew back many more nerve fibers than untreated rats or rats that received only one or two of the therapies. The regenerated nerve fibers included many that carry the nerve-signaling chemical serotonin, which is important for locomotion.
Rats that received the triple therapy had much better locomotion and coordination 8 weeks after treatment than control rats.
"The behavioral improvements in the rats receiving the triple therapy are dramatically better than those reported previously using Schwann cell bridges or cAMP strategies in spinal cord-injured animals," says Naomi Kleitman, Ph.D., the NINDS program director for spinal cord injury research. Previous studies using Schwann cells found that nerve fibers from cells above the injury could travel onto the Schwann cell bridge, but they did not leave the bridge, she explains. The triple therapy "punches the cells into overdrive and helps them get off the bridge."
The therapies tested in this study were selected for their likely feasibility in humans, Dr. Kleitman adds. Rolipram has already been tested in clinical trials for other disorders, and Schwann cells can be grown from patients' own peripheral nerves.
The researchers are now planning follow-up studies to confirm their results and to try to learn more about how the triple therapy works, Dr. Bunge says. Their studies might also lead to the development of better drugs to prevent the breakdown of cAMP, she adds.
The NINDS is a component of the National Institutes of Health within the Department of Health and Human Services and is the nation's primary supporter of biomedical research on the brain and nervous system.
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Medicare Minute
Medicare-Approved Drug Discount Cards Provide Mail-Order And Internet Savings That Are Lower Than Costco.Com And Drugstore.Com Prices
A new study by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) found that prices available from Medicare-Approved Drug Discount Cards are lower than current Internet and mail-order pharmacy prices.
“When you compare the price of drugs seniors pay at their local pharmacies – where most seniors prefer to buy their medicines – the Medicare-approved cards offer real savings,” said Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy G. Thompson. “But for the many seniors who buy their drugs online or through the mail using these Medicare-approved cards, they will also receive terrific savings when compared to other Internet pharmacies.”
The new findings build on earlier analysis that showed that the Medicare-approved drug discount cards had up to 18 percent savings off average retail prices for brand name drugs, and 30 to 60 percent savings for generic drugs, compared to the actual average retail prices paid by all Americans (including those receiving discounts through public or private insurance).
Earlier studies also showed that millions of low-income Medicare beneficiaries will see even larger savings when these discounts are combined with the $600 credit and additional low-income discounts from drug manufacturers.
CMS analyzed prices on a basket of ten brand name drugs most commonly used by Medicare beneficiaries. Key findings show:
CMS also reminds Medicare beneficiaries that the simplest way to learn how to save for the Medicare-Approved Drug Discount Cards is to call 1-800-MEDICARE (TTY users 1-877-486-2048) or log onto www.medicare.gov. If you are prepared with your zip code, your list of medicines and dosages, your preferred drug store, and your income (if you think you may qualify for the $600 credit), you can get the facts and a personalized brochure in just a few minutes.
The comparisons report can be viewed at: http://www.cms.hhs.gov/medicarereform/drugcard/reports/online_comparison_report.pdf
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Secretary Thompson's Public Schedule:
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Last updated: June 1, 2004
United States Department of Health and Human Services
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