Public/Global Health

The Health and Human Services Department (HHS) is seeking comments on designing a pilot program to create “alternative donor deferral criteria” for gay men.

Currently, men who have had sex with other men (MSM) since 1977 cannot donate blood due to “higher levels of certain transfusion-transmissible infections” among that population, the notice explains. Members of Congress’s interest and increased accuracy among donor testing have made the department reconsider the ban.

“[T]he increased effectiveness of donor testing for [Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV)], [Hepatitis B Virus (HBV)], syphilis and other infectious agents has greatly enhanced blood safety,” the department states in the notice, which will be published in the Federal Register Tuesday.

“As a result, questions have been raised about the need to continue an indefinite deferral of all MSM and whether there could be blood donation by MSM who may not be at increased risk.”

The United States faces a "pediatric epidemic" of tobacco use among youth and young adults, the U.S. surgeon general said in a new report released Thursday.

The 31st report on tobacco since 1964 found that efforts to curtail young Americans from smoking and using smokeless tobacco has slipped as states reduce their anti-smoking efforts due to struggles with budget shortfalls. 

One in four U.S. high-schoolers is a regular cigarette smoker, the report found, 80 percent of whom will smoke into adulthood, where they'll face a one in two chance of dying about 13 years earlier than nonsmokers.

The White House and congressional Democrats vowed to move forward with regulations requiring graphic images on cigarette packs and ads after a federal court struck down the rules Wednesday on First Amendment grounds.

The Obama administration "is determined to do everything we can to warn young people about the dangers of smoking, which remains the leading cause of preventable death in America," the Health and Human Services Department said in a statement Thursday. "This public health initiative will be an effective tool in our efforts to stop teenagers from starting in the first place and taking up this deadly habit. We are confident that efforts to stop these important warnings from going forward will ultimately fail."

Rep. Henry Waxman (Calif.), the top Democrat on the Energy and Commerce Committee, also weighed in late Wednesday.

The Obama administration on Tuesday made $50 million immediately available for Alzheimer's research and $26 million to support caregivers and raise public awareness.

The announcement is part of the White House's "we can't wait" strategy of bypassing the gridlocked Congress and single-handedly tackling national problems ahead of the 2012 election.

The administration also announced that the president's proposed budget for 2103 would boost funding to fight the disease by $80 million, adding up to a 25 percent increase in annual spending on Alzheimer's research. The increased funding is in keeping with the administration's stated goal of eliminating the disease by 2025.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) marked National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day on Tuesday with a pledge to work with community leaders to end the epidemic.

Black Americans are disproportionately affected by the disease, accounting for almost half of all cases despite making up just 14 percent of the total population. According to the CDC, one in 16 black men, and one in 32 women, will be diagnosed with HIV in his or her lifetime.

The CDC says "homophobia and stigma" play a part in the epidemic, along with other "complex social and environmental conditions including lack of access to healthcare."

"At CDC, HIV prevention in black communities remains one of our top priorities," Kevin Fenton, director of the National Center for HIV/AIDS, Viral Hepatitis, STD and TB Prevention, said in a statement. "Last year, we invested more than half of our HIV prevention budget to fight HIV among African-Americans."

Tanning salons are putting young girls' health at risk by downplaying melanoma risks and lying about health benefits, says a new report from Democrats on the House Energy and Commerce Committee.

The prohibition on lifetime limits in the healthcare reform law doesn't apply to high-risk pools, Kaiser Health News reports.

Healthcare was the largest contributor to employment growth in the past two years, with a 22 percent share that was almost twice as big as manufacturing, Bloomberg reports. 

Pfizer is recalling 1 million packets of birth control pills because of dosage errors that could lead women to become pregnant, the AP reports.

A new report from the Consumer Healthcare Products Association finds that over-the-counter medicines saves the U.S. healthcare system $102 billion each year.

Thirteen drugmakers promised Monday to make available 14 billion treatments to fight neglected tropical diseases over the next decade.

The pledge is part of a partnership with the U.S. and British governments, the World Bank, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and other health organizations. 

It's the largest coordinated effort ever to combat the diseases and aims to eliminate or control 10 of them within a decade.

Too few people are following the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force's recommendations for regular breast, cervical and colorectal cancer screening tests, reports The Wall Street Journal.

One doctor writing in the New England Journal of Medicine thinks the FDA's proposal to require dietary supplement manufacturers to submit data proving their product is safe doesn't go far enough, MedPage Today reports.

After a decline from 1990 to 2004, the percentage of U.S. births that occurred at home increased by 29 percent between 2004 and 2009, according to the CDC.

Medicare revisions could jeopardize healthcare access for Latinos, says a new report from the National Council of La Raza.

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta announced new Pentagon initiatives Wednesday to try to reduce an “unacceptable” number of sexual assaults in the military.

Panetta said there were 3,191 reports of sexual assault in 2011, a slight increase from 2010. Because the crime is underreported, the military estimates that the actual number was closer to 19,000, Panetta said at a press conference announcing the new measures Wednesday.

Federal health officials celebrated a major public health victory over polio on Thursday just as the taxpayer funding that made it possible is drying up.

India, long the epicenter of the incurable crippling disease, will mark its first full year without a new case on Friday, The Washington Post reports. Officials with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say U.S. funding and experience were key to beating back the disease.

"Since 1999, CDC has provided more than $113 million to India … for technical, programmatic and laboratory support and purchase of oral polio vaccine," the CDC's director for global health, Kevin De Cock, told The Hill in an email. "All of this work is visible evidence of the US government's commitment to completing polio eradication."

The news comes as federal funding for global health programs now faces sharp cuts from Tea Party lawmakers and others worried about the deficit.