Health affairs
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Review Case Reports
Protecting Access To Abortion During The COVID-19 Pandemic.
Several states attempted to deem abortions nonessential during the COVID-19 pandemic, leaving some women with difficult choices.
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State policies mandating public or community use of face masks or covers in mitigating the spread of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) are hotly contested. This study provides evidence from a natural experiment on the effects of state government mandates for face mask use in public issued by fifteen states plus Washington, D. C., between April 8 and May 15, 2020. ⋯ Mandating face mask use in public is associated with a decline in the daily COVID-19 growth rate by 0.9, 1.1, 1.4, 1.7, and 2.0 percentage points in 1-5, 6-10, 11-15, 16-20, and 21 or more days after state face mask orders were signed, respectively. Estimates suggest that as a result of the implementation of these mandates, more than 200,000 COVID-19 cases were averted by May 22, 2020. The findings suggest that requiring face mask use in public could help in mitigating the spread of COVID-19.
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Confronted with the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, New York City Health + Hospitals, the city's public health care system, rapidly expanded capacity across its eleven acute care hospitals and three new field hospitals. To meet the unprecedented demand for patient care, NYC Health + Hospitals redeployed staff to the areas of greatest need and redesigned recruiting, onboarding, and training processes. ⋯ Using new educational tools focused on COVID-19 content, the hospital system trained twenty thousand staff members, including nearly nine thousand nurses, within a two-month period. Creation of multidisciplinary teams, frequent enterprisewide communication, willingness to shift direction in response to changing needs, and innovative use of technology were the key factors that enabled the hospital system to meet its goals.
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Recent press reports and other evidence suggest that Medicare Part D plans may be encouraging the use of brand-name drugs instead of generics. However, the scope of such practices is unclear. We examined Medicare Part D formulary coverage and tier placement of matched pairs of brand-name drugs and generics to quantify how often preferred formulary placement of brand-name drugs is occurring within and across Part D plans and to assess the cost implications for Medicare and its beneficiaries. ⋯ For the small number of products whose brand-name versions were covered preferentially to their generic equivalents, beneficiary and Medicare prices were generally low for both products. Overall, we found that most Part D plan formularies are designed to encourage the use of generics rather than their brand-name counterparts. Policy makers should continue to monitor Part D formulary coverage patterns to ensure consistent and generous coverage for generic drugs, given their important role in reducing prescription drug spending.
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New York City has emerged as the global epicenter for the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. The city's public health system, New York City Health + Hospitals, has been key to the city's response because its vulnerable patient population is disproportionately affected by the disease. As the number of cases rose in the city, NYC Health + Hospitals carried out plans to greatly expand critical care capacity. ⋯ An emergency department action team was formed to ensure that the experience of front-line providers was informing network-level decisions. The steps taken by NYC Health + Hospitals greatly expanded its capacity to provide critical care during an unprecedented surge of COVID-19 cases in NYC. These steps, along with lessons learned, could inform preparations for other health systems during a primary or secondary surge of cases.