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Lawmakers to NY Docs: Screen All Baby Boomers for Deadly Liver Disease

7/2/2013

5 Comments

 
  •   Monday, July 01, 2013    
    By  Fred Mogul  : Reporter, WNYC News 

  • New   York could become the first state to mandate that doctors make testing
    for hepatitis C, a deadly and widespread liver disease, a routine part of 
    healthcare for baby boomers.



    The influential U.S. Preventive Task Force last week recommended primary care
    doctors, such as internists and gynecologists, offer screening for the virus to
    all patients born between 1945 and 1965.


    A bill recently passed both houses of the New York legislature that would
    give those guidelines the weight of law and penalize physicians who don’t offer
    the Hepatitis C test to patients in this age group. It would be up to patients
    to decide whether they actually want to take the blood test.


    Assemblyman Kenneth Zebrowski (D-New City), the bill’s author, said state
    government has a role to play in controlling the epidemic, and that advisory
    guidelines alone, even from a federal agency, are not strong enough.


    “When you codify something, and it goes into the public health law, doctors
    will follow it,” said Zebrowski, whose father died of hepatitis C in 2007 from a
    blood transfusion decades earlier.


    The Medical Society of the State of New York opposes the bill. The physicians
    group does not object to the actual screening requirement, but it says the law
    is structured in impractical ways—and that health experts, not politicians,
    should create health regulations.


    The bill is on the desk of Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who has not indicated whether
    he supports it.


    For years, doctors mainly offered tests for the virus to at-risk populations,
    including IV drug users and people who recalled having blood transfusions prior
    to 1992. That is when the first screening test was implemented, effectively
    eliminating hepatitis C from the nation’s blood supply. Prior to the new
    consensus, experts believed widely testing other groups would cost a lot and not
    pick up many infections.


    The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention now says there is strong
    enough evidence that baby boomers do not know enough about the health care they
    received in the 1970s and 1980s—including whether they received transfusions or
    were exposed to blood in other ways—that it would be worth screening the whole
    age group.


    The hepatitis C virus attacks the liver but it typically takes decades for
    external symptoms to emerge. The CDC estimates 3.2 million people are infected.
    Other estimates go as high as 8 million, with as many as three-fourths of those
    people unaware that they are carrying the virus.


    New medications for hepatitis C have improved treatment and reduced side
    effects, and more are in the development pipeline. Manufacturers of drugs and
    tests—all of which could benefit from a broader screening regimen—include Bayer,
    Merck, Vertex, Gilead, AbbVie, Orasure, Abbott Laboratories and Ortho Clinical
    Diagnostics, a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson.


    Johnson & Johnson has contributed $250 recently to Zebrowski’s campaign
    committee. His office said the donation is the only one he received from a
    company with hepatitis C products and came unsolicited, after the bill was
    passed. Several of the companies, including Abbott, Johnson & Johnson and
    Merck are regular donors to state politicians.


    Vertex Pharmaceuticals,
    a company based in Cambridge, Mass., with a new hepatitis C drug, made its debut
    as a giver to Albany in 2012. It has contributed $13,000 to legislators through
    January of this year, mostly through the Democratic and Republican Assembly and
    state Senate campaign committees. A handful of legislators received individual
    $500 donations, including Sen. Kemp Hannon (R-Garden City), chairman of the
    Senate Health Committee and the bill’s co-sponsor in the Senate.


    Hannon's office declined to comment on the donation but said the bill is
    consistent with the recommendations of the city Health Department, the CDC and
    the Greater New York Hospital Association.



    Tags:
     


    • edlin

    • federman

    • hannon

    • hepatitis

    • mt.
      sinai

    • rowe

    • zebrowski
    5 Comments
    Kelly
    7/2/2013 02:58:01 am

    Reply
    bestessays.co.uk link
    7/11/2013 03:50:48 pm

    This article has some great and useful information about this subject. Thank you for sharing it in an easy to read and understandable format. Thanks for sharing this great information.

    Reply
    Justsavelives Clinic - A New Lease of Life for People link
    8/1/2013 06:29:26 pm


    In liver disease, the cells, structures and tissues of the body stop functioning. The Hepatitis C is the end stage when liver is unable to heal itself and often progressing from inflammation to scarring, to permanent irreversible scarring. This is the situation where doctor suggest to go for liver transplantation.

    Reply
    Avail Clinical Research link
    8/14/2013 02:09:32 pm

    This seems to be the general sentiment from most authoritative groups on this matter. With the news that the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force had switched it's position on the matter, I don't see why anyone would be opposing these recommendations.

    Reply
    Stephen in Alabama link
    9/6/2013 08:47:10 am

    Well, as it is with a number of different disputes, there are always going to be people on both sides of the fence. Considering the recent recommendations from the U.S. Preventative Services Task Force, the people who oppose it will probably only become more stubborn in their resolve.

    Reply

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