“So what’s new?” the reporter asked. “Haven’t we heard this all before?” His inquiry was striking in its simplicity, yet it was a harsh wake-up call to reality. His question came at the end of a recent press conference at the state Capitol where physicians, public health professionals and advocates from a spectrum of consumer…
Georgia Health News has just published its first editorial, a Commentary piece by Dr. Harry Heiman of Morehouse School of Medicine on the proposed increase in the state’s tax on cigarettes. Read Dr. Heiman’s editorial on the proposed cigarette tax hike. We welcome submissions of editorials on health care topics for our Commentary section. Please…
Students across Georgia will soon get an unusual report card. It won’t have grades – not even pass/fail. It will have scores, but they won’t measure performance by grade level. And students can improve their results without cracking a book. Starting next school year, students in Georgia public schools who take a physical education class…
The state’s convenience stores, buoyed by the likely passage of a bill allowing Sunday alcohol sales, appear to be winners again on another legislative front. The tax overhaul package being taken up in these final days of the Legislature does not contain an increase in the state’s levy on cigarettes. Its absence comes despite being proposed…
When smoke from wildfires drifted dangerously close to a southeast Georgia nursing home last week, Liberty Regional Medical Center launched an emergency evacuation. The more than 100 residents in a Ludowici nursing home were brought to a nearby church. “The evacuation went very smoothly,’’ said Sam Johnson, an executive at Liberty Regional in Hinesville, which…
With just a few days left in the 2011 Georgia General Assembly, several bills with health care ramifications are in still in limbo, with uncertain outcomes. Not so, apparently, with House Bill 214, which would create a stand-alone department for state Public Health. The legislation sailed through the Senate Health and Human Services Committee on…
The FDA warns consumers about using supplements and other products that claim to treat or prevent health effects from radiation exposure but are not approved for those purposes, in a Consumer Reports article.
The state’s waiting list for people with HIV to get government drug assistance is steadily growing — intensifying concerns that patients won’t get the medications they need. More than 1,100 Georgians are on the waiting list for the state’s AIDS Drug Assistance Program (ADAP). That’s the second-longest list in the country behind Florida’s, says Jeff…
Children should ride in rear-facing car seats until they are 2 years old instead of 1, according to new advice from the American Academy of Pediatrics and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Both organizations issued separate but consistent recommendations this week, the Associated Press reported. The advice is based on data from crashes.
An FDA panel says that removing menthol cigarettes from the market would benefit public health, USA Today reports.