politics

Challenges ahead for RFK Jr. and the CDC

The deadly shooting at CDC, one of the public health agencies that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. vilified during his rise to power, is proving to be a unique test of his leadership at a time when fractures are emerging in his Make America Healthy Again movement. Agency employees have also expressed anger over Kennedy’s slow response to the tragedy, compounded by what they saw as his role in directing public anger toward the agency in the first place. One employee said there is “lots of frustration with lack of HHS-level messaging to our own staff and publicly.” Read more from STAT’s Chelsea Cirruzzo and Daniel Payne on where things stand.

Within the CDC, newly installed director Susan Monarez sought to reassure employees yesterday that their mission would continue and efforts to ensure their safety would be stepped up. The message was delivered during an all-hands meeting that was both brief and chaotic — it was expected to last one hour but closed after 13 minutes — leaving some agency employees marveling at what they saw as inadequate effort. Read more about the call from STAT’s Helen Branswell and Chelsea.

public health

Life expectancy is lower in the U.S. For kids, too.

We spend way more on health care in the U.S., but still lag behind other high-income nations in the ultimate measure of health: life expectancy. That may be a familiar story for adults, but a new analysis out yesterday in JAMA shows children are no exception. As of 2022, infants and children up to age 19 were 78% and 80% more likely to die as in other similar countries. This disadvantage, monitored from 2007 through 2022, cost nearly 316,000 young people their lives, the researchers concluded. 

A companion editorial cites poorer access to health care, physical inactivity, and guns in the home, among other factors. Poverty leads to poor diet and unsafe neighborhoods. It’s a long list of ways the U.S. is an outlier, ending with the lack of public policies on paid parental leave and early childhood education.

“While the administration’s Make America Healthy Again movement is drawing welcome attention to chronic diseases and important root causes such as ultra-processed foods, it is pursuing other policies that will work against the health interests of children,” the editorial says. 

In two words: budget cuts. “There is reason to worry that the health of US children will fall further behind that of children in other high-income countries.” — Elizabeth Cooney

lab dish

Japanese scientists can now make human embryos from stem cells

Japanese regulators just quietly gave researchers there a historic OK to generate human embryos from stem cells in the lab — no ovaries or testes needed. Scientists around the world are quickly working toward making viable human eggs and sperm from stem cells, a process called in vitro gametogenesis, or IVG. Those stem cell-derived sperm and eggs could be used for vitro fertilization (IVF) to generate human embryos for research or, one day, making babies. 

Under the new rules, Japanese researchers will be able to produce and then study stem cell-based human embryos for up to 14 days in the lab. And as STAT columnist Paul Knoepfler writes, it won’t be long before researchers in other countries are allowed to follow suit. Read more from Knoepfler about the critical questions raised by this decision.