The Latest Research, Commentary, And News From Health Affairs
Thursday, December 9, 2021
Dear John,
Several papers in the December issue of Health
Affairs discuss topics of health equity.
Health Equity
In the early weeks of COVID-19 vaccine
availability, one-quarter of Florida’s doses were distributed through retail pharmacies at Publix grocery stores. Jennifer Attonito and coauthors analyzed the locations of those stores and found that they were often located in areas with an older, higher-income, and larger share White resident population.
In addition, the authors found that areas with a greater percentage of the population at or below poverty or identifying as Hispanic had access to fewer vaccination sites than their wealthier or Whiter counterparts.
Attonito will be featured in an upcoming episode of A Health Podyssey.
Kayte Spector-Bagdady and coauthors explored the reasons for racial and ethnic disparities in research biospecimen and data bank recruitment and enrollment at a major academic medical center, Michigan Medicine.
They found that the patients eligible to enroll were more likely to be older, White, and male and to live in socioeconomically advantaged neighborhoods than the overall population served by the hospital. Black or African American, Asian, or Hispanic patients were almost twice as likely to
decline enrollment compared with Non-Hispanic White patients.
Kevin Nguyen and coauthors examined rates of kidney failure among US adults. While kidney failure rates declined overall, disparities between low-poverty and high-poverty counties widened between 2000 and 2017. High-poverty counties—those with about one-quarter of the population living below the federal poverty level—saw an increase in kidney failure rates of 7.8 percent.
Today on Health Affairs Blog, Kyleigh Klein and coauthors discuss the role of pediatric mental health care providers in addressing adverse mental health outcomes in LGBTQ+ youth caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Anish Mahajan argues that the journey to value for Medicaid beneficiaries will require different health system approaches, partnerships with the social services sector, and greater societal investments in social determinants of health.
Katie Keith discusses the updated enrollment report from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which shows that nearly 4.6 million people nationwide have enrolled in Marketplace coverage during the 2022 open enrollment period.
Check out our COVID-19 Resource Center for Health Affairs content about all things related to the pandemic.
New Blog Series: Medicare and Medicaid Integration
Health Affairs is launching a new blog series, Medicare and Medicaid Integration, featuring policy analysis, proposals, and commentary that will inform policies on the state and federal levels to advance integrated care for those dually eligible for Medicare and Medicaid. The series will include blog posts exploring the evidence base (and gaps in our knowledge) and the range of views on various key issues—all with the aim of enhancing the national conversation on this issue and eliciting thoughtful responses from leaders in the public and private sectors. We are grateful to Arnold Ventures for supporting this project. We are accepting submissions of blog posts for the series. Submissions will be reviewed on a rolling basis and considered for publication through August 2022.
Health Affairs is the leading peer-reviewedjournalat the intersection of health, health care, and policy. Published monthly by Project HOPE, the journal is available in print and online. Late-breaking content is also found through healthaffairs.org, Health Affairs Today, and Health Affairs Sunday Update.
Project HOPE is a global health and humanitarian relief organization that places power in the hands of local health care workers to save lives across the globe. Project HOPE has published Health Affairs since 1981.
