In a time of skyrocketing health care costs, both the private and public sectors struggle to balance economics with access to high quality health care. Evidence from comparative effectiveness research (CER) and “head-to-head” clinical trials is increasingly being used in health care treatment decision-making around the globe, but how will this affect access to quality care? More importantly, where will the public draw the line between cost and access?

This week in the Wall-Street Journal Dr. Els Torreele, director of the Access to Essential Medicines Initiative of the Open Society Foundation's Public Health Program based in New York, and Dr. Josh Bloom, director of chemical and pharmaceutical sciences at the American Council on Science and Health also based in New York, were asked an interesting question; should patents on pharmaceuticals be extended to encourage innovation?

Conventional political wisdom holds that economics will dominate the Presidential contest this year. That may be true, but increasingly clashes over scientific issues roil the American political waters: think global climate change, sex education, evolution, and Plan-B the so-called morning after pill. 

In a time where health care spending is sky-rocketing, where will the public draw the line? Evidence from comparative effectiveness research (CER) is increasingly being used in health-care treatment decision-making around the globe, yet there is still a lot to be learned about how the public feels and where they think the lines should be drawn.

This November, the Cleveland Clinic Foundation (CCF) released its “Top Ten Medical Innovations” list for 2011, and five of those top ten show great promise for diseases of aging, including remote monitoring of heart disease patients (#6), clinical confirmation of beneficial long-term statin use (#4),  the first ever FDA approved cancer vaccine (#3), a targeted T-cell therapy for late stage melanoma (#2), and an early detection imaging system for Alzheimer’s Disease (#1).  Even more promising is the potential contribution all five could make to a greater understanding of the underlying biology which could lead to discoveries across the diseases of aging.

Age-related macular degeneration (AMD) is the leading cause of irreversible vision loss in people over the age of 65. Until relatively recently, people diagnosed with AMD faced an almost certain road of progressively worsening vision. For many, that road led to legal blindness. Thanks to new drugs, much of the vision loss from wet AMD can now be prevented—or at least slowed. In many cases, it can even be reversed.

New Competition from the X Prize Foundation Aimed at the Genomes of Centenarians

The Archon Genomics X Prize Presented by medco® offers $10 million to the first team of researchers that can quickly and affordably sequence 100 genomes—of people at least 100 years old that is!

Those who care about increasing the good years of life through medical advances have lost another champion with the passing of Dr. T. Franklin Williams.