| Submit your comments on this article |
| Home Front: Politix |
| US shutdown blocks care for kids with cancer |
| 2013-10-03 |
| [Al Ahram] The US government shutdown could block hundreds of cancer patients, including children, from entering last-ditch clinical trials for treatment, a front man for the National Institutes of Health told AFP Wednesday. About three quarters of the staff at the NIH, which operates the largest research hospital in the world, has been placed on unpaid leave indefinitely. While the NIH Clinical Center is continuing to treat patients, it is operating at "roughly 90 percent of normal patient load," said an agency memo. "NIH would not admit new patients (unless deemed medically necessary by the NIH Director), or initiate new protocols," during a funding hiatus, the memo said. That means about 200 patients will be turned away from treatment at the Clinical Center each week the shutdown persists, including about 30 children, a front man told AFP. About 10 of those children have cancer, he added. There are some 1,400 clinical trials ongoing at the NIH center, and four new ones ready to start next week will have to be postponed until the government resumes work, he said. "Just to be clear, we aren't turning patients away permanently -- we would be delaying their admission, since we are not enrolling new patients at this time," front man John Burklow said in an email. |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #9 [Al Ahram] The US government shutdown could block... From Al Ahram? I thought the title smelled like something you would see Islamic radicals do (hide behind women and children). Now we know why the left loves children so much, gives them something to hide behind. |
| Posted by: Thrans Splat1574 2013-10-03 12:46 |
| #8 Civilisation ends with a shutdown of human concern. |
| Posted by: Au Auric 2013-10-03 11:23 |
| #7 Not sure how this squares with the continued funding of the "Affordable Care Act" The ACA has nothing to do with caring for sick people. That's how. |
| Posted by: Lemuel Jeatch6151 2013-10-03 11:03 |
| #6 Well, the sequester wasn't as bad as they'd hoped, so they have to go into overdrive to make this hurt. |
| Posted by: Bobby 2013-10-03 06:01 |
| #5 Yes Au Auric. I fear Tom Clancy may have left at a good time. This is becoming quite revealing, even to a black-helo, diehard skeptic like myself. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2013-10-03 02:54 |
| #4 I see this as the first volly in the Obamacare saga "Death Panels at Work" - Harry Reid General Practitioner - Help kids with cancer? Reid asks: 'Why would we want to do that?' |
| Posted by: Au Auric 2013-10-03 02:46 |
| #3 Not sure how this squares with the continued funding of the "Affordable Care Act" or $300m to assist Detroit, or anything else that is still being funded for that matter. Perhaps in the sinister government calculus, child mortality numbers would be offset by the closure or partial reduction in 'little people' terminations at Planned Parenthood Centers. Hence the apparent lack of concern by Dems and the Champ. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2013-10-03 02:40 |
| #2 Real subtle Mr President. |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2013-10-03 01:13 |
| #1 That is of no concern for the GM on the phone with Union Reps all day. Nor the actual President who screwed them anyway with his 5th grade model of a system - Lego Graft Station I think. |
| Posted by: newc 2013-10-03 00:15 |