Health Care

About one-third of elderly participants in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), formerly known as Food Stamps, were diabetic in 2006.  Despite the high and growing prevalence of diabetics among Food Stamp recipients, there is a lack of information on the effects of such in-kind transfers on recipients’ health.

In the United States, breast cancer is the second leading cause of cancer-related death among women. For women between 50 and 70 years old, screening mammography has long been recommended has as a means to detect cancers as early as possible and thus begin treatment sooner.

In 2007 the World Health Organization introduced a surgical safety checklist as part of its Safe Surgery Saves Lives initiative. The checklist’s purpose was to reduce surgical complications that result from inadequate safety practices as well as to promote greater communication among surgery teams.

The 2010 U.S. Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act bears a number of similarities to the Massachusetts health care reform enacted four years earlier. Among them is a requirement that individuals buy insurance coverage or pay a fine, sometimes referred to as an “individual mandate.”

Although it is commonly known that meat products are not necessarily healthful when consumed in large quantities, for a long time researchers had not confirmed the precise link between red meat and mortality through a large-scale study over a significant period.