“It boils down to these communities being less protected, with fewer resources to be deployed to screen and identify a threat,” said Glen Mays, chair of the Department of Health Systems, Management and Policy in the Colorado School of Public Health. “When a new thing happens, you have to make choices every day. Ultimately, that means someone’s not going to get served.”
Dr. Michelle Barron, the medical director of infection control and prevention at UCHealth University of Colorado Hospital [and CU School of Medicine], tells a story of an unannounced drill a couple years ago for responding to the Ebola virus. A member of Barron’s team talked of recent travel to Africa, then collapsed to the floor. Just as her alarmed colleagues were about to stick an IV in her arm, the woman fessed up that it was a drill. “That’s the way hospitals operate,” Barron said. “We’ve got to plan for these things. There’s nothing special for (coronavirus) we needed to do in that regard because we do it on a daily basis.”
Colorado could use the 2016 law to enact protocol for HIV medication at pharmacies, but backers of the bill are seeking new legislation because, this time, they want pharmacists to get reimbursed by insurance companies for their time. One Colorado, the LGBTQ advocacy organization that initiated the HIV medication proposal, agreed to add the insurance reimbursement requirement to the bill after consulting with the University of Colorado Skaggs School of Pharmacy and the Colorado Pharmacists Society.
Speciality drug development has expanded the disconnect between manufacturers and payers. Colorado is adding more rare diseases but some advocates question what good that does if treatment is unaffordable. “For personalized medicine to truly be successful in the United States, we need to have payers on board,” said Dr. Kathleen Barnes, director of the Colorado Center for Personalized Medicine on the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus.
Abortion rates have dropped again in Colorado, and health authorities are crediting increased access to birth control statewide. Another contributing factor: the so-called morning-after pill has been available over the counter at Colorado pharmacies since 2013. “The goal has always been access,” said Gina Moore, assistant dean for clinical and professional affairs at the University of Colorado Skaggs School of Pharmacy. “We are just really pleased.”
Years ago, when someone struggling with opioid dependency would show up in a Colorado emergency room after an overdose or as they were suffering through withdrawal, doctors and nurses would patch them up and send them on their way. “They came in and we made them feel a little bit better,” said Dr. Jason Hoppe, an associate professor in the emergency medicine department at the University of Colorado School of Medicine. “There wasn’t much we could do.”
“We were encouraging copycats. Now aren’t we encouraging heroic behavior?” said Dr. Steven Berkowitz, a psychologist at the CU Anschutz Medical Campus in Aurora. Castillo and Howell at UNC Charlotte were young adults, but Berkowitz is concerned about the message received by young kids growing up in the lockdown generation. “These individuals were heroic, and there is nothing to take away from that,” he said. “That is not the question at hand. The question at hand is the unintentional message we are giving to kids that if they don’t rush a shooter and put their lives on the line, they are not doing what they are supposed to do. They won’t get the attention. They won’t get acknowledged. They won’t get the accolades.”
(OPINION by Dr. Edwin Asturias) Colorado’s rapidly falling vaccination rates are leaving risky clusters of unvaccinated people who will likely be the catalyst for the next epidemic. As a pediatrician and professor at the CU School of Medicine and the Colorado School of Public Health, I along many colleagues, spent hours testifying in favor of this important step to protect our public health. Rep. Kyle Mullica, a brave freshman legislator and an emergency nurse, along with Sens. Julie Gonzales and Kevin Priola, worked tirelessly to ensure the bill had consensus and respected reasonable requests by parents and legislators concerned with vaccine safety. I have seen up close how children with measles suffer numerous complications including pneumonia and death.
