Gov't shutdown triggered by Capitol Hill causes damage to public health

Oct 10 2013

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention calls in furloughed scientists after a salmonella outbreak in California sickened people in 18 states.

The Associated Press: Government Efforts To Protect Health And Safety Are Slowed Or Halted As Shutdown Lingers
The government shutdown has slowed or halted federal efforts to protect Americans' health and safety, from probes into the cause of transportation and workplace accidents to tracking foodborne illness. The latest example: an outbreak of salmonella in chicken that has sickened people in 18 states. The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Tuesday that it was recalling some of its furloughed staff to deal with the outbreak, which has sickened more than 270 people. Before then, the CDC had only a handful of scientists working on outbreak detection, severely hampering its ability to track potentially deadly illnesses (Jalonick, 10/8).

JAMA: Federal Shutdown Causing Immediate And Lasting Damage To US Public Health, Science
With disease trackers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) sidelined by the US government shutdown, pediatricians and other physicians are going without essential information about outbreaks of influenza, pertussis, and other infectious diseases in their area (Kuehn, 10/8).

The Wall Street Journal: Government Shutdown Delays Medical Supplier's Bankruptcy Exit
Blaming the government shutdown, lawyers for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services persuaded a bankruptcy judge on Monday to delay a court hearing that could have allowed a California medical supplier to get out of Chapter 11 protection (Stech, 10/8).

Modern Healthcare: Shutdown Dims Hope Of Doc-Pay Fix, MGMA Attendees Told
If Congress manages to get the government restarted and avert the debt ceiling crisis, lawmakers may have just enough time to renew their 10-year tradition of "kicking the can" on finding a replacement for the Medicare sustainable growth-rate payment formula (Robeznieks, 10/8).