World Health Organization (WHO)

> The World Health Organization is asking for comment on nine proposed patient safety solutions. Release

> Watch out: within six months, it will be mandatory to use National Provider Identifier required by HIPAA. Blog

> An AIDS pill for children costing under $60 per year should …

Press Release: WHO's Seeks Comment on Proposed International Patient Safety Solutions

> An IBM-backed study suggests that most of the world's health systems will begin to fall apart by the year 2015. Release

> In a speech to a cardiology group, Schering-Plough's CEO puts forth his own set of cost-busting criteria for a managed care scorecard. (Sure, it's health plan mismanagement, not drug prices, which is driving up healthcare costs). …

> The World Health Organization launches a task force tasked with fighting the distribution of counterfeit medical devices. Article

> An HHS study sees a dramatic jump in spending on brand-name outpatient drugs. Article

> HCA decides to re-up on its contract with United Healthcare. …

A new Connecticut law requires that all hospitals report infection rates by 2008. In the United States, hospital-acquired infections and other medical mistakes account for 98,000 deaths annually and increases healthcare costs by $4.5 billion. It's an important step, because hospitals rarely report infection rates on their own. Last year the Connecticut Hospital Association revealed only three infections statewide, yet the CDC estimates that at least 21,000 of the state's patients pick up …

The World Health Organization says that a sample of the H5N1 virus collected in an Indonesian village where a family of seven people died appears to have mutated, but agency officials are stressing that there are no signs that the virus has spread any farther. Skeptical experts at the agency's Geneva headquarters call the changes "minuscule." The official WHO report on the cluster argues that the family members may have shared "a common genetic predisposition to infection with H5N1 virus …

As investigators probe a new flare up of the bird flu virus in Indonesia, the World Health Organization meets this week to try to settle an argument over how data on new influenza infections should be shared. The move was prompted by reports that scientists and some Asian governments have sought to block access to the latest samples of the virus. Critics say new information should be shared immediately with the international scientific community to spead research and help guard against a …

The World Health Organization said that a cluster of bird flu deaths in the village of Kabu Sebalang on the Indonesian island of Sumatra is a potentially seminal event. The Associated Press quotes WHO spokesman Peter Cordingsly, who alarmingly calls the six deaths "the mother of all clusters." Cordingsly state, "This is the first time that we've been completely stumped about possible single-source infection."

International health experts suspect that H5N1, the virus that …

> Dr. Lee Jong-wook, the head of the World Health Organization, died on Monday after emergency surgery for a blood clot to the brain. Article

> Ten former employees came forward to accuse CEO Haddad of Boston's Caritas Christi Health Care System of harassment since the Boston Globe's article on his behavior. …

> World Health Organization officials said yesterday that a suspicious cluster of deaths at a remote Indonesian village were probably not caused by human transmission of the H5N1 virus. Article

> Officials in New Jersey are on the defensive after this week's Dartmouth study on the cost of end of life care for the chronically ill. …