The Survive and Thrive Boomer Guide

FDA considering approval of a super-potent opioid medication that will be abused and kill people, consumer group says

A U.S. Food and Drug Administration advisory committee has recommended approval of AcelRx Pharmaceuticals’ application for use of sufentanil sublingual tablets to treat moderate-to-severe acute pain in a medically supervised setting. It’s five to 10 times more potent than fentanyl and 1,000 times more potent than morphine. The committee voted 10-3 last week for the medication to be approved.

However, Raeford Brown, M.D., chair of the FDA’s Anesthetic and Analgesic Drug Products Advisory Committee that made the recommendation, joined three Public Citizen staff in urging the agency to reject the application. Public Citizen is a consumer advocacy organization.

“I predict that we will encounter diversion, abuse and death within the early months of its availability on the market,” Brown said, adding strong opioids often are abused by medical personnel. “Sublingual sufentanil represents a danger to the general public health and will make our job of protecting Americans more difficult.”

Trump administration delays and rolls back public protections

None of the of 14 significant regulatory actions finalized during FY 2018 by the Trump administration are significantly improving the public’s health and safety or saving lives, according to Public Citizen, a citizens’ advocacy organization.

Public Citizen analyzed the U.S. Office of Management and Budget’s Unified Agenda of Regulatory and Deregulatory Actions for fall 2018 released on Tuesday.

“Today’s deregulatory agenda shows that the Trump administration finalized zero significant health and safety protections in fiscal year 2018,” said Lisa Gilbert, vice president of legislative affairs for Public Citizen. “This is a clear indication that our regulatory agencies have been corrupted and captured by corporate interests.”

Source of widespread antibiotic-resistant Salmonella outbreak unknown

An outbreak of Salmonella from an unknown source has so far infected 92 people in 29 states, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced Wednesday. This strain, Salmonella Infantis, which can be fatal, is resistant to many antibiotic treatments.

 

Antibiotic resistance, made worse by the routine overuse of antibiotics on industrial farms, makes treating dangerous foodborne disease outbreaks more difficult, according to U.S. PIRG, a consumer advocacy organization.

 

“Antibiotic-resistant diseases are sickening millions of people every year and farms aren't doing enough to solve the problem,” said Tano Toussaint, consumer watchdog associate for U.S. PIRG. “But we also need companies – from burger chains to grocery stores – to stop buying meat raised with routine antibiotic use if we want to stave off a rise in antibiotic-resistant diseases such as this one."

Burger chains make little progress in serving beef raised without antibiotics

Two burger chains, Shake Shack and BurgerFi, are serving beef raised without the routine use of antibiotics. They were the only restaurants to earn an “A” in the fourth annual Chain Reaction scorecard developed by six consumer and environmental groups. The vast majority of hamburger chains – 22 of the top 25, including top sellers such as McDonald’s – received an “F” grade because they lack established policies restricting antibiotic use in their beef supply chains.

“We should all be worried that so many restaurants are failing when it comes to antibiotic stewardship,” said Elise Orlick, director of the WashPIRG Foundation. “We need more burger chains to follow the lead of BurgerFi and Shake Shake and commit to protecting our life-saving medicines. Antibiotics are too important to lose and these companies can use their purchasing power to protect our health.”

The scorecard shows the lack of progress in the beef industry, the largest buyer of medically-important antibiotics among food animal sectors, in addressing antibiotic overuse. Public health experts warn that the widespread overuse of antibiotics for meat production is making these medications less effective by contributing to the creation and spread of drug-resistant bacteria called superbugs.

How to file claims for damage from Hurricane Michael

Hurricane Michael damage is expected to be $5 billion from wind damage and $3 billion from flood damage.

Only about one in three families who have flood damage from Hurricane Michael have federal flood insurance. Most homes have homeowners policies covering wind damage, but insurers have been steadily increasing hurricane wind coverage deductibles and imposing other homeowners insurance policy limitations, according to the Consumer Federation of America.

Because so many consumers experienced severe claims problems after Hurricane Katrina and Superstorm Sandy, the federation urges homeowners dealing with losses caused by Hurricane Michael to be vigilant with their insurance companies, including the insurers settling National Flood Insurance claims, to ensure that they receive a full and fair settlement.

Baby boomers provide information on daily living, including relationships and stress

Tom Sightings of Sightings Over Sixty is back in the classroom every week this fall, once as a teacher and twice as a student.

Many baby boomers are interested in pursuing their education, whether for profit, leisure, or cultural enrichment – whether they go to a local adult-education class, attend an Osher Lifelong Learning Institute course at a nearby university, or take off on an educational trip with Road Scholar.

Our baby boomer group, too, is interested in education. They write hundreds of articles every year to provide helpful information to boomers. Here’s this week’s offering:

Solar-powered outdoor LED light fixtures recalled by Cooper Lighting due to fire hazard

Cooper Lighting is recalling about 350,000 All-Pro and Defiant solar-powered outdoor LED light fixtures in the United States and about 11,963 in Canada.

The batteries in the solar-powered light fixtures can overheat and cause the light fixture’s housing to melt, posing a fire hazard.

Cooper Lighting has received seven reports of light fixtures overheating and property damage. No injuries have been reported.

Uninsured rates for health insurance going up again: Which states and cities are having the largest increase?

With the national health insurance uninsured rate back on the rise, growing from 10.9% in late 2016 to 12.2% in late 2017, WalletHub, a personal-finance website, released its report on "2018's Uninsured Rates by City" and by state.
 
WalletHub compared the rates for 547 U.S. cities and the 50 states, in addition to a breakdown by age, race/ethnicity, and income level. The following are some highlights from the reports:

States With Lowest Uninsured Rates			States With Highest Uninsured Rates
1	Massachusetts, 2.8%		41	North Carolina, 10.68%
2	Hawaii, 3.85%		42	South Carolina, 10.99%
3	Minnesota, 4.39%		43	Nevada, 11.23%
4	Vermont, 4.55%		44	Mississippi, 12.04%
5	Rhode Island, 4.62%		45	Wyoming, 12.25%
6	Iowa, 4.71%		46	Florida, 12.94%
7	Michigan, 5.17%		47	Georgia, 13.43%
8	Kentucky, 5.38%		48	Alaska, 13.66%
9	Wisconsin, 5.41%		49	Oklahoma, 14.16%
10	Delaware, 5.41%		50	Texas, 17.3%

For the full list, see https://wallethub.com/edu/uninsured-rates-by-state/4800/.

Republicans want Americans to be quiet while they take away our rights

First President Trump said it, then Sarah Huckabee Sanders. Now Mitch McConnell is on a “victory tour” saying it.

They’re calling anyone who disagrees with them a mob. We’re supposed to sit back and let Republicans take away our right to clean air and water, health care, consumer protection, vote, justice, civil rights, and more.

In addition, what's adding to the frustration is the media isn't reporting on the other side of this. They keep repeating what the Republicans are saying. It's unconscionable. The press needs to do better than that. I had to listen to the clip of Mitch McConnell over and over today. Finally, I just turned the radio off.

7 cancer-causing food additives widely used in foods banned by the FDA

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has banned seven chemicals used in artificial flavors that have been linked to cancer in animals.

“Chemicals that could cause cancer should never have been allowed in our food in the first place, especially not hiding behind the confusing label of ‘artificial flavors,’” said Melanie Benesh, the Environmental Wording Group’s legislative attorney. “The FDA finally did the right thing by taking this important step to better protect consumers.”

The EWG and other environmental and public health groups petitioned the FDA for the ban.