Writing in the Boston Globe, Jonathan D. Moreno and Rick Weiss say the Republican platform committee has gone beyond the Bush administration’s policy and now calls for a ban on the creation of or experimentation on any human embryos for research purposes.

The irony of the platform committee’s position, they say, is that stem cell scientists this year made major progress in understanding Down syndrome, which affects Palin’s youngest child. The scientists say their research makes it possible to envision treatments that could be helpful to people with Down syndrome. An excerpt:

Do McCain and Palin appreciate that the new research in diabetes and Down syndrome, not to mention similar recent advances for other diseases, simply could not have proceeded without the lessons being learned from embryonic stem cells? Apparently their party’s platform writers don’t.

So who’s in charge of Republican policy on this important question, and what exactly would the policy on stem cell research be in a McCain presidency? These are questions worth asking this fall.

From MarketWatch:

Vital Signs columnist Kristen Gerencher says a broad coalition of disability rights and business groups has come together behind a measure to revise the ADA in the wake of  a series of Supreme Court decisions that severely narrowed the law’s definition of disability. The ironic effect of those decisions, Gerencher says, is that the people who most need protections under the ADA often can’t get them.

An excerpt:

That means many people who suffer from a chronic disease but manage their illness well aren’t considered disabled and therefore aren’t covered by the law — even if an employer fires or refuses to hire them because of their disease.

The courts’ decisions have resulted in a Catch-22 for people with a range of disabilities, including diabetes, cancer, epilepsy, muscular dystrophy and mental illness, said Jennifer Mathis, deputy legal director for the Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law in Washington.

“You can be disabled enough to be fired but not disabled enough to sue,” she said.

Elderly, people with disabilities would be denied care

From the Associated Press:

Doctors know some patients needing lifesaving care won’t get it in a flu pandemic or other disaster. The gut-wrenching dilemma will be deciding who to let die.

Now, an influential group of physicians has drafted a grimly specific list of recommendations for which patients wouldn’t be treated.

The suggested list was compiled by a task force whose members come from prestigious universities, medical groups, the military and government agencies. They include the Department of Homeland Security, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Health and Human Services.

On the list of those not to be treated are:

• People older than 85
• Those with “severe mental impairment”;
• Those with a severe chronic disease, including advanced heart failure, lung disease of poorly controlled diabetes;
• People with severe trauma.

Public health law expert Lawrence Gostin of Georgetown University called the report an important initiative but also ”a political minefield and a legal minefield.” The recommendations would probably violate federal laws against age discrimination and disability discrimination, said Gostin, who was not on the task force.

… The recommendations appear in a report in the May edition of Chest, the medical journal of the American College of Chest Physicians.

• Related story: Pandemic flu threat remains substantial, experts say

By the Associated Press in the New York Times:

Summer camps just for kids with chronic diseases are booming — places to learn about epilepsy or finally meet someone else with Tourette’s tics or slice open a cow’s heart to see what’s wrong with their own.

Now fledgling research suggests such special camps may offer more than a rite of passage these children otherwise would miss: They just might have a lasting therapeutic value.

… ”How do you live well with a chronic condition? I believe in part, the power of being amongst your peers normalizes the experience,” explains Sandra Cushner-Weinstein, a social worker at Children’s National Medical Center who founded the hospital’s weeklong camps for five illnesses, and is studying the impact on campers.

From the Austin [Texas] American-Statesman:

Elaine MacLaughlin says the Southwest Branch of the YMCA in Austin should monitor the blood sugar levels of her son Miles during a Mother’s Day Out Program because his Type 1 diabetes is protected by federal law. The nonprofit group disagrees, saying that diabetes is not a disability and the program doesn’t have a paid staff member to provide such care.

… To Advocacy Inc. — a federally-financed nonprofit group that defends the rights of people with disabilities — the case isn’t about baby-sitting.

“Nondisabled children are allowed to be in the program without their parents’ presence on site,” said Advocacy lawyer Lucy Wood, who is representing the MacLaughlins. “YMCA’s refusal to make the accommodation is thus a form of discrimination.”

See earlier post: California schools to assist students with diabetes 

From the Chicago Tribune:

With an epidemic of obesity affecting American children and adolescents, doctors say a growing number are being diagnosed with chronic diseases once considered illnesses of adulthood.

In addition to the well-known rise in Type-2 diabetes among U.S. youths, overweight children also are suffering from fatty liver disease, hypertension, high cholesterol and sleep apnea. Health professionals are increasingly concerned, fearing the long-term impact of developing chronic diseases early in life.

“The earlier you develop diabetes, the more likely you are to develop complications,” said Dr. Paula Butler, chief of endocrinology at Mt. Sinai Hospital. “People will be having eye problems early, heart problems early, strokes early and go on dialysis. They will suffer knee and back pain, have sleep problems. They may not be able to work. It affects quality of life.”

From Medical News Today:

A new Harris survey reports that most baby boomers underestimate their risk of having a disability that would cause them to miss work for an extended period. The survey also found that baby boomers are unaware of the most common causes of disability and are not too concerned about their risk of becoming disabled.

The survey found that two-thirds of baby boomers think the chances of becoming disabled due to illness or injury are 20 percent or less. In reality, a worker has a 30 percent chance of losing three or more months of work due to disability before reaching retirement, according to the Social Security Administration.

One of the reasons baby boomers underestimate their risk is because they mistakenly believe that injuries cause more disabilities than illnesses. Research shows that the most common causes of disability are illnesses such as cancer, heart disease and diabetes.