WASHINGTON -- A federal commission hunting for ways to slow increases in Medicaid's price tag on Thursday recommended letting states increase co-payments on some expensive drugs as well as several accounting changes in the program.\nIn most cases, beneficiaries of the nation's health care program for the poor face a maximum $3 co-payment on drugs and other services. But the commission, set up by Michael Leavitt, secretary of the Health and Human Services Department, suggested states be allowed to increase this fee on certain drugs when a cheaper alternative is available.\nThis will encourage patients to choose the less expensive drug, ultimately saving Medicaid an estimated $2 billion over five years, the commission's report said.\nSome of the proposed changes are aimed at ensuring the government doesn't pay too much for prescription drugs for Medicaid patients.\nThey include allowing states to pay for drugs based on what it costs to make them rather than the cost to wholesalers, which is greater. The report estimated the change would save $4.3 billion over five years.
2. Mad Cow disease may come from human beings
LONDON -- A new theory proposes that mad cow disease may have come from feeding British cattle meal contaminated with human remains infected with a variation of the disease.\nThe hypothesis, outlined this week in The Lancet medical journal, suggests the infected cattle feed came from the Indian subcontinent, where bodies sometimes are ceremonially thrown into the Ganges River.\nIndian experts not connected with the research pointed out weaknesses in the theory but agreed it should be investigated.\nThe cause of the original case or cases of mad cow disease, or bovine spongiform encephalopathy, is unknown, but it belongs to a class of illnesses called transmissible spongiform encephalopathies, or TSEs.\nSuch illnesses exist in several species. Scrapie is a TSE that affects sheep and goats, while chronic wasting disease afflicts elk and deer. A handful of TSEs are found in humans, including Kuru, Alper's disease and Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, or CJD.
3. Swaziland royal family approves beating of princess
MBABANE, Swaziland -- The king's eldest daughter deserved the beating she received from a household official when he caught her holding a drinking party during the monarch's annual bride-choosing festivities, a member of the royal family was quoted Thursday as saying.\n"It was within the traditional overseer's right to discipline anyone -- including princesses -- who wanted to spoil the important ceremony," Jim Gama, governor of the queen mother's residence, was quoted as saying Thursday in the Times of Swaziland newspaper. "Swazi culture allows any parent to discipline any child for an unruly behavior in public."\nPrincess Sikhanyiso has long raised eyebrows in Africa's last absolute monarchy for flouting tradition with her Western-style dress.\nOn Aug. 26, the official overseer of traditional affairs, Ntfonjeni Dlamini, stumbled across a party hosted by the 17-year-old that featured loud music and alcoholic drinks. Dlamini told state-radio that he was so shocked, he beat the princess on her thighs with a stick as she fled.
