Trending News Today: Patients, Health Care Workers Rally for Affordable Insulin

Researchers have launched 2 large studies to test a medical therapy aimed at treating sepsis, NPR reported. The treatment is a cocktail of intravenous vitamin C, vitamin B1 (thiamine), and corticosteroids, the article noted. According to NPR, Dr Paul Marik, who has been using the combination treatment since 2016 at his hospital in Norfolk, Virginia, said the sepsis reaction generates large amounts of a damaging molecule called reactive oxygen, which vitamin C neutralizes.

Activists from the Boston chapter of the Right Care Alliance are rallying on Saturday in Massachusetts to call for more affordable insulin, the Associated Press reported. According to the article, the coalition of patients, health care professionals, and community members say price increases have made an essential drug unaffordable for many with diabetes, resulting in unnecessary deaths. The Associated Press reported that rally organizers say the average cost of insulin in the United States has tripled over the last 10 years, and it costs an individual with type 1 diabetes an average of $1000 per month for insulin and supplies.

In a speech at the White House on Friday, President Trump presented a broad outline of how his administration hopes to lower prescription drug costs and spending, NPR reported. According to the article, the administration also released a 39-page document describing a variety of proposals it is considering or studying to lower costs for individuals, corporations, the government, and the economy. The article stated that the plan mostly lists potential steps the administration may take, along with many others that were included in the president’s budget proposal, and will require congressional action.