Media/Policy Watch
This section is intended to alert readers to substantive news, analysis and opinion from the general media on vaccines, immunization, global; public health and related themes. Media Watch is not intended to be exhaustive, but indicative of themes and issues CVEP is actively tracking. This section will grow from an initial base of newspapers, magazines and blog sources, and is segregated from Journal Watch above which scans the peer-reviewed journal ecology.

We acknowledge the Western/Northern bias in this initial selection of titles and invite suggestions for expanded coverage. We are conservative in our outlook in adding news sources which largely report on primary content we are already covering above. Many electronic media sources have tiered, fee-based subscription models for access. We will provide full-text where content is published without restriction, but most publications require registration and some subscription level.

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Council on Foreign Relations
http://www.cfr.org/
Accessed 28 March 2015
Testimony
The Unfinished Health Agenda in Sub-Saharan Africa
by Thomas J. Bollyky March 19, 2015
In his testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on Africa and Global Health Policy, Thomas J. Bollyky argues that continued U.S. and private sector leadership on the unfinished health agenda in Africa is as important now as it has been in the past and for the same reasons: a peaceful, inclusive economy presupposes healthier, more productive lives.

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Financial Times
http://www.ft.com/home/uk
The true value of a life is not about the pharmaceutical costs
24 March 2015
The business model of the pharmaceutical industry has been based on drugs that alleviate the chronic diseases of the developed world, such as depression, hypertension and stomach acidity. By selling huge volumes of pills at moderate prices, companies could recover the expenditure involved in drug development and clinical trials and still make lavish profits. But only a few drugs fit that model. Many recent pharmacological discoveries are relevant to the acute illnesses of a few rather than the continuing ailments of the many. These are drugs such as Halavan, mainly used in patients with advanced metastatic breast cancer, and Sovaldi, a treatment for hepatitis C.

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Voice of America
http://www.voanews.com/
WHO Denies It Delayed Declaration of Ebola Epidemic
Lisa Schlein
March 20, 2015 7:43 PM GENEVA—
The World Health Organization is vigorously denying accusations that it delayed declaring the Ebola epidemic in West Africa an international public health emergency for political reasons.
An article by the Associated Press said secretly obtained e-mails of internal documents indicated the WHO was afraid that declaring a global emergency could set off alarm bells, which could hurt countries’ economies or interfere with the Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca.
WHO’s spokeswoman on Ebola, Margaret Harris, told VOA that the assertion was categorically untrue…

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Wall Street Journal
http://online.wsj.com/home-page?_wsjregion=na,us&_homepage=/home/us
Accessed 28 March 2015
The Key to Convincing Parents to Vaccinate Their Children
DREW HARRIS: The recent measles outbreak linked to Disneyland is drawing attention to the issue of families with unvaccinated children and the public policies that allow them to opt out of immunization mandates.

03/24/15
The Experts
Robert Kennedy Jr. speaks out against vaccine requirements
TRENTON, N.J. — Calling the federal agency that makes recommendations on vaccines a “sock puppet” for that industry, Robert Kennedy Jr. spoke out Monday against making it harder for parents to exempt their children from vaccinations.
03/23/15