What We're Reading: Dietary Supplement Action; AI in Healthcare; Border Crossings for Medicine

Reaction to FDA Dietary Supplement Move Mixed

An FDA announcement that it would step up oversight of the $50-billion-a-year dietary supplements industry was met with mixed reaction, The Washington Post reported. Some said the move is little more than a public relations effort, while others welcomed the effort to crack down on companies making false and misleading claims about health benefits or selling products adulterated with unlisted drug ingredients.

US, Chinese Researchers Working on AI Diagnostic System

A group of researchers in the United States and China are testing artificial intelligence (AI) to automatically diagnose common childhood conditions after processing the patient’s symptoms, history, lab results, and other clinical data, The New York Times reported. The AI system was highly accurate, according to findings. The report noted that the effort was aided by the fact that China’s privacy norms put fewer restrictions on the sharing of digital data drawn from a large Chinese population.

Californians Cross the Border to Mexico for Cheaper Prescription Drugs

Close to 1 million people in California alone cross the border to Mexico annually for healthcare, including to buy prescription drugs, Kaiser Health News reported. In Mexico, one type of insulin costs $600 for a 3-month supply compared with the $3700 price tag in the United States. The FDA largely looks the other way for people traveling and bringing medications back, as long as it is no more than a 90-day supply, but that could change at any time, experts said.