Top Clinton Staffer to Run Malaria No More

Thanks to The Washington Note for letting us know that Sen. Hillary Clinton's top legislative aide, Laurie Rubiner, is heading off to run Malaria No More, a well-funded advocacy group pushing rich countries to do more to combat malaria in the developing world.

Rubiner was instrumental in coming up with Clinton's health care plan. A recent New York Times profile quoted her saying:

“Senator Clinton is 150 percent committed to universal health care coverage, and so am I,” she said. “There’s nothing wrong with our health care in this country; the problem is with the health care system. Insurance companies shouldn’t be competing against each other based on their ability to screen out those who need coverage the most. Right now the deck is stacked against the average consumer.”

Frankly, I think there's a lot wrong with U.S. health care, and Clinton's plan admits as much with its heavy emphasis on prevention and her strong support for comparative effectiveness studies and their use, which, as we learned yesterday from the Commonwealth Fund, could save the health care system $368 billion over the next ten years -- a third of what it would take to pay for the uninsured.

It will be interesting to watch this Malaria No More group. Its website noticeably lacks the endorsement of the World Health Organization, its main effort, the Roll Back Malaria initiative, or the World Bank, which has been tasked to come up with a subsidy program for getting low-cost drugs for combating malaria to the developing world.

This year, according to its website, Malaria No More focused a lot of attention on the President's Malaria Initiative (one of the few laudable things done by this administration) and Laura Bush's promotional travels in Africa to boost the government program. The First Husband in Waiting has also made global health a primary focus of his Clinton Global Initiative.