State Highlights: Slow Trickle Of Disaster Aid Funds Frustrates Desperate Puerto Ricans; Mississippi’s 15-Week Abortion Ban Remains Blocked By Appeals Court

The Washington Post: Puerto Ricans Still Waiting On Disaster Funds As Hurricane Maria’s Aftermath, Earthquakes Continue To Affect Life On The Island
Nydia Camacho's ankles are swollen and puffy after days of sleeping in a compact car with her two teenagers. The single mother can’t return to her rented home because it shakes. The one she owns is a roofless jumble of wood and tin, uninhabitable since the hurricanes ravaged it. The 39-year-old is low on cash, her hours as a private security guard have been suspended because the public school she protects is closed. (Hernandez, 1/19)

The Associated Press: Appeals Court Won't Rehear Mississippi 15-Week Abortion Case
A federal appeals court said Friday that it will not reconsider its ruling that Mississippi's law banning most abortions after 15 weeks is unconstitutional. The 2018 state law remains blocked and Mississippi's only abortion clinic remains open. The owner has said the clinic d oes abortions up to 16 weeks. Mississippi is likely to ask the U.S. Supreme Court to consider the case. (1/17)

The Associated Press: LGBT Activists Say New Bills Target Transgender Youth 
At the urging of conservative advocacy groups, Republican legislators in more than a dozen states are promoting bills that focus on transgender young people. One batch of bills would bar doctors from providing them certain gender-related medical treatment; another batch would bar trans students from participating on school sports teams of the gender they identify with. (1/18)

The Associated Press: Ohio State Doctor Abuse Investigation, Suits Have Cost $9.8M
The investigation and related lawsuits about alleged sexual abuse decades ago by an Ohio State University team doctor have cost nearly $10 million so far, according to the school. The total was about $9.8 million as of December, school spokesman Benjamin Johnson said by email. (1/18)

Health News Florida: Genetic Information Bill Finds Quick Support
Incoming House Speaker Chris Sprowls had little trouble Thursday convincing members of a House health-care panel to approve legislation that would prohibit life-insurance, long-term care insurance and disability-insurance companies from using customers’ genetic information in changing, denying or canceling policies. Florida would become the first state to have such a law if Sprowls’ proposal is ultimately passed by the Legislature and signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis. (Sexton, 1/17)

NBC News: 'Love, Over Everything': As West Virginia Struggles With Foster Care Crisis, Families Step Up
West Virginia officials are desperate to recruit more foster families. Today, more than 7,000 children in West Virginia are in state care, a 71 percent increase over the past decade. Experts say this is due in large part to the opioid crisis, as more children are being removed from their homes because of parental substance abuse and neglect. (Rappleye and Breslauer, 1/21)

The Washington Post: Fighting Suicides In Dairy Country Through ‘Farmer Angels’
On what would have been Leon Statz’s 59th birthday, two dozen plaid-shirted farmers sat in the basement of St. Peter’s Lutheran Church to talk about how they were coping with the forces conspiring against them — the forces that had pushed their neighbor, a third-generation dairyman, to kill himself. The gathering was therapy of the most urgent kind. Statz’s 2018 suicide was the first some of the farmers had ever experienced, and in the small community of Loganville, it was a tragic jolt. (Simmons, 1/18)

Cleveland Plain Dealer: Mayfield Doctor Agrees To Cooperate With Feds In Probe Into Neurological Drug’s Marketing
A doctor in Cleveland’s eastern suburbs who admitted to a federal charge will cooperate with prosecutors in a case where they said doctors received kickbacks from drug company representatives to increase prescriptions for a neurological medication, court records show. Dr. Franklin Price, who practiced internal medicine and specialized in hematology and medical oncology, pleaded guilty Friday to a charge of wrongful disclosure of individually identifiable health information, a misdemeanor. (Heisig, 1/20)

The New York Times: A Doctor Abused Her. His Name Is On Her Child’s Birth Certificate.
To register her twin daughters for kindergarten a few years ago, Marissa Hoechstetter needed their birth certificates. It had been quite a while since she had last looked closely at them, and when she pulled the papers out, what she saw made her stomach turn, she said. There, on a document that legally and symbolically marked the start of her children’s lives, was the name of a gynecologist in New York City who she said sexually abused her, Robert A. Hadden. (Gold, 1/17)

The Associated Press: Virginia Teens Advocate For Seizure Safe School Legislation
Rowena and Thomas Gesick take turns sleeping in their daughter’s room every night so they can monitor her for seizures while she sleeps. But when Brie goes to school in the morning, the personnel are not required to know how to recognize and respond to seizures. Two families — the Gesick family from Virginia Beach and the Van Cleave family from Yorktown — want to change that, so they’re advocating for Seizure Safe School legislation in Virginia. (Nolte, 1/18)

St. Louis Public Radio: One In 3 Missouri Jail Officers Struggles With Depression, Study Reports
About 1 in 3 jail officers surveyed in Missouri showed symptoms of depression — with younger officers at a higher risk than their older colleagues. More than 745,000 people are held in county and city jails in the U.S., according to Bureau of Labor Statistics. (Farzan, 1/21)

The Baltimore Sun: A Bad Flu Year Could Be Even More Dangerous For Baltimore Kids
As the flu continues its achy, feverish march across the state and nation, U.S. health officials said the most common strain is one that can be particularly tough on kids. And many of Baltimore’s youth may not be protected. The rate of vaccination of city students during school clinics has been far lower than those in other Maryland counties, with just a small fraction of schools even offering the vaccine because there were too few takers. (Cohn, 1/21)

Texas Tribune: Texas Churches Consider Arming Volunteer Security After White Settlement
Chuck Chadwick, the founder and president of the National Organization for Church Security and Safety Management, has been in the church security business for about 18 years, encouraging parishioners and worshippers to take their safety into their own hands. He’s experienced a spike in interest in recent weeks, following the White Settlement shooting, that mirrors the same interest his business got after Sutherland Springs. (Fernandez, 1/21)

The Washington Post: Bill Marler Fought E.Coli. Now He Wants Tougher Salmonella Regulations.
Bill Marler, the Seattle lawyer who represented hundreds of victims in the Jack in the Box food poisoning case in the 1990s, was outraged by the avoidable tragedy that sickened 700 and claimed the lives of four children. He courted the media to get the E. coli bacteria on the agenda of policymakers — and played a key role in getting the U.S. Department of Agriculture to outlaw the most virulent strains of the pathogen in meat. (Kindy, 1/19)

Denver Post: In Colorado, Wealth Is A Big Indicator For Health
Colorado has one of the healthiest populations in the nation, but that doesn't mean some resolutions aren't in order for 2020, assuming they haven't been already attempted and cast aside. (Svaldi, 1/19)

Seattle Times: As Smaller Washington Cities Grapple With Homelessness, Republicans Take Up The Issue In The State Legislature
In the 2020 legislative session, a Republican lawmaker wants to authorize a local sales tax increase to pay for homelessness programs. Despite his party’s historical antipathy to new taxes, Rep. Drew Stokesbary, R-Auburn, says he’s “going to ask my caucus to compromise on that point, and I’m hoping the other side of the aisle would be willing to meet halfway.” (Brownstone, 1/20)

Captial Times: DOJ May Reopen Botched Wisconsin National Guard Assault Investigations
The Wisconsin Department of Justice will review a series of sexual assault investigations from the Wisconsin National Guard after a federal report released last month found that many were conducted improperly. At least two Guard victims whose cases were initially investigated by the Guard were notified by the National Guard Bureau last week that Wisconsin’s DOJ would review some cases, according to an email from the NGB obtained by the Cap Times. (Ferral, 1/20)

California Healthline: For 2020, California Goes Big On Health Care
California is known for progressive everything, including its health care policies, and, just a few weeks into 2020, state leaders aren’t disappointing. The politicians’ health care bills and budget initiatives are heavy on ideas and dollars — and on opposition from powerful industries. They put California, once again, at the forefront. The proposals would lower prescription drug costs, increase access to health coverage, and restrict and tax vaping. (Ibarra, 1/17)

The Oregonian: ‘Serious Violation’ Of Safe-Sleep Rules Preceded Baby’s Day Care Death, Oregon Regulators Say
Oregon child care regulators imposed first-of-their-kind restrictions Thursday on a Hillsboro day care where an infant died Jan. 6. The Office of Child Care found a “serious danger to the health and safety of children” and ordered Mrs. Williams Childcare, operated by Jeannette Williams, to stop caring for children younger than 2. Regulators also ordered the 24/7 provider to watch over children who are asleep at all times and to increase staffing beyond the baseline required by law. (Young, 1/20)

Los Angeles Times: Feds Investigate Causes Of A Norovirus Outbreak At Yosemite National Park
As of Monday, one of the West’s most majestic national parks had received reports of about 170 visitors and employees with similar symptoms and most had spent time in Yosemite Valley earlier this month. The National Park Service and other health agencies have launched an investigation into the outbreak, casting a pall over Martin Luther King Jr. Day holiday, when visitors were allowed free of charge into the 1,162-square-mile Sierra Nevada landmark known for its giant sequoia trees, towering granite ridges and tumbling waterfalls. (Sahagun, 1/20)

Los Angeles Times: Orange County Jail Scandal Investigation Ends With No Answers
When former California Atty. Gen. Kamala Harris in 2015 launched a criminal investigation into corruption inside Orange County’s jails, local activists and attorneys hoped it would finally reveal the breadth of a scandal that engulfed the Sheriff’s Department and district attorney’s office — and may have affected countless court cases. Four years later — after an investigation into the misuse of informants inside the county’s jails came to an anticlimactic end in a Santa Ana courtroom with no explanation and no charges filed — those same advocates were left asking a much simpler question: What happened? (Queally and Mason, 1/20)

North Carolina Health News: N.C. Gives Away Radon Test Kits
It’s known as the silent killer for a reason. Every year, radon, a naturally occurring, invisible, odorless, radioactive gas, causes an estimated 21,000 lung cancer deaths in the United States. In North Carolina, officials with the state Department of Health and Human Services estimate that 435 residents will die from radon-related lung cancer in 2020. In an effort to make people more aware of the dangers, the state is again giving away 3,000 radon test kits as part of National Radon Action Month. (Barnes, 1/20)

North Carolina Health News: Perinatal Depression Affects 1 In 7 Women 
Less well-known than postpartum depression, perinatal depression caused by hormone and life changes affects many pregnant women. I should know: I’m one of them. I knew going into my third pregnancy that it’s not a walk in the park: around two-thirds of pregnant women experience morning sickness, almost everyone experiences fatigue from building a placenta, the immune system changes, and sleep problems arise. But I never expected that it would be this bad. ...It turns out that about one in seven childbearing women experiences perinatal depression, or depression that strikes either during pregnancy or up to a year after birth. According to a paper published this month in the North Carolina Medical Journal, 85 percent of women with perinatal depression don’t receive treatment. (Duong, 1/17)