Stat: Biden Targets Hefty Hospital 'Facility Fees' That Often Surprise Patients
As part of the Biden administration’s broader efforts to lower health care costs, the White House announced new guidelines on Friday targeting a few of the most common sources of sticker shock. The new policy initiatives target some of the usual suspects: surprise billing, which was restricted in 2020 yet persists as health care providers exploit loopholes; short-term insurance policies that often fail to cover essential treatment; and high-interest credit cards and payment plans especially marketed to help patients cover medical debt. (Merelli, 7/7)

Reuters: Biden's Junk Fee Crusade Turns To Short-Term Health Insurance Plans
"It's not necessarily about healthcare, it’s about being played for a sucker," Biden said at a White House event announcing the policies. "That's a scam and it has to end." The Obama administration in 2016 limited short-term insurance plans to three months to try to get more people on year-round plans, but regulations adopted by the Trump administration in 2018 allowed people to stay on such plans for 12 months and renew them for three years. (Bose, 7/7)

AP: Biden Takes Aim At 'Junk' Insurance, Vowing To Save Money For Consumers Being Played As 'Suckers' 
Biden invited Cory Dowd to tell his story at the White House event to spotlight the initiative. Dowd in 2019 purchased a high-deductible health care plan when he returned stateside after serving in the Peace Corps in Ghana but before he started graduate school and was able to get on a student health plan. He thought the plan would protect him in the case of a medical emergency. But just weeks before he started school, he had to have emergency surgery to remove his appendix. Months later, the hospital called him to tell him his insurer would only cover a small portion of his bill and that he would have to pay more than $37,000 out of pocket. (Boak, 7/7)

Medical credit cards are investigated —

Modern Healthcare: Medical Credit Cards Under Scrutiny By HHS, CFPB
The Health and Human Services Department, Treasury Department and Consumer Financial Protection Bureau launched a joint inquiry Friday into these financial products, requesting information on how they work, the risks they pose and the impact they have on billing services, according to a news release. The agencies opened a 60-day public comment period to gain feedback from consumers, lenders and providers. (Hudson, 7/7)

KFF Health News: What You Need To Know About The Drug Price Fight In Those TV Ads 
In recent months ominous ads about prescription drugs have flooded the TV airwaves. Perhaps by design, it’s not always clear who’s sponsoring the ads or why. Or, for that matter, why now? The short answer is that Congress is paying attention. House and Senate members from both parties have launched at least nine bills, parts of which may be packaged together this fall, that take aim at pharmacy benefit managers, companies that channel prescription drugs to patients. Here’s a primer to help you decipher what’s happening. (Allen, 7/10)

In other administration news —

CBS News: Billions In NIH Grants Could Be Jeopardized By Appointments Snafu, Republicans Say
The Biden administration allegedly failed to correctly reappoint more than a dozen top-ranking National Institutes of Health leaders, House Republicans say, raising questions about the legality of billions in federal grants doled out by those officials over the last year. Their claim, detailed Friday in a letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra, obtained by CBS News, follows a monthslong probe led by Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, the Republican chair of the House Energy & Commerce Committee, into vacancies at the agency. (Herridge and Tin, 7/9)

Stat: Biden’s NIH Nominee Is Languishing In Congress
Sen. Bernie Sanders’ rare move to delay President Biden’s health care nominees has put the drug pricing firebrand and the White House in a standoff — and public health advocates worry the feud could squeeze out an otherwise uncontroversial pick to lead the country’s top science agency. (Owermohle, 7/10)

Stat: ACA's Risk Program Benefits Blue Cross Blue Shield Insurers
A program that undergirds the Affordable Care Act’s health insurance marketplaces continues to bolster the balance sheets of large Blue Cross Blue Shield companies, according to a STAT analysis of new federal data. Conversely, that same program — called “risk adjustment” — has created substantial financial burdens for startup insurers including Bright Health Group, which has now exited all health insurance markets, and Friday Health Plans, which has shut down. (Herman, 7/10)

USA Today: Supreme Court Affirmative Action Ruling Detrimental To Latinos' Health
A study found Latinos are still underrepresented among certain health care professions and obstacles to advanced education may be to blame. The study, published Wednesday in Health Affairs, comes a week after the recent Supreme Court decision to strike down affirmative action policies that helped diversify medical schools across the country for decades. (Rodriguez, 7/7)

Stat: Medicare Wants To Send $9 Billion To 340B Hospitals
Medicare is planning to send $9 billion in lump-sum payments to more than 1,600 hospitals that participate in a drug discount program after the Supreme Court found the program underpaid them for prescription drugs, the agency announced on Friday. To pay for the restitution, Medicare would slash all hospitals’ payments for other items and services by 0.5% for the next 16 years. (Cohrs, 7/7)

Stat: Home Health Providers Sue Medicare Over Payment Cuts
The National Association of Home Care and Hospice sued the Biden administration to halt the government’s recent proposed rule that would cut Medicare payments to home health agencies by 2.2% in 2024. Since 2020, Medicare has updated its system for how it pays for home health, in particular by basing payments less on how much therapy someone is getting at home. By law, the new system can’t cost more or less than it otherwise would have, but Medicare reinforced this year that it had “paid more under the new system than it would have under the old system” — and thus continued cuts to home health for next year. (Herman, 7/7)

On Medicaid 'unwinding' —

The Wall Street Journal: Millions Of People Booted From Medicaid After Pandemic 
Millions of people are losing Medicaid coverage in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic. Enrollment in the health program for the low-income and disabled grew to 95 million during the pandemic, as states stopped checking to make sure people were eligible. Now states have started checking again, and more than 1.6 million people have been kicked off the program in the past three months, according to KFF, a health-analysis foundation. Federal regulators estimate that 15 million to 17 million people will eventually be pushed off Medicaid. (Armour, 7/8)

Health News Florida: Florida Is One Of Two States Declining Federal Waivers To Help With Medicaid Unwinding
Federal health officials are urging states like Florida to make it easier for people to renew their Medicaid coverage as a mass unwinding following the COVID-19 public health emergency continues. Thousands of Floridians have been disenrolled from Medicaid since the state began redetermining eligibility in May, after a federal directive that states suspend such efforts during the pandemic was lifted. Florida began its process earlier than some others, but committed to spreading out renewals over the course of a year. (Colombini, 7/7)

Idaho Capital Sun: In Idaho, Half Of People Removed From Medicaid Didn’t Send State Their Info
More than 87,000 Idahoans – so far – are being removed from Medicaid coverage after expanded coverage from the pandemic has lapsed. A little more than half of Medicaid recipients who lost coverage — 48,857 — were removed because the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare either could not contact them or the Medicaid enrollees didn’t give the agency the information to prove their eligibility, department spokesperson Greg Stahl told the Idaho Capital Sun in an email. Another 38,682 people removed from Medicaid were determined ineligible, Stahl said, while 27,537 were deemed eligible. (Pfannenstiel, 7/10)

Also —

NY Daily News: Judge Temporarily Blocks Mayor Adams From Switching NYC Retirees To Medicare Advantage
A trial court judge has temporarily blocked Mayor Adams from switching retired city workers to a cost-cutting Medicare Advantage Plan. Manhattan Supreme Court Judge Lyle Frank granted a temporary restraining order Thursday that, until he issues a final ruling, prevents roughly 250,000 city retirees and their dependents from losing their current health insurance. (Sommerfeldt and Bamberger, 7/7)

Philadelphia Inquirer: Independence Blue Cross Is A Force In Philadelphia, But Its National Medicaid Business Is Driving Growth
The Philadelphia region’s largest health insurer is seeing a dramatic shift in its growth in an increasingly competitive market. Annual revenue at Independence Blue Cross’s parent company has grown by an impressive two-thirds over the last five years, adding $10 billion in revenue though 2022. (Brubaker, 7/10)

NBC News: More Malaria Cases Arise In Florida: Doctor Describes Symptoms
Florida health officials reported two additional cases of malaria on Thursday. Both were identified last week and neither was linked to travel outside the country. That brings the total number of locally acquired malaria infections in the U.S. to seven since May. All but one case has been in Sarasota County, Florida. The other case, which was not connected to the Florida ones, was a Texas man who was working for the National Guard along the Rio Grande. (Bendix, 7/8)

On Legionnaires' disease, Cyclospora, and blastomyces —

Houston Chronicle: Legionnaires’ Disease Sickens 4 At Fulshear 55-Plus Community
A Fulshear community clubhouse has been closed after confirmed cases of legionellosis, most commonly called “Legionnaires' disease,” sickened at least four members. The Fort Bend County Health and Human Services said one person who had legionellosis died, but the department did not confirm the cause of death. (Goodman, 7/7)

Houston Chronicle: What Is A Cyclospora Infection? Houston Area Sees Rise In New Cases
Harris and Fort Bend counties have received reports of an increased number of Cyclospora infections in the region, according statements from health officials sent Friday evening. Harris County Public Health and Fort Bend County Health and Human Services are urging residents to take proper precautions this summer while preparing food containing fresh vegetables and fruit, cooking and spending time outdoors. (Breen, 7/8)

Fox News: Wisconsin Woman Dead After Contracting Rare Fungus Found In Soil 
A Wisconsin woman's death from an unusual fungus left her loving family reeling. Now, the family of Sonya Cruz from Ketnosha, Wisconsin, is warning others about blastomyces- a rare fungus that when disturbed releases spores into the air that can cause severe illness and death. The fungus can be found in soil, especially in moist and wooded areas. (Rumpf-Whitten, 7/8)

On the heat wave and air pollution —

The New York Times: The Southwest Bakes With More Heat On The Way
As the heat engulfed Tucson, Ariz., on Sunday afternoon, six people, part of a new mutual aid group they call Gator-Aid, were dropping seven-pound bags of Reddy Ice on the hot sidewalks and loading coolers with hundreds of bottles of water and Gatorade. Every Sunday for the past month, the group has been bringing beverages to downtown Tucson and distributing them to those in need, they said. (Washington, Betts and Moya, 7/9)

Houston Chronicle: Texas Heat Led To Air Pollution From Oil And Gas Machinery Failures
The unrelenting heat that gripped Texas in June was responsible for the release of hundreds of tons of air pollutants, including an estimated 5,733 pounds of propane and propylene from a Pasadena plant, as facilities in the oil and gas industry struggled to keep their equipment running properly. (Ward, 7/7)

On PFAS and lead contamination —

KFF Health News: Proposed PFAS Rule Would Cost Companies Estimated $1B; Lacks Limits And Cleanup Requirement
A proposed federal rule calls for forcing companies to disclose whether their products contain toxic “forever” chemicals, the government’s first attempt at cataloging the pervasiveness of PFAS across the United States. The Environmental Protection Agency rule would require manufacturers to report many products that contain perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances. They’re a family of chemicals that don’t degrade in nature and have been linked to cancer, birth defects, and hormone irregularities. (Scaturro, 7/10)

AP: Decades After The Dangers Of Lead Became Clear, Some Cities Are Leaving Lead Pipe In The Ground
Around the country, utilities have been leaving lead pipe in the ground even when it is easiest to remove during water main work. Worse, they have been removing sections, disturbing the pipe and leaving the rest, which can spike lead levels, causing harm that will last a lifetime, an investigation by The Associated Press has found. (Phillis, 7/9)

The Wall Street Journal: America Is Wrapped In Miles Of Toxic Lead Cables
AT&T, Verizon and other telecom giants have left behind a sprawling network of cables covered in toxic lead that stretches across the U.S., under the water, in the soil and on poles overhead, a Wall Street Journal investigation found. As the lead degrades, it is ending up in places where Americans live, work and play. The lead can be found on the banks of the Mississippi River in Louisiana, the Detroit River in Michigan, the Willamette River in Oregon and the Passaic River in New Jersey, according to the Journal’s tests of samples from nearly 130 underwater-cable sites, conducted by several independent laboratories. The metal has tainted the soil at a popular fishing spot in New Iberia, La., at a playground in Wappingers Falls, N.Y., and in front of a school in suburban New Jersey.  (Pulliam, Ramachandran, West, Jones and Gryta, 7/9)

AP: Wisconsin Judge: Lawsuit To Repeal Abortion Ban Can Continue
Wisconsin’s 173-year-old abortion ban outlaws killing fetuses but doesn’t apply to consensual medical abortions, a judge ruled Friday in allowing a lawsuit challenging the ban to continue in the perennial battleground state. Dane County Circuit Judge Diane Schlipper said the legal language in the ban doesn’t use the term “abortion” so the law only prohibits attacking a woman in an attempt to kill her unborn child. (Richmond, 7/7)

AP: Iowa Republicans Will Pursue A 6-Week Abortion Ban During A Special Session That Starts Tuesday
Iowa’s Republican-controlled Legislature will aim to enact a ban on abortion after roughly six weeks of pregnancy during a rare special session that starts Tuesday, a draft of the bill released Friday shows. The proposed measure is similar to a 2018 law that a deadlocked state Supreme Court declined to reinstate last month, prompting Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds to call for the extraordinary session. Abortion is currently legal in Iowa up to 20 weeks of pregnancy. (Fingerhut, 7/7)

The 19th: New York Equal Rights Amendment: How It Impacts Abortion, LGBTQ+ Rights
Democrats and abortion rights advocates in New York are pushing for a novel equal rights amendment they hope will establish the state as a haven for abortion access, boost Democratic enthusiasm in 2024 and set a roadmap for other states. New York lawmakers have, in two consecutive sessions, passed the New York Equal Protection of Law Amendment, which would ban a wide range of discrimination based on sex, expressly including sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, pregnancy and pregnancy outcomes. It would also ban discrimination based on age, disability, ethnicity and national origin and establish a constitutional right to abortion and other reproductive health care. (Panetta, 7/7)

PolitiFact: Fact Check: Are U.S. Abortion Laws Really Like China, North Korea?
PolitiFact rating: Mostly false. This oversimplifies a complex web of global abortion laws, ignores exceptions and accessibility and relies on outdated information about abortion policies in China and North Korea. The claim also ignores that both countries have participated in coerced abortions for their own goals — something that U.S. abortion policy doesn’t come close to permitting. Some Western European countries have stricter gestational limits for “elective” abortions than some U.S. states. But abortion access is often easier for many women in some of those countries, with costs covered, and far-reaching exceptions that include mental health and income. (Putterman, 7/10)

Also —

Indianapolis Star: Out-Of-State Abortion Patients Tripled In Indiana In 2022, Report Says
The number of out-of-state patients who traveled to Indiana for abortions more than tripled in 2022. That's one finding in the Indiana Department of Health's newly released annual Terminated Pregnancy Report, which captured data on the state’s abortion landscape during a year that saw Roe v. Wade overturned and several neighboring states increase restrictions on abortion. (Basile, 7/10)

AP: Nebraska Mom Pleads Guilty To Giving Daughter Pills For An Abortion And Helping Bury The Fetus
A Nebraska mother pleaded guilty Friday to giving her 17-year-old daughter pills for an illegal abortion last year and helping to burn and bury the fetus. Under a plea agreement, Jessica Burgess, 42, of Norfolk, admitted to providing an abortion after 20 weeks of gestation, false reporting and tampering with human skeletal remains. Charges of concealing the death of another person and abortion by someone other than a licensed physician were dismissed. (7/7)

CNN: A Pregnant Woman Traveled To Oregon Get An Abortion Due To The Louisiana Ban 
When 45-year-old Victoria realized she was five weeks late and the lines showed as positive on two pregnancy tests, the New Orleans resident dreamed up a plan to get an abortion. Traveling out of state was the only abortion option for Victoria, who asked CNN to withhold her last name out of fear of backlash against her and her family. Louisiana is one of several states that have essentially banned all abortions. (Zdanowicz, 7/9)

Chicago Tribune: James Lewis, Sole Suspect In 1982 Tylenol Murders, Has Died
James Lewis, the lone suspect in the 1982 Tylenol murders, was found dead Sunday at his home in suburban Boston, multiple law-enforcement sources confirmed to the Tribune. His death comes after 40 years of intense scrutiny from law enforcement, in which Lewis played a cat-and-mouse game with investigators. Local authorities questioned him as recently as September as part of a renewed effort to bring charges in the case. With the investigation’s only suspect dead, it now seems unlikely that charges will ever be brought in poisonings that killed seven people and caused a worldwide panic. (Gutowski and St. Clair, 7/9)

Today: Tylenol Murders: New Efforts To Solve The 40-Year-Old Case
It sounds like an urban legend, but it was chillingly real in 1982. Tylenol capsules laced with cyanide that were sold in the Chicago suburbs were linked to the deaths of seven people, leading to a nationwide panic that had the Food and Drug Administration advising consumers across the country to stop taking Tylenol products. No one has ever been charged with the murders. (Stump, 9/23/22)

The crime fundamentally changed medicine safety —

The New York Times: How An Unsolved Mystery Changed The Way We Take Pills
Odds are that you have had moments of frustration trying to open new bottles of aspirin or other over-the-counter medications. Perhaps your fingernails are not up to the task of breaking the seal on the plastic wrap. Or maybe the pop-up cap is a challenge, seemingly designed to be not only childproof but also adultproof. The foil covering the lip of the bottle may defy neat tearing. Then you struggle to remove every wisp of the cotton wad standing between you and the medicine. (Haberman, 9/16/18)

PBS NewsHour: How The Tylenol Murders Of 1982 Changed The Way We Consume Medication
Early on the morning of Sept. 29, 1982, a tragic, medical mystery began with a sore throat and a runny nose. It was then that Mary Kellerman, a 12-year-old girl from Elk Grove Village, a suburb of Chicago, told her mother and father about her symptoms. They gave her one extra-strength Tylenol capsule that, unbeknownst to them, was laced with the highly poisonous potassium cyanide. Mary was dead by 7 a.m. Within a week, her death would panic the entire nation. And only months later, it changed the way we purchase and consume over-the-counter medications. (9/29/2014)

How the murders unfolded —

Chicago Tribune: The Tylenol Murders: Read The Tribune Investigation
The 1982 poisonings left seven people dead and panicked the nation. Widely regarded as an act of domestic terrorism — a term not in the country’s vernacular at the time — the murders led to tamper-evident packaging, copycat killings and myths about tainted Halloween candy. (Gutowski and St. Clair, 10/27/2022)

Chicago Tribune: The Tylenol Murders: How Johnson & Johnson Saved The Brand
Ty Fahner, then the Illinois attorney general and head of the multiagency task force investigating the poisonings, described J&J as “a wonderful, willing partner” with law enforcement. “They couldn’t have been better,” Fahner said of company executives. (St. Clair and Gutowski, 10/27, 2022)

St. Louis Post-Dispatch: Washington University Researchers Develop Air Monitor That Detects COVID-19 Virus
A team of researchers at Washington University has developed an air monitor that can alert users to the presence of SARS-CoV-2 — the virus responsible for COVID-19 — in just five minutes. In an article published in Nature Communications on Monday, the researchers showed the monitor’s ability to detect as few as tens of viral particles in a cubic meter. They hope to commercialize the air monitor so it can be placed in public spaces like hospitals and schools, helping prevent the spread of COVID-19. (Vargo, 7/10)

CIDRAP: Increased Antibiotic Exposure Linked To Severe COVID-19 Outcomes
Repeated antibiotic exposure may be associated with severe COVID-19 outcomes, British researchers reported this week in eClinical Medicine. (Dall, 7/7)

San Francisco Chronicle: Where To Find COVID Risk Data Before Setting Off On Summer Travels
Dr. Bob Wachter, chair of medicine at UCSF, pointed to three reliable pieces of data that offer a snapshot of how much COVID is in circulation: wastewater surveillance, hospitalizations and deaths. (Hwang and Vaziri, 7/9)

Forbes: New Insights Into Long COVID Point To Damage To The Vagus Nerve
Reports from 2022 show that more than 65 million people that were infected with Covid-19 developed long-lasting symptoms, a condition that is now defined as Long COVID. Given how difficult it can be to identify and diagnose, the incidence rates among those exposed to multiple viral infections may be much higher. Long COVID symptoms, such as fatigue, difficulty breathing, and brain fog, can significantly interfere with one’s quality of life. Emerging studies now suggest that many of these symptoms may be a consequence of damage to the vagus nerve. As the body’s primary communication superhighway, the vagus nerve extends into every major organ in the body, including the heart, lungs, and gastrointestinal tract. (Haseltine, 7/7)

Stat: House Panel To Mark Up Pandemic-Preparedness Bill Next Week
A House subcommittee will next week mark up a package of public health bills, including pandemic-preparedness legislation, according to five lobbyists. The House Energy & Commerce Committee hasn’t yet announced the markup, and the lobbyists didn’t know the exact date. But time is running out for reauthorizing a law that created several of the federal government’s biodefense and pandemic-preparedness programs. (Wilkerson, 7/7)

Fortune: Half Of Boomers And Late Gen Xers Who Took Early Retirement During First Covid Are In Poverty
Thousands of seasoned professionals dropped out of the workforce early during the pandemic, but far from enjoying an early retirement, new research now shows that nearly half of them have been forced into poverty. (Royle, 7/7)

In other news about respiratory infections —

CIDRAP: FDA Clears Rapid Diagnostic Test For Respiratory Ailments 
Australian diagnostics company Lumos Diagnostics announced this week that it has received US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) marketing clearance for a rapid diagnostic test that helps clinicians determine when antibiotics are needed for respiratory infections. The FDA clearance means that FebriDX, a disposable point-of-care immunoassay designed to aid diagnosis of acute bacterial respiratory infections, can now be marketed in the United States for use by healthcare providers in urgent care and emergency care settings. Company officials say the test, which differentiates bacterial- from viral-associated host immune response and is intended to be used in conjunction with clinical signs and symptoms, could help improve antibiotic prescribing for acute respiratory infections. (Dall, 7/7)

NBC News: New HIV Cases Linked To New Mexico Salon That Gave Vampire Facials
New Mexico health officials say new HIV infections have been linked to a salon that performed so-called vampire facials, almost five years after the business closed. The Albuquerque salon, called VIP Spa, was shut down in September 2018 after at least two clients tested positive for HIV following the facials. (Lenthang, 7/7)

On transgender health care —

AP: Tennessee Can Enforce Ban On Transgender Care For Minors, Court Says
Tennessee’s ban on gender-affirming care for transgender youth can go into effect — at least for now — after a federal appeals court on Saturday temporarily reversed a lower court ruling. Last month, a district court judge in Tennessee found that the state’s new law banning transgender therapies like hormone blockers and surgeries for transgender youth was unconstitutional because it discriminated on the basis of sex. The judge blocked large swaths of the law from taking effect. (Barakat, 7/8)

AP: Trans Kids' Families Have To Go Out Of State For Essential Care
On an early morning in June, Flower Nichols and her mother set off on an expedition to Chicago from their home in Indianapolis. The family was determined to make it feel like an adventure in the city, though that wasn’t the primary purpose of the trip. The following afternoon, Flower and Jennilyn Nichols would see a doctor at the University of Chicago to learn whether they could keep Flower, 11, on puberty blockers. (Rodgers and Goldbert, 7/10)

On mental health care —

AP: Judge Holds Washington State In Contempt For Not Providing Services To Mentally Ill People In Jails
A federal judge has found Washington state in contempt and ordered it to pay more than $100 million in fines for failing to provide timely psychiatric services to mentally ill people who are forced to wait in jails for weeks or months. In her order released late Friday, U.S. District Judge Marsha Pechman said the Washington Department of Social and Health Services has been violating the constitutional rights of these people since 2015 due to a “lack of foresight, creativity, planning and timely response to a crisis of its own making.” (Bellisle, 7/8)

North Carolina Health News: Few Treatment Resources Force Kids Into NC's Troubled Child Welfare System
In March 2022, John called the police to his home in Mecklenburg County because his 16-year-old son Paul was experiencing a violent behavioral health episode. John and his wife began fostering Paul and his two younger siblings when Paul was 12 and later adopted all three children. John said child welfare services had been involved in Paul’s life from a young age, and the boy had several behavioral health diagnoses, including ADHD, a disruptive behavior disorder and an attachment disorder. A child with an attachment disorder struggles to form healthy relationships, and they can have trouble regulating their emotions. (Knopf, 7/10)

Billings Gazette: Mentally Ill Patients Fill ER's As Psychiatric Services Drop
Hospitals across the country are stretched beyond capacity caring for more patients with mental illness than ever before. The ongoing closure of crisis services has left many people without access to therapeutic support, making emergency departments (ED) their first point of contact during a mental health crisis. EDs are designed to treat physical traumas and are ill-equipped to provide regular care for people with mental illnesses. The resulting overflow of patients creates a potentially dangerous environment for both patients and staff. (Schabacker, 7/7)

Columbus Dispatch: Mental Health Training For High School Coaches Signed Into State Law
Words that Matt Triplet had waited more than two years to hear finally met his ears shortly after 11 a.m. last Friday. “I think you got a law passed, my friend,” Triplet was told by Eric Weldele, a lobbyist from Columbus-based Capitol Partners. The DeSales boys lacrosse coach’s two-year crusade to mandate mental health training for high school coaches was signed into law Tuesday by Gov. Mike DeWine as part of the state budget, turning what started as House Bill 492 into the first such law in the nation. (Purpura, 7/7)

In other health news from across the U.S. —

KFF Health News: Meet The People Deciding How To Spend $50 Billion In Opioid Settlement Cash
As more than $50 billion makes its way to state and local governments to compensate for the opioid epidemic, people with high hopes for the money are already fighting over a little-known bureaucratic arm of the process: state councils that wield immense power over how the cash is spent. In 14 states, these councils have the ultimate say on the money, which comes from companies that made, distributed, or sold opioid painkillers, including Purdue Pharma, Johnson & Johnson, and Walmart. In 24 other states, plus Washington, D.C., the councils establish budget priorities and make recommendations. Those will affect whether opioid settlement funds go, for example, to improve addiction treatment programs and recovery houses or for more narcotics detectives and prisons. (Pattani, 7/10)

NBC News: Kidney Stones Are Rising Among Kids And Teens, Especially Girls
Experts aren’t sure why more children and teens are developing the condition, but they speculate that a combination of factors are to blame, including diets high in ultraprocessed foods, increased use of antibiotics early in life and climate change causing more cases of dehydration. Doctors who spoke to NBC News said they see more kids with kidney stones in the summer than any other season. (Camero, 7/8)

The New York Times: Antibiotic Shortage Could Fuel Rise In Syphilis Rates 
A new shortage of a type of penicillin crucial to the fight against syphilis is alarming infectious disease experts, who warn that a protracted scarcity of the drug could worsen the U.S. epidemic of the sexually transmitted infection. The shortage, announced by the drugmaker Pfizer in a letter last month, involves Bicillin L-A, a long-acting injectable antibiotic also known as penicillin G benzathine. The company cited significant increases in demand because of the rising rate of syphilis infections, as well as Bicillin’s recent use as an alternative to amoxicillin, another antibiotic that has periodically been scarce and is prescribed for more general infections like strep throat. (Ryan, 7/7)

Fox News: Resistance Training Can Alleviate Alzheimer’s Disease Symptoms, Research Suggests 
Resistance training and physical exercise plays a role in alleviating symptoms of Alzheimer's disease, researchers suggest. An article published in the journal Frontiers in Neuroscience said its beneficial effects serve as a "complementary treatment." (Musto, 7/8)

CNN: A Lack Of Sleep Blocks Brain-Boosting Benefits From Exercise, Study Says
One of the most important ways to keep your body healthy is by exercising — it has been shown to help prevent chronic disease, lengthen life, ward off dementia, slow cognitive decline and much more. However, the amount of sleep you get may be just as important — at least when it comes to the benefits of exercise and how well your brain functions as you age. In a new study, researchers discovered people with more frequent, higher-intensity physical activity who slept less than six hours a night on average had faster overall cognitive decline than short sleepers who exercised infrequently. (LaMotte, 7/6)

Becker's Hospital Review: AI Tool Can Predict A Brain Tumor's Profile Instantly: Study
Identifying the genetic characteristics of a glioma tumor is a process that traditionally takes days or weeks, but a study published July 7 in the journal Med revealed an artificial intelligence tool can predict a tumor's profile almost instantly. The tool, the Cryosection Histopathology Assessment and Review Machine, or CHARM, is a machine-learning algorithm that was trained by researchers showing it sample photos collected during brain surgeries and comparing its work with each respective diagnosis, according to a July 7 report from Bloomberg. (7/7)

The New York Times: Drowning Is No. 1 Killer Of Young Children. U.S. Efforts To Fix It Are Lagging. 
Yadira Salcedo was born in Mexico to parents who did not know how to swim. As a child, she nearly drowned when she waded too deep in a backyard pool. Now a mother of two in Santa Ana, Calif., Ms. Salcedo is “breaking the cycle,” she said, making sure Ezra, 3, and Ian, 1, never experience such terror. The family has qualified for Red Cross scholarships to a new program that teaches children who might not have other chances to learn how to swim. (Baumgaertner, 7/8)

The New York Times: Substance Abuse Is Climbing Among Seniors
Until a few years ago, even as the opioid epidemic raged, health providers and researchers paid limited attention to drug use by older adults; concerns focused on the younger, working-age victims who were hardest hit. But as baby boomers have turned 65, the age at which they typically qualify for Medicare, substance use disorders among the older population have climbed steeply. “Cohorts have habits around drug and alcohol use that they carry through life,” said Keith Humphreys, a psychologist and addiction researcher at the Stanford University School of Medicine. (Span, 7/9)

The Washington Post: When An Older Parent Won't Go To The Doctor, Here's What Experts Advise 
An article in the Journal of Applied Gerontology in 2020 reported that one-fourth of people 65 and older had avoided medical care, based on a sample of 2,155 participants from the 2008 Health Information National Trends Survey. (Neumann, 7/9)

AP: The FDA Is Being Asked To Look Into PRIME, Logan Paul's Energy Drink, Which Has The Caffeine Of 6 Coke Cans 
An influencer-backed energy drink that has earned viral popularity among children is facing scrutiny from lawmakers and health experts over its potentially dangerous levels of caffeine. On Sunday, Sen. Charles Schumer called on the Food and Drug Administration to investigate PRIME, a beverage brand founded by the YouTube stars Logan Paul and KSI that has become something of an obsession among the influencers’ legions of young followers. (Offenhartz, 7/9)

The Star Tribune: Could AA Help More People If It Were Not Christian-Centric?
In the past year, more than 140,000 people in the United States have died from excessive alcohol use. What's a struggling person to do? It's tempting to recommend people attend Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) meetings. (Peg O'Connor, 7/9)

USA Today: Drugs And Untreated Mental Health Issues Are Killing America's Kids. You Can Help Stop It
Every day brings more evidence that our nation’s youth are facing a mental health crisis: rates of depression, anxiety and suicidal thoughts among young people are on the rise, and so are adolescent deaths from drug poisoning. (Dr. Rahul Gupta and Dr. Vivek Murthy, 7/10)

The Washington Post: The Best PTSD Treatment You've Never Heard Of 
All around the conference room in Atlanta last fall, jaws were dropping. Michael Roy, a physician from the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, had just revealed to the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies the preliminary results of a study comparing two treatments for post-traumatic stress disorder: Prolonged Exposure (PE) therapy, long regarded as the “gold standard,” and a novel approach called Reconsolidation of Traumatic Memories or RTM. (Garry Trudeau, 7/10)

The Star Tribune: Wisconsin Legislators Fumble On Vital Vaccine
Meningococcal disease, a serious bacterial infection that can lead to meningitis, is rare but fearsome. The illness can make someone severely ill with terrifying speed, which is especially alarming given that children and teens are at increased risk. (7/9)

Modern Healthcare: Helping Nurses Bridge The Care Complexity Gap
While the ongoing national nursing shortage remains a major challenge for hospitals and healthcare systems, a related issue also requires leaders’ attention: the care complexity gap. (Sammie Mosier, 7/7)

Los Angeles Times: How Susan Love Changed Care For Breast Cancer Patients 
In the end, a lowly tape recorder helped to change the face of breast cancer treatment.Susan Love, who died Sunday at age 75, was in the early 1990s the director of the UCLA Breast Center, which was designed to turn the world of breast cancer treatment on its head. (Karen Stabiner, 7/7)

Chicago Tribune: Supreme Court Justice's Stat About Black Infant Mortality Demands Scrutiny
Last month, when the U.S. Supreme Court decided the case on affirmative action in college admissions, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson issued a stinging dissent that included a litany of harms and injustices that Black citizens have had to endure from the age of slavery until the present. (Cory Franklin, 7/10)

CNN: Why I’m Worried About Malaria In The US
Last week, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced a public health advisory that five cases of locally acquired malaria had been identified in Texas and Florida. The Florida Department of Health has since reported two more cases of locally acquired malaria. Although there are an estimated 2,000 cases of malaria in the US each year, mostly contracted during travel, the news from the CDC marks the first time in over 20 years that the deadly parasite has been found to be acquired locally. (Wierson, 7/7)