First Edition: Wednesday, Dec. 11, 2024

KFF Health News: Former Montana Health Staffer Rebukes Oversight Rules As A Hospital 'Wish List'
A former Montana health department staffer who described himself as the lead author of legislation to scrutinize nonprofit hospitals’ charitable acts said new rules implementing the bill amounted to a hospital “wish list” and that the state needs to go back to the drawing board. The Montana Department of Public Health and Human Services recently adopted the rules outlining how the state will collect data on nonprofit hospitals’ charitable acts with the goal of eventually creating giving standards. That could include benchmarks, such as how much financial aid hospitals must provide patients. (Houghton, 12/11)

KFF Health News: Toxic ‘Forever Chemicals’ Taint Rural California Drinking Water, Far From Known Sources
Juana Valle never imagined she’d be scared to drink water from her tap or eat fresh eggs and walnuts when she bought her 5-acre farm in San Juan Bautista, California, three years ago. Escaping city life and growing her own food was a dream come true for the 52-year-old. Then Valle began to suspect water from her well was making her sick. “Even if everything is organic, it doesn’t matter, if the water underground is not clean,” Valle said. (Norman, 12/11)

KFF Health News: Federal Judge Halts Dreamers’ Brand-New Access To ACA Enrollment In 19 States
A federal judge in North Dakota has ruled in favor of 19 states that challenged a Biden administration rule allowing — for the first time — enrollment in Affordable Care Act coverage by people brought to the U.S. as children without immigration paperwork, known as “Dreamers.” The move effectively bars those who have qualified for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program in those 19 states from enrolling in or getting subsidies for ACA plans. It does not appear to affect enrollment or coverage in other states, lawyers following the case said Tuesday. (Appleby, 12/10)

KFF Health News: Listen To The Latest 'KFF Health News Minute'
This week on the KFF Health News Minute: Leaders often fail to address racial health disparities even when they have data showing they exist, and state programs to import cheaper drugs from Canada are struggling to get off the ground. (12/10)

Stat: Dietary Guidelines Should Stress Plant-Based Foods: Advisory Panel
After nearly two years of review and discussion, scientists charged with advising federal health and agriculture agencies on the next edition of dietary guidelines issued their report Tuesday, clarifying the role of food in health promotion and disease prevention. (Cooney, 12/10)

AP: More Beans And Less Red Meat: Nutrition Experts Weigh In On US Dietary Guidelines
Americans should eat more beans, peas and lentils and cut back on red and processed meats and starchy vegetables, all while continuing to limit added sugars, sodium and saturated fat. That’s the advice released Tuesday by a panel of nutrition experts charged with counseling the U.S. government about the 2025 edition of the dietary guidelines that will form the cornerstone of federal food programs and policy. (Aleccia, 12/10)

Newsweek: Ultra-Processed Food May Lead To Colon Cancer
Ultra-processed food might be driving colon cancer risk by fueling inflammation in the body, according to a study scientists believe could "revolutionize cancer treatment." Scientists in Florida have uncovered a potential link between inflammatory foods in the diet and the growth of tumors in the gut, by analyzing the tumors of people with cancer. (Willmoth, 12/10)

CNN: Most Women In The US Aren’t Accessing Family Planning Services, Even As Abortion Restrictions Grow 
Most women in the United States haven’t received birth control prescriptions or other family planning services in recent years, a new report suggests, even as abortion restrictions have grown. Family planning – including birth control, emergency contraception, sterilization and counseling for these services – is an important part of health care, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (McPhillips, 12/11)

The 19th: Sen. Warren, Democrats Push To Protect Data Privacy Of People Seeking Abortions
Democrats at the federal and state levels are pushing to pass bills protecting sensitive reproductive health data before Republicans take control of key legislative chambers. (Panetta, 12/10)

AP: Idaho's Strict Abortion Ban Faces Scrutiny In Federal Appeals Court Hearing 
A federal appeals court scrutinized the impact of Idaho’s strict abortion ban on emergency medical care on Tuesday, weighing whether the ban criminalizing abortions should be enforceable in life- and health-threatening situations. John Bursch, an attorney with the Alliance Defending Freedom representing Idaho, asked the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel of 11 judges to urgently lift the injunction preventing the state from enforcing its abortion ban in emergency room settings, saying it “harms Idaho sovereignty, harms women, (and) harms unborn children.” (Boone and Ding, 12/11)

AP: US Health Panel Adds Self-Testing Option For Cervical Cancer Screening
Women should have the option of taking their own test samples for cervical cancer screening, an influential health panel said Tuesday. Draft recommendations from the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force are aimed at getting more people screened and spreading the word that women can take their own vaginal samples to check for cancer-causing HPV. Women in their 20s should still get a Pap test every three years. But after that — from age 30 to 65 — women can get an HPV test every five years, the panel said. (Johnson, 12/10)

CNN: HPV Testing Preferred Over Pap For Cervical Cancer Screening Starting At Age 30, Task Force’s Draft Recommendation Says
Testing for high-risk human papillomaviruses every five years – even with a self-collected sample – is the “preferred screening strategy” for cervical cancer starting at age 30, according to a new draft recommendation from the US Preventive Services Task Force. (Howard, 12/10)

Axios: Most Americans Distrust Trump, RFK Jr. On Health: Axios-Ipsos Poll
The public trusts Anthony Fauci more than President-elect Trump and his incoming health team as a source of medical information, according to the latest Axios-Ipsos American Health Index. (Bettelheim, 12/11)

Stat: RFK Jr.'s 'Tough Love' Views Could Bring New Era In Addiction Policy 
Despite the seemingly uncontroversial goal of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to “Make America Healthy Again,” many of his health care stances are deeply divisive: In the last two years alone, he has suggested that Covid-19 was genetically engineered to spare specific ethnicities, stated that radiation from cell phones causes cancer, and doubled down on the long-disproven claim that HIV does not cause AIDS. (Facher, 12/11)

Reuters: Lilly CEO Says Tax And Regulation Reform, Drug Affordability Are Focuses Under Trump
Eli Lilly, CEO David Ricks on Tuesday said at the Economic Club of Washington that tax and regulation reform and drug affordability were some policy focuses for the company in a second Trump administration. President-elect Donald Trump met with Ricks and the chief executive of industry lobbying group PhRMA in Florida last week. It was also reported that Pfizer (PFE.N), CEO Albert Bourla attended. (Wingrove, 12/10)

AP: US Rep. Brett Guthrie Of Kentucky To Lead Panel Overseeing Issues Affecting Daily Lives Of Public
Republican U.S. Rep. Brett Guthrie of Kentucky has secured the chairmanship of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, which wields broad jurisdiction over issues affecting the daily lives of Americans. ... Guthrie’s new role puts him at the forefront of some of the nation’s biggest policy discussions. The Kentucky congressman will lead a committee with jurisdiction over the country’s health care system, energy and environmental policies, consumer safety, and telecommunications and technology innovation. (Schreiner, 12/10)

The Hill: Mitch McConnell Receives Medical Attention After Falling
Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) received medical attention after falling following a Republican lunch meeting Tuesday. A spokesman for McConnell said the GOP leader tripped after the lunch. “He sustained a minor cut to the face and sprained his wrist. He has been cleared to resume his schedule,” the aide said in a statement. McConnell was later seen at the Capitol with a brace on one wrist and a bandage on his face. Asked by reporters how he was feeling, McConnell responded, “good.” (Bolton and Weaver, 12/10)

Modern Healthcare: PBM, Telehealth Bills See Last-Minute Push Into Spending Bill
Lawmakers and advocates are making a last-ditch effort to include pharmacy benefit manger-focused provisions and other legislation in year-end government funding bills, as a flurry of activity targets telehealth measures. Some of the items under consideration were part of a proposal leaked to lobbyists and reporters last week, including a possible three-year extension of expiring telehealth authorities in Medicare. But PBM legislation was not floated as part of the deal, and proponents inside and outside of Congress are pushing to bring those bills to the forefront. (McAuliff, 12/10)

Reuters: WHO's Tedros Confident Of Finalising Pandemic Treaty In 2025
The World Health Organization chief on Tuesday voiced confidence that states could finalise a pandemic agreement by May 2025, despite questions about whether the administration of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump will support it. The WHO's 194 member states have been negotiating for two years on an agreement that could increase collaboration before and during pandemics after acknowledged failures during COVID-19. (12/10)

CIDRAP: Genetic Analysis Finds H5N1 In California Child Most Similar To Cattle Genotype
Though virus RNA levels in the sample from a California child whose H5N1 avian flu infection was reported in November weren’t enough for complete sequencing, complex analysis was able determine that is most closely resembles the B3.13 genotype found in cattle, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said today in a technical update. In other developments, the CDC said yesterday that follow-up testing didn’t confirm two recent cases from Arizona as H5 infections, though they are classified as probable cases. (Schnirring, 12/10)

Fortune Well: Here’s What You Need To Know About Norovirus, The Highly Contagious ‘Winter Vomiting Disease’
It’s that time of year again, when the misery of norovirus strikes much of the U.S. Each year the pathogen causes an average of 900 deaths, 109,000 hospitalizations, 465,000 emergency room visits, and 19 to 21 million illnesses, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The agency reports national norovirus trends as three-week moving averages of positive test rates. So far in the 2024–25 season, infections peaked the week of Nov. 30, 2024, at 17.06% positivity. (Prater, 12/11)

Newsweek: 800 Million People Living With STIs, Researchers Say
Around one in every five people aged below 50 around the world is infected with incurable genital herpes, researchers have newly estimated. According to a new paper in the journal Sexually Transmitted Infections, 846 million people worldwide are genitally infected with the herpes simplex virus—which causes both genital and oral herpes—with 42 million new cases in 2020 alone. During the same year, the researchers predict that over 200 million 15 to 49-year-olds likely had at least one outbreak of the infection. (Thomson, 12/10)

Axios: Gene Tied To Risk For Breast Cancer Spread Identified
Some breast cancer patients are at higher risk of having their disease spread elsewhere in their body because of an inherited genetic predisposition, researchers reported in Cell. The vast majority of cancer deaths stem from the spread of cancer, rather than issues associated with the initial tumor. (Reed and Goldman, 12/11)

Stat: Promising BioNTech Data On Triple Negative Breast Cancer Treatment
New data suggests researchers may have found one of their most promising candidates yet for the next generation in immunotherapy drugs — bispecific antibodies targeting two key proteins in cancer, PD1 or PD-L1 and VEGF. (Chen, 12/10)

CIDRAP: Studies Describe Vaccine Efficacy Against Long COVID
Two new large studies, one based on outcomes among US children and teens and the other on adults in Japan, show COVID-19 vaccines are protective against long COVID. Both studies were conducted when the Omicron strain of the virus was dominant, with the first also assessing the Delta variant. (Soucheray, 12/10)

CIDRAP: Study Links Low Socioeconomic Status To Severe Disease In Hospitalized Flu Patients
Socially vulnerable adults hospitalized for influenza required invasive mechanical ventilation and/or extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) support at greater rates than their higher-income counterparts during five respiratory virus seasons in the United States, concludes a study published in JAMA Network Open. (Van Beusekom, 12/10)

CIDRAP: Novel Strain Of Extensively Drug-Resistant Shigella Identified In Los Angeles
A paper published yesterday in the American Journal of Infection Control describes a small cluster of extensively drug-resistant (XDR) Shigella cases in California. The three cases of XDR Shigella sonnei were identified in men who have sex with men (MSM) in Los Angeles who all presented with symptoms within 3 months of one another in 2023. All three men had reported histories of high-risk sexual behavior, and one was HIV-positive. (Dall, 12/10)

Reuters: Siga's Mpox Drug Did Not Improve Lesion Resolution Or Pain, NIH Study Finds
Siga Technologies' (SIGA.O) antiviral drug did not reduce the time to lesion resolution or have an effect on pain among adults affected by the clade II strain of mpox, according to a U.S. National Institutes of Health study published on Tuesday. A data safety and monitoring board recommended stopping further enrollment of patients in the study based on the interim results. (12/10)

CIDRAP: Data: Rotavirus Vaccine Benefits NICU Babies, With Disease Spread Rare
Transmission of vaccine-strain rotavirus was uncommon and had no clinical consequences in a US neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) that routinely administers the live pentavalent (five-strain; RV5) rotavirus vaccine, a report published yesterday in Pediatrics suggests. (Van Beusekom, 12/10)

Newsweek: Want To Live To 100? 'Superagers' Stem Cell Research Could Make It Possible
Stem cells have been taken from the blood of 'superagers' – people aged 100 or more - and reprogrammed so that they are again capable of becoming any cell type in the body in research that could open the door to a better understanding of how cells age, and how some of us become more resistant to diseases of aging such as Alzheimer's. (Duke, 12/10)

Politico: Detecting Alzheimer’s Faster
Early detection is vital to treating Alzheimer’s disease — and AI could help doctors make the diagnosis faster. What now? A $2.35 million NIH grant to train Arizona State University doctoral students to build artificial intelligence-backed tools to diagnose and treat neurodegenerative diseases is the agency’s latest contribution to the fight. The project will connect molecular scientists, AI experts and local research institutions like Mayo Clinic with students to develop AI medical imaging technology. (Svirnovskiy, Reader and Paun, 12/10)

Stat: Eli Lilly To Test Obesity Medications As Treatments For Alcohol And Drug Addiction
Eli Lilly, the company that makes the blockbuster weight loss treatment Zepbound, will start studying its obesity products as treatments for alcohol and drug abuse, making it the first major drugmaker to do so, CEO David Ricks said Tuesday. (Chen, 12/10)

Modern Healthcare: Walgreens May Be Sold To Private Equity Firm Sycamore Partners
Walgreens is reportedly in talks to sell itself to private equity firm Sycamore Partners. Walgreens and Sycamore have been discussing a deal that could close in early 2025, according to a Tuesday report from the Wall Street Journal, which cited people familiar with the matter. The deal would take Walgreens off the public market. (Hudson, 12/10)

CNN: Federal Judge Blocks Kroger’s $25 Billion Mega-Merger With Albertsons 
A federal judge in Oregon blocked Kroger’s proposed $25 billion tie-up with Albertsons, ruling that the largest merger in US supermarket history would limit competition and harm consumers. The ruling is a major setback for the chains and puts the merger’s likelihood in jeopardy. The judge issued a preliminary injunction halting the deal, which the companies can appeal. (Meyersohn, 12/10)

The Wall Street Journal: CarePoint Creditors, Regulator Seek To Oust Directors From Rival Hospital Operator
Creditors of CarePoint Health and its New Jersey regulator are seeking to remove three board members affiliated with Hudson Regional Hospital, a competing hospital operator that has proposed taking over the CarePoint hospitals out of bankruptcy. The three individuals, employed by Hudson Regional, can’t sit on CarePoint’s board while providing loans to the hospital operator and attempting to acquire its assets. ... These roles pose insurmountable conflicts of interest, the objecting lawyers said. (Biswas, 12/10)

Modern Healthcare: Siemens Buys Advanced Accelerator Applications Molecular Imaging
Siemens Healthineers has finalized its deal to purchase radiopharmaceutical company Advanced Accelerator Applications Molecular Imaging from Novartis, the company announced Tuesday. The property, which Siemens renamed Advanced Accelerator Applications, manufactures and distributes diagnostic radiopharmaceuticals for positron emission tomography scans. The Siemens Healthineers-Novartis deal is worth $224 million, Reuters reported. (Dubinsky, 12/10)

Modern Healthcare: How AI Can Cut Hospital Expenses, Increase Revenue
Health systems are using artificial intelligence to get patients in and out of the hospital quicker, increase capacity and hone staffing levels. Cleveland Clinic, OhioHealth and UCHealth are among the many systems using predictive analytics and machine learning to try to run hospitals more efficiently, cut down on unnecessary expenses, increase revenue and improve the patient experience, executives said. Much of the cost savings stem from reallocating nurses to different departments based on demand, and revenue increases come from treating more patients. (Kacik, 12/10)

CBS News: Michigan Legislature To Consider Ban On Flavored Tobacco
Flavored tobacco that can be found in vapes and e-cigarettes has become incredibly popular among young populations, and the Michigan Legislature is using one of its waning session days to consider banning them. A package of seven bills were approved for consideration by the full state House on Tuesday afternoon. The bills would also change advertising, licensing, criminal penalties for possessing tobacco as a minor, and local ordinances among other reforms. (Meyers, 12/10)

CBS News: Families On Edge As Colorado Recommends Rate Cuts To Providers Of Critical Autism Therapy
Colorado residents Karmen Peak and her husband have two children, both who she says are thriving because of their access to a critical autism therapy. "What the staff members are doing at my kids' center is life-changing for my kids," Peak said. She started fighting to maintain that access last summer and came to CBS Colorado after her family lost care. (Morfitt, 12/10)