First Edition: Tuesday, April 8, 2025

KFF HEALTH NEWS ORIGINAL STORIES

KFF Health News: For Opioid Victims, Payouts Fall Short While Governments Reap Millions 
Christopher Julian’s opioid journey is familiar to many Americans. He was prescribed painkillers as a teenager for a series of sports injuries. He said the doctor never warned him they could be addictive. Julian didn’t learn that fact until years later, when he was cut off and began suffering withdrawal symptoms. At that point, he started siphoning pills from family members and buying them from others in his southern Maine community. After his brother died of brain cancer in 2011, Julian used opioids to cope with more than physical pain. (Pattani with Zuraw and Larweh, 4/8)

KFF Health News: Rural Hospitals Question Whether They Can Afford Medicare Advantage Contracts
Rural hospital leaders are questioning whether they can continue to afford to do business with Medicare Advantage companies, and some say the only way to maintain services and protect patients is to end their contracts with the private insurers. Medicare Advantage plans pay hospitals lower rates than traditional Medicare, said Jason Merkley, CEO of Brookings Health System in South Dakota. Merkley worried the losses would spark staff layoffs and cuts to patient services. So last year, Brookings Health dropped all four contracts it had with major Medicare Advantage companies. (Zionts, 4/8)

KFF Health News: Public Health Risks Of Urban Wildfire Smoke Prompt Push For More Monitoring
When the catastrophic Los Angeles fires broke out, John Volckens suspected firefighters and residents were breathing toxic air from the burning homes, buildings, and cars, but it was unclear how much risk the public faced. So, the professor of environmental health at Colorado State University devised a plan to get answers. Volckens shipped 10 air pollution detectors to Los Angeles to measure the amounts of heavy metals, benzene, and other chemicals released by the flames, which burned more than 16,000 homes, businesses, and other structures, making it one of the country’s costliest natural disasters. (Gammon, 4/8)

KFF Health News: Firings At Federal Health Agencies Decimate Offices That Release Public Records
Public access to government records that document the handling of illnesses, faulty products, and safety lapses at health facilities will slow after mass firings at the federal Department of Health and Human Services swept out staff members responsible for releasing records, according to transparency advocates and health experts. HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s layoffs across health agencies in recent days eliminated workers who handled Freedom of Information Act requests at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and cut FOIA staff at the FDA and the National Institutes of Health. (Pradhan and Kelman, 4/7)

The New York Times: Kennedy Calls For States To Ban Fluoridated Drinking Water
Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. kicked off a tour through southwestern states on Monday by calling on states to ban fluoride in drinking water supplies, a move that would reverse what some medical experts consider one of the most important public health practices in the country’s history. The announcement came at a news conference in Utah, the first state to enact such a ban into law. The state’s new law is set to take effect in early May, despite concerns from public health experts who consider fluoridation of water core to preventing tooth decay. (Baumgaertner Nunn, 4/7)

CNN: HHS, EPA To Study Fluoride In Drinking Water As RFK Jr. Says He’ll Tell CDC To Stop Recommending It 
The US Department of Health and Human Services said Monday that it is reconvening the Community Preventative Services Task Force, an independent panel of public health and prevention experts, “to study and make a new recommendation on fluoride.” (Christensen and McPhillips, 4/7)

RESTRUCTURING OF HHS

The Hill: How Kennedy’s Cuts To HHS Could Curb ‘MAHA’ Agenda
Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and the Department of Government Efficiency are reshaping the U.S. health care system, starting with deep cuts to the agencies Kennedy now leads. Kennedy and his allies argue such moves are needed to change federal culture and improve efficiency in the name of long-term health improvements. But critics question how Kennedy’s “Make America Healthy Again,” or MAHA, movement can be successful with a weakened federal health department. (Weixel, 4/7)

Stat: RFK Jr.'s Senate Hearing On Health Department Cuts To Be Delayed For Weeks
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. will likely delay his appearance before the Senate’s health committee by several weeks, even as he makes historic changes to the Department of Health and Human Services and contends with a surging measles outbreak. (Payne and Wilkerson, 4/7)

Stat: Entire Chronic Pain Research Division Eliminated In NIH Layoffs 
Last week’s layoffs across the Department of Health and Human Services left a significant casualty in the vast ecosystem of government-backed science: an entire division focused on researching pain. (Facher, 4/8)

NPR: HHS Guts Sexual Violence Prevention Division, Leaving Local Efforts Adrift
April 1 was the first day of Sexual Assault Awareness Month. It's also the day the Department of Health And Human Services fired the teams that work on sexual violence prevention. The layoffs were part of a round of dramatic cuts to the federal health agencies, amid the Trump administration and Elon Musk's efforts to shrink the federal workforce. (Simmons-Duffin, 4/8)

Fierce Healthcare: CHAI Embarks On Post-Deployment Monitoring For AI As FDA Lags
In the absence of a federal framework to monitor the impact of artificial intelligence in the clinic, the Coalition for Health AI (CHAI) is stepping in on post-deployment oversight. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) lacks the capability to assess how models are performing in the real world after they are authorized for use by the agency. The failure to monitor AI products in the post-deployment phase has been a major hurdle for the industry to adopt AI. (Beavins, 4/7)

MEASLES

CBS News: CDC Redeploys To Texas Measles Outbreak After Layoffs, As RFK Jr. Calls Vaccine "Most Effective Way" To Stop Spread
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has begun redeploying staff to respond to the deadly outbreak of measles in Texas, a spokesperson said Monday, a week after steep layoffs at the agency impacted its response to the spread of the virus. "A team of three deployed yesterday to meet with county and state officials to assess the immediate needs to respond to this outbreak. The team is meeting with officials again today," CDC spokesperson Jason McDonald said in an email. (Tin, 4/7)

Bloomberg: Measles Outbreak: Health Officials Alarmed RFK Jr. Sowing Confusion On Vaccine
Health officials across the US are increasingly concerned that Robert F. Kennedy Jr., head of the federal health department, is sowing confusion about the effectiveness of the measles vaccine amid an outbreak that has left two unvaccinated children in Texas dead. On Sunday, in a post on X disclosing the latest death, Kennedy wrote that “the most effective way to prevent the spread of measles is the MMR vaccine,” marking his clearest endorsement of the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine to date. (Garde, 4/7)

The Washington Post: Trump Has Faced Measles Before. The Difference This Time Is RFK Jr.
Six years ago, as measles outbreaks cropped up across the country, President Donald Trump was asked what parents should do. “They have to get the shots,” he said. “The vaccinations are so important.” On Sunday, Trump was asked about the growing measles outbreak in Texas and New Mexico. “It’s so far a fairly small number of people,” he said, though the outbreaks were similar in size at the time of both interviews. “This is not something new.” (Weber, Sun, Nirappil and Roubein, 4/8)

CNN: Response To Multistate Measles Outbreak Hampered By Unique Set Of Challenges 
 The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is on the ground in Texas for the second time this year, as an ongoing multistate measles outbreak centered in the western part of the state has grown to one of the worst the United States has seen in decades. (McPhillips, Mukherjee and Tirrell, 4/7)

Newsweek: New York State Issues Travel Advisory For 11 Countries
New York State Department of Health officials are cautioning residents to be vaccinated when traveling domestically and abroad to avoid contracting the measles amid an uptick in national cases. Measles cases across the United States by March 26 had already eclipsed the total number of viruses contracted from the disease the entire 2024 calendar year, according to New York state health officials. (Mordowanec, 4/7)

VACCINES

The Hill: Former Top Vaccine Regulator Says He Blocked RFK Jr. Team From Database
A former top official at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said he blocked members of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s team from directly accessing a vaccine database over concerns they would rewrite or erase the stored information. Peter Marks, who headed the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research before being ousted in March, told The Associated Press in an interview published Monday that he agreed to allow Kennedy’s associates to read reports from the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) but refused to allow them to directly edit the information. (Choi, 4/7)

AP: Army Reenlists Nearly Two Dozen Soldiers Ousted For Refusing COVID-19 Vaccine
The Army has reenlisted more than 23 soldiers who were discharged for refusing the COVID-19 vaccine, officials said Monday, rushing to implement President Donald Trump’s order that troops be rehired and given back pay. Three people rejoined active duty Army service, and more than 20 came back either to the National Guard or the Reserve, the Army said. The soldiers have signed their contracts and were sworn in, and the active duty troops were reporting to their units, the Army said. (Baldor, 4/7)

MEDICARE AND MEDICAID

The Wall Street Journal: Private Medicare Plans To Get Big Payment Boost From Trump Administration
The Trump administration will substantially increase payment rates for Medicare insurers next year, generating more than $25 billion in additional revenue for the industry and doubling the boost proposed in January. The rate increase of 5.06%, compared with 2.23% in the earlier proposal from the Biden administration, overshoots even optimistic expectations from many Wall Street analysts, and will likely lead to a rally in the shares of big Medicare insurers such as UnitedHealth Group, Humana and CVS Health, parent of Aetna. (Wilde Mathews, 4/7)

Stat: Republicans Are Proud Of Creating Medicare Advantage. Now Some Are Urging Reform Amid Runaway Costs
Republicans in Congress, long an unwavering source of support for privatized Medicare plans, are increasingly calling for reforms amid widespread evidence that health insurers are abusing the system to collect billions of dollars in unwarranted payments. (Ross, Bannow, Herman and Lawrence, 4/8)

Stat: Study Shows How UnitedHealth Uses Coding To Rake In Extra Cash From Medicare Advantage 
Health insurers in the private Medicare business have a big incentive to diagnose their members with lots of health conditions: The government pays them more money. A new study shows the extent to which the biggest player in that business, UnitedHealth Group, stands out from the rest for its prowess at raking in extra cash from that program. (Bannow, 4/7)

Modern Healthcare: What The Senate Budget Resolution Means For Medicaid Cuts
Congressional Republicans agree that cutting taxes is their top priority, but the House and Senate have diverged on how, and how much, to cut Medicaid. The Senate approved a budget resolution in the early hours of Saturday that calls for $4 billion in spending cuts to offset a small portion of the $5.8 trillion cost for the tax cuts. By contrast, the House-passed budget resolution seeks at least $1.5 trillion in spending reductions including $880 billion from the Energy and Commerce Committee, which has jurisdiction over Medicaid. (McAuliff, 4/7)

NURSING HOMES AND ELDER CARE

Modern Healthcare: Nursing Home Staffing Mandate Struck Down By Federal Judge
A federal judge in Texas late Monday blocked a federal nursing homes staffing mandate former President Joe Biden's administration rolled out last year. United States District Court for the Northern District of Texas Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk said in his decision the Health and Human Services Department did not have the authority to go beyond laws passed by Congress governing nursing homes staffing. (Eastabrook, 4/7)

Modern Healthcare: HHS Restructuring Leaves PACE Operators Uncertain Over Growth
A government reorganization of a program aimed at keeping older adults out of nursing homes is raising concerns that changes could hamper the program's growth. Some organizations that offer Programs of All-Inclusive Care for Elderly worry changes in how Health and Human Services Department plans to manage PACE could make it more difficult to launch new programs and enroll participants. (Eastabrook, 4/7)

The New York Times: Why Cameras Are Popping Up In Eldercare Facilities
The assisted-living facility in Edina, Minn., where Jean H. Peters and her siblings moved their mother in 2011, looked lovely. “But then you start uncovering things,” Ms. Peters said. Her mother, Jackie Hourigan, widowed and developing memory problems at 82, too often was still in bed when her children came to see her in mid-morning. ... Most ominously, Ms. Peters said, “we noticed bruises on her arm that we couldn’t account for.” Complaints to administrators — in person, by phone and by email — brought “tons of excuses.” (Span, 4/7)

REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH

The New York Times: New Study Links Diabetes During Pregnancy To Greater A.D.H.D. Risk In Children 
Maternal diabetes, a pregnancy complication that can affect up to a third of women globally, is linked with a higher risk of neurodevelopmental issues in children, a large new study found. The study, which was published in the journal Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology on Monday, adds to a growing body of evidence that ties maternal diabetes to a range of health complications for both the mother and the child. (Gupta and Agrawal, 4/7)

Stat: Abortion Opponents Expect Reversal Of Biden Policy Allowing The Procedure At VA Facilities
Abortion opponents believe that a repeal is in the works for a Biden administration policy allowing abortions for veterans and their dependents in limited circumstances at Department of Veterans Affairs medical facilities. (Wilkerson, 4/7)

HEALTH CARE INDUSTRY

Bloomberg: CVS CFO Thomas Cowhey Leaving As Pharmacy Chain Faces Activist Investor
CVS Health Corp.’s chief financial officer plans to leave his post as new Chief Executive Officer David Joyner charts a path forward for the health-care conglomerate. Thomas Cowhey, the current CFO, will leave the position, according to people familiar with the situation. The timing of his departure is unclear. A spokesperson for CVS declined to comment. (Swetlitz, 4/8)

Modern Healthcare: Envision Healthcare Layoffs To Affect 120 Employees
Staffing company Envision Healthcare plans to lay off 120 employees at its subsidiaries by May 31 due to the end of its contract with San Antonio-based Baptist Health System. The cuts are expected to affect physicians, nurse practitioners, practice coordinators and clinical operations specialists at Envision Physician Services, Questcare Hospitals and Questcare Matrix, according to an April 1 letter accompanying the company's Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification filing. (DeSilva, 4/7)

AP: Health Systems Using 'Zero Suicide Model' See Fewer Attempts
Health care systems can reduce suicides through patient screening, safety planning and mental health counseling, a new study suggests, an important finding as the U.S. confronts it 11th leading cause of death. The “Zero Suicide Model” was developed in 2001 at Detroit-based Henry Ford Health, where the focus on people considering suicide included collaborating with patients to reduce their access to lethal means such as firearms and then following up with treatment. (Johnson, 4/7)

CIDRAP: Study Highlights Hidden Spread Of C Diff In ICUs
A new study by researchers at the University of Utah suggests one of the most common healthcare-associated infections (HAIs) spreads more widely in intensive care units (ICUs) than previously understood. The findings, published last week in JAMA Network Open, are based on genomic analysis of Clostridium difficile isolates collected from two ICUs in Utah in 2018. (Dall, 4/7)

PUBLIC HEALTH

NBC News: Invasive Strep Infections Have More Than Doubled In The U.S., CDC Study Finds
Severe, possibly life-threatening strep infections are rising in the United States. The number of invasive group A strep infections more than doubled from 2013 to 2022, according to a study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention published Monday in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Prior to that, rates of invasive strep had been stable for 17 years. Invasive group A strep occurs when bacteria spread to areas of the body that are normally germ-free, such as the lungs or bloodstream. (Bendix, 4/7)

Newsweek: Scientists Find MRI Scans Could Leave Toxic Metal Behind In Your Body
A new study has found why MRI scans may leave harmful metals behind in a person's body. The University of New Mexico (UNM) study explored health risks caused by toxic rare earth metal gadolinium, which is used in MRI imaging. Gadolinium-based contrast agents, which create sharper images of the scan, are injected into the body before an MRI to explore any potential issues in the body. (O'Connor, 4/7)

MedPage Today: Comorbidities In Midlife Tied To Cancer Risk
Comorbidities in midlife were associated with a modestly higher risk of cancer overall and more strongly associated with a risk for multiple individual cancer types, according to a secondary analysis of the prospective Prostate, Lung, Colorectal, and Ovarian (PLCO) screening trial. ... None of the other comorbidity classifications (gastrointestinal, liver, and metabolic) had a significant association with the risk of cancer overall. (Bassett, 4/7)

CNN: ‘Amazing’ Reduction In Alzheimer’s Risk Verified By Blood Markers, Study Says 
The preliminary data, presented Monday at the American Academy of Neurology annual meeting in San Diego, analyzed biomarkers on 54 participants in an ongoing preventive neurology study called the Biorepository Study for Neurodegenerative Diseases, or BioRAND. (LaMotte, 4/7)