First Edition: Friday, April 18, 2025

KFF HEALTH NEWS ORIGINAL STORIES

KFF Health News: Covid Worsened Shortages Of Doctors And Nurses. Five Years On, Rural Hospitals Still Struggle
Even by rural hospital standards, Keokuk County Hospital and Clinics in southeastern Iowa is small. The 14-bed hospital, in Sigourney, doesn’t do surgeries or deliver babies. The small 24-hour emergency room is overseen by two full-time doctors. CEO Matt Ives wants to hire a third doctor, but he said finding physicians for a rural area has been challenging since the covid-19 pandemic. He said several physicians at his hospital have retired since the start of the pandemic, and others have decided to stop practicing certain types of care, particularly emergency care. (Krebs, 4/18)

KFF Health News: Watch: Why Insurance Companies Are Denying Coverage For Prosthetic Limbs
Although knee replacements are usually covered by health insurance, amputees face roadblocks to coverage and often must prove their prosthetics are medically necessary. (Andrews, 4/18)

KFF Health News: KFF Health News’ ‘What The Health?’: On Autism, It’s The Secretary’s Word Vs. CDC’s
Tensions between Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and his employees at the Department of Health and Human Services are mounting, as he made a series of claims about autism this week — contradicting his agency’s findings. Plus, President Donald Trump unveiled an executive order to lower drug prices as his administration explores tariffs that could raise them. (Rovner, 4/17)

GUN VIOLENCE AND MENTAL HEALTH

CBS News: 2 Dead, 6 Injured After Shooting At FSU. Here's Everything That We Know. 
According to Leon County Sheriff Walt McNeil, the 20-year-old suspect is the son of one of his deputies, saying his mother has been with the force for 18 years and that he was involved in the sheriff's office programs. The shooter also used his mother's former service weapon — now a personal handgun — which was found at the scene. "Not a surprise to us that he had access to weapons," McNeil said. According to Revell, the shooter also had a shotgun with him during the shooting but could not confirm whether it was used. (Geisel, 4/17)

ABC News: What To Know About Phoenix Ikner: Alleged FSU Gunman And Stepson Of Sheriff's Deputy
Twenty-year-old Phoenix Ikner was previously at the center of a protracted battle between his parents that featured a custody dispute stretching from the Florida panhandle to Norway, according to court documents. At the time of the custody dispute, the suspect was a child and was known as Christian Gunnar Eriksen. Christian was taken by his biological mother to Norway in March 2015 in violation of a child custody order, according to a 2015 probable cause affidavit from the Leon County Sheriff's Office. ... "Mr. Ikner advised that Christian has developmental delays and has special needs which he feared would not be taken care of without access to his doctors here in the United States." The sheriff's affidavit said the child was on medication for "several health and mental issues, to include a growth hormone disorder and ADHD." (Sarnoff, Shapiro, Katersky, Thomas, Margolin and Kofsky, 4/18)

The New York Times: Several FSU Students Also Endured Parkland School Shooting 
It was not the first time some of them had barricaded themselves in a room at school. The sight of law enforcement officers in tactical gear, sweeping campus for a gunman, was familiar. So was the fear for several students who sheltered in place during Thursday’s deadly shooting at Florida State University and shared a traumatizing coincidence: They had endured the Parkland, Fla., school massacre in 2018. (Vigdor and Hassan, 4/17)

Bloomberg: Luigi Mangione Indicted On Federal Murder Charges In Shooting Of Brian Thompson
Luigi Mangione was indicted on federal murder charges in the shooting of a UnitedHealth Group Inc. executive, paving the way for US prosecutors to pursue the death penalty against him. Mangione’s federal case has now been assigned to a US judge, who will rule on disputes in the case and oversee a trial. Mangione has separately been charged by New York state prosecutors with Brian Thompson’s murder and awaits trial. (Hurtado, Van Voris, and Voreacos, 4/17)

FEDERAL BUDGET CUTS AND FUNDING FREEZE

The Washington Post: DOGE Pauses Health-Care Grants, Freezing Payments For Review
The U.S. DOGE Service is putting new curbs on billions of dollars in federal health-care grants, requiring government officials to manually review and approve previously routine payments — and paralyzing grant awards to tens of thousands of organizations, according to 12 people familiar with the new arrangements. The effort, which DOGE has dubbed “Defend the Spend,” has left thousands of payments backed up, including funding for doctors’ and nurses’ salaries at federal health centers for the poor. Some grantees are waiting on payments they expected last week. (Diamond, Johnson and Natanson, 4/17)

Modern Healthcare: Draft White House Budget Expands Hospital Cost Report Auditing
Health systems would be subject to greater oversight under a White House proposal to expand hospital cost report audits. The White House Office of Management and Budget is seeking information from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services as it weighs whether to increase funding for hospital cost report auditing, according to a leaked draft of its fiscal 2026 budget plan, dated April 10. (Early, 4/17)

CBS News: FDA Making Plans To End Its Routine Food Safety Inspections, Sources Say
The Food and Drug Administration is drawing up plans that would end most of its routine food safety inspections work, multiple federal health officials tell CBS News, and effectively outsource this oversight to state and local authorities. The plans have not been finalized and might need congressional action to fully fund, said the officials, who were not authorized to speak publicly. Andrew Nixon, a spokesperson for the Department of Health and Human Services, denied that the FDA was making plans to do this. (Tin, 4/17)

Stat: Makary Says FDA Will Remove Pharma Representatives From Advisory Panels
The Food and Drug Administration will remove industry representatives from advisory committees and replace them with patients and caregivers, Commissioner Marty Makary announced Thursday. (Wilkerson, 4/17)

Stat: Big Changes Coming To Federal Health IT Regulator?
Buried in a leaked draft budget from the Trump administration is an ask that may alarm (or elate?) health tech watchers. The administration is proposing to create a new office of the chief technology officer within the federal health department that would house the Assistant Secretary for Technology Policy, the department’s health IT regulator, and an “Office of Chief Information.” Under the proposal, ASTP would be funded with $9 million,  compared to the $66 million appropriated in the 2023 budget. (Aguilar, 4/17)

Stat: Health Care Industry, Worried Millions Could Lose ACA Insurance, Pushes To Trump To Delay Changes
Hospitals, health insurers, and insurance agents are asking President Trump to pump the brakes on a regulation that would lead to potentially millions of people losing their health insurance. (Herman, 4/18)

AP: Federal Judge In Baltimore Temporarily Limits DOGE Access To Social Security Data
A federal judge on Thursday imposed new restrictions on billionaire Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, limiting its access to Social Security systems that hold personal data on millions of Americans. U.S. District Judge Ellen Hollander issued a preliminary injunction in the case, which was brought by a group of labor unions and retirees who allege DOGE’s recent actions violate privacy laws and present massive information security risks. Hollander had previously issued a temporary restraining order. (Skene, 4/18)

AUTISM

The Washington Post: RFK Jr. Said Autistic People Don’t Work Or Play Sports. They Say He’s Wrong.
Autistic people and their loved ones have swiftly and publicly rejected statements by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the nation’s top health official, that people with autism will never play baseball, date, pay taxes or have a job. They say the health and human services secretary’s comments Wednesday, during his first official news conference, misstate the capabilities of many people with autism — and they flooded social media with counterexamples. (Somasundaram, 4/17)

The Hill: Maxwell Frost Chides RFK Jr. Over 'Disrespectful' Rhetoric Around Autism
Rep. Maxwell Frost (D-Fla.) criticized Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for comments he made Wednesday about autism. ... “This is disrespectful and a flat out lie that further stigmatizes autism. It’s not a virus or a disease – it’s a neurological condition with a wide spectrum. Many Americans with autism work, pay taxes, and are living happy and healthy lives,” Frost said in his post. (Suter, 4/17)

MEASLES

CBS News: CDC Scraps Plan To Help Texas Schools Curb Measles Over Layoffs, Employee Says
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has scrapped a plan to offer help curbing measles in Texas schools after some staff working on the agency's response to this year's record outbreak of the virus were warned they could face layoffs, an agency employee said. CDC officials had initially weighed expanding a service they had been offering to hospitals in Texas — onsite assessments to root out how errors in ventilation and air filtration could be enabling spread of the virus – to other kinds of facilities like schools as well. (Tin, 4/17)

The New York Times: Measles Outbreaks In Canada And Mexico Bring Grim Prognosis
As the United States struggles to contain a resurgence of measles that has swept through swaths of the Southwest, neighboring countries are responding to their own outbreaks. Canada has reported more than 730 cases this year, making this one of the worst measles outbreaks in the country since it declared the virus “eliminated” in 1998. Mexico has seen at least 360 measles cases and one death, most of them in the northern state of Chihuahua, according to Mexican health authorities. (Rosenbluth, 4/17)

REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH

Bloomberg: Google’s AI Summaries Echo Anti-Abortion Messaging, Report Finds
Google’s AI summaries have responded to some internet searches about abortion by echoing talking points from organizations that attempt to dissuade women from ending their pregnancies, according to a Campaign for Accountability report. In a series of searches conducted in three states that require women to have an ultrasound before undergoing an abortion — Arizona, Florida and Wisconsin — the nonprofit group found that Google’s AI Overviews framed the scans as a way for women to make informed choices about their health and cited pages from crisis pregnancy centers as sources for the summaries. (Love and Alba, 4/17)

MedPage Today: Clinicians Worry About Loss Of A Critical CDC Contraceptive Guideline
The team behind CDC's U.S. Medical Eligibility Criteria for Contraceptive Use (MEC) was another casualty in the mass layoffs at HHS -- and clinicians worry what losing this critical guideline will mean for patient care. The MEC details the safety of contraceptive types for people with different medical conditions, and was run by a slim eight-person team. The latest MEC guidelines and companion practice recommendations were released in August 2024. (Robertson, 4/17)

The CT Mirror: Freeze On $1.8M In Planned Parenthood Funds Affects 14 CT Sites
Fourteen Planned Parenthood sites in Connecticut are affected by a temporary freeze on $1.8 million in federal funding. Planned Parenthood of Southern New England, which also has one location in Rhode Island, found out about the pause on March 31. (Ingram, 4/17)

HEALTH CARE INDUSTRY

Modern Healthcare: Ohio, West Virginia Hospitals Form Clinically Integrated Network
More than two dozen rural hospitals in Ohio and West Virginia formed a clinically integrated network, which providers are increasingly turning to instead of health system-led acquisitions. The Ohio High Value Network, announced Thursday, is a 26-hospital collaboration designed to provide the purchasing power, patient volume and clinical expertise needed to reduce costs, reinforce alternative payment models and boost care quality. Similar coalitions formed in Minnesota and North Dakota over the past two years. (Kacik, 4/17)

Modern Healthcare: Where Ascension Is Selling Hospitals, Investing New Resources
Ascension has sold dozens of facilities over the past few years to streamline its sprawling footprint, and now it may be turning into a buyer. Ascension announced two deals this month that would expand its clout in two southern states. Last week, the health system said it formed a joint venture with startup PathPoint Health to open two Tennessee centers that would treat metabolic conditions such as diabetes and obesity, with additional sites planned. On Tuesday, Ascension said it would take full ownership of Cedar Park Regional Medical Center in Cedar Park, Texas, for $460 million. (Hudson, 4/17)

Bloomberg: Morgan Stanley Hires Senior Health-Care Banker David Kostel
Morgan Stanley has hired senior dealmaker David Kostel as the vice chairman of its health-care investment banking group, people familiar with the matter said. Kostel, who had previously been global co-head of coverage and global head of health care at UBS Group AG, will join the Wall Street firm next month and will be based in New York, the people said, asking not to be identified discussing confidential information. (Davis, 4/17)

Modern Healthcare: Medicare Advantage Rate Increase Could Boost Home Health Pay
Home health providers are turning up the heat on Medicare Advantage plans over reimbursements and patient access. Compassus, Aveanna Healthcare, Vital Caring Group and others said they want health insurers to pony up part of the 5.06% rate increase they will be getting next year from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services or risk losing member access to home healthcare services. Providers said expectations of higher medical supply costs due to tariffs and rising labor costs are forcing them to bargain harder with health insurers for better rates to ensure that patients can transition quickly from the hospital to their home. (Eastabrook, 4/17)

Modern Healthcare: Semler Scientific Offers $30M To Settle DOJ's QuantaFlo Probe
Medtech company Semler Scientific has announced an offer to pay nearly $30 million to the Justice Department to resolve allegations related to how Medicare and other federal healthcare programs were billed for peripheral artery disease tests conducted using its QuantaFlo device. The Justice Department has not responded to the offer. If it’s rejected, the agency could proceed with a civil lawsuit under the False Claims Act, which could result in the company having to pay more. (Dubinsky, 4/17)

STATE WATCH

NBC News: A Deadly E. Coli Outbreak Hit 15 States, But The FDA Chose Not To Make The Details Public
An E. coli outbreak linked to romaine lettuce ripped across 15 states in November, sickening dozens of people, including a 9-year-old boy in Indiana who nearly died of kidney failure and a 57-year-old Missouri woman who fell ill after attending a funeral lunch. One person died. But chances are you haven’t heard about it. The Food and Drug Administration indicated in February that it had closed the investigation without publicly detailing what had happened — or which companies were responsible for growing and processing the contaminated lettuce. (Khimm, 4/17)

The Baltimore Sun: Listeria-Tainted Ice Cream Company Accused Of Killing Baltimore County Newborn In $30M Suit
A Baltimore County woman is suing a Pikesville supermarket and out-of-state ice cream manufacturers that she says sold products contaminated with listeria and led to the death of her newborn baby, according to a complaint filed in Baltimore County Circuit Court this month. (Karpovich, 4/17)

The Guardian: Who Are The Death Row Executioners? Disgraced Doctors, Suspended Nurses And Drunk Drivers
Being an executioner is not the sort of job that gets posted in a local wanted ad. Kids don’t dream about being an executioner when they grow up, and people don’t go to school for it. So how does one become a death row executioner in the US, and who are the people doing it? This was the question I couldn’t help but ask when I began a book project on lethal injection back in 2018. I’m a death penalty researcher, and I was trying to figure out why states are so breathtakingly bad at a procedure that we use on cats and dogs every day. Part of the riddle was who is performing these executions. (Lain, 4/17)

PUBLIC HEALTH

Fortune Well: Seed Oils Show Possible Link To Cancer In New Study
In the ongoing war over the health of seed oils, Robert F. Kennedy may have just scored a point. That’s because the Health and Human Services secretary has made a push for beef tallow over seed oils, by which he claims Americans are being “unknowingly poisoned”—and a new study has linked the oils, including safflower, canola, corn, soybean, and sunflower oils, to an aggressive form of breast cancer. (Mikhail, 4/17)

The Wall Street Journal: Eating Disorders Are On The Rise. Scientists Still Don’t Know How To Treat Them.
Eighteen years ago, Steve and Linda Znachko dropped their 14-year-old daughter Anna off at a private, inpatient eating disorder facility for the first time. The sign at the facility’s entrance read, “Expect a miracle.” As devout Christians with resources, they expected nothing less. This it turned out was just the beginning of what would be a long and grueling battle with anorexia. Anna spent nearly two decades cycling between therapists, treatment centers and psychiatric medications at a cost of hundreds of thousands of dollars. It was a battle she ultimately lost: Anna Znachko died of anorexia in August 2024. (Andersen, 4/17)

MedPage Today: Hearing Loss May Play A Bigger Role In Dementia Than Previously Thought
Hearing loss may play a bigger role in dementia than previously thought, data from a U.S. cohort study suggested. ... The findings mean that "up to 32% of population-level dementia risk could potentially be delayed or prevented if we completely treated hearing loss, assuming there is a causal association between hearing loss and dementia," Smith told MedPage Today. (George, 4/17)

MedPage Today: Study Questions New Proposal To Redefine Obesity
Virtually all individuals identified as having obesity based on body mass index (BMI) also had confirmed excess adiposity, according to an analysis of National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) data. Among the 2,225 adults in the study, all under 60 years of age, 39.7% had obesity as defined only by higher BMI, while 39.1% had confirmed excess adiposity when using diagnostic criteria recently laid out by an expert commission that recommended pairing BMI with at least one other anthropometric index, or direct body fat measurement. (Monaco, 4/17)

The Hill: New Study Shows Smartphone Usage Can Boost Mental Health
The question of when children should get smartphones and whether these devices are harmful has sparked debate for years, but new research from the University of South Florida challenges some long-held assumptions. Leading up to the study, researchers expected to find negative outcomes tied to smartphone use among children. Instead, they found the devices may not be as damaging to kids’ mental health as some believe and could, in fact, be beneficial. (Shafer, 4/17)

GLOBAL WATCH

CIDRAP: Mexico's Fatal H5N1 Case Involved D1.1 Genotype, Which Has Been Tied To Serious Illness
In updates on H5N1 avian flu today, the World Health Organization (WHO) shared new details about Mexico's recent fatal case, the country's first H5N1 infection, along with an updated risk assessment from the WHO and two global animal health groups. In an outbreak notice, the WHO said the child from Durango state didn't have any underlying health conditions and became ill on March 7 with fever, malaise, and vomiting. (Schnirring, 4/17)

Stat: GSK Blood Cancer Therapy, Once Pulled From The Market, Is Approved In The U.K.
GSK’s blood cancer drug Blenrep won regulatory approval in the U.K. on Thursday, marking the medicine’s return to the market after it was withdrawn several years ago. (Joseph, 4/17)

CIDRAP: Studies Across 14 Nations Show 25% To 30% Rate Of Long COVID
A new study in BMJ Global Health across 13 middle- and high-income countries reveals that 25% of patients reported symptoms of long COVID after symptomatic COVID-19, and long COVID is significantly more prevalent in participants from less wealthy nations and in patients of Arab or North African ethnicity. A second study published in BMC Public Health showed that, among 3,693 COVID-19 patients in China, 30.2% reported at least one persistent long-COVID symptom, and 10.7% noted symptoms affecting daily life. (Soucheray, 4/17)