AP: Trump Signs Law Returning Whole Milk To School Lunches
Whole milk is heading back to school cafeterias across the country after President Donald Trump signed a bill Wednesday overturning Obama-era limits on higher-fat milk options. Nondairy drinks such as fortified soy milk may also be on the menu in the coming months following adoption of the Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act, which cleared Congress in the fall. The action allows schools participating in the National School Lunch Program to serve whole and 2% fat milk along with the skim and low-fat products required since 2012. (Aleccia, 1/14)

The New York Times: Is Whole Milk Healthier For Kids? 
There’s no question that milk provides essential nutrients, and for that reason health organizations have recommended that children aged 5 to 8 consume up to 2.5 cups of milk per day, and those aged 9 and up consume up to three cups per day. But health experts and legislators have disagreed about which types to promote. (Callahan, 1/14)

What RFK Jr. thinks about President Trump's diet —

The Hill: RFK Jr.: Trump ‘Eats Really Bad Food’ But Has ‘Constitution Of A Deity’
Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. says President Trump has the least healthy eating habits of anyone in his administration but praised the commander in chief for what he described as his remarkable stamina nonetheless. ... “The interesting thing about the president is that he eats really bad food, which is McDonald’s, and, you know, candy and Diet Coke,” Kennedy continued. “He drinks the Diet Coke at all times.” But, he added, “He has the constitution of a deity. I don’t know how he’s alive, but he is.” (Fortinsky, 1/14)

In other Trump administration news —

The New York Times: H.H.S. Reverses Decision To Cut $2 Billion For Mental Health And Addiction Services
Less than 24 hours after the Trump administration informed more than 2,000 addiction and mental health programs nationwide that it was immediately terminating almost $2 billion of their funding, the administration reversed course and reinstated the money. An administration official confirmed Wednesday night that the money was being restored, but declined to say why. (Hoffman, 1/14)

The Baltimore Sun: The FDA's Growing Addiction To 'No' 
Listening to Food and Drug Administration (FDA) leadership, it’s easy to think that 2025 was a banner year for patient choice. On Dec. 19, Food and Drugs Commissioner Dr. Marty Makary listed the FDA’s accomplishments in 2025, including reducing decision times, hitting drug target date goals, “accelerating cures,” “cutting red tape” and ushering in “a new era of innovation.” Tellingly, the agency’s leader failed to confront concerns that the FDA is becoming more risk-averse and eager to reject new — and even existing — medications. (Ross Marchand, 1/14)

The New York Times: NASA Astronauts Splash Down After Space Station Medical Evacuation 
The astronauts, riding in a SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule, were originally expected to return next month after a replacement crew arrived. But a medical issue involving one of them last week led NASA to decide to bring the crew members home early. NASA officials called it a “controlled medical evacuation,” the first time that an astronaut left the I.S.S. for a medical reason in its 25 years of continuous habitation. (Chang, 1/15)

ABC News: Republican Lawmakers Call For FDA To Review Abortion Pill Restrictions At Senate Hearing
The Senate’s health committee convened its first hearing of the year on the efficacy of the chemical abortion drug mifepristone, which requires a prescription, amid a growing push from conservatives to restrict abortion access across the country. Mifepristone is an oral drug typically used in combination with another drug, misoprostol, to induce an abortion or to help manage an early miscarriage. In 2019, the Food and Drug Administration approved a generic version of the drug. (Jones II, 1/15)

Mother Jones: Sen. Patty Murray: GOP Abortion Pill Hearing Is “Really About” A Nationwide Ban 
Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) decried Republican efforts to discredit medication abortion in an interview Wednesday with Mother Jones, saying that “the only reason they’re going after mifepristone is because it is the way most women get their abortive care.” On Wednesday morning, the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions held a hearing on “protecting women” from the “dangers of chemical abortion drugs.” “Republicans are holding this hearing to peddle debunked junk ‘studies’ by anti-abortion organizations which have no credibility and have been forcefully condemned by actual medical organizations,” Murray said in her opening statement. The hearing, she continued, was “really about the fact that Trump and his anti-abortion allies want to ban abortion nationwide.”

How abortion is being linked to ACA subsidies —

The Hill: Abortion Threatens To Derail Senate ObamaCare Deal 
A push by Senate negotiators to strike a deal on extending enhanced ObamaCare subsidies is running into a brick wall as they struggle to clear a key hurdle on abortion. But time is of the essence: Open enrollment in most states and the federal healthcare.gov exchange ends today. (Weaver and Weixel, 1/15)

Politico: Abortion Opponents Warn Trump: Hold The Line Or Risk Midterms ‘Devastation’
Amid concerns about the president's actions, abortion opponents are threatening to redirect or withhold campaign spending and withdraw their volunteer armies in the midterms. (Ollstein and Messerly, 1/15)

More abortion news from California, North Carolina, and elsewhere —

AP: California Gov. Newsom Says He Will Block Louisiana's Extradition Of Doctor Over Abortion Pills
California Gov. Gavin Newsom said Wednesday he was blocking Louisiana’s attempt to extradite a doctor in the Golden State accused of mailing abortion pills. The Democratic governor’s announcement comes a day after Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry, a Republican, said he sent the extradition paperwork in an effort to bring the physician “to justice.” Louisiana has some of the strictest anti-abortion laws in the country, while California law aims to protect abortion providers from criminal prosecution for treating out-of-state patients. (Austin, 1/15)

ProPublica: A Pregnant Woman at Risk of Heart Failure Couldn’t Get Urgent Treatment. She Died Waiting for an Abortion.
When Ciji Graham visited a cardiologist on Nov. 14, 2023, her heart was pounding at 192 beats per minute, a rate healthy people her age usually reach during the peak of a sprint. She was having another episode of atrial fibrillation, a rapid, irregular heartbeat. The 34-year-old Greensboro, North Carolina, police officer was at risk of a stroke or heart failure. In the past, doctors had always been able to shock Graham’s heart back into rhythm with a procedure called a cardioversion. But this time, the treatment was just out of reach. (Presser and Surana, 1/14)

Axios: Pregnancy Crimes: Prosecutions On The Rise In States With Abortion Bans
Prosecutors in states with abortion bans are increasingly charging mostly low-income women with pregnancy-related crimes, in a test of whether fetuses and embryos have the same rights as children. (Goldman, 1/15)

In other reproductive health news —

KFF Health News: Native Americans Are Dying From Pregnancy. They Want A Voice To Stop The Trend
Just hours after Rhonda Swaney left a prenatal appointment for her first pregnancy, she felt severe pain in her stomach and started vomiting. Then 25 years old and six months pregnant, she drove herself to the emergency room in Ronan, Montana, on the Flathead Indian Reservation, where an ambulance transferred her to a larger hospital 60 miles away in Missoula. Once she arrived, the staff couldn’t detect her baby’s heartbeat. Swaney began to bleed heavily. She delivered a stillborn baby and was hospitalized for several days. At one point, doctors told her to call her family. They didn’t expect her to survive. (Orozco Rodriguez, 1/15)

The New York Times: The Quest To ‘Make America Fertile Again’ Stalls Under Trump
Administration officials have been urging Americans to get married and procreate, but some conservatives are frustrated by a lack of action. (Kitchener, 1/13)

San Francisco Chronicle: Kaiser Affiliates To Pay $556 Million In Medicare Fraud Scheme
Kaiser Permanente affiliates were ordered to pay $556 million to settle a lawsuit alleging that the healthcare provider defrauded Medicare by using falsified medical information to increase reimbursements, the Justice Department said. The settlement puts an end to claims that affiliates of Kaiser Permanente — the Oakland-based healthcare giant — violated federal law by pressuring doctors to add certain diagnoses to patients’ medical records after visits had already happened, according to the Justice Department. That allowed Kaiser to receive higher payments from Medicare Advantage, the federal records say. (Toledo, 1/14)

San Francisco Chronicle: Kaiser Permanente Data Settlement: Who Qualifies For Payment
Certain current and former Kaiser Permanente members may be eligible for a cash payment under a proposed $46 million class-action settlement tied to allegations that the health care provider improperly shared sensitive patient data through online tracking tools. The settlement has received preliminary approval from a federal judge. It resolves a series of lawsuits accusing Kaiser of allowing third-party tracking code on its websites and mobile applications to transmit personal and health-related information without patients’ consent. The Oakland-based nonprofit health organization has 12.6 million members. (Vaziri, 1/14)

In other Medicare Advantage news —

Modern Healthcare: Alignment Healthcare Plans Medicare Advantage Expansion
Alignment Healthcare is preparing for a major market expansion in 2027 after recording a substantial increase in members during the past year. Earlier this week, the Medicare Advantage insurer said it covered 275,300 members as of Jan. 1, a 31% increase from a year ago. (Tepper, 1/14)

Modern Healthcare: UnitedHealthcare To Launch Rural Payment Acceleration Pilot
UnitedHealthcare is launching a program intended to speed up Medicare Advantage payments for rural hospitals. The Rural Payment Acceleration Pilot will run for the next six months and focus on halving Medicare Advantage average payment timelines to less than 15 days, the UnitedHealth Group subsidiary said in a news release Wednesday. (DeSilva, 1/14)

More on health care costs and coverage —

Modern Healthcare: Health Spending Rose To $5.3T In 2024, CMS Actuaries Report
The U.S. spent $5.28 trillion on healthcare in 2024, a 7.2% increase from the prior year, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Office of the Actuary reported Wednesday. Healthcare accounted for 18% of gross domestic product in 2024, up slightly from 2023, the actuaries wrote in the journal Health Affairs. The independent CMS division attributes the spending spike to higher use and intensity of healthcare services and products. (Early, 1/14)

The Boston Globe: Massachusetts Health Insurance Prior Authorizations To Face Restrictions, Healey Says
Massachusetts health insurers will face new restrictions around the much-maligned practice of prior authorizations, eliminating the red tape around how patients access some drugs and services, Governor Maura Healey said Wednesday. Healey announced at the State House that the Division of Insurance will establish regulations to eliminate any insurer permissions required for many routine and essential services. The changes, along with some other reforms, take aim at a practice that’s long drawn the ire of many consumers upset over insurer denials. (Bartlett, 1/14)

CBS News: Retired Georgia Couple Hit With $39,000 Health Insurance Bill After ACA Subsidies End 
Barbara Brockway and Matt Padula's monthly insurance premiums have doubled after the lapse of enhanced Affordable Care Act subsidies. In 2025, the couple paid about $1,600 a month. Now, their monthly premium has doubled to $3,200 — totaling nearly $39,000 a year for insurance alone. (Montgomery, 1/14)

KFF Health News: GOP Cuts Will Cripple Medicaid Enrollment, Warns CEO Of Largest Public Health Plan
When the head of the nation’s largest publicly operated health plan worries about the looming federal cuts to Medicaid, it’s not just her job. It’s personal. Martha Santana-Chin, the daughter of Mexican immigrants, grew up on Medi-Cal, California’s version of Medicaid, the government-run health care program for people with low incomes and disabilities. Today, she is CEO of L.A. Care, which runs by far the biggest Medi-Cal health plan, with more than 2.2 million enrollees, exceeding the Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program enrollments in 41 states. (Wolfson, 1/15)

Modern Healthcare: How A Federal Reserve Interest Rate Cut May Hit Insurer Earnings
Health insurers struggling with rising medical expenses may have less of a cushion in 2026. Companies such as UnitedHealth Group reaped gains on their investments over the past several years that bolstered their finances and offset narrowing profit margins or losses from operations. (Tepper, 1/14)

On health care workers —

The New York Times: As N.Y.C. Nurses’ Strike Continues, Both Sides Prepare For A Long Fight
Two days into the largest nursing strike New York City has seen in decades, Mount Sinai Hospital made a startling accusation. Three nurses had been fired, administrators said, after they were caught “deliberately sabotaging” the labor-and-delivery floor by hiding critical supplies for newborns so that replacement nurses would not find them. “This is completely unacceptable behavior,” the hospital said in a statement on Tuesday, adding that the action last week risked “interfering with patient safety.” (Goldstein, 1/14)

HR Dive: Gender Pay Gap In Healthcare Still Exists, Analysis Shows
The gender wage gap persists in healthcare despite women making up the majority share of workers in that industry, according to data analysis by Premier Law Group, which represents plaintiffs in healthcare lawsuits. For example, women registered nurses earn $0.91 for every $1.00 earned by male registered nurses. “The ongoing pay gap and underrepresentation of women in leadership roles within the healthcare sector are not just disparities,” the firm’s analysts said in a statement. “They represent structural inequalities that hinder the industry’s growth and stability.” (Colvin, 1/14)

Stat: Biomedical Student Enrollment Rose In 2025 But Warning Signs Loom 
The first year of President Trump’s second term rattled academic science, raising fears would-be biomedical researchers would avoid the field. New data on student enrollment, however, paint a more complicated picture. (Wosen, 1/15)

AP: Public Mistrust Linked To Drop In Deceased Donor Organ Donations And Kidney Transplants
Organ donations from the recently deceased dropped last year for the first time in over a decade, resulting in fewer kidney transplants, according to an analysis issued Wednesday that pointed to signs of public mistrust in the lifesaving system. More than 100,000 people in the U.S. are on the list for an organ transplant. The vast majority of them need a kidney, and thousands die waiting every year. (Neergaard, 1/14)

In related news about vaccines and mistrust —

NBC News: Vaccine Exemptions For Religious Or Personal Beliefs Are Rising Across The U.S., Data Shows
A majority of counties across the U.S. are seeing a steady rise in vaccine exemptions for religious or personal beliefs among children entering kindergarten, a trend that has accelerated since the pandemic, according to a new study. The research, published Wednesday in JAMA, is based on a data investigation by NBC News with Stanford University. Mustafa Fattah, medical fellow with NBC News, is lead author on the study. (Ozcan, 1/15)

Stat: Kennedy's New Vaccine Schedule Ignored By Major Healthcare Providers 
Pediatric hospitals — Children’s National in Washington, D.C., Texas Children’s, Children’s Seattle, Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, and Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia — told STAT they would be following the American Academy of Pediatrics’ guidance, a plan mirrored by several other pediatric groups throughout the U.S. (Payne, 1/15)

Bloomberg: Pharma CEOs Vent Vaccine Anger During Largest Industry Gathering
Pfizer’s Albert Bourla, leader of the first company to launch a vaccine that’s widely credited with saving millions of lives during the Covid pandemic, was the most forthright. “I am very annoyed. I’m very disappointed. I’m seriously frustrated,” Bourla said during a lunch with journalists, discussing efforts to curtail use of the Covid shots. “What is happening has zero scientific merit and is just serving an agenda which is political, and then antivax.” (Muller, Smith and Thornton, 1/14)

Nj.com: Did N.J. Just Take Control Of Your Children’s Health? What The ‘Vaccine Bill’ Actually Does. 
Amid substantial changes in federal vaccine policy, New Jersey lawmakers passed a bill this week that would give the state Department of Health the authority to rely on expert recommendations beyond the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s vaccine panel. The bill has received backlash from parents rights groups and Republican legislators who say the state Department of Health is trying to become the sole authority on vaccines and bulldoze parents’ decision-making power. But its supporters dispute that framing and argue that parents will remain in charge of what vaccines their children receive. (Roman, 1/14)

NPR: Kitchen Countertop Workers Are Dying. Some Lawmakers Want To Ban Their Lawsuits
An epidemic of a deadly lung disease among hundreds of workers who cut kitchen and bathroom countertops has regulators on opposite sides of the country considering two drastically different responses this week. In a California hearing on Thursday, workplace safety regulators will be discussing a proposed ban on cutting so-called quartz or engineered stone, a popular choice for countertops. That's because this material creates an unusual amount of lung-damaging silica dust when it gets cut or polished, far more than natural granite or marble. (Greenfieldboyce, 1/14)

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

Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Kemp Proposes $50M Homelessness Initiative
Gov. Brian Kemp rolled out a sweeping infrastructure proposal Wednesday that included a $50 million initiative addressing homelessness. (Bluestein, 1/14)

North Carolina Health News: NC Lawmakers Weigh How To Deal With Unfunded Mandates, Cuts As Feds Overhaul SNAP 
North Carolina could face hundreds of millions of dollars in new costs — or risk losing the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program entirely — if counties fail to meet new federal requirements, state lawmakers were warned Tuesday during a Joint Legislative Oversight Committee hearing in Raleigh. (Fredde, 1/15)

Verite News: Judge Set To Rule On Key Motion In Trans Health Care Lawsuit
An East Baton Rouge Parish judge is expected to rule as soon as this week on whether to dismiss a two-year-old lawsuit against the state of Louisiana over a 2023 law that bans medical professionals from providing transgender health care for minors, following a U.S. Supreme Court decision upholding a similar law in Tennessee. In January 2024, five Louisiana teenagers and their families sued the state to block Act 466, which had gone into effect after the state legislature voted to override then-Gov. John Bel Edwards’ veto of the legislation. (Costley, 1/14)

CBS News: Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson Wants To Tackle The City's "Death Gap." Here's How He's Trying To Do It
Chicago has for decades been dealing with a so-called "death gap," in which life expectancy in one neighborhood can be 20 years lower than in others. Mayor Brandon Johnson tells CBS News his administration is working to address that discrepancy, which he said is driven by homicides and drug overdoses. (Dokoupil, 1/14)

Also —

San Francisco Chronicle: Rare Disease Found In Berkeley Homeless Encampment, Officials Say
Berkeley health officials are urging people to vacate a homeless encampment at Eighth and Harrison streets so they can decontaminate the area after an outbreak of leptospirosis, a treatable bacterial disease that can cause severe — and potentially fatal — illness in people and dogs. The disease was confirmed in two dogs living at the camp in November, according to an alert issued by the city Monday. That prompted county health officials to trap and test rats in the area, which also carried the bacteria — the first such finding in Alameda County in five years. (Talerico, 1/14)

CIDRAP: Novel XDR Shigella Strain Identified In Los Angeles
A case report published yesterday in Antimicrobial Stewardship & Healthcare Epidemiology describes the identification of a novel strain of extensively drug-resistant Shigella in Los Angeles. The strain of XDR Shigella sonnei was isolated separately from two patients in Los Angeles with no known epidemiologic connection or transmission route a year apart, researchers from the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) David Geffen School of Medicine reported. (Dall, 1/14)

ABC News: At Least 171 Measles Cases Confirmed In 9 States: CDC
At least 171 measles cases have been confirmed in the U.S. so far this year, according to newly updated data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Cases have been confirmed in nine states, including Arizona, Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon, South Carolina, Utah and Virginia. At least one state, South Carolina, has been facing a measles outbreak since early October, with the majority of cases in Spartanburg County, which borders North Carolina. (Kekatos, 1/15)

The Hill: Decline In Overdose Deaths Slowing: Government Data
The number of drug overdose deaths continued to fall in 2025, albeit at a slower pace than the year prior, new data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) shows. The data, released Wednesday, projects that nearly 73,000 people died of a drug overdose in the 12-month period ending August 2025, a decline of roughly 21 percent relative to the year ending August 2024. Estimated overdose deaths dropped from nearly 107,000 in the 12-month period ending January 2024 to nearly 82,000 in December 2024, a roughly 23 percent drop. (Rego, 1/14)

More health and wellness news —

ABC News: Study Suggests There May Be Beneficial 'Goldilocks' Window For Kids' Social Media Use
A new study suggests there may be a so-called "Goldilocks" time frame in which kids may face less risk when they use social media. The time frame doesn't cut out social media use completely but suggests there is an amount of time that is "just right" for kids to use it, a reference to the phrase Goldilocks uses in the fairy tale of the same name. The study from Australia, published Monday in the journal JAMA Pediatrics, suggests there may be a certain amount of time that can benefit kids and their mental health and estimates that it is less than two hours a day, on average. (Yu, 1/13)

WUFT: Can Texting A Therapist Help With Depression? A New Study Says Yes 
You likely have experience with text-to-talk, a technology that converts texts into audio to make content accessible for people with disabilities. How about text-to-therapy? A JAMA Network study shows it might be just as helpful for those battling depression. In fact, the convenience of text therapy, which allows users to respond and interact with their therapist throughout the day, is shown to be just as effective as video-based therapy. (Wesner, 1/14)

The New York Times: Lung Cancer Stigma Keeps People From Care
When Jim Pantelas was diagnosed with lung cancer at 52, he felt that he had brought this disease upon himself. Having started smoking at age 12, Mr. Pantelas, a Navy veteran, was consumed by shame — certain that cancer was his punishment. (Bajaj, 1/14)

ABC News: FDA Upgrades Voluntary Cheese Recall To Highest Risk Level: What To Know About The Products 
Several pecorino Romano cheese products that were voluntarily recalled in November due to possible listeria contamination have been reclassified by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to the highest hazard level. In a Jan. 6 enforcement report, the FDA updated a prior Nov. 21, 2025, voluntary recall from the Ambriola Company to a Class 1 designation, which means the affected cheese products -- which were recalled after routine testing confirmed the presence of listeria, according to the company -- could cause "serious adverse health consequences or death" if consumed. (McCarthy, 1/14)

CBS News: Recalled "Super Greens" Supplement Linked To Dozens Of Salmonella Cases, CDC Says
A "super greens" dietary supplement recalled by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday has been linked to at least 45 salmonella cases across 21 states, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Illnesses linked to the New York-based Live it Up Super Greens brand powder were reported from Aug. 22, 2025, to Dec. 30, 2025, in Alabama, Connecticut, Delaware, Iowa, Illinois, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Utah, Vermont, Washington and Wisconsin, the CDC said. (Intarasuwan, 1/14)

The Washington Post: Multiple Myeloma Immunotherapy Drug Found To Keep Patients Alive
An immunotherapy kept multiple myeloma at bay for over 80 percent of patients in a three-year clinical trial, and the FDA offered an accelerated approval path. (Gilbert, 1/15)

MedPage Today: CAR7 Gene Therapy Shows Promise In T-Cell ALL
The use of base editing to generate universal off-the-shelf CAR T cells induced durable remissions -- up to 36 months in one case -- in patients with relapsed or refractory T-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), according to results from a phase I study. (Bassett, 1/8)

MedPage Today: Multiple Sclerosis Risk May Start Before Birth 
Prenatal and perinatal factors were tied to multiple sclerosis in offspring, a Norwegian cohort study showed. Prenatal exposure to maternal diabetes was associated with a doubled risk of developing MS in adulthood, reported Sarah Tom, PhD, MPH, of Columbia University in New York City, and co-authors in JAMA Neurology. (George, 1/12)

MedPage Today: MicroRNA Tests Eyed For Flagging Heart Transplant Rejection 
The noninvasive diagnosis of allograft rejection after heart transplantation may be on the horizon, according to findings from the GRAfT cohort study. MicroRNA sequencing results, based on blood samples obtained at the time of an endomyocardial biopsy, were found to flag acute cellular rejection and antibody-mediated rejection after heart transplantation, according to Palak Shah, MD, MS, of Inova Schar Heart and Vascular and George Washington University in Falls Church, Virginia, and colleagues. (Lou, 1/13)

MedPage Today: Phone Data May Give Early Warning On Rheumatoid Arthritis Flares 
Devices can record subtle behavioral changes before patients notice anything amiss. (Gever, 1/12)

UC Davis: Cat Coronavirus Study Offers Clues To Long COVID
Researchers at the University of California, Davis, have uncovered new details about how a once-deadly coronavirus disease in cats spreads through the immune system. The findings may help scientists better understand long COVID and other long-lasting inflammatory illnesses in people. The disease, feline infectious peritonitis, or FIP, is caused by a form of feline coronavirus that changes inside some cats. If left untreated, it is almost always fatal. While FIP only affects cats, it shares many features with serious coronavirus-related conditions in humans. (Quinton, 1/12)

Stat: A Doctor's Lessons From The Inventor Of The Hepatitis B Vaccine 
Baruch Samuel Blumberg, M.D., Ph.D, led the team of American scientists who discovered the hepatitis B virus in 1965, then developed the first screening test and the first vaccine to protect against infection. In 1976, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for the discovery while working at Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia. (Emilie G.C. Thompson, 1/15)

Stat: Medical AI Safety Research Must Be Ramped Up Now 
On Jan. 6, the Food and Drug Administration released updated guidance for clinical decision support (CDS) tools, relaxing key medical device requirements. With this change, many generative artificial intelligence tools that provide diagnostic suggestions or perform supportive tasks like medical history-taking — tools that probably would have required FDA sign-off under the prior policy — could reach clinics without FDA vetting. (Katherine E. Goodman and Daniel Morgan, 1/15)

The Baltimore Sun: The FDA's Growing Addiction To 'No'
According to a recent analysis by Nature, FDA approvals appear to be plateauing. The agency’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research approved 46 new therapeutic agents in 2025, in line with its five-year average. (Ross Marchand, 1/14)

The Washington Post: RFK Jr. Wants To Take Your Child's Vaccines Away By Bankrupting Manufacturers 
Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. wants to flood the vaccine injury compensation program to hurt vaccine access in the U.S. (Ezekiel J. Emanuel and Paul Friedrichs, 1/15)

The Seattle Times: New Vaccine Recommendations Will Harm Americans — For No Good Reason
The American Academy of Pediatrics, with succinct accuracy, criticized the new recommendations as “dangerous and unnecessary.” (Christopher Sanford and Paul Pottinger, 1/14)