The Hill: Opioid Crisis Takes Personal Toll On Washington
Deaths involving opioids have been rising since 1999. They increased nearly 28 percent from 2015 to 2016, an increase largely driven by a synthetic opioid packing up to 50 times more power than heroin. An estimated 115 people are dying of an opioid-related overdose every day. When members of Congress return to their districts, they say they hear first-hand how painkillers, heroin and fentanyl are wrecking lives — and that’s resulted in a sea change in attitudes about drug abuse. (Roubein, 4/16)

And in other news from Capitol Hill —

The Baltimore Sun: Maryland Rep. Elijah Cummings, Sen. Elizabeth Warren Plan Sweeping Legislation To Combat Opioid Crisis
With drug overdose deaths ravaging communities across the country, Rep. Elijah Cummings of Baltimore and Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts are planning to introduce legislation Wednesday that would require $10 billion a year in federal funding to combat the opioid crisis. Modeled off 1990’s Ryan White Act — which provided billions in federal money to combat the AIDS crisis — the Cummings and Warren are proposing a similar program to address the drug overdoses which are claiming lives in record numbers. The program would send federal help directly to local and state governments to provide treatment services. (Broadwater, 4/17)

Stat: Nursing Homes Routinely Refuse People On Addiction Treatment
Nursing facilities routinely turn away patients seeking post-hospital care if they are taking medicine to treat opioid addiction, a practice that legal experts say violates the Americans with Disabilities Act. After discharge from the hospital, many patients require further nursing care, whether for a short course of intravenous antibiotics, or for a longer stay, such as to rehabilitate after a stroke. But STAT has found that many nursing facilities around the country refuse to accept such patients, often because of stigma, gaps in staff training, and the widespread misconception that abstinence is superior to medications for treating addiction. (Bond, 4/17)

Modern Healthcare: Will New Payment Model For Treating Opioid Abuse Help Meet Demand For Treatment?
The American Medical Association and the American Society of Addiction Medicine on Monday advocated for a new way to reimburse physicians who treat patients for opioid use disorder, hoping it will help meet the increasing demand for medication-assisted therapies. The new alternative payment model, called Patient-Centered Opioid Addiction Treatment, would give providers an initial, one-time payment to cover the costs associated with evaluating, diagnosing and planning treatment for a patient, as well as a month of outpatient medication-assisted treatment. After the initial payment, subsequent reimbursement would come in the form of monthly "maintenance" payments to cover the cost of providing ongoing outpatient medication-assisted treatment, psychological care and social services." (Johnson, 4/16)

The Associated Press: Organs From Drug Overdoses Could Help Transplant Shortage
Fatal drug overdoses are increasing organ donations, and researchers reported Monday that people who receive those transplants generally fare as well as patients given organs from more traditional donors. The findings could encourage more use of organs from overdose victims. Researchers from Johns Hopkins University found those transplants have jumped nearly 24-fold since 2000. That was before overdoses were making headlines or most transplant centers considered accepting such organs. (Neergaard, 4/16)

The Hill: West Virginia Reaches $550k Settlement In Opioid Case 
West Virginia has reached a $550,000 settlement with a pharmacy it accused of dispensing nearly 10 million doses of painkillers in 11 years to a county of fewer than 25,000 people, the state attorney general's office announced Monday. Attorney General Patrick Morrisey had alleged that Larry’s Drive-in Pharmacy didn’t identify suspicious prescriptions or determine if it was dispensing a suspicious volume of opioids, according to a press release. (Roubein, 4/16)

Health News Florida: Improved Care Could Be On The Way For Babies Born Addicted To Drugs
Florida Sens. Bill Nelson and Marco Rubio’s introduced the Protecting Newborns from Opioid Abuse Act on Thursday. It would set up a new system of collecting information around mothers and babies affected by Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome, and sharing it with the Center for Disease Control and Prevention. There’s been a five-fold increase in these births from 2000 to 2012, with more than 22,000 babies being born with symptoms of withdrawal. (Prieur, 4/16)

The Associated Press: What Is Known About Former First Lady Barbara Bush’s Health
Former first lady Barbara Bush is receiving “comfort care” at her family’s home in Houston after deciding she wanted no further medical treatment for unspecified health problems. The 92-year-old has suffered from congestive heart failure and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease in recent years, and had surgery in 2009 for severe narrowing of her main heart valve. She also has been treated for decades for a thyroid condition called Graves’ disease, and had surgery on a perforated ulcer in 2008. A family spokesman did not elaborate on whether there were other health problems. (4/16)

Kaiser Health News: Barbara Bush’s End-Of-Life Decision Stirs Debate Over ‘Comfort Care’
As she nears death at age 92, former first lady Barbara Bush’s announcement that she is seeking “comfort care” is shining a light — and stirring debate — on what it means to stop trying to fight terminal illness. Bush, the wife of former President George H.W. Bush, has been suffering from congestive heart failure and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, according to family spokesman Jim McGrath.In a public statement Sunday, the family announced she has decided “not to seek additional medical treatment and will focus on comfort care.” (Bailey and Aleccia, 4/16)

The Washington Post: Scientists Study Brains Of People Whose Memory Stays Strong Into Old Age
It’s pretty extraordinary for people in their 80s and 90s to keep the same sharp memory as someone several decades younger, so scientists are peeking into the brains of “superagers” who do to uncover their secret. The work is the flip side of the disappointing hunt for new drugs to fight or prevent Alzheimer’s disease. Instead of tackling that problem, “why don’t we figure out what it is we might need to do to maximize our memory?” said neuro­scientist Emily Rogalski, who leads the SuperAging study at Northwestern University in Chicago. (Neergaard, 4/16)

Meanwhile, in Baltimore —

The Associated Press: Plan To Curb Older Adults From Falling Announced In City
Baltimore officials say a plan to curb hospitalizations and emergency department visits related to older adults falling has been announced. A Baltimore City Health Department news release says Mayor Catherine E. Pugh and Baltimore City Health Commissioner Dr. Leana Wen announced the new strategy Monday. The strategy will focus on multiple components including educating the public that falls are preventable and that resources are available. (4/17)

The Baltimore Sun: Baltimore Launches Campaign To Stop The Elderly From Falling 
Nearly 5,000 older people were hospitalized in Baltimore last year for broken hips, concussions and other injuries suffered after a fall, city officials said. The city’s fall hospitalization rate is 55 percent higher than elsewhere in Maryland. Officials hope to reduce the rate of falls in the city by 20 percent in the next decade with a campaign that will include targeting hot spots in the city where there are a high numbers of falls. (McDaniels, 4/16)

The Associated Press: AP Investigation: #MeToo Has Little Impact On Medical World
In recent months, Hollywood moguls, elite journalists and top politicians have been pushed out of their jobs or resigned their posts in the wake of allegations of sexual misconduct. In contrast, the world of medicine is often more forgiving, according to an AP investigation. When the doctors are disciplined, the punishment often consists of a short suspension paired with mandatory therapy that treats sexually abusive behavior as a symptom of an illness or addiction, the AP found. (Horwitz and Linderman, 4/16)

Stat: Miniature Human Brains Grow For Months When Implanted In Mice Skulls
The mice behaved just like others of their kind, as far as scientists could tell, and they also looked the same — except for the human mini brain that had been implanted into each rodent’s own cortex, made visible by a little clear cover replacing part of their skull. The report on Monday by scientists at the Salk Institute is the first publication describing the successful implant of human cerebral organoids into the brains of another species, with the host brain supplying the lentil-sized mini cerebrums with enough blood and nutrients to keep them alive and developing for months. It won’t be the last, as scientists use the approach to understand human brain development and test whether the tiny entities might one day serve as cortical repair kits, replacing regions of the brain that have been injured or failed to develop normally. (Begley, 4/16)

The Washington Post: Teenagers And College-Age People Drink Less While This Group Pours Another Round
Experts on alcohol abuse have found one demographic group that’s drinking at an alarming rate. Not teenagers. Not college-age people. It’s baby boomers. For reasons not well understood, teenage and college-age Americans today are consuming alcohol at lower rates than young people 10 years ago, according to the Monitoring the Future study at the University of Michigan. The most widely discussed hypothesis is that young people have changed the way they organize their social lives today, said Katherine Keyes, a Columbia University professor of epidemiology who has tracked drinking trends. (Achenbach, 4/16)

CNN: How Dad's Pre-Conception Health Can Affect The Baby, Too
Many moms-to-be know that their health even before they become pregnant -- known as pre-conception health -- can affect the health of their babies. Now, research is continuing to show that the pre-conception health of fathers also can influence a pregnancy and the baby.Three papers published Monday in the journal The Lancet detail how the health of both women and men, before they even conceive a child, can have profound impacts on the health of their offspring -- such as birth weight and brain development. (Howard, 4/16)

The Associated Press: Maryland Health Exchange Board Votes For Reinsurance Program
The board of trustees for the Maryland Health Benefit Exchange has voted to move forward with a federal application for a reinsurance program. The board voted Monday to proceed with the program that Gov. Larry Hogan and state lawmakers approved to hold down consumer costs to Maryland’s individual market for health insurance for 2019 and 2020. The vote creates the parameters for a reinsurance program. It also authorizes the exchange to apply to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to request federal approval for a waiver to create the program. (4/16)

Miami Herald: What's Next For Obamacare? UM Healthcare Summit Seeks Answers
The Affordable Care Act provides health insurance coverage for about 1.7 million Floridians, more than any other state. But new policies under President Donald Trump and old politics around the law known as Obamacare will continue to change the program — and the business of healthcare — in the years to come. So what's next for the patients, health insurers, hospitals, pharmaceutical companies, medical device manufacturers and others who make up the industry? (Chang, 4/12)

The Associated Press: Supreme Court Rejects Anti-Abortion Pastor's Appeal On Noise
The U.S. Supreme Court won't hear an appeal from a pastor who challenged a state law's noise limit that was used to restrict his anti-abortion protest outside a Planned Parenthood clinic in Portland, Maine. The justices offered no comment Monday in rejecting the appeal from the Rev. Andrew March, who sued after he said Portland police officers repeatedly told him to lower his voice while he was protesting outside the clinic in Maine's largest city. (4/16)

St. Louis Post Dispatch: St. Louis Aldermen Say No To Protest-Free ‘Buffer Zones’ Around Health Care Facilities
A controversial proposal to ban protesters within an 8-foot radius of a health care facility's driveway was defeated Monday by the St. Louis Board of Aldermen on a 9-15 vote on the last day of session. Similar “buffer zones” have been enacted in cities such as New York and Chicago, with backers arguing they offer a clearer avenue to charge those who impede the flow of traffic in and out of facilities such as Planned Parenthood. The Supreme Court has struck down more extreme measures creating zones as wide as 35 feet but has upheld smaller zones such as the one proposed for St. Louis. (Bott, 4/16)

The Associated Press: Pennsylvania House Votes To Ban Abortions For Down Syndrome
A proposal to prohibit abortions in Pennsylvania when the sole reason is that the fetus has or may have Down syndrome is headed to the state Senate after passing the House by a comfortable margin. The Republican-majority House voted Monday 139 to 56 for a bill that supporters say would protect a vulnerable population. Opponents argue it would violate the right of women to make their own decisions about abortion. (Scolforo, 4/16)

Texas Tribune: For Girls In The Texas Foster Care System, Teen Pregnancy Is 5 Times More Likely
After entering Texas’ foster care system in 2006, the day after her 14th birthday, Unisha Curry bounced around anywhere from nine to 11 foster homes. In one of her final homes, she had three foster sisters who were teen mothers. One foster sister gave birth in middle school, and the father of her child fled to another country. Two others gave birth in high school. (Greene, 4/16)

Dallas Morning News: Teens In Foster Care More Likely To Become Pregnant Than Other Texas Youths, Report Finds  
The pregnancy rate for teens in foster care is almost five times as high as the rate for other Texas girls ages 13 to 17, according to a report from an advocacy group. The analysis, which Texans Care for Children released Monday, also found that more than half of teens who age out of foster care at 18 or extend their time until 21 will become pregnant before they turn 20. That's double the 1 in 4 American teens who will be pregnant before turning 20, according to the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy. (Wang, 4/16)

The Wall Street Journal: Coffee Brands Fight California Ruling On Cancer Warnings
The coffee industry is fighting the suggestion its products could cause cancer. A Los Angeles judge’s recent ruling in a lawsuit over cancer labels has galvanized coffee brands and retailers, including Starbucks Corp., to push harder to avoid carrying the labels. The companies say that trace amounts of the chemical acrylamide in their brew doesn’t justify a warning to consumers in California—an important market for food and beverage brands. (Randazzo and Gasparro, 4/16)

Boston Globe: Teaching Hospitals Pledge To Hire, Treat More Minorities
Two of Boston’s top teaching hospitals said they are expanding efforts to hire more black and Latino doctors, and to ensure their facilities are welcoming to minorities they treat — an attempt to address two longstanding issues in the health care industry. Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, one of the nation’s leading cancer centers, plans to hire a new leader for diversity programs and to require all faculty and administrative leaders to complete a bias awareness workshop, and has set diversity goals in its 2018 strategic plan. (Kowalczyk, 4/16)

St. Louis Post Dispatch: Suicide At St. Louis VA Hospital Is One In A String Of Self-Inflicted Deaths At Veterans Facilities 
An estimated 20 to 22 veterans die of suicide each day, at an average age of 60. While it is unknown how many of those deaths occur at VA facilities, they include a 76-year-old who shot himself in a parking lot of a New York hospital in August 2016, a veteran of Afghanistan who hanged himself at age 32 in a Tennessee hospital in November 2016, a 63-year-old Navy veteran who shot himself in a car at a North Carolina hospital and a 35-year-old Marine who overdosed on fentanyl at a Massachusetts VA psychiatric facility. (Bernhard, 4/16)

Georgia Health News: Deal Tells Health Care Giants To Settle Dispute Or Face State ‘Action’
Gov. Nathan Deal has given Piedmont Healthcare and Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Georgia a deadline to resolve their contract dispute.Deal said in a tweet Monday morning that he has asked the two sides to come to an agreement by close of business Tuesday, or else the state “will be forced to initiate executive action.’’ The warning represents an unprecedented level of involvement by a Georgia governor in a hospital/insurer contract dispute, experts say. Leaders of Blue Cross and Piedmont met with Deal early Monday morning to explain the remaining differences to reaching a new contract. (Miller, 4/16)

San Jose Mercury News: Transgender Services Boosted In Santa Clara County With New Manager, Clinic Plans
For years, it’s been a community that health officials say has been underserved. But now transgender residents in Santa Clara County will have their own health clinic that specializes in their care. The county’s first transgender health clinic is scheduled to open in the fall on the second floor of the Valley Health Center Downtown on East Santa Clara Street in San Jose. “There’s a long history of this community being treated poorly and that has resulted in individuals not seeking care,” said Maribel Martinez, director of the county Office of LGBTQ Affairs. “We want a happy and healthy population, and that’s only possible if all residents have access to medical care proficient for their needs.” (Salonga, 4/16)

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Critics: Ascension Abandoning Mission Of Providing Health Care To Poor
A growing chorus of public officials, community leaders and health systems is calling on Ascension Wisconsin to reconsider its plans to limit the services it provides at St. Joseph hospital in a largely low-income part of Milwaukee. "There is a reason we (the city) have the second-lowest health outcomes in the state,” said George Hinton, a former health care executive. “And it has a lot to do with how the systems are applying their resources to poor communities.” (Boulton, 4/16)

The Associated Press: Los Angeles Plans To Double Spending On Homeless Crisis
Just steps from City Hall’s main door, a homeless woman sprawls on a cardboard box spread across the lawn, her belongings stuffed into a battered shopping cart beside her. Within a short walk, rows of tents line the streets, creating makeshift encampments edged by piles of trash. The smell of urine is unmistakable. (Blood, 4/16)

Health News Florida: First Responder, State College Issues Go On Ballot
Florida voters will decide whether the state Constitution should mandate death benefits be paid when law enforcement officers, correctional officers, firefighters and other first responders are killed while performing their official duties. In a 30-7 vote on Monday, the Florida Constitution Revision Commission backed the proposal (Proposal 6002), which will appear as Amendment 7 on the Nov. 6 general-election ballot. (4/17)

Dallas Morning News: 'Unacceptable' Errors Spur Abbott To Send Aide To Ride Herd On Texas Health And Human Services
Gov. Greg Abbott says he is alarmed by contracting mistakes at the Texas Health and Human Services Commission and is sending a top aide, former state Sen. Tommy Williams, to correct the problems. ...The recent string of flubs in evaluating bids has raised the possibility that the commission, which grants hundreds of billions worth of Medicaid and other contracts each year, may have to cancel and rebid other contracts that were incorrectly handled, costing taxpayers more money. And it comes as lawmakers, especially in the Texas House, have spoken scornfully of the agency's ability to police vendors and make sure they provide the services to vulnerable Texans the state is paying them for. (Garrett, 4/16)

The Cleveland Plain Dealer: Akron City Council Votes To Raise The Legal Age To Buy Tobacco To 21
After weeks of discussion, Akron City Council voted Monday to raise the age for buying tobacco products in the city from 18 to 21. The new law also applies to e-cigarettes, vaping oils and paraphernalia. Voting for the legislation were council members Linda Omobien, Russel Neal, Jeff Fusco, Rich Swirsky, Zach Milkovich, Margo Sommerville, Mike Freeman and  Bruce Kilby. (Conn, 4/16)

California Healthline: California Lawmakers Seek Reparations For People Sterilized By The State
Rosie Zaballos liked to host playtime tea parties and was sweet to everyone she met. But her older brother worried that the 16-year-old, whom her family described as “a little slow,” might someday become pregnant. In his 30s and married, he had three kids of his own. And their mom was sick and needed help. So he took Rosie to be sterilized at a state-run hospital so she couldn’t have babies who might place an extra burden on the family. (Young, 4/16)

The Associated Press: 5 Plead Guilty In Florida State Hazing Death
Five men have accepted a plea deal and will serve jail time for the hazing death of a Florida State University student. The men originally faced up to five years in prison for a felony hazing charge before agreeing to plead guilty to a misdemeanor hazing charge. The Tallahassee Democrat reports four of the men will serve 60-day jail sentences and a fifth will serve 30 days after cooperating with the investigation. (4/17)

The Associated Press: Medical Marijuana Push Spreads To Utah, Oklahoma
The push for legalized marijuana has moved into Utah and Oklahoma, two of the most conservative states in the country, further underscoring how quickly feelings about marijuana are changing in the United States. If the two measures pass, Utah and Oklahoma will join 30 other states that have legalized some form of medical marijuana, according to the pro-pot National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana laws. Nine of those states and Washington, D.C. also have broad legalization where adults 21 and older can use pot for any reason. Michigan could become the 10th state with its ballot initiative this year. (McCombs, 4/17)

New Orleans Times-Picayune: Where Will Louisiana's 1st Medical Marijuana Pharmacies Operate? 
Metairie could be home to one of the state's first medical marijuana pharmacies. The Louisiana Pharmacy board, which took applications under advisement last month, is scheduled to award permits during its meeting Tuesday (April 17.) in Baton Rouge.Five companies are competing for the medical marijuana operating permit for Region 1, which covers the New Orleans metro area, including Jefferson, Orleans, and St. Bernard parishes. (Bacon-Blood, 4/16)

Health News Florida: Patient's Right To Grow, Use Pot Challenged
A Leon County circuit judge has scheduled a hearing Tuesday to consider lifting a stay in a case in which Tampa businessman Joe Redner seeks to grow marijuana as part of his treatment for cancer. Judge Karen Gievers last week ruled that Redner, who made his fortune as a strip-club owner, should be able to grow pot under a 2016 constitutional amendment that broadly legalized medical marijuana. (4/16)

Wisconsin State Journal: Go After Doctors To Solve Opioid Crisis
Last year, 4.1 million prescriptions were written in Wisconsin for opioids -- more than two prescriptions for every three people in the state -- and this is actually down a million in the last three years.If you want to know where the drugs are coming from that are killing people, you don’t have to look any further than this obscene number of prescriptions. And the manufacturers and wholesale distributors didn’t write one of them. The hard truth is that we have an opioid crisis in Dane County -- and in Wisconsin and across the nation -- because doctors and pharmacists are making big money writing opioid prescriptions for whoever wants one, without asking questions. (Michael Reichert, 4/16)

Tallahassee Democrat: Time To Hold Big Pharma Responsible For Opioid Crisis
More than a decade ago, the state of Florida held the tobacco companies responsible for the enormous costs that nicotine addiction caused its citizens. The time has come to hold the drug companies responsible for the opioid epidemic. A group of Florida’s mental health providers has filed suit to do just that. For years, the drug companies marketed opioid drugs as non-addictive and safe, and they were widely prescribed to Florida citizens. Trouble was, of course, that it became quickly learned that opioids are extremely addictive, and the costs of addiction have reached into every community in Florida. (Ryan Robbs, 4/16)

Austin American-Statesman: How Fentanyl Got Its Grip On Texas
As a former Border Patrol Agent, Member of Congress and Chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, I understand first-hand the difficulties of securing our borders. Perhaps today, there may be no more important border-security priority than stopping fentanyl, the synthetic opioid, from entering the United States from Mexico and China. (Silvestre Reyes, 4/15)

The Wall Street Journal: Barbara Bush Faces Death With Courage
Barbara Bush’s decision to stop aggressive treatment for lung and heart disease at 92 is a valiant one. Her condition has worsened over the past year, leading to a recent series of hospitalizations. Now she is facing death with fortitude, courage and realism. She should inspire everyone in the medical arena, doctors and patients alike. (Marc Siegel, 4/16)

Los Angeles Times: Garcetti's Plans For Homeless Shelters Raise As Many Questions As They Answer
In his state of the city speech Monday, Mayor Eric Garcetti eloquently conjured the image of a child who sees a homeless woman sleeping on a bench and asks whether she has someone to take care of her. "The answer is yes," Garcetti said. "The city of Los Angeles is going to take care of her and bring her home." Certainly, the new plans that the mayor laid out in his speech for financing shelters across the city of Los Angeles are a start toward finding at least temporary housing — about 1,500 beds, he estimates. But his plans raised as many concerns as they addressed. (4/17)

The New York Times: The Ethical Case For Having A Baby With Down Syndrome
My wife’s ultrasound turned up something abnormal in the baby’s heart — an otherwise innocuous feature that correlates with genetic conditions such as Down syndrome. A series of tests confirmed that our son indeed had Down syndrome. We were given the option of abortion, but my wife, Jan, already regarded him as our baby, and a few months later Aaron was born. The first days after the diagnosis were hard. We thought about our son’s future, and our future. We went through a period of grieving. But we soon came to accept that Aaron would have Down syndrome, and to accept him as a member of our family. (Chris Kaposy, 4/16)

The Hill: To Reduce Health-Care Disparities We Must Address Biases In Medical School Admissions
As the gatekeepers to their institutions, medical school admissions committees wield a powerful influence over the health care of the nation. Because of this, they have an ethical obligation to be as objective as possible. The Association of American Medical Colleges issued a report in 2015 that showed racial disparity in medical school acceptance rates nationwide. Black applicants had only a 34 percent medical school acceptance rate compared to 44 percent for Caucasians and 42 percent for Asians and Latinos. Are admissions committees unconsciously biased against minorities? At The Ohio State University College of Medicine, we set out to determine the answer to that question. (Quinn Capers, 4/14)

The Wall Street Journal: How Bad Is The Government’s Science?
Half the results published in peer-reviewed scientific journals are probably wrong. John Ioannidis, now a professor of medicine at Stanford, made headlines with that claim in 2005. Since then, researchers have confirmed his skepticism by trying—and often failing—to reproduce many influential journal articles. Slowly, scientists are internalizing the lessons of this irreproducibility crisis. But what about government, which has been making policy for generations without confirming that the science behind it is valid? The biggest newsmakers in the crisis have involved psychology. (Peter Wood and David Randall, 4/16)

Kansas City Star: KU Needs You To Help Latinos Fight Alzheimer’s Disease
Over the course of the last movie awards season, “Coco,” the latest animated film from Disney’s Pixar, won not only the Oscar for best animated feature film, but also the best original song Oscar, a Golden Globe, a BAFTA and an Annie Award. The film’s co-directors noted that having the movie portray Mexican cultural traditions was a major focus for them during the film’s development. But the film artfully incorporated another complex theme rarely found in major motion pictures: living with and caring for someone with dementia. Through their masterful direction, the film creators took a difficult but important topic — dementia’s impact on Latino families — and transformed it into a piece of art that resonates with broad audiences. (Jamie Peraless, 4/16)

Ventura County Star: The Right To Health Care
I have been practicing family medicine in Oxnard for 30 years and it is a natural time for reflecting on my career. My largest regrets are the patients who died preventable deaths for lack of health insurance; people who presented late or for whom a charity treatment plan could not be patched together. Amid the current confusing and incomplete array of options in California for health insurance is the hope provided by Senate Bill 562. The basic premise of 562 is that, like education for children and Medicare for seniors and fire and police protection, everyone should have health insurance simply because they are a Californian. (Josephine Soliz, 4/16)

Des Moines Register: Andie Dominick Named 2018 Pulitzer Prize Winner For Editorial Writing
Andie Dominick, an editorial writer at the Des Moines Register, on Monday won the 2018 Pulitzer Prize for editorial writing for a selection of Iowa-focused editorials criticizing policies that restrict access to health care. ...The Pulitzer Prize citation states that Dominick won "for examining in a clear, indignant voice, free of cliché or sentimentality, the damaging consequences for poor Iowa residents of privatizing the state’s administration of Medicaid." The Register invited Iowans to share the experiences they have had with Medicaid under privatized management, which allowed Dominick to put a human face on denials of care, loss of access to services, and providers going out of business because they were not being reimbursed by for-profit insurers. (4/16)

Des Moines Register: Pulitzer Prize-Winning Editorial: Privatized Medicaid Is Worst Prank Ever
EDITOR'S NOTE: Andie Dominick of the Des Moines Register won a 2018 Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Writing. This is one of those editorials, described by the awards committee this way: For examining in a clear, indignant voice, free of cliché or sentimentality, the damaging consequences for poor Iowa residents of privatizing the state’s administration of Medicaid. ...Saturday was the first anniversary of Gov. Terry Branstad’s Medicaid privatization experiment. On April 1, 2016, Iowa abandoned state management of the $4 billion health insurance program for more than 500,000 poor Iowans and hired three for-profit insurers to take over. One year later, the entire ordeal is like an April Fool’s joke with no end. The joke is on low-income Iowans who have lost access to health services. These include home-bound, disabled people who rely on daily visits from caregivers. (4/16).