State Highlights: Florida Seeks To Close Facility For Disabled, Citing Horrific Abuse; NYC Sets Up Task Force On Mentally Ill After Shootings

ProPublica: Florida Moves To Shut Down For-Profit Residence After Finding Horrific Abuse And Neglect
After another patient died under suspicious circumstances and reports surfaced of more instances of abuse and neglect, Florida regulators moved this week to shutter a for-profit school and residential campus for children and adults with severe developmental disabilities. (Vogell, 4/19)

The Wall Street Journal: New York City Launches Task Force On Mentally Ill After Shootings
Two weeks after New York Police Department officers fatally shot a mentally disturbed man they thought was armed with a gun, Mayor Bill de Blasio launched a task force aimed at improving city responses to emergencies involving the mentally ill. The task force, made up of city officials, as well as New Yorkers living with mental illness, will over the course of 180 days focus on ways to prevent crises with the mentally ill and increase collaboration between the NYPD and the city’s health agencies, municipal officials said on Thursday. (Kanno-Youngs, 4/19)

Los Angeles Times: Gavin Newsom Gets Backing From Doctors Group, Despite Differences Over Single-Payer Healthcare
California’s doctors are siding with Gavin Newsom in the governor’s race, even though they don’t see eye-to-eye on a defining issue of the campaign: single-payer healthcare. The California Medical Assn., the state doctors lobby and a political heavyweight, announced its endorsement of the lieutenant governor on Thursday. “Gavin is a lifelong champion for health care in California, and we know he will continue to fight for pragmatic solutions to our most crucial health care challenges, including working to achieve universal access and tackling our state’s physician shortage,” CMA President Theodore M. Mazer said in a statement. (Mason, 4/19)

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: The Future Of Wisconsin Caps On Malpractice Payment Goes To Wisconsin Supreme Court
The more than $9.5 million award paid to a Milwaukee woman who lost all four of her limbs as a result of medical malpractice will not be enough to cover all of her future healthcare costs, her attorney told the state Supreme Court on Thursday. (Spivak, 4/19)

KQED: San Joaquin County Should Install Independent Medical Examiner, Audit Finds
An audit of San Joaquin County’s sheriff-coroner operations, made public Wednesday, concluded that removing the sheriff from death investigations and instituting a medical examiner's office run by a physician is the best way to ensure the probes remain independent from law enforcement. (Small, 4/19)

Orlando Sentinel: Chain Of Mental Health Clinics Declares Bankruptcy
Sanford-based Coastal Mental Health, which has eight locations across the region, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy Monday declaring more than $500,000 in debt. But it was the interest rate on the debt that made it unusual — much of it was at 30 percent to 50 percent. (Brinkman, 4/19)

California Healthline: Calif. Leads Nation In Pushing Back Against Trump Administration Health Policies
These days, when the federal government turns in one direction, California veers in the other — and in the case of health care, it’s a sharp swerve.In the nation’s most populous state, lawmakers and other policymakers seemingly are not content simply to resist Republican efforts to dismantle the Affordable Care Act. They are fighting to expand health coverage with a series of steps they hope will culminate in universal coverage for all Californians — regardless of immigration status and despite potentially monumental price tags. (Ibarra, 4/19)

New Orleans Times-Picayune: Louisiana House Passes Budget That Would Shutter Hospitals, Reduce TOPS
The Louisiana House voted 55-47 for a state operating budget Thursday (April 19) with $648 million worth of cuts that state officials said would result in the closing of hospitals, nursing homes and medical residency programs for doctors throughout the state as early as July. More than 46,000 people who are elderly and disabled are expected to lose their nursing home slots and 24-hour home health care services in a little over two months if the House budget plan becomes law. (O'Donoghue, 4/19)

Pioneer Press: MN Legislature Tax Fight Muddied Over Health Care Funding
Minnesota Republicans say Gov. Mark Dayton needs to drop a proposal to continue a tax that pays for health care for the working poor if he wants any chance at an agreement to rewrite the state’s tax code. “If the provider tax is not part of the conversation, tax conformity is a lot easier,” Rep. Pat Garofalo said Thursday, moments after finishing a news conference where he accused the Democratic governor of supporting what amounts to a $1.4 billion tax hike. (Magan, 4/19)

San Francisco Chronicle: State Can Label Widely Used Herbicide As Possible Carcinogen
A state appeals court on Thursday backed California’s listing of the widely used herbicide glyphosate as a possible cause of cancer and the state’s prohibition against discharging it into public waterways. ...Citing new findings by the International Agency for Research on Cancer, state health officials added glyphosate to their list of potential carcinogens in July 2017 under Proposition 65, a 1986 initiative that requires warnings of exposure to products that pose a risk of cancer or reproductive harm. (Egelko, 4/19)

San Francisco Chronicle: SF’s St. Mary’s Hospital Finally Gets OK To Open Beds For Mentally Ill
The 54 beds for severely mentally ill patients have opened at St. Mary’s Medical Center in the Richmond District, six weeks after Mayor Mark Farrell announced the city’s plans to add them. Forty of the beds are reserved for patients in San Francisco’s public health system, including some that may be homeless. (Swan, 4/19)

The San Diego Union-Tribune: Mounting Toll Of Alzheimer's In Lives, Dollars In San Diego Spelled Out In Reports 
More than 84,000 people in San Diego County are living with Alzheimer’s and related dementias, a figure that will reach 115,000 by 2030, according to two reports released by the county Friday. The lifetime cost of care for San Diegans with these dementias now exceeds $38 billion and is expected to surpass $52 billion by 2030. The reports update a 2015 report on an ambitious county program to cope with the rising toll of dementia. One report focuses on the prevalence of these diseases. The other examines the cost. (Fikes, 4/20)

The Baltimore Sun: State Health Body Approves Anne Arundel Medical Center Mental Health Hospital 
A new Annapolis mental health hospital could be opening its doors in 2020 after the Maryland Health Care Commission on Thursday approved the center’s certificate of need. The Anne Arundel Medical Center Mental Health hospital will include 16 beds and provide in- and out-patient services for a number of mental health conditions. It will be the second hospital providing in-patient mental health care in the county. (Ohl, 4/19)

Georgia Health News: Georgia Rates Better In Emergency Preparedness, But Still Has Room For Improvement
Georgia’s preparedness for managing health emergencies is improving but still lags behind the national average, according to a newly released report. The state scored a 6.8 on a 10-point scale for preparedness, in an index that shows the ability to protect Americans’ health from incidents such as newly emerging infectious diseases; an increase in resistance to antibiotics; terrorism; and extreme weather conditions. (Miller, 4/19)

Boston Globe: For Those Who Receive — And Deliver — Meals On Wheels, More Than Nutrition Is On The Menu
The federally funded Meals on Wheels program provides a daily visit for about 75,000 people over age 60 in Massachusetts. Many are hungry, isolated, and living in or near poverty. It’s a human connection to an outside world that can recede from view in later years. (Weisman, 4/20)