State Highlights: New York City’s Diabetic Students Treated Unfairly, Parents Claim In Lawsuit; ACLU Pushes To End Aid-In-Dying Ban At Hawaii Retirement Home
Media outlets report on news from New York, Hawaii, California, Arizona and Minnesota.
The Wall Street Journal:
Parents Of Children With Diabetes Sue NYC Education Department
A federal lawsuit accuses New York City of failing to ensure that students with diabetes can attend public school safely and with equal access to educational opportunities as their peers. The proposed class-action suit, filed Thursday in federal court in Brooklyn, claims that the New York City Department of Education and others violate students’ rights by denying them adequate diabetes-related care, including services for school field trips, before-and-after school activities and bus transportation. Diabetes, a lifelong condition, is considered a disability under federal and local laws. (West, 11/1)
The Associated Press:
ACLU Objects To Hawaii Retirement Home Assisted Suicide Ban
The American Civil Liberties Union demanded Thursday that a Hawaii retirement home stop discriminating against non-Catholic residents and allow them to take advantage of the state’s new medically assisted suicide law if they wish. The ACLU of Hawaii sent a letter to the executive director of the Kahala Nui home after receiving an anonymous tip that the home had notified residents they would not be permitted to exercise the provisions of the law, which takes effect in January. (McAvoy, 11/2)
San Jose Mercury News:
Bay Area Hospitals, Union Spending Millions On Local Patient-Cost Measures
In a high-stakes election campaign with statewide implications, a health care union is spending millions to sway voters in two Bay Area cities to cap how much hospitals can charge patients. The hospitals, led by Stanford Health Care, are fighting back with their own millions to deliver the message that the union is more interested in signing up new members than containing patient costs. (Ruggiero, 11/1)
Arizona Republic:
Woman Wants Arizona Law To Require Insurers To Cover Infertility
Only 16 states have laws concerning insurance coverage for infertility treatments and five states have fertility preservation laws, which require insurance companies to help women undergoing chemotherapy freeze their eggs before starting treatment. In states without these laws, many insurance companies refuse to cover treatments that can help families conceive children. (Castle, 11/1)
Cleveland Plain Dealer:
A Step-By-Step Look At How Ohio’s Pro-Gun Lawmakers Stripped Away Cities Power To Write Their Own Rules
Gov. John Kasich proposed modest gun reforms in the wake of the school shooting in Parkland, Fla., earlier this year and the legislature has been mulling over numerous bills, including Republican-introduced legislation that calls for a means to flag people with mental health issues who should not own guns. As it stands, Ohio has some of the loosest gun laws in America, but not for a lack of trying by some urban communities. (Krouse, 11/1)
Cleveland Plain Dealer:
Do The Ohio Lawmakers Who Stripped Away Local Gun Laws Still Think It Was A Good Idea?
In light of the continued onslaught of gun violence in Cleveland and communities across the country (but before the recent slayings at a synagogue in Pittsburgh), cleveland.com asked several legislators who voted for HB 347, and for the override of Gov. Bob Taft's veto of that bill, why they supported legislation that Cleveland leaders believed would help reduce gun violence. We also asked them if their views had changed since then and to discuss their views on other commonly debated gun reforms.One of the legislators is no longer in the General Assembly but is running for office this year. (Krouse, 11/1)
Stat:
A New California Law Will Put Hundreds More Women In Biotech Boardrooms
In the next few years, publicly traded life sciences companies headquartered in California could collectively need to add hundreds of women to their boards in order to comply with a new state gender-parity law. That’s going to mean finding women to fill 126 board seats in the sector by the end of 2019. And by the end of 2021, 456 women may need to be recruited to join these boards. All told, across every category of the life sciences sector, at least 85 percent of public California companies will need to add at least one woman to their board by the end of 2021. (Robbins, 11/1)
Georgia Health News:
‘D’ Grade: Georgia’s Preterm Births Rise
Georgia’s preterm birth rate rose from 11.2 percent to 11.4 percent in 2017, keeping the state at a “D’’ grade in the annual Premature Birth Report Card from the March of Dimes. The state’s rate of babies born too soon (before 37 weeks of pregnancy) continued to reflect large racial disparities, with black women at 13.7 percent – 46 percent higher than the rate among all other women. (Miller, 11/1)
Arizona Republic:
Planned Phoenix Cell Therapy Facility Has No Price Or Location Yet
The Phoenix-based Translational Genomics Research Institute is planning to build a cell therapy manufacturing facility to improve cancer treatment. The California-based City of Hope cancer research center, along with TGen, announced Thursday the intent to develop the facility in Phoenix. (Innes, 11/1)
WBUR:
Immigrating To The U.S.? Get Ready For A New Gut Microbiome (And Maybe More Pounds)
Moving to the U.S. can seriously mess with immigrants' microbiomes, according to a new study that tracked the digestive health of refugees coming to Minnesota from Southeast Asia. ...Knights and his colleagues arrived at these insights by analyzing the intestinal bacteria of about 500 ethnically Hmong and Karen women living in Thailand and in the U.S., including first- and second-generation immigrants. (Singh, 11/1)
The Associated Press:
Family Of Singer Chris Cornell Sues Doctor Over His Death
Family members of Chris Cornell on Thursday sued a doctor they say overprescribed drugs to the rock singer, leading to his death. Cornell’s widow, Vicky Cornell, and their children, Toni and Christopher, are plaintiffs in the lawsuit filed in Los Angeles Superior Court alleging that prescription drugs, especially the anti-anxiety drug lorazepam, led to erratic behavior from the Soundgarden frontman before his death in Detroit in 2017 at age 52. (Dalton, 11/1)
