State Highlights: ‘Bellwether’ Trial Over Roundup Cancer Claim Begins In California; Texas Awarded Millions In Funds To ‘Deficient’ Women’s Clinics

The Associated Press: High-Stakes Trial Over Roundup Cancer Claim To Begin
A jury in federal court in San Francisco will decide whether Roundup weed killer caused a California man's cancer in a trial starting Monday that plaintiffs' attorneys say could help determine the fate of hundreds of similar lawsuits. Edwin Hardeman, 70, is the second plaintiff to go to trial of thousands around the country who claim agribusiness giant Monsanto's weed killer causes cancer. Monsanto says studies have established that the active ingredient in Roundup, glyphosate, is safe. (2/25)

Houston Chronicle: Texas Gave Anti-Abortion Group Millions For Women's Health, Despite Warnings 
[Carol] Everett had never contracted with the state and had no clinical background. Many of the pregnancy centers she cited don’t provide contraception, a core service. Yet state health officials gave her much of the money anyway, ignoring warning signs and overruling staff who recommended millions less in funding, according to a review of the contracting by the Houston Chronicle. When Everett’s clinics began failing, the state delayed for months in shifting money to higher performing clinics, instead devoting vast amounts of time to support Everett and her small, understaffed team. Though it’s impossible to say how many more women could have been served had the resources been shifted sooner, several competing clinics burned through their funding early in the grant cycle, surpassing their targets for both spending and patients treated. (Blackman, 2/25)

KQED: Study: Sugary Drink Consumption Down By Half In Berkeley Since Soda Tax Implemented
Public health researchers say Berkeley’s soda tax is working to reduce the consumption of sugary beverages in neighborhoods hit hardest by diabetes, obesity and other chronic health problems linked to too much sugar. Ever since Berkeley voters overwhelmingly passed the nation's first penny-per-ounce tax on sugary beverages in 2014, a team at UC Berkeley’s School of Public Health has been interviewing people on the street about what kind of drinks they consume. (Dillon, 2/22)

The Associated Press: Special Unit To Move Mental Patients Under Consideration
Overhauling how South Carolina handles mental patients who must be brought to hospitals under the order of a doctor or a court is a more difficult problem than they expected, a group of senators said. Sen. Marlon Kimpson began working on the bill in fall, just weeks after two mental health patients drowned in the back of a locked police van while being moved during Hurricane Florence. (2/23)

The Associated Press: Doctors, Physician And Nursing Assistants Would Pay More To Practice Under New Washington Rules
Washington state regulators plan to increase the fees doctors and physician assistants must pay to renew their license to practice, citing increased costs tied to discipline as the primary cause of double-digit hikes. The increases are among the first revisions to licensure fees for health care professionals in a phased approach that could affect the tens of thousands of health care workers in Spokane County. The state Department of Health will hold a public meeting on the fee increases in Tumwater next week, amid pushback from the trade group representing the state’s practicing physicians who say the agency hasn’t yet made its case that the hikes, between 54 percent and 96 percent, are urgently needed. (Hill, 2/24)

WBUR: Arizona Law Leaves Schools Struggling To Navigate LGBTQ Issues
Arizona is one of at least seven states with curriculum laws around LGBTQ issues, according to the advocacy group GLSEN. But of all the state laws, Arizona's is the only one that bans promoting "a homosexual life-style," says University of Utah law professor Clifford Rosky. (Dale, 2/24)

Houston Chronicle: Doctor, Hospital Owner Convicted Of Health Care Fraud, Money Laundering In Houston Federal Case 
A Houston federal jury convicted two men of health care fraud and money laundering Friday after finding they had submitted false medical test claims and patient records in a multi-million-dollar fraudulent scheme. Harcharan Narang, a 50-year-old internal medicine doctor who owned a clinic in Cypress, and Dayakar Moparty, a 47-year-old former owner of Red Oak Hospital, face up to 10 years in federal prison for each of 17 health care fraud counts. (Scherer, 2/23)

San Jose Mercury News: Judge Rejects AG Request To Block Hospital Sale To Santa Clara
For the second time in a month, a federal judge has denied a request by California Attorney General Xavier Becerra to block the sale of two hospitals to Santa Clara County, saying Becerra doesn’t have the authority to regulate the sale of the nonprofit hospitals to a public entity. It’s unclear whether the attorney general will pursue another appeal and attempt to block the sale before it is set to close at the end of the month. (Vo, 2/22)

KQED: Lack Of Medication Treatments For Meth Frustrates Doctors
As San Francisco faces a resurgence of meth, with spikes in meth-related deaths, emergency room visits and hospitalizations, health officials are grappling with the limited treatment options available for meth addiction. For opioid use disorder there are three FDA-approved medications people can take to reduce cravings and withdrawal symptoms, and all are pretty effective. For meth and cocaine, there’s nothing. (Dembosky, 2/22)

PBS NewsHour: New York Moves To Regulate A ‘Likely Human Carcinogen’ In Drinking Water
New York state is proposing the country’s first firm limit on a chemical found in drinking water in heavy concentrations in some Long Island, New York communities. 1,4-dioxane has been labeled a “likely human carcinogen” by the EPA, but is not currently regulated in drinking water at the federal level. (Sreenivasan, Weber and Kargbo, 2/23)

Columbus Dispatch: Technology Increasingly Bridges Gaps In Support For Disabled Ohioans
Although its use is still far from widespread, “supportive technology” is emerging as an answer to some of the disability community’s most pressing issues. Advocates see it as a means to help people gain greater independence and reduce reliance on the direct-support workforce, which is struggling under low wages, a shortage of employees and alarmingly high turnover rates. (Price, 2/25)

Chicago Tribune: Lawsuit Accuses Drugmaker Akorn Of Misleading Investors About Problems At Decatur Plant 
An Akorn shareholder has filed a class action lawsuit against the Lake Forest-based drugmaker, accusing it of misleading investors about the severity of problems at the company’s Decatur plant. The lawsuit, filed in federal court Thursday, alleges that Akorn; its former CEO Rajat Rai; and its chief financial officer and executive vice president, Duane Portwood, failed to adequately warn investors about the seriousness of manufacturing problems in Decatur that drew the ire of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. (Schencker, 2/22)

Des Moines Register: Kent Nebel Becomes Iowa Board Of Medicine Executive Director
The Iowa Board of Medicine has promoted its longtime lawyer to executive director. Kent Nebel had served as interim executive director since shortly after his predecessor abruptly retired in July. Nebel, 53, previously served nearly 20 years as the board's legal director. The board licenses physicians and disciplines those who break ethics rules or are found to be practicing unsafe medicine. It often is involved in controversial issues, including abortion and the prescription of addictive painkillers. The board's executive director is one of the state's most powerful regulators of health care. (Leys, 2/22)

Sacramento Bee: CA Nurses Volunteer To Care For Asylum Seekers In Arizona
Moved by the deaths of immigrants at the nation’s southern border, registered nurses from California, Florida and Texas volunteered to travel to Arizona to provide basic medical support to migrants and asylum seekers Friday through Sunday. (Anderson, 2/22)

Cleveland Plain Dealer: Cuyahoga County Inmate Dies While Being Housed At State-Run Psychiatric Hospital
A Cuyahoga County inmate died Thursday while being held in a state-run psychiatric hospital. Robert Brown, 52, died Tuesday at University Heights Broadview Medical Center after being taken to the hospital from Northcoast Behavioral Healthcare in Northfield, according to the Cuyahoga County Medical Examiner. (Ferrise, 2/22)

Arizona Republic: Rate Of Babies Born With Syphilis In Maricopa County Skyrockets
Five babies in Maricopa County died from congenital syphilis in 2018 as the rate of the disease doubled in the county over the last two years, according to new data from the Maricopa County Department of Public Health. The department counted 30 babies born last year with the "tragic and preventable" disease. (Frank and Sanders, 2/24)

WBUR: How Atlanta Is Streamlining Funding And Targeting The Most Vulnerable To Reduce Homelessness
The state of Georgia has reduced homelessness by 51 percent since 2007, and Atlanta has brought it down significantly in that time as well. Since 2015, the number of people who are homeless has dropped almost 30 percent. Advocates in Atlanta are employing some innovative methods to tackle homelessness, like aligning public and private funding streams. (Hobson, 2/22)

The Washington Post: Craft Beer Wars In Maryland: Comptroller Peter Franchot Vs. Sen. Ben Kramer
A struggle over whether to strip alcohol regulation from the Maryland comptroller’s office turned ugly last week as each side accused the other of putting politics over public health and safety. In the past two years, Comptroller Peter Franchot (D) has pushed legislation that would remove caps on how much craft beer can be made and sold in local breweries. The effort did not succeed, and he angered some fellow Democrats with rhetoric accusing state lawmakers — including House Speaker Michael E. Busch (Anne Arundel) — of being under the thumb of big beer distributors. (Thompson, 2/24)