First Edition: April 4, 2019

Kaiser Health News: Even Amid Measles Outbreaks, Oregon Model Offers Easy Vaccine Exemptions
As measles outbreaks continue in the Northwest and across the nation, newly revealed health records from Oregon suggest it’s surprisingly easy to opt out of required vaccinations in that state — as in several others. In Oregon — which has the highest kindergarten vaccine exemption rate in the U.S. — about 95% of parents whose kids skip one or more vaccines use a print-your-own certificate to do so. That’s according to data from the Oregon Health Authority, which shows that of more than 31,500 non-medical vaccine exemptions submitted last year, nearly 30,000 were documented by parents who watched an online education video and then printed out a do-it-yourself form. (Aleccia, 4/4)

California Healthline: Popular Weed Killer’s Alleged Link To Cancer Spreads Concern
Clumps of dandelions have popped up in your yard, so you reach for a bottle of Roundup, the popular weed killer. It is known for being very effective, but its main ingredient, glyphosate, is getting a lot of attention because of lawsuits alleging links to cancer. Last week, a federal jury ordered Monsanto, the maker of Roundup, to pay $80 million to a 70-year-old man with cancer who had used it for three decades on his 56 acres in Sonoma County, Calif. The jury found that Roundup was a “substantial factor” in his illness. Bayer AG, which bought Monsanto last year, said it would appeal the decision. (Cone, 4/3)

Kaiser Health News: Listen: What’s Up With Trump’s Sudden Turnaround On Health Care?
Julie Rovner, the chief Washington correspondent for Kaiser Health News, joined Stephen Henderson on WDET’s “Detroit Today” show Tuesday to talk about the Trump administration’s recent decision calling for a federal appeals court to overturn the Affordable Care Act. The decision created so many concerns among Republican lawmakers that President Donald Trump has stepped back from comments suggesting the GOP would push through its own health plan this year.  Rovner also takes questions from listeners about the uncertain future of health care policies. Listen here for the conversation. (4/3)

The New York Times: House Condemns Trump Administration For Legal Attack On Health Law
The House voted Wednesday to condemn the Trump administration for pushing a federal appeals court to obliterate the Affordable Care Act, and it urged the Justice Department to defend the law in court. The vote, 240-186, was nonbinding, but it documented the House’s support of the health law, which was passed nine years ago without the votes of any Republicans. With the resolution, Democrats sought to put Republicans on the record for failing to come to the defense of the health law’s most popular provisions, such as protecting people with pre-existing medical conditions and mandating coverage for “essential health benefits,” like mental health coverage, prescription drugs, emergency services and maternity care. (Pear, 4/3)

The Washington Post: House Votes To Rebuke Trump’s Attempt At A Court-Ordered Destruction Of Obamacare
The resolution passed 240 to 186, with eight Republicans joining the chamber’s Democrats in rebuking Trump. One Democrat, Rep. Collin C. Peterson (Minn.), broke ranks and voted against the resolution. With Wednesday’s vote, Democrats were seeking to put Republicans on record as siding with Trump in his attempt to use the courts to overturn the ACA, known as Obamacare, including politically popular provisions that protect people with preexisting conditions and allow individuals to remain on their parents’ insurance plans until age 26. (Wagner, 4/3)

Politico: House Condemns Trump's Bid To Get Rid Of Obamacare
The non-binding resolution is one of is one of several steps Democrats are taking to try to link vulnerable Republicans with the administration's controversial legal strategy while touting their own work to shore up the law. The last time the GOP tried to get rid of Obamacare, it cost them control of the House and several state capitols, and Democrats are working to keep the spotlight on the issue going into the 2020 election cycle. (Ollstein, 4/3)

The Wall Street Journal: Democrats, Trump Try To Keep Spotlight On Health Care
Many Republicans on Capitol Hill were ready to move on Wednesday from pursuing a politically risky health-care overhaul ahead of the 2020 election. But President Trump and the Democrats weren’t quite ready to change the subject. The Democratic-led House on Wednesday passed a resolution criticizing the Trump administration’s actions to undermine the Affordable Care Act. Eight House Republicans, largely from swing districts, defected to support the resolution, which was backed by all but one Democrat. “There’s no backup plan,” said Rep. Fred Upton (R., Mich.), who voted for the resolution. (Peterson and Armour, 4/3)

Politico: Senate GOP Alarm Forced Trump’s Latest Health Care Flip-Flop
Trump’s rare reversal acknowledged dual political realities: One is that House Democrats are extremely unlikely to pass any Republican-backed health care bill. Perhaps more important, health care is a toxic issue for Republicans, who have repeatedly failed to unite behind an Obamacare alternative that would necessarily be hugely complex and filled with difficult compromises. Speaking at a GOP fundraiser in Washington on Tuesday night, Trump acknowledged that Democrats — who hammered Republicans on health care in the 2018 midterm elections — enjoy a political advantage on the issue: "They have healthcare right now," Trump said. "We have to take that away from them." Republican leaders said that the campaign for Trump to roll back his pledge stemmed from unrest in the rank-and-file of the Senate. (Johnson and Everett, 4/2)

Politico: Obamacare Fight Obscures America’s Real Health Care Crisis: Money
The Obamacare wars have ignored what really drives American anxiety about health care: Medical costs are decimating family budgets and turning the U.S. health system into a runaway $3.7 trillion behemoth. Poll after poll shows that cost is the number one issue in health care for American voters, but to a large extent, both parties are still mired in partisan battles over other aspects of Obamacare – most notably how to protect people with pre-existing conditions and how to make insurance more affordable, particularly for people who buy coverage on their own. (Kenen, 4/3)

Politico: Health Department Suspends Contracts With GOP-Linked Consultants
The Trump administration's health department is suspending contracts with several GOP-connected communications firms, according to four people with knowledge of the situation, days after a POLITICO report revealed the existence of the contracts. One of the contractors who was hired to boost Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator Seema Verma's profile with the media has also abruptly cut ties with the agency, two people with knowledge of the situation said. (Diamond and Cancryn, 4/3)

The Associated Press: 6 States, DC Sue Over Changes To School Lunch Rules
Six states and the District of Columbia sued the Department of Agriculture on Wednesday, saying it weakened nutritional standards in school breakfasts and lunches when it relaxed the requirements affecting salt and refined grains last year. The lawsuit in Manhattan federal court asked a judge to overturn the changes, saying they were carried out in an arbitrary and capricious manner. (4/3)

Reuters: U.S. States Sue To Undo Trump Rollback Of Healthy School Lunch Rules
New York, California, Illinois, Minnesota, New Mexico, Vermont and the District of Columbia said Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue acted in an "arbitrary and capricious" manner, and asked a Manhattan federal judge to void the new sodium and whole grain standards. "The Trump administration has undermined key health benefits for our children . . . with deliberate disregard for science, expert opinion, and the law," New York Attorney General Letitia James said in a statement. (Stempel, 4/3)

The New York Times: Trump Administration Sued Over Rollback Of School Lunch Standards
The attorney general of New York, Letitia James, announced the lawsuit outside a Brooklyn elementary school, Public School 67, which serves residents of the Ingersoll Houses, a low-income apartment complex run by New York City. Ms. James said 99 percent of those students qualified for free or reduced-price meals before 2017, when the city made school lunches free for all students. With local officials, parents, a pediatrician and antihunger advocates at her side, Ms. James said the Trump administration, by rolling back nutritional requirements, was “attacking the health and the safety of our children,” particularly the poorest, including the two million across the state who live in poverty. (Green and Piccoli, 4/3)

The Wall Street Journal: States Sue Trump Administration Over Rollback Of School-Lunch Nutrition Standards
In December, the Agriculture Department unveiled its final plans to loosen those standards, which mandated that carbohydrate-rich foods—like pizza, pasta or hamburger buns—be made with whole grains, and targeted an overall reduction in sodium content in elementary school lunches to 640 milligrams. The new standards require schools to serve whole grains in only half the items on their lunch menus, and maintain the overall sodium limit at 1,230 milligrams. The maximum recommended daily sodium intake is about 1,900 milligrams for that age group, according to government dietary guidelines. (Hackman, 4/3)

The New York Times: Risky Stem-Cell Treatments Come Under F.D.A. Scrutiny — Again
The Food and Drug Administration warned rogue stem-cell clinics on Wednesday to stop selling unproven treatments that could harm patients. The agency’s latest effort, like most of its previous ones, consisted only of letters to companies and clinics. One letter warned a company making products from umbilical-cord blood that it was violating federal law, and other letters told 20 clinics and stem-cell makers that they appeared to be subject to F.D.A. review for approval and that they should contact the agency about how to comply. (Grady, 4/3)

The Washington Post: FDA Sends Letters To 20 Companies In Attempt To Rein In Stem Cell Industry
The letters are part of an ongoing attempt by the FDA to rein in the booming industry , which critics say has injured dozens of patients and cheated thousands more. In recent years, hundreds of clinics have have popped up selling stem cell procedures — not covered by insurance, unproven by science and unauthorized by the government — that purveyors claim can treat ailments ranging from creaky knees to Alzheimer’s, Crohn’s disease and multiple sclerosis. (Wan and McGinley, 4/3)

The Wall Street Journal: FDA Probes More Stem-Cell Treatment Companies
“Most forms of regenerative medicine are still in early stages of development, and adult stem cells and stem cells from birthing tissues have not been shown to be safe and effective for use” in treating patients, said FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb and Peter Marks, director of the FDA’s center on biologic therapies, in a statement. The FDA warning letter issued to Cord for Life Inc., of Altamonte Springs, Fla., said that the company’s products are intended for therapeutic uses such as orthopedic conditions. But they are, in the FDA’s view, subject to federal regulation as drugs and as human cells or cellular or tissue-based products. (Burton, 4/3)

The Washington Post: This Clinic’s Experimental Stem Cell Treatment Blinded Patients. Years Later, The Government Is Still Trying To Stop It.
In the summer of 2015, ophthalmologist Thomas Albini examined a patient who had suddenly lost vision in both eyes. The woman, 78, had macular degeneration and had visited a Miami clinic offering a new treatment: injections of stem cells made from fat in her belly. Instead of getting better, the woman’s vision deteriorated significantly. Peering into her eyes, Albini said, he saw clumps of blood floating inside. The next day, a second patient appeared in Albini’s emergency room at the University of Miami complaining of blindness and searing pain after receiving eye injections from the same company, U.S. Stem Cell. (McGinley and Wan, 4/3)

The Washington Post: NIH Police Yank Iranian Graduate Student From Lab As Agency Clamps Down On Security
The National Institutes of Health is requiring all visitors — including patients — to disclose their citizenship as a condition of entry, a policy that has unnerved staff scientists and led to recent disputes with at least two Iranian scientists invited to make presentations, only to be blocked from campus. In one incident, a Georgetown University graduate student arriving for a job interview was held up at security, then allowed to proceed to one of the campus buildings. But as he prepared to make a presentation, NIH police arrived, removed him from a lab and escorted him off campus, according to a complaint Monday to a group that represents staff scientists. (Bernstein, Sun and Rein, 4/3)

Politico: The Congressman Who Turned The VA Into A Lobbying Free-For-All
The Indian Treaty Room is a grand two-story meeting space in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building next to the White House, with French and Italian marble wall panels, a pattern of stars on the ceiling and the image of a compass worked into the tiled floor. Over the years, it has hosted signing ceremonies for historic foreign policy pacts such as the Bretton Woods agreement and the United Nations Charter. On Nov. 16, 2017, it hosted a different kind of gathering: an intimate meeting called by the White House to discuss the future of the Department of Veterans Affairs. ... Within months of leaving office, By the time the meeting in the Indian Treaty Room took place, [Jeff] Miller had three clients vying for access to veteran patients and VA dollars. He subsequently would lobby on behalf of seven other private interests seeking a piece of the agency’s budget. (Craven, 4/4)

The New York Times: The Army Thought He Was Faking His Health Issues. Turns Out He Had Chronic Lead Poisoning.
At age 30, Stephen Hopkins was back in the Army for a second time. After serving as an enlisted soldier from 1991 to 1995, he returned as an officer in 2000. He was a man who routinely maxed fitness tests and endured physical hardship while deployed to rural locales in Afghanistan. Selected for Special Forces training, Hopkins tackled the demanding courses with gusto, later returning to combat for a total of seven deployments. He had a job he loved and excelled at, and his star was ascending. But in 2005, Hopkins began experiencing wild swings in blood pressure. (Kime, 4/3)

USA Today: Cancer-Causing Wind Turbines? President Donald Trump Claim Blown Away
What Trump said about wind and cancer: "And they say the noise causes cancer. You tell me that one (makes whirring noise mimicking a turbine).” There's no evidence to suggest cancer and wind farms are linked. Critics have linked wind turbine operations to electromagnetic fields (EMF), shadow flicker, audible noise, low-frequency noise and infrasound, annoyances that could disrupt sleep, induce headaches or even cause mild nausea. (King, 4/3)

Politico: Grassley Schools Trump On ‘Idiotic’ Wind Turbines And Cancer Comment
Count Chuck Grassley as among those displeased by President Donald Trump's attacks on wind energy. The longtime Iowa GOP senator told Iowa reporters on Wednesday afternoon that Trump's comments implying turbines cause cancer was "idiotic." Then he explained to Capitol Hill reporters that the president needs to stop railing against wind power. (Everett, 4/3)

The Hill: Grassley: Trump Saying Wind Turbine Noise Causes Cancer Is 'Idiotic'
"I’m told that the White House respects my views on a lot of issues," Grassley said Wednesday during the call. "[Trump's] comments on wind energy — not only as a president but when he was a candidate — were, first of all, idiotic, and it didn’t show much respect for Chuck Grassley as the grandfather of the wind energy tax credit." (Daugherty, 4/3)

The New York Times: Express Scripts Offers Diabetes Patients A $25 Cap For Monthly Insulin
Consumers whose drug benefits are managed by Express Scripts could see their out-of-pocket costs for insulin limited to $25 a month under a plan announced on Wednesday. The move is aimed at addressing rising anger over the cost of the lifesaving product, whose list price has skyrocketed in recent years. Express Scripts said about 700,000 people filed a claim for insulin last year through its Cigna or Express Scripts plans. The average monthly savings for those whose employers opted into the plan would be about $16 a month. (Thomas, 4/3)

The Wall Street Journal: Express Scripts To Offer A Way To Lower Insulin Costs
The cap, if picked up by employers, would save the average patient about $15 a month, or 40%, and even more for patients covered under a typical high-deductible health plan, according to Express Scripts. Patients could start benefiting from the lower out-of-pocket costs in the next few months, depending on when employers decide to opt-in, a company spokesman said. The offering will include all insulin types, including those made by Eli Lilly & Co., Novo Nordisk AS and Sanofi SA, three of the biggest makers of diabetes drugs. Express Scripts and Cigna insure about 700,000 patients taking insulin, said Glen Stettin, chief innovation officer at Express Scripts. (Walker, 4/3)

NPR: Express Scripts Takes Steps To Cut Insulin's Price To Patients
Insulin has become a major focus. A Minnesota man died last year, according to his mother, when he tried to ration his insulin because he couldn't afford the $1,300 monthly cost. Though the drug has been in use for more than a century, its price in the U.S. is 10 times higher than it was 20 years ago, according to a report by the House of Representatives released last week. (Kodjak, 4/3)

The Wall Street Journal: Sorrento Therapeutics Sues Billionaire Soon-Shiong Over Development Of Cancer Drug
Sorrento Therapeutics Inc. alleges billionaire Patrick Soon-Shiong and one of his companies stopped development of an experimental cancer drug because its success would hurt sales of a rival drug sold by Celgene Corp. CELG 0.44% that Dr. Soon-Shiong invented, according to a civil complaint filed in Los Angeles Superior Court. Sorrento sold the cancer drug Cynviloq to Dr. Soon-Shiong’s NantPharma LLC in a deal valued at up to $1.3 billion in 2015. Sorrento received more than $90 million in cash, with the remaining funds tied to regulatory and sales milestones if the drug received regulatory approval. (Hopkins, 4/3)

Los Angeles Times: Sorrento Therapeutics Sues Soon-Shiong, Alleging It Was Shortchanged In Cancer Drug Sale
In the arbitration case, the biotech firm charges that Soon-Shiong purchased and then sought to kill Sorrento’s experimental drug, Cynviloq, before it could reach market. The drug candidate was lauded as a next-generation spin on Abraxane, the anti-cancer drug Soon-Shiong sold to Celgene for $2.9 billion in 2010. Soon-Shiong later “orchestrated a secret, illegal transaction” to recoup the funds he paid for Cynviloq, according to the civil case. In an emailed statement, Soon-Shiong denied the allegations. (Van Grove, 4/3)

Politico's Pulse Check: Rep. Joe Kennedy On Defending Medicaid In The Trump Era
Rep. Joe Kennedy first appeared on this podcast in early 2017, at House Democrats' lowest moment: The GOP had steamrolled the party, speeding an Affordable Care Act repeal bill that seemed inevitable. But the GOP's efforts ultimately failed; Democrats retook the House a year later; and Kennedy this week rejoined POLITICO's Dan Diamond to reflect on how House Democrats' health policy has changed as they've become the majority party, why he now supports a Medicare for All bill, how he approaches questioning Trump officials like HHS Secretary Alex Azar and more. (4/3)

The New York Times: Scientists Thought They Had Measles Cornered. They Were Wrong.
The measles outbreak that led to a state of emergency in New York’s Rockland County began far away: in an annual Hasidic pilgrimage from Israel to Ukraine. It is emblematic of a series of fierce, sometimes connected measles outbreaks — in places as diverse as Indonesia, the Philippines, Madagascar and Venezuela — that have shaken global health officials, revealing persistent shortcomings in the world’s vaccination efforts and threatening to tarnish what had been a signature public health achievement. (McNeil, 4/3)

The Associated Press: US Investigates Seizure Risk With Electronic Cigarettes
U.S. health officials are investigating whether electronic cigarettes may trigger seizures in some people who use the nicotine-vaping devices. The Food and Drug Administration said Wednesday it has reviewed 35 reports of seizures among e-cigarettes users, mainly in young people. Regulators stressed it's not yet clear whether vaping is responsible. But they said they're concerned and encouraged the public to report information about the issue. (Perrone, 4/3)

Reuters: FDA Warns Of Potential Seizure Risk In Some Users Of E-Cigarettes
Seizures or convulsions are known potential side effects of nicotine poisoning and have been reported in relation to intentional or accidental swallowing of nicotine-containing e-liquids, according to the FDA statement. (4/3)

The Associated Press: Study: Safe To Transplant Hepatitis C-Infected Hearts, Lungs
Doctors can safely transplant hepatitis C-infected lungs and hearts into people desperate for a new organ, say researchers who may have found a way to protect those patients from getting the risky virus. The experiment, reported Wednesday, is the latest attempt to put a dent in the nation's long transplant waiting list by using organs that otherwise would be wasted, often ones from victims of the opioid epidemic. (4/3)

NPR: Study: Hepatitis C Infected Organs OK For Heart And Lung Transplants
Typically, these organs have been discarded because of concerns about spreading the viral infection. But a study of heart and lung transplants published Wednesday by the New England Journal of Medicine finds that new antiviral drugs are so effective that the recipients can be protected from infection. And, as another sad result of the opioid epidemic, organs for donation increasingly carry the hepatitis C virus. People who use injected drugs and share needles are at high risk of hepatitis C infection. (Harris, 4/3)

Stat: Digital Health Start-Ups Want To Help Medicare Prevent Diabetes 
In rolling out a first-of-its-kind program to prevent diabetes, Medicare officials dashed the hopes of many start-ups in 2017 by deciding to exclude online health companies from participation. Since the program’s launch, however, large cracks have formed in Medicare’s service network. The program, which offers classes to improve diet and exercise habits, has no providers in Alabama or Mississippi — states in the heart of the so-called diabetes belt — and only one in Georgia, according to a federal database of more than 460 participants. (Ross, 4/4)

The New York Times: ‘Predatory’ Scientific Publisher Is Hit With A $50 Million Judgment
In the world of scientific research, they are pernicious impostors. So-called predatory journals, online publications with official-sounding names, publish virtually anything, even gibberish, that an academic researcher submits — for a fee. Critics have long maintained that these journals are eroding scientific credibility and wasting grant money. But academics must publish research to further their careers, and the number of questionable outlets has exploded. (Kolata, 4/3)

Stat: Experts Call For More Research About Taking Medicine While Breastfeeding
A growing number of babies born in the U.S. are breastfed, and health officials are pushing to make it easier for even more new mothers to nurse their babies. But experts say there still isn’t enough research about one of the most common experiences among lactating women: taking medication. Scientific studies frequently exclude pregnant and lactating women, which means there’s little information about whether drugs are safe to use while pregnant or breastfeeding, how well they work, or the best doses to take. And in a new perspective paper published Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine, OB-GYNs say there is still a slew of unanswered questions about drug use while breastfeeding. (Thielking, 4/3)

NPR: Many Miss Sunscreen Around Eyes And Other Spots Vulnerable To Skin Cancer
You may not be thin-skinned, but your eyelids certainly are. The fragile tissue is the thinnest on the body, less than 1 millimeter thick. While crepe-thin skin is great for blinking, it makes the area especially vulnerable to the sun's UV rays. Five to 10 percent of skin cancers occur on the eyelid. Unfortunately, that same patch of sensitive skin is the area where we're most likely to skimp on sun protection, according to a study published Wednesday in PLOS One. (Ellis, 4/3)

The Associated Press: People Living With Incurable Cancers Urge More Research
Tom Smith hesitated to buy light bulbs guaranteed for up to 10 years, thinking they'd outlast him. Terry Langbaum debated filling a prescription for a $13,000-a-month drug that keeps cancer from worsening for three months on average and carries six pages of warnings. "There are so many of us living with cancers that can't be cured," Langbaum said. "We study the treatments but we don't study what it's like to be the person going through treatment." (4/3)

The New York Times: The Boy Was Feverish, With A Swollen Testicle. What Could He Possibly Have?
I can’t eat,” the 16-year-old boy announced sadly. He and his brother, along with their parents, were in London on vacation. The boy arrived a few days earlier, but he’d felt awful for the two weeks before that. Sitting at the restaurant, the boy looked sick — he was pale and clearly uncomfortable. “I have to go back to the room,” he said. His mother handed him the key, and he limped slowly to the elevators to go back to bed. That summer had started normally enough. The boy and his family spent two weeks in Hawaii, where they had a vacation home. Then they went back to their year-round home in Seattle to prepare for the rest of what was going to be a busy summer. (Sanders, 4/4)

The New York Times: Eat Your Veggies: Study Finds Poor Diets Linked To One In Five Deaths
Mom is right when she says to eat your peas. In one of the largest surveys of data on global dietary habits and longevity, researchers found that consuming vegetables, fruits, fish and whole grains was strongly associated with a longer life — and that people who skimped on such healthy foods were more likely to die before their time. (Jacobs, 4/3)

Los Angeles Times/ProPublica: Border Patrol Agents Are Granted Wide Latitude When Trying To Catch Drivers Seeking To Enter U.S. Illegally
On a rainy November afternoon last year, eight men held tight to a gray tarp, their bodies pressed against one another as they lay feet to head in the bed of a pickup truck. Most knew one another from Acatic, a Mexican town in the state of Jalisco, where the country’s most vicious cartel has caused the morgue to overflow. Rainwater pooled on the tarp, running in rivulets down the sides and soaking the men underneath. The closeness provided only some warmth, as the men lay shivering, feeling every bump of the rocky scrubland as they crossed into the United States. (Surana, Mejia and Queally, 4/4)

The Washington Post: San Diego County Board Of Supervisors Sues Trump Administration Over Asylum Seekers After End Of Safe Release
San Diego county’s Republican-dominated board of supervisors filed a federal lawsuit Wednesday against the Trump administration, claiming that policy changes in the way the federal government treats asylum seekers have strained the city’s finances and health services. The Trump administration ended the so-called “Safe Release” program in October, which gave asylum seekers who had crossed the border assistance in reaching final destinations with family members and friends, the lawsuit noted. (Rosenberg, 4/4)

Los Angeles Times: Border Patrol’s Largest Holding Area — Known To Migrants As ‘The Kennel’ — Is Overwhelmed
Overwhelmed by an influx of migrant families, the federal government’s largest holding facility for people caught crossing the border illegally has run out of space and exhausted its budget. The Central Processing Center, located in McAllen, Texas, is known to migrants as la perrera, or “the kennel.” Designed for 1,500 people, it now houses 2,400, according to Border Patrol officials, who gave journalists a rare tour on Wednesday. (Hennessy-Fiske, 4/3)

The Associated Press: Autopsy: Migrant Boy Who Died In US Had Flu Infection
An autopsy report confirmed that an 8-year-old Guatemalan boy who died while in custody of the U.S. Border Patrol on Christmas Eve succumbed to a flu infection — one of two deaths of Central American children in December that raised concerns about the government’s ability to care for minors at the southern border. The New Mexico Office of the Medical Examiner released its autopsy findings for Felipe Gomez Alonzo on Wednesday, two days after Guatemalan authorities said they had received a copy of the report disclosing the boy had a rapid, progressive infection that led to organ failure. (Hudetz, 4/4)

The New York Times: Alabama’s Gruesome Prisons: Report Finds Rape And Murder At All Hours
One prisoner had been dead for so long that when he was discovered lying face down, his face was flattened. Another was tied up and tortured for two days while no one noticed. Bloody inmates screamed for help from cells whose doors did not lock. Those were some of the gruesome details in a 56-page report on the Alabama prison system that was issued by the Justice Department on Wednesday. The report, one of the first major civil rights investigations by the department to be released under President Trump, uncovered shocking conditions in the state’s massively overcrowded and understaffed facilities. (Benner and Dewan, 4/3)

The Associated Press: A Look At Fixes Justice Department Wants In Alabama Prisons
The U.S. Justice Department says that in addition to long-term measures, the Alabama Department of Corrections should make immediate changes in response to constitutional violations in its prisons. Here is a brief summary. (4/3)

inewsource: Dozens Of Women Sue Sharp Grossmont For Secretly Videotaping Their Surgeries
More than 80 women are suing Sharp Grossmont Hospital and Sharp Healthcare for videotaping them without their consent as they underwent painful and emotional obstetric surgeries, including C-sections. According to the 15-page lawsuit, the operating room cameras in the La Mesa facility captured videos of about 1,800 women between July 17, 2012 and June 30, 2013. Plaintiffs’ attorneys said Sharp officials disclosed those numbers and dates during legal proceedings before the lawsuit was filed. (Clark, 4/2)

Los Angeles Times: More Than 80 Women Sue San Diego Hospital Alleging Secret Camera Recordings
Allison Goddard, the lawyer representing the 81 plaintiffs, said one video shows a patient being wheeled into an operating room for an emergency caesarean section. Goddard said the video shows the woman being prepared for surgery with her gown tucked under her breasts. It shows her exposed stomach and thighs and, after the delivery of the baby, a nurse massaging the woman’s uterus to expel any blood clots. (Diaz, 4/3)

The Washington Post: Sharp Grossmont Hospital In La Mesa Secretly Recorded Women During Medical Procedures, Lawsuit Claims
Sharp Grossmont Hospital’s parent company, Sharp HealthCare, said in a statement that from July 2012 to June 2013, computer monitors with motion-activated cameras were set up to record in three operating rooms in the women’s health center as part of an investigation into medications that had gone missing from drug carts. “Although the cameras were intended to record only individuals in front of the anesthesia carts removing drugs, others, including patients and medical personnel in the operating rooms, were at times visible to the cameras and recorded,” Sharp HealthCare said in the statement. (Bever, 4/4)

The Associated Press: Maryland Passes Countermeasure To Trump Family-Planning Rule
In a countermeasure to a proposed Trump administration rule, Maryland would become the first state to stop participating in a federal family planning program known as Title X, under a bill that received final approval Wednesday in the Maryland General Assembly. The Maryland Senate voted 28-16 for the measure, sending the bill to Republican Gov. Larry Hogan, whose spokesman said the governor would review the bill before deciding whether to sign it. (4/3)

The Associated Press: 'Healthy Holly', Once Lucrative, Now Bane Of Baltimore Mayor 
"Healthy Holly" is a polite African American girl with devoted parents and a curious little brother. She loves exercise. She craves fresh fruit and vegetables. And she's now the bane of Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh's existence. Since the state prosecutor's office began a criminal investigation into Pugh at the Maryland governor's request earlier this week, there's been a growing tide of examinations spurred by revelations that she was paid some $700,000 over roughly eight years for her self-published paperback series about the fictional "Healthy Holly." (4/3)

CALmatters: Beyond The Tampon Tax: How Far Will California Go To End 'Menstrual Inequity'?
Annie Wang remembers the panic she felt being a freshman in a 500-person chemistry class at UC Davis when her period arrived and she didn’t have a tampon or pad. There was nowhere nearby to go, and leaving to find something meant missing the class. So she tried to focus on the lecture instead. “I stayed in my seat and prayed it would not be too bad. When I got up I had left a mark on UC Davis in a very bold way,” she said. “It was a very embarrassing moment for me.” (Aguilera, 4/3)

The New York Times: A Robotics Team Built A Toddler A Wheelchair. Now He’s Chasing His Corgis Around.
It took Rogue Robotics to get Cillian Jackson his wheels. At an age when most children are careening across the living room, 2-year-old Cillian was stuck, held back by a genetic condition that delays his physical and cognitive development and a Catch-22 requirement from his family’s insurance provider. Then a tip from Cillian’s physical therapist led his parents, Krissy and Tyler Jackson, who live in Farmington, Minn., to a website that provided a model for retrofitting toy cars to give mobility to children with disabilities. (Malkin, 4/3)

The Washington Post: Maryland Legislature Agrees To Raise Minimum Smoking Age To 21
Spurred by a sharp rise in teen use of e-cigarettes, the Maryland legislature voted Wednesday to raise the legal age to buy tobacco from 18 to 21. Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R) has not said whether he will sign the bill, which exempts members of the military. The proposed law is one of several similar measures advancing across the country this year and comes as the Food and Drug Administration has taken steps to crack down on flavored cigars and vaping cartridges popular with young people. Outgoing FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb has said teen vaping use nationwide has become “an epidemic.” (Cox, 4/3)

The Associated Press: Company Will Keep Using Toxic Chemical At Wisconsin Refinery
Husky Energy says it will invest more than $400 million to rebuild its oil refinery in Superior, Wisconsin, and continue its use of a highly toxic chemical that raised fears in the community of 27,000 after an explosion at the refinery last April. The blast injured 36 people and required the evacuation of much of Superior due in large part to the presence of hydrogen fluoride, which can be hazardous to human health. The tank containing the chemical was not damaged by the explosion. (4/3)