First Edition: Aug. 2, 2022

KHN: Because Of Texas Abortion Law, Her Wanted Pregnancy Became A Medical Nightmare 
New, untested abortion bans have made doctors unsure about treating some pregnancy complications, which has led to life-threatening delays and trapped families in a limbo of grief and helplessness. Elizabeth Weller never dreamed that her hopes for a child would become ensnared in the web of Texas abortion law. (Feibel, 8/2)

KHN: The Time Has Come For DIY Mandates On Covid 
Here we are in the grip of yet another covid-19 surge, yet most people I see out and about are behaving as if the pandemic is over. And I live in Los Angeles County, whose public health department is arguably one of the most vigilant and proactive in the U.S. We all have pandemic fatigue. Even people who should know better have let precautionary measures slide. If you are sensing a mea culpa on the way, I won’t disappoint. (Wolfson, 8/2)

KHN: The Debt Crisis That Sick Americans Can’t Avoid 
President Joe Biden’s campaign promise to cancel student debt for the first $10,000 owed on federal college loans has raised debate about the fairness of such lending programs. While just over half of Americans surveyed in a June poll supported forgiving that much debt incurred for higher education, 82% said that making college more affordable was their preferred approach. (Rosenthal, 8/2)

KHN: Watch: Explaining The Nitty-Gritty Of Medicare Drug Price Negotiations — And Patients’ Potential Savings
Julie Rovner, KHN’s chief Washington correspondent, joined PBS NewsHour’s Laura Barrón-López on Friday to discuss Senate Democrats’ proposals to let Medicare negotiate some drug prices, cap out-of-pocket drug costs for seniors and continue funding for enhanced premium subsidies for people buying health insurance on the Affordable Care Act’s marketplaces. (8/1)

The Washington Post: Kentucky Judge Revives State Abortion Ban, Reversing Lower-Court Order
A Kentucky judge reinstituted the state’s near-total abortion ban Monday, reversing a lower court’s order from less than two weeks ago that temporarily allowed the procedures to continue in the state. The decision by Kentucky Court of Appeals Judge Larry E. Thompson means that abortions are again illegal in the state, unless the mother is at risk of death or serious permanent injury, with no exceptions for rape or incest. Health-care workers who provide abortion services can face up to five years in prison, though mothers are not subject to criminal liability. (Jeong, 8/2)

Detroit Free Press: Judge Grants Whitmer Request, Blocks Prosecutors From Enforcing Abortion Ban
An Oakland County judge temporarily blocked Michigan prosecutors from enforcing the state's 1931 abortion ban, a move requested from Gov. Gretchen Whitmer's legal team after a higher court's ruling earlier in the day paved the way to potential charges for providers. Judge Jacob Cunningham issued the temporary restraining order late Monday, according to a filing obtained by the Free Press. (Boucher, 8/1)

CNN: Kansas Set To Become First State To Let Voters Weigh In On Abortion In Post-Roe US 
Kansas on Tuesday will become the first state in the nation to let voters weigh in on abortion since the US Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. (Stracqualursi, 8/2)

AP: Democrats Want Clarity On North Dakota Abortion Law Trigger 
Two North Dakota Democratic lawmakers on Monday called for an attorney general’s opinion on the state’s abortion restrictions, saying clarity in needed to ensure care is not denied in or delayed in emergency situations. Reps. Zac Ista, of Grand Forks, and Karla Rose Hanson, of Fargo, said discrepancies in state law could result in victims of rape having to get permission from a spouse to obtain an abortion, or in doctors not treating ectopic pregnancies, which occur when an embryo grows outside the womb and often are life-threatening to the women involved. (8/1)

The Hill: Bipartisan Senators Introduce Bill To Codify Abortion Rights 
A bipartisan group of senators on Monday introduced legislation that would codify the right to an abortion into federal law, but it faces an uncertain future. The bill from Sens. Tim Kaine (D-Va.), Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) and Susan Collins (R-Maine) comes after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, the landmark abortion rights case, and left the authority to regulate the procedure to individual states. (Weixel, 8/1)

Modern Healthcare: Abortion Ruling Prompts Action By Healthcare Unions
Unions representing healthcare workers are executing plans to help workers who may run afoul of state abortion laws. In the wake of the Supreme Court ruling last month that ended the federal right to abortion access and cleared the way for restrictive state laws, healthcare workers are anxious that treatment choices they make with patients could put them in legal jeopardy. (Christ, 8/1)

The Washington Post: Abortion Bans Violate Religious Freedom, Clergy Say In New Legal Campaign
When the Rev. Laurie Hafner ministers to her Florida congregants about abortion, she looks to the founding values of the United Church of Christ, her lifelong denomination: religious freedom and freedom of thought. She taps into her reading of Genesis, which says “man became a living being” when God breathed “the breath of life” into Adam. She thinks of Jesus promising believers full and abundant life. “I am pro-choice not in spite of my faith, but because of my faith,” Hafner says. (Boorstein, 8/1)

Politico: Data Brokers Resist Pressure To Stop Collecting Info On Pregnant People 
Democratic lawmakers are piling pressure on data brokers to stop collecting information on pregnant people in order to protect those seeking abortions. They’re not having much luck. For years, brokers have sold datasets on millions of expectant parents from their trimester status to their preferred birth methods. Now that the Supreme Court has overturned Roe v. Wade, that same data is becoming a political issue, with abortion-rights groups warning that states with abortion bans are likely to weaponize it. (Ng, 8/1)

Bloomberg: GOP Plans To Deploy Obscure Rule As Weapon Against Spending Bill
They’re planning to challenge many of the provisions in the 725-page, $433 billion bill using the so-called Byrd Rule, which sharply limits the ability to pass legislation with a simple majority, a process known as reconciliation. (Natter, 8/2)

The New York Times: Democrats’ Climate Deal Isn’t Done Yet. Here Are The Remaining Hurdles.
Democrats are racing to muscle the package — packed with hundreds of billions of dollars in climate and energy proposals, a major drug price reduction initiative, tax increases and health care subsidies — through the evenly divided Senate over united Republican opposition. They are doing so under a process known as budget reconciliation, which allows certain tax and spending bills to move quickly and avoid a filibuster but also is subject to strict rules that limit what can be included. ... Here are the hurdles that remain before President Biden can sign the package into law. (Cochrane, 8/1)

The New York Times: G.O.P. Reversal Imperils Burn Pits Bill To Treat Veterans 
Republicans’ turnabout has stunned proponents in Congress and veterans groups who had seen the burn pits legislation, a top priority of President Biden, as a done deal. (Lai, 8/1)

NBC News: Veterans Have Been Camping Out On The Capitol Steps After GOP Blocks Burn Pit Bill
The protest by 60 veterans groups — along with comedian Jon Stewart — has put Senate Republicans on the defensive as they’ve struggled for days to explain why they are holding up legislation that would provide much-needed health care for millions of veterans exposed to things like burn pit smoke, Agent Orange and radiation. (Wong, Vitali and Thorp V., 8/1)

The Washington Post: FEMA's Fenton To Be Named Monkeypox Response Coordinator 
The White House is planning to name Robert J. Fenton Jr. as coordinator of the nation’s monkeypox response amid a surging epidemic that has prompted three states to declare health emergencies, according to four people with direct knowledge of the plans who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment about the pending announcement. (Diamond, 8/1)

The Hill: House Democrats Ask For Review Of US Monkeypox Response 
A trio of House Democrats on Monday requested that the Government Accountability Office (GAO) review the “adequacy of the Federal response to the monkeypox outbreak.” In a letter addressed to U.S. Comptroller General Gene Dodaro, Democratic Reps. Bennie Thompson (Miss.), Richie Torres (N.Y.) and Val Demings (Fla.) asked that the government watchdog agency conduct a review in order to “make recommendations for ongoing and future preparedness and response efforts.” (Choi, 8/1)

The New York Times: How The U.S. Let 20 Million Monkeypox Vaccine Doses Expire 
Less than a decade ago, the United States had some 20 million doses of a new smallpox vaccine — also effective against monkeypox — sitting in freezers in a national stockpile. (Goldstein, 8/1)

NBC News: California And Illinois Declare Monkeypox Emergencies
In Illinois, Pritzker said in a statement that his declaration will likewise give the Department of Public Health the full power of the state to distribute vaccines and to inform the public about the virus. (Romero, 8/2)

Las Vegas Review-Journal: Monkeypox Found In Southern Nevada Wastewater
Monkeypox has been detected in Southern Nevada’s wastewater, suggesting there are more infections than the 23 cases reported in Clark County, a UNLV researcher said Monday. (Hynes, 8/1)

Fortune: An Epidemiologist Debunks 7 Monkeypox Myths 
Whether you’re confused by the headlines or exhausted trying to make sense of them, you’re not alone. Here, an epidemiologist cuts through the swirl of misinformation to help you understand the facts about monkeypox, including how it’s contracted, prevented, and how worried you should really be. (Fields, 8/1)  

The Washington Post: Biden’s Covid Case Highlights Confusing CDC Guidance On Ending Isolation 
With new research showing that people are often infectious for more than five days, the CDC guidance has drawn criticism from some infectious-disease experts. The Biden protocol strikes many of them as the right way to go — because it’s empirical evidence that a person isn’t shedding virus. (Sun and Achenbach, 8/1)

The Washington Post: When You Have Covid, Here’s How You Know You Are No Longer Contagious
You’ve got covid-19. When can you exit isolation? If you do resume activities outside your home, can you be sure you’re no longer contagious? It’s complicated. Be forewarned: Guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are nuanced but a little confusing. (Sun and Achenbach, 8/1)

Los Angeles Times: Second Coronavirus Case Heightens Long COVID Risk, Experts Say
As the coronavirus mutates, though, that’s no longer a given. And each individual infection carries the risk not only for acute illness but the potential to develop long COVID. “The additive risk is really not trivial, not insignificant. It’s really substantial,” said Dr. Ziyad Al-Aly, clinical epidemiologist at Washington University in St. Louis and chief of research and development at the Veterans Affairs St. Louis Healthcare System. (Lin II and Money, 8/1)

CBS News: NorthShore University Health To Pay $10.3 Million In COVID-19 Vaccine Lawsuit
The NorthShore University Health System has agreed to pay $10.3 million in a COVID-19 vaccine lawsuit. More than a dozen health care workers sued the Evanston-based group after they were denied religious exemptions for vaccinations. In a statement, NorthShore said the settlement reflects its new vaccine policy at Edward-Elmhurst Health. (8/1)

Axios: Back-To-School, Back To Outbreaks
As students around the country start a new school year, providers say childhood immunization rates are too low, in some places, to prevent outbreaks of diseases like measles. (Dreher, 8/2)

CBS News: "It's A Crisis": More Children Suffering Mental Health Issues, Challenges Of The Pandemic
COVID is not over, but the pandemic exposed a troubling trend - children's mental health has suffered. According to the Mental Health Alliance, in 2022, fifteen percent of kids ages 12 to 17 reported experiencing at least one major depressive episode. That was 306,000 more than last year. (Murray, 8/1)

Modern Healthcare: Inpatient Hospitals Get 4.3% Medicare Reimbursement Bump
Medicare payments for hospital inpatient services will rise 4.3% in fiscal 2023 under a final rule the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services published Monday. That amounts to (A) pay increase of about $2.6 billion and is higher than the 3.2% rate hike CMS proposed in April. (Goldman, 8/1)

Stat: Hospitals Win Higher Payments From Medicare After Lobbying Campaign
Hospitals secured significantly larger payments from Medicare for 2023, after months of lobbying centered around arguments that inflation and the pandemic have crippled hospitals’ finances. (Herman, 8/1)

Modern Healthcare: Dialysis Consolidation Bad For Medicare Advantage Plan Health, Study Says
Researchers at the University of Southern California found three large Medicare Advantage insurers paid 127% of fee-for-service Medicare costs for dialysis treatment in 2016 and 2017. If the number of dialysis patients enrolling in Medicare Advantage continues to grow following recent policy changes, insurers could be forced to cut back on other benefits to pay for dialysis treatments. (Goldman, 8/1)

Modern Healthcare: Accrediting Group Adds Health Equity Metrics To Quality Data
The National Committee for Quality Assurance is adding metrics to the Healthcare Effective Data and Information Set to track how well insurers address health disparities. The update adds some race and ethnicity breakdowns, revises gender labels for people who are pregnant and includes social needs screening within 2023 measures for health plans. (Hartnett, 8/1)

The Boston Globe: PerkinElmer Sells Off Three Business Units In $2.45 Billion Deal
PerkinElmer’s remaining Life Sciences and Diagnostics business unit, which made up approximately 80 percent of the company’s revenue in 2021, will operate under a new name, brand, and ticker that the company said it will announce prior to the closing of the sale. The Applied, Food, and Enterprise Services businesses will continue to operate under the PerkinElmer name, according to the company. (Robisheaux, 8/1)

Bay Area News Group: Sequoia Hospital Workers End Strike, Reach Agreement With Dignity Health
After a nearly two-week-long strike by hundreds of Sequoia Hospital workers, management and strikers reached an agreement for a 16% raise effective immediately and provisions that could make healthcare benefit costs more predictable. (Toledo, 8/1)

CIDRAP: CDC Study Highlights Community Spread Of Superbugs 
New US surveillance data indicates infections caused by multidrug-resistant bacterial pathogens are moving beyond the healthcare setting. In a study published last week in the American Journal of Infection Control, researchers with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and eight US public health departments reported that 1 in 10 infections caused by carbapenem-resistant Enterobacterales (CRE) were community-associated, occurring in patients without the known healthcare risks—like hospitalization or stays in long-term care facilities—typically associated with CRE infections. Most were found in white women with urinary tract infections (UTIs). (Dall, 8/1)

Scientific American: Algorithm That Detects Sepsis Cut Deaths By Nearly 20 Percent 
Academics and electronic-health-record companies have developed automated systems that send reminders to check patients for sepsis, but the sheer number of alerts can cause health care providers to ignore or turn off these notices. Researchers have been trying to use machine learning to fine-tune such programs and reduce the number of alerts they generate. Now one algorithm has proved its mettle in real hospitals, helping doctors and nurses treat sepsis cases nearly two hours earlier on average—and cutting the condition’s hospital mortality rate by 18 percent. (Bushwick, 8/1)

Des Moines Register: Iowa To Receive Part Of $6.6 Billion Allergan, Teva Opioid Settlement
A former opioid manufacturer and a pharmaceutical company that acquired a portion of its business in 2016 have agreed in principle to pay up to $6.6 billion in a settlement with a dozen states, including Iowa, state Attorney General Tom Miller says. Miller also announced he is pursuing legal action to enforce a prior settlement of a lawsuit against several tobacco companies. (Morris, 8/1)

AP: WVa Cities, Counties Reach $400M Settlement With Drug Firms 
West Virginia cities and counties reached a $400 million tentative settlement with three major U.S. drug distributors, lawyers announced Monday. In a lawsuit in state court, the cities and counties accused the distributors of fueling the opioid epidemic. The companies are AmerisourceBergen, Cardinal Health and McKesson. (8/1)

Chicago Tribune: Double-Digit Increases Proposed For ACA Health Insurance Plans
Illinois residents who buy health insurance through the Affordable Care Act exchange will likely see prices rise for next year — in some cases by double digit percentages. (Schencker, 8/1)

NBC News: Eating Lots Of Highly Processed Food Is Linked To Faster Cognitive Decline, Research Finds
Eating highly processed foods like instant noodles, sugary drinks or frozen meals may be linked to a faster rate of cognitive decline. That's according to new research presented Monday at the Alzheimer’s Association International Conference in San Diego. The study examined the diets and cognition of more than 10,000 middle-aged and older adults in Brazil. (Bendix, 8/2)

Bloomberg: USDA Labels Salmonella ‘Adulterant’ To Combat Bacteria In Poultry
The agency announced Monday it will declare salmonella an adulterant in breaded and stuffed raw chicken products, meaning these food products will be subject to regulation if they exceed a low level of the bacteria. The USDA will also take public input on whether to set an even stricter zero tolerance standard for salmonella in poultry, the agency said in a press release. (Sheehey and Elkin, 8/1)