First Edition: Dec. 5, 2023

KFF Health News: Many People Of Color Worry Good Health Care Is Tied To Their Appearance
Many people from racial and ethnic minority groups brace themselves for insults and judgments before medical appointments, according to a new survey of patients that reaffirms the prevalence of racial discrimination in the U.S. health system. The KFF survey of nearly 6,300 patients who have had care in the past three years found that about 55% of Black adults feel they have to be very careful about their appearance to be treated fairly by doctors and other health providers. Nearly half of American Indian, Alaska Native, and Hispanic patients feel similarly, as do about 4 in 10 Asian patients. (DeGuzman, 12/5)

KFF Health News: California’s Ambitious Medicaid Experiment Gets Tripped Up In Implementation 
Nearly two years into Gov. Gavin Newsom’s $12 billion experiment to transform California’s Medicaid program into a social services provider for the state’s most vulnerable residents, the institutions tasked with providing the new services aren’t effectively doing so, according to a survey released Tuesday. As part of the ambitious five-year initiative, called CalAIM, the state is supposed to offer the sickest and costliest patients a personal care manager and new services ranging from home-delivered healthy meals to help paying rental security deposits. (Hart, 12/5)

The Wall Street Journal: Exclusive: CVS Plans To Overhaul How Much Drugs Cost 
CVS Health, the nation’s largest drugstore chain, will move away from the complex formulas used to set the prices of the prescription drugs it sells, shifting to a simpler model that could upend how American pharmacies are paid. Under the plan, CVS’s roughly 9,500 retail pharmacies will get reimbursed by pharmacy-benefit managers and other payers based on the amount that CVS paid for the drugs, in addition to a limited markup and a flat fee to cover the services involved in handling and dispensing the prescriptions. Today, pharmacies are generally paid using complex measures that aren’t directly based on what they spent to purchase specific drugs. (Mathews, 12/5)

Modern Healthcare: CMS Medicaid Unwinding Enforcement Rule Issued
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services outlined its plans to get Medicaid redeterminations disenrollments under control in an interim final rule published Monday. States that fail to comply with federal Medicaid policies as they review their benefit rolls for ineligible enrollees risk reduced federal funding under the regulation, which comes after 11.8 million Medicaid beneficiaries have been removed from the program since April, according to CMS data compiled by KFF. (Bennett, 12/4)

Modern Healthcare: Biden's Nursing Home Staffing Rule Finds Scant Political Support
President Joe Biden’s high-profile plan to improve nursing home quality by setting staffing minimums has attracted intense resistance and lukewarm support, regulatory comments and public statements reveal. The nursing home industry strenuously opposes the policy, which the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services proposed Sept. 1. And as a growing number of congressional Republicans have spoken against it, Biden and CMS have gotten little support, and even resistance, from a cadre of Democrats and patient advocates. (Bennett, 12/4)

Stat: Chemotherapy Shortages Won’t Get Better Under Biden’s Latest Plan
President Biden’s new plan to curb drug shortages by boosting domestic drug production won’t expand the supply of the chemotherapies that are currently in shortage, an administration official confirmed. The limited scope surprised experts, who told STAT Biden could have included those drugs in the effort. (Wilkerson, 12/5)

Axios: Study Finds Sharp Drop In FDA Inspections Since Pandemic Began
Food and Drug Administration inspections of drug manufacturing facilities in the U.S. and abroad dropped well below pre-pandemic levels between 2020 and 2022, according to a new study in Health Affairs. The findings are further evidence of a fragile global drug supply chain at a time when some critical medicines are in short supply. Some of the squeeze was due to inspections that took overseas facilities offline because of safety concerns. (Reed, 12/5)

Axios: House Oversight Committee Investigating FDA's Handling Of Phenylephrine
Republicans on a House oversight panel will investigate the Food and Drug Administration's handling of a common decongestant ingredient that the agency recently concluded was ineffective, the committee told Axios first. The inquiry, the latest in an aggressive investigative agenda by House Republicans, seeks to understand why the FDA didn't take earlier action against a wide range of over-the-counter cough and cold drugs that accounted for nearly $1.8 billion in sales last year. (Reed, 12/4)

Stat: Broad Opioid Addiction Bill To Go Before Senate Committee
The Senate health care committee will consider a sweeping bill next week meant to combat the opioid epidemic, according to four lobbyists and a congressional aide familiar with the legislation. The proposal would reauthorize a number of programs first created by the SUPPORT Act, an addiction-focused bill that Congress first passed in 2018. Many of those programs’ authorizations expired earlier this year, however, leading addiction treatment advocates to fret that lawmakers — and specifically the committee’s chairman, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) — no longer view the issue as a priority. (Facher and Cohrs, 12/4)

The Washington Post: Supreme Court Appears Torn During Purdue Opioid Settlement Arguments
The Supreme Court on Monday seemed torn about both the merits and the legality of a proposed Purdue Pharma bankruptcy plan that would allocate billions of dollars to help ease the nation’s opioid crisis, but also shield the family that owns the company from future lawsuits. Justices across the ideological spectrum asked tough questions of lawyers from the Justice Department, which opposes the plan, and attorneys for Purdue and the vast number of parties that agreed to the deal — seeing it as the best hope of ending years of legal disputes and recovering at least a portion of their claims against Purdue and its owners, the Sackler family. (Barnes and Ovalle, 12/4)

The New York Times: Supreme Court Appears Split Over Opioid Settlement For Purdue Pharma
Questions from the justices reflected why the deal has drawn intense criticism in a dispute that pits money against principle. Under debate was the practical effect of unraveling the agreement, painstakingly negotiated for years for victims and families who have urgently sought settlement funds, and broader concerns over whether releasing the Sacklers from liability would free them from further scrutiny over their role in the opioid crisis. A decision in the case could also have consequences for similar agreements resolved through the bankruptcy system that have been structured to insulate a third party from liability. (VanSickle, 12/4)

Reuters: Convictions Should Outlive Defendants' Deaths, US Tells Appeals Court 
The U.S. Department of Justice on Monday urged a federal appeals court in Boston to break new ground by holding that a defendant's conviction outlasts his death and does not get wiped away just because he died before his appeal could be heard, in a case involving a former biotech chief executive's securities fraud conviction. Prosecutors in making that argument to the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals acknowledged that every other federal appeals court would under their precedents vacate former PixarBio Corp CEO Frank Reynolds' conviction following his 2022 death. (Raymond, 12/4)

KCAL News: Planned Parenthood Sues Fontana For Allegedly Blocking Abortion Access
Planned Parenthood filed a formal complaint against the city of Fontana for allegedly blocking abortion access, which recently became a right protected by the California Constitution. "We did not want to be among the first organizations to file a lawsuit alleging violation of Californians' constitutional rights under Proposition 1," regional president Jon Dunn said. "However, we have chosen to defend the rights of our community members against the city of Fontana, due to their deliberate actions to actively deny their community access to healthcare services." (Rodriguez, 12/4)

The 19th: Anti-Abortion Arizona Supreme Court Justice Recuses Self From Abortion Case
An Arizona Supreme Court judge who once accused Planned Parenthood of committing genocide has agreed to recuse himself from a case involving the organization that will determine the future legality of abortion in the state. (Gomez and Mirror, 12/4)

Stat: Fetal Surgery At Risk From Dobbs And New Abortion Restrictions 
The concept of fetal surgery captures the imagination when, from time to time, it makes the headlines. Few pregnant mothers will need the assistance of fetal medicine specialists; fewer still will need a fetal surgeon to save their children. But it can offer parents-to-be a sense of hope: In the appropriate circumstances, doctors may be able to help before the child is even born. Now, anti-abortion laws intended to protect the unborn may do the exact opposite by threatening this already-challenging field. (Francois I. Luks, Tippi Mackenzie and Thomas F. Tracy Jr., 12/5)

The Washington Post: The Rape Victim Behind Kentucky’s Viral Abortion Ad 
Hadley Duvall’s ad about abortion rights helped Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear win reelection — and she’s ready to campaign again in 2024. (Kitchener, 12/4)

CBS News: Study: Slow COVID-19 Booster Rollout Cost Thousands Of Lives
Thousands of lives could have been saved if the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention approved COVID-19 boosters sooner, along with stronger public health messaging, according to a new study. The Northwestern University study used Israel as a counterfactual or a "what if" scenario to see the possible outcomes that could have happened in the United States. (Price, 12/4)

Reuters: Emcure Wins Dismissal Of US Lawsuit Over COVID-19 Vaccine Trade Secrets 
Generic drugmaker Emcure Pharmaceuticals convinced a federal court in Seattle, Washington, on Monday to throw out a lawsuit that accused it of stealing trade secrets from biopharma company HDT Bio to develop a COVID-19 vaccine. A sealed entry in the court's docket said that U.S. District Judge James Robart dismissed the case without prejudice, which means it can be refiled. India-based Emcure had argued that the court lacked jurisdiction over the company. (Brittain, 12/4)

Stat: Is MRNA Technology The Right Fit For Flu Shots? Experts Aren’t So Sure
Here are two things that are true. The world needs more effective flu vaccines. And pharmaceutical companies that learned of the vaccine-making power of the messenger RNA platform during the Covid-19 pandemic need new markets for their technology. (Branswell, 12/5)

CIDRAP: Small Study Finds Brain Alterations After COVID Omicron Infection 
Researchers in China report thinning of the gray matter and other changes in certain parts of the brain in 61 men after COVID-19 Omicron infection. For the study, published late last week in JAMA Network Open, the researchers evaluated 61 men before and after infection with the SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant in January 2023. The men had been part of a larger cohort who had undergone magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and neuropsychiatric screenings before infection in August and September 2022. Average age was 43 years. (Van Beuskom, 12/4)

Reuters: As Bayer Confronts Mounting Roundup Losses, All Eyes On Philadelphia Trial 
With Bayer facing investor pressure to resolve thousands of lawsuits over its Roundup weedkiller after being hit with $2 billion in verdicts in recent weeks, all eyes are on a trial wrapping up in Philadelphia. Plaintiffs have won the last four trials over their claims that the product causes cancer, each time securing a larger verdict. Those losses ended a nine-trial winning streak for Bayer, shattering investor and company hopes that the worst of the Roundup litigation was over. (Pierson, 12/5)

Reuters: After $97 Million Med-Mal Verdict, Doctors Sue Insurer For Making Them Tort Reform ‘Pawns’ 
The Iowa Supreme Court was supposed to hear oral arguments next week in the appeal of a record-setting $76 million medical malpractice judgment against an obstetrics and gynecology clinic accused of causing an infant’s severe brain injuries. That appeal is now stayed amid a blitz of accusations and counterattacks, in both state and federal court, by the medical clinic and the company that provided its malpractice insurance. A case that began as a dispute over the tragic consequences of one infant’s birth has transformed into a high-stakes examination of an alleged conflict between the interests of a policyholder that allegedly wanted to settle and avoid trial and an insurance company that was dedicated to changing malpractice law. (Frankel, 12/4)

New Hampshire Bulletin: State Facing Class-Action Lawsuit Over In-Home Care For Older And Disabled Residents
Until last week, the Department of Health and Human Services was facing a lawsuit from two people who said the state had put them at severe risk of entering a nursing home by providing them less in-home care than it had deemed necessary. In one case, a 38-year-old woman with disabilities was receiving only a “small portion” of the 68 hours of weekly care the state had allotted her, according to the lawsuit. A federal judge has certified the case as a class-action lawsuit, pointing to evidence that there could be dozens, even hundreds of people who face the same risk of being institutionalized for the same reasons. (Timmins, 12/4)

Orange County Register: California Plastic Surgeon ‘Dr. Laguna’ Faces Dozens Of Claims, From Botched Procedures To Medical Negligence
An Orange County plastic surgeon who dubbed himself “Dr. Laguna” is under fire from dozens of former patients and the Orange County District Attorney’s Office amid claims of horribly botched procedures, medical negligence and a brief suspension of his medical license following the death of a patient. The chief of the plastic surgery department at a south Orange County hospital calls Dr. Arian Mowlavi “a danger to the community.” (Emery, 12/4)

Reuters: As Ozempic Cases Mount, Consumer Lawyers Push To Consolidate Lawsuits
Attorneys representing people who say they weren’t properly warned about harsh side effects associated with blockbuster weight loss drugs such as Ozempic and Wegovy are pushing to centralize the lawsuits in a Louisiana federal court, filings show. About 20 lawsuits over the drugs, known as GLP-1 receptor agonists, have been filed since August against pharmaceutical companies Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly, court records show. Attorneys from Morgan & Morgan, which has brought nine of the lawsuits, filed a motion on Friday asking the U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation (JPML) to consolidate the litigation over the drugs in the Western District of Louisiana. (Jones, 12/4)

Cincinnati Enquirer: Ohio Senators Want To Overhaul Legal Marijuana, Ax Home Grow
Lawmakers in the Ohio Senate want to eliminate growing marijuana at home, increase the tax rate and change who gets the money from the state's new legal marijuana program, according to changes announced Monday. The overhaul, which was added to an unrelated liquor bill Monday, comes after Ohio voters approved legal marijuana in a 57-43% vote last month. The Ohio Senate plans to vote on the new House Bill 86 on Wednesday. (Balmert, 12/4)

NBC News: Panera Bread’s Charged Lemonade Blamed For A Second Death, Lawsuit Alleges
Panera Bread’s highly caffeinated Charged Lemonade is now blamed for a second death, according to a lawsuit filed Monday. Dennis Brown, of Fleming Island, Florida, drank three Charged Lemonades from a local Panera on Oct. 9 and then suffered a fatal cardiac arrest on his way home, the suit says. Brown, 46, had an unspecified chromosomal deficiency disorder, a developmental delay and a mild intellectual disability. (Chuck, 12/5)

The New York Times: Brain Implants Helped 5 People Recover From Traumatic Injuries 
Traumatic brain injuries have left more than five million Americans permanently disabled. They have trouble focusing on even simple tasks and often have to quit jobs or drop out of school. A study published on Monday has offered them a glimpse of hope. Five people with moderate to severe brain injuries had electrodes implanted in their heads. As the electrodes stimulated their brains, their performance on cognitive tests improved. (Zimmer, 12/4)

CBS News: Scientists Say New Treatment Could Replace Root Canals 
A novel treatment could one day replace the "dreaded" root canal. Dental pulp is the tissue inside a tooth that can become inflamed and infected after injury or from cavities. ADA Forsyth scientists are studying the use of a molecule called Resolvin E1 that is produced by the body and has been shown to control excess inflammation. ... Not only could this treatment one day replace root canals, but it could also potentially be used to grow bones and other tissues in various parts of the body. (Marshall, 12/4)

CBS News: Study Finds Personalized Coaching Could Help Prevent Alzheimer's
A personalized coaching approach could help prevent Alzheimer's in people at risk of developing the disease. A team at the University of California, San Francisco recruited 172 adults between the ages of 70 and 89 with at least two dementia risk factors ... The researchers say this personalized approach could help improve mental function and help prevent the mental decline associated with Alzheimer's disease. (Marshall, 12/4)

CBS News: Wasabi, Beloved On Sushi, Linked To "Really Substantial" Boost In Memory, Japanese Study Finds
A study conducted in Japan suggests there's more to sushi than just a healthy dose of fish and seaweed. Researchers at Tohoku University found that wasabi, that spicy green condiment traditionally dabbed on the raw fish dish, improves both short- and long-term memory. Rui Nouchi, the study's lead researcher and an associate professor at the school's Institute of Development, Aging and Cancer, told CBS News the results, while based on a limited sample of subjects without preexisting health conditions, exceeded their expectations. (Craft, 12/4)

The Washington Post: Just 1 Teaspoon Less Of Salt A Day Lowered Blood Pressure In This Study 
Reducing salt consumption by just one teaspoon a day could lower your blood pressure as much as hypertension medication, according to research presented at the American Heart Association’s recent Scientific Sessions and published in JAMA. (Searing, 12/4)

Reuters: Stigma, Regulatory Barriers Delay Mpox Response In Country That Needs It Most
Vaccines and treatments that could help tackle an mpox epidemic in the Democratic Republic of Congo are lying unused outside the country despite a death rate far higher than from the global outbreak that began last year. Stigma, regulatory hurdles and competing disease outbreaks are all factors holding back the response, according to almost a dozen scientists, public health officials and drugmakers involved. (Rigby, 12/5)

The Washington Post: After Long Banning Polio Campaigns, Taliban Declares War On The Disease
During its 20-year armed campaign, the Taliban repeatedly banned door-to-door immunization campaigns, helping to make Afghanistan one of only two countries where naturally acquired poliovirus is still endemic. Two years after the Taliban took power, however, it has done an about-face, and its unexpected efforts may now represent the best shot in two decades at eradicating the highly transmissible, crippling children’s disease in Afghanistan. (Noack, 12/5)