First Edition: December 6, 2017
Today's early morning highlights from the major news organizations.
Kaiser Health News:
Hospitals Find Asthma Hot Spots More Profitable To Neglect Than Fix
Keyonta Parnell has had asthma most of his young life, but it wasn’t until his family moved to the 140-year-old house here on Lemmon Street two years ago that he became one of the health care system’s frequent customers. “I call 911 so much since I’ve been living here, they know my name,” said the 9-year-old’s mother, Darlene Summerville, who calls the emergency medical system her “best friend.” (Hancock, Bluth and Trielli, 12/6)
Kaiser Health News:
Attack On Asthma: Scrubbing Homes Of Allergens May Tame Disease And Its Costs
After years of studying the causes of asthma, a pediatrician-turned-public health sleuth thinks there’s a way to substantially reduce its impact. But the approach faces a big hurdle: getting someone to pay for it, said Dr. Elizabeth Matsui, a professor at Johns Hopkins medical school in Baltimore. Matsui, who suffered from asthma as a child, has spent much of her career studying the link between poor housing and asthma in low-income neighborhoods. (Birch, 12/6)
Kaiser Health News:
Facebook Live: A Status Check On Obamacare Enrollment
As of today, Dec. 5, only 10 more shopping days remain for consumers who buy their own Affordable Care Act health insurance on the federal exchange and in most state marketplaces. So how is it going? What are the numbers so far? What are the market trends? And how has the enrollment experience been for consumers? This live chat features KHN senior correspondent Julie Appleby answering these and other questions. (12/5)
The Wall Street Journal:
Support Wavers For Senate Bill To Shore Up Health-Insurance Markets
Republicans appear to be on the brink of striking down the Affordable Care Act’s health-insurance requirement, an ardently sought goal of the law’s opponents. But the fate of a bipartisan bill that centrist Republicans hoped would offset some of the fallout remains uncertain. Some key GOP centrists supported a Senate tax overhaul that repeals the requirement that most people have health insurance, a move experts say will likely drive up premiums, on the condition that it be swiftly accompanied by a bipartisan measure that aims to lower premiums. (Armour and Peterson, 12/5)
The Hill:
Ryan's Office Warning He Wasn't Part Of Deal On ObamaCare: Source
Speaker Paul Ryan's (R-Wis.) office told a meeting of congressional leadership offices on Monday that the Speaker is not part of a deal to get ObamaCare fixes passed before the end of the year, according to a source familiar with the meeting. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) made a commitment to Sen Susan Collins (R-Maine) that he would support passage of two bipartisan ObamaCare bills before the end of the year, a promise that helped win her vote for tax reform. (Sullivan, 12/5)
The Hill:
House Conservatives Push For Repeal Of ObamaCare Mandate In Final Tax Bill
The Republican Study Committee (RSC), a group of conservative Republicans in the House, is pushing for tax reform to include a repeal of the individual insurance mandate. "Including language to repeal this harmful policy will return personal decisions about health care choices to patients, fulfilling a key promise we have made to the American people," the RSC wrote in a letter being circulated among members. (Hellmann, 12/5)
The Hill:
Chairman Expects 'Strong Support' Among House GOP For Mandate Repeal In Tax Bill
House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Kevin Brady (R-Texas) told reporters Tuesday that he expects most House Republicans will support repealing ObamaCare's individual mandate in tax legislation, as GOP senators did. "We'll be asking our members where do they want us to be on that position. I suspect there will be strong support," he said. (Jagoda, 12/5)
The New York Times:
The CHIP Program Is Beloved. Why Is Its Funding In Danger?
Laquita Gardner, a sales manager at a furniture rental store here, was happy to get a raise recently except for one problem. It lifted her income just enough to disqualify her and her two young sons from Medicaid, the free health insurance program for the poor. She was relieved to find another option was available for the boys: the Children’s Health Insurance Program, known as CHIP, that covers nearly nine million children whose parents earn too much for Medicaid, but not enough to afford other coverage. (Goodnough and Pear, 12/5)
CQ:
Long-Term Children's Health Funding Remains Unclear
A stopgap funding bill revealed last week could further stretch the timeline for renewing funds for the Children’s Health Insurance Program, but questions remain about how a longer-term renewal will come together. The continuing resolution to extend funding for the government and prevent a shutdown that was released last week would make it easier for states to use additional redistributed funding without being subject to a cap. Essentially, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services could distribute leftover federal dollars through the end of the year even to states that already received their maximum share of the redistribution funding under current rules. (Raman, 12/5)
Stat:
How Alex Azar Would Shape HHS: A Reader Discussion
President Trump has nominated Alex Azar, a former Eli Lilly executive, as secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services. If he’s confirmed, Azar will have broad authority over many of the Trump administration’s major health priorities. He’ll oversee the implementation of Obamacare as well as the mammoth Medicare and Medicaid programs. He’ll be involved in efforts to address the opioids crisis and in decisions about funding for key women’s health and pregnancy prevention initiatives, among a host of other policies. (Mershon, 12/5)
The Hill:
Dems Push For More Money For Opioid Fight
Top Democrats are pushing for additional federal dollars to combat the opioid epidemic, saying more money is needed to curb the crisis killing thousands of Americans each year. Democrats have indicated that additional opioid funding will be one of several top priorities the party is pushing for in a larger spending deal. But Republicans haven’t matched their rhetoric, making it unclear if additional dollars will come in a spending package. (Roubein, 12/5)
Reuters:
CVS Likely Wants FTC Antitrust Review, Not Justice Department, Of Aetna Deal
It is uncertain who in the U.S. government will carry out an antitrust review of CVS Health Corp's deal to buy health insurer Aetna Inc, but the drugstore company is likely hoping the potentially more lenient Federal Trade Commission gets the nod, antitrust experts say. The Justice Department's Antitrust Division and Federal Trade Commission share the job of reviewing mergers to make sure they don't hurt consumers, but sometimes it comes down to a coin toss as to who reviews a deal that involves both agencies' areas of expertise. (Bartz, 12/5)
The Hill:
Top House Dem Calls For Probe Into CVS-Aetna Merger
A top House Democrat is calling for a hearing to examine the merger between CVS and Aetna. In a letter to House Energy and Commerce Committee chairman Greg Walden (R-Ore.), the committee’s ranking member Frank Pallone Jr. (D-N.J.) asked for a hearing on the merger as soon as possible. (Weixel, 12/5)
The Wall Street Journal:
CVS Boss Larry Merlo’s Path From Corner Pharmacy To C-Suite
The architect of the year’s biggest and arguably most surprising health-care deal is a former pharmacist from rural Pennsylvania who won over Wall Street with a reboot of CVS Health Corp. Larry Merlo, CVS’s chief executive since 2011, impressed skeptics with his turnaround of Caremark, the pharmacy-benefits manager that CVS bought four years before he took over. (Terlep, 12/5)
The Wall Street Journal:
Aetna’s Outgoing CEO Set to Reap About $500 Million If CVS Deal Closes
Aetna Inc. Chief Executive Mark T. Bertolini is set to pocket roughly half a billion dollars when he leaves his company if it successfully merges with CVS Health Corp. If the $69 billion deal between the pharmacy chain and health insurer goes through, Mr. Bertolini stands to reap a generous exit payment and benefit from a sizable increase in the value of the stock and rights he owns because of the premium CVS is paying for Aetna. His combined payout is expected to be about $500 million, according to people familiar with the matter, a review of Aetna filings, and analysis from compensation-research firm Equilar Inc. (Mattioli, Mathews and Becker, 12/5)
Los Angeles Times:
FDA's Program To Speed Up Drug Approval Shaved Nearly A Year Off The Process
Speeding the pace at which potentially lifesaving drugs are brought to market was a rallying cry for Donald Trump as a candidate, and is a stated priority of his Food and Drug Administration commissioner, Dr. Scott Gottlieb. But a new study finds that programs already in place were routinely shortening the drug development process by close to a year, and sometimes much more. (Healy, 12/5)
The Wall Street Journal:
Pharma’s Helping Hand May Pinch Investors
Scrutiny of a key profit source for the drug industry is increasing. That means it is getting harder for investors to forecast industry growth. The Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Inspector General last week revoked a key favorable advisory opinion for Caring Voice Coalition, one of the largest U.S. charities that helps patients afford insurance copayments for their medicine. The OIG said in a letter, first reported by Bloomberg News, that the charity had provided undue influence to its donors over how the charity was run. The charity said that the loss of the OIG stamp of approval would likely cause it to cease operating. (Grant, 12/6)
Stat:
Finance Titan Sam Isaly Harassed Women For Years, Former Employees Said
The founder of biotech’s largest and most powerful hedge fund has for years perpetuated a toxic culture of sexual harassment, former employees told STAT, routinely subjecting young female assistants to pornography in the workplace, lewd jokes, and pervasive sexist comments. Five people who once worked at investing giant OrbiMed Advisors said Sam Isaly, the firm’s 72-year-old managing partner, kept a set of breast implants on his desk, palpating them like stress balls during idle conversation. He wantonly demeaned and verbally abused female employees, they said. (Garde, 12/5)
Stat:
These Companies Want To Transform Our Gut Bugs Into Drugs. How Close Are They To Market?
Now doctors at that same hospital system can order the sludge themselves — in no less than three different formulations — from a nonprofit stool bank. There are clinical trials on using fecal transplants to treat everything from bacterial infections to ulcerative colitis to obesity. And last week, a new study in the Journal of the American Medical Association found that when treating recurrent Clostridium difficile infections, other people’s waste works just as well if it’s delivered by pill or by colonoscopy. (Boodman, 12/6)
The Washington Post:
D.C. Moves To Protect Women’s Health Coverage If Affordable Care Act Repealed
In anticipation of regulatory rollbacks and the possible repeal of the Affordable Care Act, the D.C. Council voted overwhelmingly Tuesday to block insurance providers in the District from charging additional fees for preventive women’s health services. The legislation requires insurance providers to offer contraception, breast cancer screening and counseling for sexually transmitted infections without raising co-pays or deductibles. These benefits are required by guidelines released with the Affordable Care Act but are not written into the text of the law and could be erased by federal action. (Chason, 12/5)
The Associated Press:
ACLU Disputes Suggestion Of Wrongdoing In Abortion Case
The American Civil Liberties Union is pushing back against a claim by the Trump administration that ACLU attorneys acted improperly while helping an immigrant teenager held in federal custody obtain an abortion. The government last month accused the ACLU of misleading the Justice Department during the high-profile case. In papers filed with the Supreme Court, the Justice Department said ACLU attorneys did not alert government lawyers that the teen’s abortion would take place sooner than they expected. That, the administration says, deprived its lawyers of the chance to ask the Supreme Court to block the procedure, at least temporarily. The government suggested disciplinary action against ACLU attorneys might be appropriate. (Gresko, 12/5)
Stat:
Temporary Doctors Are No Worse For Patients' Health, Study Finds
Doctors who are employed under short-term contracts — called locum tenens (Latin for “to hold a place”) — provided a similar level of care as staff doctors, a study published Tuesday in the Journal of the American Medical Association found. Researchers came to that conclusion after analyzing 1.8 million Medicare patients hospitalized between 2009 and 2014 who were treated by general internists. No significant difference in 30-day mortality rates was seen between patients treated by temp physicians compared to those treated by staff physicians. That finding could help dispel the stigma that temp doctors have long faced, researchers said. (Blau, 12/5)
Los Angeles Times:
Widespread Screening For Breast Cancer Didn't Do Much To Save Women's Lives, Study Finds
Breast cancer deaths have declined markedly in the Netherlands since a nationwide screening program began in 1989, but mammograms deserve little — if any — of the credit, a new study suggests. In fact, the main impact of inviting Dutch women between the ages of 50 and 74 to get a mammogram every other year has been a steady increase in cases of early-stage breast cancers. More than half of these cancers were harmless and would have gone totally unnoticed if women hadn't had mammograms in the first place, the study authors report. (Kaplan, 12/5)
Stat:
Experts Challenge Ban On Psychiatrists Discussing Politicians' Mental Health
A prohibition against psychiatrists discussing the mental health of public figures — a rule that has become especially controversial, and sometimes flouted, since the inauguration of President Trump — is “premised on dubious scientific assumptions,” researchers concluded in an analysis scheduled for publication in a psychology journal. The American Psychiatric Association (APA) defends its “Goldwater rule” by arguing that an in-person psychiatric examination is the gold standard for diagnosing mental illness and psychological traits — given that there are no blood tests or brain scans for psychiatric disorders. (Begley, 12/6)
The New York Times:
Air Pollution May Harm Babies Even Before They Are Born
Air pollution may be harmful to babies even before they are born, a new study has found. Researchers in London calculated mothers’ exposure to air pollution and traffic noise in various parts of the city from 2006 to 2010. Then they amassed data on birth weights of 540,365 babies born during those years to women who lived in those areas. (Bakalar, 12/5)
The Washington Post:
The International Space Station Is Super Germy
Thousands of species have colonized the International Space Station — and only one of them is Homo sapiens. According to a new study in the journal PeerJ, the interior surfaces of the 17-year-old, 250-mile-high, airtight space station harbor at least 1,000 and perhaps more than 4,000 microbe species — a finding that is actually “reassuring,” according to co-author David Coil. (Kaplan, 12/5)
The New York Times:
At Hearing On Lead-Paint Test Lapses, Questions Go Unanswered
The embattled chairwoman of the New York City Housing Authority faced withering questioning at the City Council on Tuesday about lapses in lead-paint inspections, and she struggled to explain communication failures that left the public uninformed about the risks they posed. Even as she defended the city’s response, the chairwoman, Shola Olatoye, conceded that more could have been done over the past year to tell residents what top officials learned in mid-2016: Lead-paint inspections ceased in 2012 and were not restarted for nearly four years. (Goodman, 12/5)
The Wall Street Journal:
New York City Council Grills Housing Chief On Lead-Paint Issue
New York City Housing Authority Chairwoman Shola Olatoye told the City Council that she regretted submitting documentation to federal officials showing the agency was in compliance for lead paint when it hadn’t conducted the required inspections in four years. “Signing the forms at that time was a mistake,” she said during nearly four hours of testimony. She said she thought at the time that an informal notice to federal officials was sufficient. (Gay, 12/5)
The Washington Post:
An Illinois Doctor Traded Drugs For Sex And Cash. He Just Pleaded Guilty.
The first scheme that Constantino Perales ran involved some simple math. He'd provide a drug dealer with hundreds of oxycodone and Xanax pills and the man would pay the doctor $15 to $20 for every tablet he sold, according to federal prosecutors. The second scheme was even simpler, if baser. Perales would write prescriptions for the drugs; in return, his drug-addicted patients would have sex with him, the prosecutors say. (Wootson, 12/5)
The Wall Street Journal:
Brooklyn Prosecutors Charge 20 In $146 Million Health-Care Fraud
Brooklyn prosecutors said Tuesday that they charged 20 people and 14 corporations in a $146 million fraud scheme, calling it the biggest health-care case in their office’s history. The defendants paid patients to come to clinics, where they received unnecessary tests that were subsequently billed to Medicare and Medicaid, prosecutors said. The defendants then spent the proceeds on real estate, luxury shopping sprees and lavish vacations, according to an indictment. (Ramey, 12/5)
The Associated Press:
Eye Doctor Awaits Sentence In $100 Million Medicare Fraud
A federal judge heard wildly conflicting stories Tuesday about a prominent Florida eye doctor convicted in a $100 million Medicare fraud scheme. Some former patients said Dr. Salomon Melgen restored their sight for free, while others described painful and unnecessary treatments that left them blind. Melgen, 63, is facing a possible life sentence after being found guilty of 67 counts, including health care fraud, submitting false claims and falsifying records in patients’ files. Evidence presented during his trial earlier this year showed he subjected patients to unnecessary procedures, including sticking needles in their eyes and burning their retinas with lasers. (Spencer, 12/5)
The Associated Press:
Famed 'Concussion' Pathologist Alleges Autopsy Interference
San Joaquin County’s chief medical examiner, known nationally as the doctor depicted in the movie “Concussion” about brain injuries among football players, resigned Tuesday over what he said was interference by the sheriff that has become so invasive that it borders on the unlicensed practice of medicine. Dr. Bennet Omalu accused Sheriff-Coroner Steve Moore of routinely interfering with death investigations to protect law enforcement officers. (Thompson, 12/5)
The Associated Press:
Oklahoma Officer Charged In Fatal Shooting Of Suicidal Man
An Oklahoma City police officer was charged Tuesday with second-degree murder in the fatal shooting of a suicidal man who had doused himself in lighter fluid and was trying to set himself on fire. District Attorney David Prater filed the charge against Sgt. Keith Sweeney and listed an alternative charge of first-degree manslaughter in the Nov. 15 killing of 29-year-old Dustin Pigeon. An affidavit by a police investigator concluded that Pigeon was unarmed and didn’t pose a threat to responding officers when Sweeney shot him. (Miller and Juozapavicius, 12/5)
Los Angeles Times:
Fire Badly Damages Ventura Hospital: 'I Burst Into Tears'
At least two buildings on the campus of Vista Del Mar Hospital burned down as the Thomas fire ravaged the canyons above Ventura. The hospital treats adolescents and adults with mental health issues, and among its specialties is treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder. (Hamilton, 12/5)
Los Angeles Times:
L.A. Adds More Public Toilets As Homeless Crisis Grows
Los Angeles officials have debated for decades how best to provide for one of the most basic needs of homeless people. For those camped in the 50-block skid row district, the streets have been an open-air restroom — with only nine toilets available overnight in recent months to as many as 1,800 people camped on sidewalks. (Holland, 12/5)