First Edition: January 13, 2020

Kaiser Health News: Smokers Need Not Apply: Fairness Of No-Nicotine Hiring Policies Questioned
When U-Haul recently announced it will no longer hire people who use nicotine in any form in the 21 states where such hiring policies are legal, the Phoenix-based moving company joined a cadre of companies with nicotine-free hiring policies. U-Haul’s announcement is receiving outsize attention because nicotine-free hiring policies are more common at high-profile hospitals such as Cleveland Clinic that are especially protective of their healthy image. (Farmer, 1/13)

California Healthline: Homeless Californians Adapt To Camp Sweeps And ‘The Caltrans Shuffle’
It’s 5 a.m., and the thermostat reads 44 degrees. Cars round the bend of an off-ramp of state Route 24 in northern Oakland, spraying bands of light across Norm Ciha and his neighbors. They wear headlamps so they can see in the dark as they gather their belongings: tents, clothes, cooking gear, carts piled with blankets, children’s shoes and, in one case, a set of golf clubs. Shredder, Ciha’s dog, takes a treat and then lets it fall from his mouth. He whines as Ciha walks away with a camping mattress. “I can leave him all day in the tent and he’s fine, but he freaks out every time we have to move,” Ciha said. (Barry-Jester, 1/10)

The New York Times: Trump Administration Says Obamacare Lawsuit Can Wait Until After The Election
The Trump administration came into office with its top legislative priority clear: Repeal the Affordable Care Act. It failed. Then, when a group of Republican states tried to throw out Obamacare through a lawsuit, the administration agreed that a key part of the law was unconstitutional. But now that defenders of the law have asked the Supreme Court to settle the case quickly, the president’s lawyers say they are in no particular hurry. The case, which seeks to invalidate the entire health care law, can wait for the lower courts to consider certain questions more carefully, they said in a filing to the Supreme Court on Friday. (Sanger-Katz, 1/10)

The Washington Post: Trump Administration Tells Supreme Court No Need To Rush An Obamacare Ruling
They said the court should not grant a motion by the House of Representatives and Democratic-led states to expedite review of a decision by a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit last month. The panel struck down the law’s mandate that individuals buy health insurance but sent back to a lower court the question of whether the rest of the statute can stand without it. (Barnes, 1/10)

The Hill: Trump Administration Wants Supreme Court To Delay Hearing On ObamaCare Case
“As the case comes to this Court, no lower-court ruling exists on severability or the appropriate remedy. Far from being urgently needed, this Court’s review thus would be premature,” Francisco wrote. “Absent any operative ruling invalidating the ACA’s other provisions in the interim, the accelerated review petitioners seek is unnecessary,” Francisco wrote of the Affordable Care Act. (Weixel, 1/10)

The Associated Press: Suit Over Border Patrol Detention Conditions Goes To Trial
A years-old lawsuit challenging detention conditions in several of the Border Patrol’s Arizona stations will go to trial Monday as the agency as a whole has come under fire following several migrant deaths. The lawsuit filed in 2015 applies to eight Border Patrol facilities in Arizona where attorneys say migrants are held in unsafe and inhumane conditions. (Galvan, 1/12)

The Hill: Lawsuit Alleges Child Abuse And Neglect After Trump Administration Family Separation
Two fathers who were separated from their children at the U.S.-Mexico border as a result of the Trump administration’s policies are suing the government for $12 million, claiming the children were subject to abuse and neglect while in federal custody. The lawsuit, filed Friday in U.S. District Court of Arizona, argues that the administration’s “zero tolerance” policy was “cruel and unconstitutional.” “The United States government tore these families apart pursuant to a cruel and unconstitutional policy: The government intended to inflict terror and harm on these small children and their fathers, as a means of deterring others from seeking to enter the United States,” the lawsuit said. (Weixel, 1/10)

The Associated Press: Ruling Barring Discharge Of HIV-Positive Airmen Upheld
An injunction barring the Trump administration from discharging two Air Force members who are HIV-positive was upheld Friday by a federal appeals court panel that called the military's rationale for prohibiting deployment of service members living with HIV “outmoded and at odds with current science." (Lavoie, 1/10)

The Washington Post: Appeals Court Upholds Temporary Ruling Barring Discharge Of HIV-Positive Service Members
Writing for the panel, U.S. Circuit Judge James A. Wynn Jr. said plaintiffs were likely to show the military acted “arbitrarily or capriciously” in violation of the Administrative Procedures Act by discharging service members without an individualized fitness assessment. “A ban on deployment may have been justified at a time when HIV treatment was less effective at managing the virus and reducing transmission risks,” Wynn wrote in the 46-page opinion. “But any understanding of HIV that could justify this ban is outmoded and at odds with current science. Such obsolete understandings cannot justify a ban, even under a deferential standard of review and even according appropriate deference to the military’s professional judgments.” (Hus, 1/10)

The Hill: Drug Price Outrage Threatens To Be Liability For GOP
The GOP’s reluctance to challenge rising prescription drug costs could be a political liability for the party in 2020. Outrage over increasing prices has propelled the issue to the top of voters’ minds heading into the November elections, when Republicans hope to keep control of the Senate and retake the House. But proposals that would limit what drug companies can charge for their products face opposition from Republicans, presenting an obstacle to congressional passage. (Hellmann, 1/10)

The Hill: Democratic Groups Launch Ad Campaign Attacking Trump, GOP On Drug Pricing
A new advertising campaign spearheaded by Democratic strategists aims to excoriate congressional Republicans and the Trump administration for opposing Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D-Calif.) drug pricing legislation. The Patients Over Pharma campaign is run by Accountable.US, an umbrella organization of progressive watchdog groups that attacks the Trump administration’s apparent conflicts of interest and ties to industry groups. (Weixel, 1/10)

The Washington Post: Medicaid Expansion May Have Saved Thousands From Drug Overdose Deaths
Expanding Medicaid rolls under the Affordable Care Act may have saved as many as 8,132 people from fatal opioid overdoses, virtually all involving heroin and fentanyl, a study released Friday suggests. The research is the latest evidence that allowing more people to enroll in Medicaid has saved lives and improved health. (Bernstein, 1/10)

The Hill: Study: Medicaid Expansion Linked To 6 Percent Decline In Opioid Overdose Deaths
“These findings add to the emerging body of evidence that Medicaid expansion under the ACA may be a critical component of state efforts to address the continuing opioid overdose epidemic in the United States,” the study states. The study could provide fodder for Democrats pushing for more states to accept the expansion of Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act. (Sullivan, 1/10)

The Associated Press: Opioid-Dependent Kids' Guardians Seek To Form Class In Suit
Guardians caring for hundreds of thousands of children born dependent on opioids since 2000 should be grouped together as part of the class action lawsuit filed by local governments and others against the manufacturers, distributors and sellers of prescription pain medication, lawyers argued in a motion filed in federal court in Cleveland. (Gillispie, 1/10)

NPR: Kratom's Benefits And Dangers Debated Amid Marketing Push
Americans know the dangers of drugs such as morphine and heroin. But what about a supplement that acts in the brain a bit like an opiate and is available in many places to kids — even from vending machines. Kratom, an herb that's abundant, legal in most states and potentially dangerous, is the subject of an ongoing debate over its risks and benefits. (McClurg, 1/13)

The Wall Street Journal: Trump Administration Weighs Tighter Requirements For Disability Payments
The Trump administration is working on a plan to tighten eligibility requirements for disability benefits, especially for older Americans, the latest step in a broader White House effort to shrink federal safety-net programs. The proposal being prepared by the Social Security Administration would revise eligibility for disability benefits based on age, education and work experience, according to a draft viewed by The Wall Street Journal. Those factors determined the eligibility of about 500,000 people in 2017, according to the latest available data. More than eight million people currently receive disability payments. (Davidson, 1/10)

The New York Times: Tighter Food Stamp Rules Crowded Soup Kitchens, Not Job Rosters
In the early mornings, Chastity and Paul Peyton walk from their small and barely heated apartment to Taco Bell to clean fryers and take orders for as many work hours as they can get. It rarely adds up to full-time week’s worth, often not even close. With this income and whatever cash Mr. Peyton can scrape up doing odd jobs — which are hard to come by in a small town in winter, for someone without a car — the couple pays rent, utilities and his child support payments. Then there is the matter of food. “We can barely eat,” Ms. Peyton said. She was told she would be getting food stamps again soon — a little over two dollars’ worth a day — but the couple was without them for months. (Robertson, 1/13)

The Wall Street Journal: Plan To Revamp Medicaid-Eligibility Checks Draws Criticism
A push by the Trump administration and states to overhaul Medicaid-eligibility regulations is alarming critics who say stiffer verification measures are already creating procedural hurdles that depress enrollment. The Trump administration says a lack of oversight on Medicaid, a federal-state program for low-income and disabled people, threatens its future by allowing people to get health coverage even though they earn too much to qualify. (Armour, 1/12)

Stat: Supreme Court Will Review Arkansas Law Governing PBMs
In a move with the potential to affect health care costs, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to review a case that will determine the extent to which the states can regulate pharmacy benefit managers, the controversial middlemen in the pharmaceutical supply chain. At issue is an Arkansas law that governs the reimbursements rates that pharmacy benefit managers, or PBMs, must pay to pharmacies. Specifically, the law requires PBMs to reimburse pharmacies at or above their wholesale costs paid for generic drugs. (Silverman, 1/11)

Stat: A Health Care Veteran Tries To Upend The System And Bring Drug Prices Down
The U.S. health system could get some relief from rising drug prices from an unlikely source: a venture capitalist starting a new company to try to make medicines less expensive. Alexis Borisy, 47, is a fixture in Boston biotech, known for his striking felt fedoras. He co-founded Foundation Medicine and Blueprint Medicines, both of them based in Cambridge, Mass., and focused, in different ways, on using genetics to treat cancer — the kind of approach that has produced remarkable outcomes but also driven up the price of drugs. His next company, called EQRx and being launched Monday, seeks to bring them down. He will serve as both CEO and chairman. (Herper, 1/12)

The Wall Street Journal: Geneticists Call On Myriad To Share Proprietary Data To Aid Gene Tests
A leading medical society is calling on Myriad Genetics Inc. and other lab companies to share proprietary data from their genetic testing in a public database, to help the scientific community better assess the disease-causing risk of mutations. The call by the board of the American College of Medical Genetics and Genomics, a professional organization that also publishes influential guidelines on classifying genetic variants, came in response to a Dec. 20 article in The Wall Street Journal. (Marcus, 1/12)

The Wall Street Journal: High Drug Prices? Pharma Startup Thinks It Has The Right Medicine
A startup pharmaceuticals company wants to capitalize on the backlash against high drug prices by developing slightly different versions of expensive brand-name drugs and selling them at a significantly lower price than competitors. The new company, EQRx Inc., aims to bring 10 drugs to market over the next decade and sell them for perhaps as little as one-third to one-fifth of rivals’ prices, the company’s co-founder and Chief Executive Alexis Borisy said. (Walker, 1/12)

The Washington Post: Five Years After An Abortion, Most Women Say They Made The Right Decision
There’s been quite a lot of research about women’s emotions immediately following an abortion. Some experience sadness, guilt and anger; others feel relief. For many, it’s a mix of all of these and more. But what about in the long term? Researchers from the University of California at San Francisco delved into this question in an analysis of 667 women recruited from 30 sites across the country as part of the Turnaway Study — a landmark body of research about how abortion affects women physically, socially, emotionally and economically. (Cha, 1/12)

The Associated Press: Kansas GOP To Stymie Ban In Reversing Abortion-Rights Ruling
Top Kansas Republicans want to head off any push for an abortion ban in the state even as they make overturning a Kansas Supreme Court ruling that protects abortion rights a top priority. The GOP-controlled Legislature expects to consider a proposed amendment to the Kansas Constitution during the annual 90-day lawmaking session set to convene Monday. It's a response to the state high court's ruling in April that the state's Bill of Rights makes access to abortion a fundamental right. (Hanna, 1/13)

The Wall Street Journal: Inside Google’s Quest For Millions Of Medical Records
Roughly a year ago, Google offered health-data company Cerner Corp. an unusually rich proposal. Cerner was interviewing Silicon Valley giants to pick a storage provider for 250 million health records, one of the largest collections of U.S. patient data. Google dispatched former chief executive Eric Schmidt to personally pitch Cerner over several phone calls and offered around $250 million in discounts and incentives, people familiar with the matter say. (Copeland, Mattioli and Evans, 1/11)

Stat: Facebook Can't Tell If Its New Preventive Health Tool Is Working
As Facebook’s newest health tool makes its way to your feed, the company is still trying to figure out how to measure whether or not it is improving health outcomes. Launched in October, the preventive health tool is designed to nudge people toward getting recommended disease screenings and checkups, with the goal of improving users’ health and narrowing the wide gaps in health equity, including disparities in life expectancy from one state to the next. (Thielking and Brodwin, 1/13)

Stat: Apple Barely Discussed Health In First CES Appearance In 28 Years
Breaking a 28-year hiatus, Apple made an appearance this week at the annual Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Last year, the iPhone maker’s CEO, Tim Cook, made the bold claim that Apple’s biggest impact on humankind would be in health. But the company did not discuss any health-specific products at the conference this year. (Brodwin, 1/10)

Reuters: U.S. To Probe Fitbit, Garmin, Other Wearable Devices After Philips Complains
U.S. trade regulators said on Friday they will investigate wearable monitoring devices, including those made by Fitbit Inc and Garmin Ltd, following allegations of patent violations by rival Koninklijke Philips and its North America unit. The U.S. International Trade Commission, in a statement, said the probe would also look at devices by made by California-based Ingram Micro Inc as well as China-based Maintek Computer Co Ltd and Inventec Appliances. (1/10)

The Wall Street Journal: Virus In China Is Part Of A Growing Threat
New, more severe human coronaviruses are emerging at an accelerating pace. Since 2002, three new types of coronavirus have emerged: SARS, MERS, and now this new one in Wuhan. SARS changed the game for virologists as the first coronavirus that was deadly to humans. Before that, it was known as a virus causing common colds. MERS is even deadlier. It also infects people on a continuing basis, unlike SARS, which disappeared after causing one epidemic that shook up global public health. The new Wuhan virus appears milder. While some people are severely ill, only one death has been reported. (McKay, 1/10)

Stat: First Death From Wuhan Pneumonia Outbreak Reported
The fatal case involved a 61-year-old man who died on Thursday after he had been admitted to the hospital with respiratory failure and severe pneumonia, according to Wuhan health authorities. He apparently had other health issues, with the statement from the Wuhan Municipal Health Committee noting he had abdominal tumors and chronic liver disease. (Joseph, 1/11)

The New York Times: China Reports First Death From New Virus
Chinese state media on Saturday reported the first known death from a new virus that has infected dozens of people in China and set off worries across Asia. The Xinhua news agency cited the health commission in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, where the illness first appeared, in reporting the death. The health commission said the patient, a 61-year-old man, died on Thursday night. (Qin and Hernandez, 1/10)

The Wall Street Journal: China Reports First Death From New Coronavirus
Seven people quarantined in the viral-pneumonia outbreak are in critical condition and eight have been released, the health commission said. Two of those eight people are confirmed to have been infected with the new coronavirus, according to the commission. No new cases have been reported since Jan. 3. (Wang, 1/11)

Stat: 5 Reasons To View Falling Cancer Death Rates With Dash Of Skepticism
Not to be a downer at the start of the new year, but might it be that all the headlines, news reports, and tweets this week about a decline in cancer death rates in 2017 were just a little too exuberant? “U.S. Cancer Death Rate Lowest In Recorded History! A lot of good news coming out of this Administration,” President Trump tweeted Thursday morning after reading the headlines. (Weintraub, 1/10)

The Washington Post: CDC Flu Data Shows Child Deaths From Influenza B
An unusual viral strain is dominating flu activity across the United States and may be one reason for the severe infections in children so far, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and this season’s influenza vaccine is not a close match for the virus. There are different types of flu viruses, and the strain causing illnesses in most parts of the country is an influenza B virus. (Sun, 1/10)

The New York Times: Race And Medicine: The Harm That Comes From Mistrust
Racial discrimination has shaped so many American institutions that perhaps it should be no surprise that health care is among them. Put simply, people of color receive less care — and often worse care — than white Americans. Reasons includes lower rates of health coverage; communication barriers; and racial stereotyping based on false beliefs. Predictably, their health outcomes are worse than those of whites. (Frakt, 1/13)

The Washington Post: Genetic Sequencing Of Measles Suggests A Much Older History For The Virus
In the 10th century, Persian physician Abu Bakr Muhammad ibn Zakariya al-Razi wrote about patients with fever, anxiety and full-body rashes — the first clear medical descriptions of measles. But scientists have never been able to pinpoint when the virus came into being. Now, genetic sequencing of measles found in a pair of ­century-old lungs suggests the virus existed 1,500 years earlier than previously thought. (Blakemore, 1/11)

The New York Times: At 16, She’s A Pioneer In The Fight To Cure Sickle Cell Disease
Helen Obando, a shy slip of a girl, lay curled in a hospital bed in June waiting for a bag of stem cells from her bone marrow, modified by gene therapy, to start dripping into her chest. The hope was that the treatment would cure her of sickle cell disease, an inherited blood disorder that can cause excruciating pain, organ damage and early death. (Kolata, 1/11)

NPR: Running, Marathon Training Can Improve Heart Health, Study Shows
If you've ever considered training for a marathon, but you're a bit intimidated by the idea of 26.2 miles, here's some motivation. A slow and steady 6-month training program designed to gradually build up endurance and mileage gave a group of novice runners, aged 21 to 69, an impressive boost to their heart health. (Aubrey, 1/12)

The New York Times: Alcohol Deaths Have Risen Sharply, Particularly Among Women
The number of women drinking dangerous amounts of alcohol is rising sharply in the United States. That finding was among several troubling conclusions in an analysis of death certificates published Friday by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. The analysis looked at deaths nationwide each year from 1999 through 2017 that were reported as being caused at least partly by alcohol, including acute overdose, its chronic use, or in combination with other drugs. (Richtel, 1/10)

Los Angeles Times: Feeling Distressed About Climate Change? Here's How To Manage It
Climate change is often framed as a scientific or technical issue. But for many, it’s an emotional one too. It can be almost unbearable to witness entire towns obliterated by wildfires and islands leveled by storms. To see photos of koala bears singed by flames and dead seabirds washing ashore by the thousands. Or to read the latest confirmation that nations are woefully underperforming on their pledges to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. (Rosen, 1/11)

The Wall Street Journal: California’s Newsom Proposes New Approach To Homeless Spending
California would take new steps to address homelessness, expand government health care to illegal immigrants 65 and over, and enact a tax on vaping products under a budget proposed by Gov. Gavin Newsom on Friday. Bolstered by a multibillion-dollar surplus amid a booming economy, the Democrat proposed spending $1.4 billion to address homelessness in the fiscal year beginning in July, including $750 million which would be distributed in a manner Mr. Newsom described as a “radical shift.” (Mai-Duc, 1/10)

ProPublica/Sacramento Bee: California Governor’s Budget Makes Stronger Jail Oversight A Priority
California Gov. Gavin Newsom on Friday demanded more accountability from his state community corrections board and called for more frequent jail inspections, tighter oversight and stricter standards for how sheriffs run local lockups. His calls followed a yearlong McClatchy and ProPublica investigation into county jails that showed that there are no limits on how long sheriffs can hold mentally ill inmates in extreme isolation, that violence goes unchecked in many lockups and that state inspectors are powerless to enforce their own standards. (Pohl, 1/10)

Los Angeles Times: After Years Of Financial Woes, Los Angeles Hospital Running Out Of Prayers
Many years ago, Gilbert San Juan watched as a wrecking ball demolished the old St. Vincent Medical Center. An elevator operator and painter there at the time, San Juan wanted to fetch some old furniture from the building, but backed down after seeing the massive, threatening ball hanging from a crane. Still, he knew he would enter its doors again, when the new hospital near downtown Los Angeles sprung just yards away from the old. For 47 years, San Juan worked in that facility. (Reyes-Velarde, 1/12)

The Washington Post: No Room On The Street: D.C. Orders Homeless Out Of Underpass In Fast-Developing Neighborhood
The 100 block of K Street NE is a dank and gloomy underpass connecting rapidly growing neighborhoods of high-end condos, gleaming office buildings and trendy restaurants. The rumble of trains pulling in and out of Union Station on the tracks above creates a steady din, and the blare of horns and sirens pierces all hours of the day. It often smells. (Heim and Moyer, 1/10)