First Edition: January 15, 2019

Kaiser Health News: Providers Walk ‘Fine Line’ Between Informing And Scaring Immigrant Patients
While the Trump administration decides whether to adopt a controversial policy that could jeopardize the legal status of immigrants who use public programs such as Medicaid, doctors and clinics are torn between informing patients about the potential risks and unnecessarily scaring them into dropping their coverage or avoiding care. “We are walking a fine line,” said Tara McCollum Plese, chief external affairs officer at the Arizona Alliance for Community Health Centers, which represents 176 clinics. “Until there is confirmation this indeed is going to be the policy, we don’t want to add to the angst and the concern.” (Ibarra, 1/15)

California Healthline: California’s Top Lawyer Cements His Role As Health Care Defender-In-Chief
Xavier Becerra, the political savvy Democratic attorney general of California, has sued the Trump administration 45 times in the past two years, often with much fanfare. In winning a legal challenge Sunday against new government rules limiting birth control, he once against cemented himself as a national figure leading a fight against the administration across a range of issues — especially health care. (Young, 1/15)

The Associated Press: FDA Resuming Some Food Inspections Halted By Shutdown
The Food and Drug Administration said it will resume inspections of some of the riskiest foods such as cheeses, produce and infant formula as early as Tuesday. The routine inspections had been briefly halted as a result of the partial government shutdown. (1/14)

The New York Times: F.D.A. Says It Will Resume Inspecting Some High-Risk Foods
But Dr. Scott Gottlieb, the agency’s commissioner, said that he was asking employees to return from furlough to conduct some of the inspections and other agency functions involving surveillance of certain drugs, devices and potential outbreaks of food-borne illnesses. About one-third of all food safety inspections are for high-risk foods, he said. It was unclear when more routine inspections would resume. (Kaplan, 1/14)

Stat: A Longer Shutdown At FDA Could Put Anticipated New Drugs In Jeopardy
The government shutdown could soon jeopardize highly anticipated new drugs from Janssen, Sanofi and Novartis for depression, diabetes and multiple sclerosis, as well as a host of other potential new therapies, according to a STAT analysis of upcoming regulatory decision dates. President Trump has warned that the shutdown — already the longest in history — could stretch on for “months or even years.” And though the Food and Drug Administration can retain more than half of its workforce thanks to application fees paid by drug and device makers, Commissioner Scott Gottlieb has cautioned the agency only has about three more weeks’ worth of funding to draw down. (Florko and Swetlitz, 1/14)

The New York Times: Court Blocks Trump Administration Restrictions On Birth Control
A federal court issued a nationwide injunction on Monday that prevents the Trump administration from interfering with women’s access to free birth control guaranteed under the Affordable Care Act. The decision, by Judge Wendy Beetlestone of the Federal District Court in Philadelphia, extends a losing streak for President Trump, who has repeatedly been set back in his efforts to allow employers to deny insurance coverage of contraceptives to which the employers object on religious or moral grounds. (Pear, 1/14)

Reuters: Second U.S. Judge Blocks Trump Administration Birth Control Rules
U.S. District Judge Wendy Beetlestone in Philadelphia issued a nationwide injunction preventing the rules from taking effect, a day after another judge issued a more limited ruling blocking their enforcement in 13 states and the District of Columbia. The rules would let businesses or nonprofits lodge religious or moral objections to obtain exemptions from the Obamacare mandate that employers provide contraceptive coverage in health insurance with no copayment. (1/14)

The Washington Post: Judge Blocks Trump Effort To Roll Back Birth Control Mandate Nationwide
In a 65-page opinion, Beetlestone concludes the Trump administration’s effort to carve out coverage of contraceptives for stricter limits than other types of preventive care “is inconsistent with the . . . text” of the ACA. And she rejects the contention that broader exemptions for birth control are required under a 1993 law called the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. The judge said states would bear expenses from women seeking state-funded contraceptive services and from unintended pregnancies. Noting that federal health officials estimate 70,500 women would lose coverage under the policy, Beetlestone wrote: “The only serious disagreement is not whether the states will be harmed, but how much.” (Goldstein, 1/14)

The Wall Street Journal: Judge Blocks Rules Allowing Employers To Opt Out Of Covering Birth Control
The rulings were early steps in what is likely to be a long court battle that could reach the U.S. Supreme Court. Officials in multiple states, including California, have sued the Trump administration over the contraception rules. “Until these discriminatory rules are blocked for good, the health and livelihoods of millions across the country are still threatened,” said Fatima Goss Graves, president of the National Women’s Law Center, a liberal-leaning nonprofit that advocates for women and families. (Hackman, 1/14)

The Associated Press: House Dems Announce Sweeping Investigation Of Drug Pricing
House Democrats announced a sweeping investigation Monday of the pharmaceutical industry's pricing practices, jockeying for the upper hand with the Trump administration on an issue that concerns Americans across the political spectrum. Oversight and Reform Committee Chairman Elijah Cummings said he's sent letters to 12 major drugmakers seeking detailed information and documents about pricing practices for brand-name drugs to treat diseases including cancer, diabetes, kidney failure and nerve pain. (Alonso-Zaldivar, 1/14)

Reuters: U.S. Lawmaker Launches Investigation Into Pharma Drug Pricing
AbbVie Inc, Amgen Inc, AstraZeneca PLC, Celgene Corp, Eli Lilly and Co, Johnson & Johnson, Mallinckrodt PLC, Novartis AG, Novo Nordisk, Pfizer Inc, Sanofi and Teva Pharmaceutical all received letters seeking information about their pricing practices. Novo Nordisk, Amgen, Celgene, and Novartis said they were reviewing the request. The other drug companies did not immediately respond to requests for comment. (Abutaleb, 1/14)

Stat: House Democrats Launch Drug Pricing Investigation
“For years, drug companies have been aggressively increasing prices on existing drugs and setting higher launch prices for new drugs while recording windfall profits,” Cummings said in a statement. “The goals of this investigation are to determine why drug companies are increasing prices so dramatically, how drug companies are using the proceeds, and what steps can be taken to reduce prescription drug prices.” (Facher, 1/14)

Stat: Medicare Part D Could Have Saved $14.4B In 2016 By Negotiating As The VA Did
As Congressional lawmakers push to negotiate prices for Medicare Part D, a new analysis finds the federal government could have saved $14.4 billion on the top 50 pills that were covered two years ago if the program obtained the same prices as the Department of Veterans Affairs, which already haggles for discounts. For instance, the VA spent roughly $1.7 billion on the Harvoni hepatitis C treatment sold by Gilead Sciences (GILD) in 2016, compared with $3 billion spent by Part D, which spent more on this particular pill that year than any other oral medicine. (Silverman, 1/14)

Stat: CVS CEO Hints The Company Could Deliver Prescriptions By Drone 
Larry Merlo, chief executive of CVS, has big ideas for how his company will transform healthcare. It’s merging with Aetna, one of the country’s largest insurers. It’s opening new clinics where patients can get blood tests along with their toilet paper. And it might one day deliver drugs by drone. “We are doing some work on that, believe it or not,” Merlo said, visibly flustered, in response to a question about whether the company had looked into distributing prescriptions by drone. (Swetlitz, 1/15)

Politico: Rand Paul Headed To Canada For Surgery, But Will Pay Out Of Pocket
Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) is going to Canada for surgery — but don't accuse the staunch opponent of all things socialist of seeking public health care. He'll be paying for his care in full. "This is a private, world-renowned hospital separate from any system and people come from around the world to pay cash for their services,” a spokesperson told POLITICO. While the U.S. and Canada are often portrayed as having opposing health systems — one private, one public, the reality is more nuanced. Canada also offers some for-profit services, while the U.S. has federal health insurance programs. (Panetta, 1/14)

The Associated Press: Sen. Rand Paul To Have Hernia Surgery In Canada
The surgery is related to the 2017 attack, the court document says. Boucher pleaded guilty to assaulting a member of Congress and was sentenced to 30 days in prison. Federal prosecutors are appealing the sentence, saying 21 months would have been appropriate. Paul is scheduled for surgery at Shouldice Hospital, which touts itself as a world leader in “non-mesh hernia repair.” (1/14)

The New York Times: The Strange Marketplace For Diabetes Test Strips
On most afternoons, people arrive from across New York City with backpacks and plastic bags filled with boxes of small plastic strips, forming a line on the sidewalk outside a Harlem storefront. Hanging from the awning, a banner reads: “Get cash with your extra diabetic test strips.” Each strip is a laminate of plastic and chemicals little bigger than a fingernail, a single-use diagnostic test for measuring blood sugar. More than 30 million Americans have Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes, and most use several test strips daily to monitor their condition. (Alcorn, 1/14)

Reuters: U.S. Healthcare Stocks Seen Maintaining Momentum After Strong 2018
One of the rare market bright spots last year, the U.S. healthcare sector remains a Wall Street darling despite a slow start to 2019. As 2019 begins, healthcare is the most favored of the 11 main S&P 500 sectors, according to a Reuters review of ratings from 13 large Wall Street research firms, which recommend how to weigh those groups in investment portfolios. (1/14)

Stat: Anti-Abortion Leaders Are Rebranding As "Pro-Science." Are They?
In recent months, anti-abortion advocates have advocated for the cancellation of a federal research contract for fetal tissue procurement and pushed to halt other research they view as immoral. The results: a $2 million project to test HIV drugs derailed and another pair of studies, including one to develop cancer immunotherapies, left in limbo. The movement’s latest objective: to force President Trump to fire the renowned director of the National Institutes of Health, Francis Collins, the country’s top biomedical research scientist. (Facher and Thielking, 1/15)

The Hill: Pence To Speak At Anti-Abortion Fundraiser
Vice President Pence will speak at a fundraiser commemorating the country's largest anti-abortion march, organizers said Monday. The Rose Dinner, taking place Friday night, follows the March for Life, the annual march against abortion in Washington. (Hellmann, 1/14)

The New York Times: Opioids, Car Crashes And Falling: The Odds Of Dying In The U.S.
The opioid crisis in the United States has become so grim that Americans are now likelier to die of an overdose than in a vehicle crash. That’s according to a new report by the National Safety Council that analyzed the causes of preventable deaths in the country in 2017. The probability of dying from an opioid overdose, according to the report, is one in 96. The chances of dying in a vehicle crash? One in 103. (Mazzei, 1/14)

CNN: Mass Drug Overdose In California Kills 1 Person And Sends 14 More To Hospitals
A mass drug overdose at a home in Chico, California, has killed one person and sent more than a dozen people to hospitals, police said. Chico Police Chief Michael O'Brien said the main substance involved is believed to be fentanyl -- the most commonly used drug in overdoses, according to a recent government report. (Boyette and Yan, 1/14)

Stat: Purdue Appeals Kentucky Court Order To Unseal OxyContin Records
Purdue Pharma on Monday asked the Kentucky Supreme Court to review a lower court decision that would unseal secret records about the company’s marketing of its opioid painkiller OxyContin. The legal fight stems from a motion filed by STAT in 2016 to make public sealed records believed to show how Purdue promoted OxyContin and what company executives knew about the addictive properties of the drug, which has been blamed for helping spawn the opioid addiction crisis. (Joseph, 1/14)

The New York Times: You’re Not Getting Much Taller, America. But You Are Getting Bigger.
Meet the average American man. He weighs 198 pounds and stands 5 feet 9 inches tall. He has a 40-inch waist, and his body mass index is 29, at the high end of the “overweight” category. The picture for the average woman? She is roughly 5 feet 4 inches tall, and weighs 171 pounds, with a 39-inch waist. Her B.M.I. is close to 30. (Bakalar, 1/14)

CNN: Black And Hispanic Youth Are Targeted With Junk Food Ads, Research Shows
Click over to TV programming that caters to black and Hispanic youth and the commercials almost exclusively push fast food, sugary drinks, bad-for-you snacks and candy, a new report shows. Junk food comprised 86% of ad spending on black-targeted programming and 82% of spending on Spanish-language television in 2017, according to the study released Tuesday. (Ravitz, 1/15)

CNN: A New Guide Could Help Halt Overeating 
The British Nutrition Foundation released this month new portion-size guidelines designed to help people eat the right amounts of each food group -- and possibly help them avoid overeating. "It's really worth having a quick check of portion sizes before you're filling up with food because we know that it does take a little bit of time to get those fullness signals coming through," said Bridget Benelam, nutrition communications manager at the BNF. "Probably all of us have had the experience where you eat something and then you eat a bit more and perhaps a bit more and then 10 minutes later you feel much too full and you wish you had eaten a little less." (Thomas, 1/14)

Stat: Which Cancer Patients Will Checkpoint Inhibitors Help? 
Experiments involving just a few patients have hinted at it, and research on one type of tumor at a time has supported it, but a large study has now delivered the strongest evidence yet about how to identify cancer patients who are likely to benefit from a particular form of immunotherapy: count. Specifically, count how many mutations their tumor cells have. The higher this “tumor mutational burden,” concludes a study published on Monday in Nature Genetics, the likelier a patient is to go into remission, and possibly be cured, by checkpoint inhibitor drugs such as Bristol-Myers Squibb’s nivolumab (Opdivo) and Merck’s pembrolizumab (Keytruda). (Begley, 1/14)

NPR: Transplant Surgeon Joshua Mezrich On 'When Death Becomes Life'
When Joshua Mezrich was a medical student on the first day of surgical rotation, he was called into the operating room to witness a kidney transplant. What he saw that day changed him. After the donor kidney came out of ice and the clamps on it were released, he says, "it turned pink and literally, in front of my eyes, this urine just started squirting out onto the field." (Davies, 1/14)

CNN: Dynamic Duos: Why Science Loves Twins
One of the broadest studies of twins in the United States suggests that our genes tend to influence the diseases that afflict us more than where we live, according to research published Monday in the journal Nature Genetics. Using insurance claims data, researchers identified more than 56,000 pairs of twins and estimated the heritability of 560 diseases, finding that nearly a third of the variation in these conditions could be attributed to genetics, on average. Where people grew up was less contributory on the whole. (Nedelman, 1/14)

The New York Times: North Korea’s Less-Known Military Threat: Biological Weapons
Pound for pound, the deadliest arms of all time are not nuclear but biological. A single gallon of anthrax, if suitably distributed, could end human life on Earth. Even so, the Trump administration has given scant attention to North Korea’s pursuit of living weapons — a threat that analysts describe as more immediate than its nuclear arms, which Pyongyang and Washington have been discussing for more than six months. (Baumgaertner and Broad, 1/15)

The New York Times: A Device That Gives Parents Of Stillborn Babies Time To Say Goodbye
The death of a child is nearly always devastating and typically followed by an outpouring of support while parents mourn. But when a baby dies before it is born or shortly thereafter, parents are often alone in a hospital with a limited source of comfort and little, if any, opportunity to say goodbye to the baby — or babies. Enter the CuddleCot, a kind of refrigerated baby bed that helps preserve the body of a deceased newborn for days. The device gives parents a chance to bond with their babies — to love and hold them, take pictures, even take them home and take them for walks, creating memories to last a lifetime. (Brody, 1/14)

The New York Times: A Silver Bullet Against The Brain-Eating Amoeba?
The brain-eating monsters are real enough — they lurk in freshwater ponds in much of the United States. Now scientists may have discovered a new way to kill them. Minuscule silver particles coated with anti-seizure drugs one day may be adapted to halt Naegleria fowleri, an exceptionally lethal microbe that invades through the sinuses and feeds on human brain tissue. (Baumgaertner, 1/14)