First Edition: January 2, 2019

Kaiser Health News: How Sen. Orrin Hatch Changed America’s Health Care
Sen. Orrin Hatch, the Utah Republican retiring from 42 years in the Senate as a new generation is sworn in, leaves a long list of achievements in health care. Some were more controversial than others. Hatch played key roles in shepherding the 1983 Orphan Drug Act to promote drug development for rare diseases, and the 1984 National Organ Transplant Act, which helped create a national transplant registry. And in 1995, when many people with AIDS were still feeling marginalized by society and elected leaders, he testified before the Senate about reauthorizing funding for his Ryan White CARE Act to treat uninsured people who have HIV. (Neumann, 1/2)

Kaiser Health News: Insured But Still In Debt: 5 Jobs Pulling In $100K A Year No Match For Medical Bills 
Robert and Tiffany Cano of San Tan Valley, Ariz., have a new marriage, a new house and a 10-month-old son, Brody, who is delighted by his ability to blow raspberries. They also have a stack of medical bills that threatens to undermine it all.In the months since their sturdy, brown-eyed boy was born, the Canos have acquired more than $12,000 in medical debt — so much that they need a spreadsheet to track what they owe to hospitals and doctors. (Aleccia, 12/28)

Kaiser Health News: Up To A Third Of Knee Replacements Pack Pain And Regret
Danette Lake thought surgery would relieve the pain in her knees. The arthritis pain began as a dull ache in her early 40s, brought on largely by the pressure of unwanted weight. Lake managed to lose 200 pounds through dieting and exercise, but the pain in her knees persisted. (Szabo, 12/25)

California Healthline: En Route To Congress, California Democrats Hit Wall On ‘Medicare-For-All’
Each of the seven California Democrats who flipped Republican congressional seats in the midterm election campaigned for more government-funded health care — with most of them calling for a complete government takeover. So when they join the Golden State’s delegation this week, they will make it the largest state bloc to support “Medicare-for-all” in the U.S. House of Representatives. And Democrats, of course, will control the House. (Young, 1/2)

Kaiser Health News: Refund On The Way To Latest ‘Bill Of The Month’ Patient
Sarah Witter had to pay for a second surgery to repair her broken leg after a metal plate installed during the first surgery broke. On Friday, she got a more welcome break — a $6,358.26 refund from the hospital and her insurer. Witter’s experience was the subject of December’s KHN-NPR “Bill of the Month” feature. She and her insurer, Aetna, had racked up $99,159 in bills from a Rutland, Vt., hospital and various medical providers after she fractured her leg in a skiing accident last February. (Rau, 12/21)

The New York Times: Obamacare, Ruled Invalid By Federal Judge, Will Remain In Effect During Appeal
The federal judge in Texas who ruled this month that the entire Affordable Care Act was invalid issued a stay in the case on Sunday, meaning that the law will remain in effect while the ruling is appealed. The judge, Reed O’Connor of the Federal District Court in Fort Worth, said that the ruling should not go into immediate effect “because many everyday Americans would otherwise face great uncertainty” during an appeal. The ruling opened the door for an appeal by California and 15 other states that support the health care law. (Mervosh, 12/30)

The Associated Press: Judge Clears The Way For Appeal Of Ruling Against Health Law
In a ruling issued Sunday, Judge Reed O'Connor in Fort Worth wrote that he stands by his earlier conclusion that the entire law is invalidated by congressional repeal of its fines on people who remain uninsured, like a house of cards collapsing. However, because "many everyday Americans would ... face great uncertainty" if that ruling were immediately put into effect, O'Connor issued a stay to allow for appeals. (12/30)

Politico: Texas Judge Lets Obamacare Stand While Court Challenge Continues
Public health groups, Democrats and even some Republicans had warned of catastrophic cuts in health coverage if O'Connor’s Dec. 14 ruling to strike down the entire ACA had been allowed to take immediate effect. Many health policies proposed by the Trump administration, including efforts to lower drug prices and reshape hospital payment, also depend on provisions of the law. Seventeen states defending the ACA — led by California Attorney General Xavier Becerra — had asked O’Connor to clarify the ramifications of his ruling so they would be able to file an immediate appeal to the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals. (Diamond, 12/30)

The Associated Press: ACA Mandate Gone, But A Few States Still Require Coverage
The mandate directing individuals to obtain health insurance or face tax penalties ends on Tuesday for most, but not all Americans. In Massachusetts, an individual mandate that has been on the books since 2006 will continue in the absence of the federal fines that had been in effect since 2014 under the Affordable Care Act but were eliminated as part of the Republican-backed tax reform law passed in 2017. (1/1)

Modern Healthcare: 2018 Year In Review: Bookended By Obamacare, 2018 Was The Year Of Policy Change
With Congress' attempt to repeal the Affordable Care Act dead by the end of 2017, any relief the law's supporters felt were likely short-lived, as 2018 was the year the Trump administration began significantly remolding a law it fundamentally opposes. Led by HHS Secretary Alex Azar, who took the reins of the $1.2 trillion department last January, the administration charted an overarching strategy to lower drug prices and reduce spending on hospital care. Moreover, by the end of 2018, the entire Affordable Care Act was back in legal peril when a federal judge in Texas struck it down and blocked immediate appeal. (Luthi, 12/26)

Politico: Conservative Health Care Experiment Leads To Thousands Losing Coverage
Arkansas is throwing thousands of people off its Medicaid rolls each month for not complying with work requirements, blindsiding vulnerable residents panicked about losing their health coverage. Views differ on the fairness of the unprecedented social experiment, but there’s unanimity here that it’s causing confusion. And that’s feeding a philosophical debate about whether low-income adults are ducking the work rules or just can’t navigate the tech-heavy reporting system that goes offline every night at 9 p.m. (Pradhan, 12/30)

Politico: Mississippi’s Republican Governor Quietly Considering Medicaid Expansion
Mississippi’s Republican governor is considering Medicaid expansion, the first sign that long-held GOP opposition could be wilting in the Deep South after an election that was a big winner for the Obamacare program. Republican Gov. Phil Bryant, entering his final year in office, has been engaged in quiet talks about adopting expansion after resisting for years, according to two sources familiar with the discussions. (Demko, 12/22)

Modern Healthcare: 2018 Year In Review: Medicaid Expansion Battle Shifted To Executive Branch, States 
With congressional action to repeal the Affordable Care Act off the table in 2018, the Trump administration and the states engaged in a tense tug of war through the year between expanding, not expanding and limiting Medicaid eligibility. The administration in 2018 also proposed penalizing legal immigrants for enrolling in Medicaid and offering states greater flexibility in how they regulate Medicaid managed-care plans. (Meyer, 12/26)

The Associated Press: Paying For Medicaid, Schools Will Be Priority For Lawmakers
Big-dollar decisions about health care and education will top the agenda in many state capitols as lawmakers convene for their 2019 sessions with a closer balance between Republicans and Democrats. Some states will be considering anew whether to expand government-funded health coverage to more people after Democrats put a sizable dent in Republican statehouse dominance during the November elections. Others will be wrestling with how to boost salaries for teachers and funding for their public schools. (Lieb, 12/31)

The New York Times: Shutdown Leaves Food, Medicine And Pay In Doubt In Indian Country
For one tribe of Chippewa Indians in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, the government shutdown comes with a price tag: about $100,000, every day, of federal money that does not arrive to keep health clinics staffed, food pantry shelves full and employees paid. The tribe is using its own funds to cover the shortfalls for now. But if the standoff in Washington continues much longer, that stopgap money will be depleted. Later this month, workers could be furloughed and health services could be pared back. “Everything,” said Aaron Payment, the chairman of the Sault Ste. Marie Tribe, “is on the table.” (Smith and Turkewitz, 1/1)

The Washington Post: Disruptive, Disappointing, Chaotic: Shutdown Upends Scientific Research
Kay Behrensmeyer was supposed to be preparing for a three-week expedition to look for evidence of ancient humans in Kenya. Instead, she spent Thursday packing her research permits, her fossil-collecting supplies, and maps she’d spent weeks compiling and annotating by hand into a FedEx box, which she shipped to a junior colleague on the project. Behrensmeyer, curator of vertebrate paleontology at the National Museum of Natural History, wasn’t going anywhere. The federal government was shut down. (Guarino, Kaplan, Fritz and Johnson, 12/28)

The Associated Press: What Happens In A Partial Government Shutdown
A look at the impact of the partial government shutdown that began on Dec. 22. (12/30)

The New York Times: Trump Blames Democrats Over Deaths Of Migrant Children In U.S. Custody
President Trump blamed Democrats on Saturday for the deaths of two migrant children in detention at the southwest border this month, wielding the episodes as justification to fund a border wall. The comments came in twin posts on Twitter, where the president spent much of the day denouncing Democrats as the partial government shutdown approached its eighth day over his demand for funding for the wall. (Haberman, 12/29)

The Associated Press: Trump Tries To Deflect Blame For Migrant Children's Deaths
Trump, whose administration has faced widespread criticism over the deaths, pointed on Twitter at Democrats "and their pathetic immigration policies that allow people to make the long trek thinking they can enter our country illegally." He also said that both children "were very sick before they were given over to Border Patrol." (Merchant, Miller and Long, 12/29)

The Associated Press Fact Check: Trump's Political Spin On Migrant Deaths
President Donald Trump twisted circumstances behind the deaths of two migrant Guatemalan children to insulate his administration from any blame, contending without justification that they were in dire health before they reached the border. The children cleared initial U.S. health screenings and one of them was in the U.S. for five days before suddenly showing signs of illness. (Woodward, 12/31)

The Associated Press: House Democrats Want Evidence Preserved In Border Deaths
Top House Democrats, preparing to take control of key committees early next year, have called for the preservation of all evidence related to the two child deaths in Customs and Border Protection custody. An 8-year-old Guatemalan boy died Monday at a New Mexico hospital after suffering coughing, vomiting and fever, authorities said. It was the second such death this month. (12/28)

The Wall Street Journal: Homeland Security Steps Up Medical Services For Migrants After Two Children Die
Homeland Security officials said Wednesday the agency has stepped up health checks for migrant children and tapped Coast Guard medical personnel to help improve care for sick migrants after an 8-year-old Guatemalan boy died in Border Patrol custody on Christmas Eve. Since the boy’s death, which occurred nine hours after he initially was released from a New Mexico hospital, almost all children in Border Patrol custody have received a secondary medical screening, officials said. (Frosch, 12/26)

The Hill: DHS Promises Changes To Protect Health Of Migrant Children 
Nielsen also said she asked the Coast Guard Medical Corps to provide an assessment of Customs and Border Protection’s (CBP) medical programs and make appropriate recommendations for improvements. The announcement comes as congressional Democrats are promising an investigation into the death of an 8-year-old boy from Guatemala, the second such death of a child in CBP custody in a little over two weeks. (Weixel, 12/26)

The Associated Press: Videos Show Staff Dragging, Shoving Immigrant Kids
Arizona authorities said Monday they sent prosecutors the results of an investigation into a now-shuttered shelter for immigrant children where videos showed staffers dragging and shoving kids. The Maricopa County Sheriff's Office investigated incidents that took place on three days in September. Prosecutors will now decide whether to file charges. (Galvan, 12/31)

The Associated Press: Migrant Teen Tent City Staying Open Into 2019
The Trump administration said Wednesday it will keep open through early 2019 a tent city in Texas that now holds more than 2,000 migrant teenagers, and also will increase the number of beds at another temporary detention center for children in Florida. The Tornillo facility opened in June in an isolated corner of the Texas desert with capacity for up to 360 children. It eventually grew into a highly guarded detention camp where, on Christmas, some 2,300 largely Central American boys and girls between the ages of 13 and 17 slept in more than 150 canvas tents. (Burke and Snow, 12/26)

The New York Times: ‘Medicare For All’ Gains Favor With Democrats Looking Ahead To 2020
More and more Democrats, fed up with private health insurance companies, are endorsing the goal of a government-run, single-payer system like Medicare for all Americans. But they have discovered a problem. More than one-third of Medicare beneficiaries are in Medicare Advantage plans, run not by the government but by private insurers. (Pear, 12/29)

Bloomberg: Democratic Left Playing A Long Game To Get `Medicare For All' 
A clamor to create “Medicare for All” has exploded on the left. Democratic presidential hopefuls are racing to co-sponsor legislation, rising stars in the party are embracing it, and national polls show Americans warming to the concept. But even the idea’s most fervent backers acknowledge that the goal is far off in the distance, beyond the next year or even the 2020 election. Their aim for now is to shift the health care debate. By making single-payer health care -- a model under which all Americans would get their insurance from a single government plan -- the progressive position, advocates argue that gives Democrats representing conservative areas of the country political cover to support more modest proposals to expand the government’s role in health insurance. (Kapur, 12/26)

The Wall Street Journal: House Democrats Weigh Risks Of Medicare-For-All Push In 2019
A Medicare for All plan—of which there are currently eight proposals, with the boldest requiring the government to operate taxpayer-funded health care for all—is unlikely to become law, given Republicans’ enlarged majority in the Senate. But promoting such an idea, or declining to, would send a strong signal about the party’s direction heading toward the 2020 elections. Both paths carry political risks, but with voters deeply concerned about health care, it’s a discussion Democrats may not be able to avoid. “It would almost be negligent of us to not have an expanded debate now,” said Rep. John Yarmuth (D., Ky.), who’s in line to chair the Budget Committee, citing a Texas judge’s recent ruling that the Affordable Care Act is unconstitutional. (Armour and Peterson, 12/27)

The Hill: ‘Medicare For All’ Advocates Emboldened By ObamaCare Lawsuit 
“In light of the Republican Party’s assault, a version of Medicare for all is necessary for the future," said Topher Spiro, vice president for health policy at the Center for American Progress. "There are just too many points of vulnerability in the current system.” The court decision in Texas that invalidates ObamaCare in its entirety came on the heels of sweeping Democratic victories in the midterm elections, a combination that has energized advocates of Medicare for all. (Weixel, 12/30)

The Hill: 2020 Dems Go On Offense Over Drug Prices 
Potential 2020 Democratic presidential contenders are rolling out a slew of plans to lower prescription drug prices, highlighting the importance the issue will hold in the coming campaigns. Just in the past two weeks, Sens. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) have unveiled new drug pricing plans. Democrats see lowering drug prices as a way to harness populist anger at pharmaceutical companies and reclaim an issue that President Trump has put in the spotlight. (Sullivan, 12/25)

Stat: The Inside Story Of PhRMA's Biggest Lobbying Loss In Years
The drug industry’s storied lobbying group isn’t accustomed to bad news — and with its small army of well connected advocates, it’s even less familiar with surprises. For PhRMA, the news last winter was both. On Feb. 7, the group’s board — made up of dozens of the CEOs of major pharmaceutical companies including Amgen, Johnson & Johnson and Sanofi — was gathered for a meeting to welcome its new chairman. Suddenly, the gathered crew had something far more threatening to discuss: Congress had just laid out a plan to force drugmakers to pay far more into Medicare — a policy change none of pharma’s lobbyists had seen coming. (Florko, 1/2)

The Wall Street Journal: Drugmakers Raise Prices On Hundreds Of Medicines
Pharmaceutical companies are ringing in the new year by raising the price of hundreds of drugs, with Allergan PLC setting the pace with increases of nearly 10% on more than two dozen products, according to a new analysis.Many companies’ increases are relatively modest this year, amid growing public and political pressure on the industry over prices. Yet a few are particularly high, including on some generics, the cheaper alternative to branded accounting for nine out of 10 prescriptions filled in the U.S. Overall, price increases, including recently restored price increases from Pfizer Inc., continue to exceed inflation. (Hopkins, 1/1)

Stat: Judge Blocks Trump Administration Cuts To 340B Hospital Payments 
A federal judge has blocked a Trump administration policy that reduces payments to hospitals under a drug discount program, ruling Thursday that the government overstepped its authority in an attempt to address the high cost of prescription medications. The decision is a win for the 2,000-plus hospitals participating in the program, known as 340B, most of which serve large numbers of low-income patients. (Swetlitz, 12/28)

The Hill: Federal Judge Blocks Trump Administration's Cuts To Discount Drug Program 
The judge determined the rule went against Congress's intent when it approved the program. "The court’s carefully reasoned decision will allow hospitals and health systems in the 340B Drug Pricing Program to serve their vulnerable patients and communities without being hampered by deep cuts to the program," the American Hospital Association, Association of American Medical Colleges and America's Essential Hospitals, which brought the lawsuit, said in a statement. (Hellmann, 12/28)

The Wall Street Journal: Medicare Can’t Cut Drug Subsidy Payments For Hospitals, Court Rules
The subsidies are designed to help eligible hospitals pay for certain cancer drugs and other medications. Starting this past January, the Department of Health and Human Services reduced the payments. Hospitals sued over the move shortly before it went into effect. U.S. District Judge Rudolph Contreras ruled in favor of the hospitals on Thursday, saying the department lacked the authority to make its cuts under current circumstances. (Evans, 12/28)

The New York Times: Memorial Sloan Kettering’s Season Of Turmoil
Hundreds of doctors packed an auditorium at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center on Oct. 1, deeply angered by revelations that the hospital’s top medical officer and other leaders had cultivated lucrative relationships with for-profit companies. One by one, they stood up to challenge the stewardship of their beloved institution, often to emotional applause. Some speakers accused their leaders of letting the quest to make more money undermine the hospital’s mission. Others bemoaned a rigid, hierarchical management that had left them feeling they had no real voice in the hospital’s direction. (Thomas and Ornstein, 12/31)

The New York Times: When Doctors Serve On Company Boards
Cancer centers are re-evaluating their relationships with health care companies, including when, if ever, doctors and researchers should serve on corporate boards. Here are some hospital executives and cancer researchers who sit on the boards of publicly traded companies, in dual roles that may raise questions about conflicts of interest. (Thomas and Ornstein, 12/31)

Bloomberg: What We Learned From A Year Of Americans ‘Risking It’ Without Insurance 
We started off following a dozen families: people who were trying to work, raise children and pay for a house or college. When we invited others to share their stories about going uninsured, an overwhelming number did — more than 5,000. Many sent us messages that could break your heart or raise your blood pressure. In Virginia, the Jordan family shared their tale of sinking into bankruptcy because of unexpected medical expenses, even though they had insurance. (Tozzi, 12/28)

The Wall Street Journal: John Stockman’s Medical Bills Topped $1 Million. What Happened?
John Stockman thought he just had a terrible stomach ache when he went to the emergency room at UCHealth Memorial Hospital Center while on vacation in Colorado Springs, Colo., last year. It was a clot that had partially blocked the flow of blood from his intestine. By nightfall the next day, Mr. Stockman, 62, was on a ventilator after emergency surgery to remove 4 feet of damaged bowel. (Armour, 12/27)

The Wall Street Journal: The Hidden System That Explains How Your Doctor Makes Referrals
Phoebe Putney Health System doesn’t want its doctors to send business to competitors. If they do, Phoebe makes sure their bosses know about it. Doctors working for the Albany, Ga.-based hospital system’s affiliated physician group get regular reports breaking down their referrals to specialists or services. One viewed by The Wall Street Journal included cardiology, colonoscopies and speech therapy, along with the share of each referred to Phoebe health-care providers. (Wilde Mathews and Evans, 12/27)

NPR: Should Crowdfunding Companies Restrict Campaigns For Dubious Medical Treatments?
For deep water divers who decompress too quickly, doctors may advise they lie inside a pressurized glass tube and inhale pure oxygen to treat painful symptoms known as "the bends." The oxygen boost is thought to reduce swelling and prevent infection. The treatment, known as hyperbaric oxygen therapy or HBOT, is approved for a few other conditions, like carbon monoxide poisoning and a form of gangrene. But some clinics around the country offer it for numerous other health problems, including migraine headaches, depression, strokes, and even brain injuries. And HBOT hasn't been proven to work for most of these, according to the FDA. (Cohen, 1/2)

NPR: Medical Debt And GoFundMe: Friends And Strangers Step In Where Insurance Lags
Tammy Fox wanted to help, after a friend took ill with a rare and difficult-to-diagnose autoimmune disorder that required many trips to the Mayo Clinic. While Fox couldn't do anything medically, she knew there was a way to ease some of the burden of medical bills and costs associated with doctor visits. She turned to the website GoFundMe and set up a site for her friend. (Zdechlik, 12/27)

The Wall Street Journal: Psychiatric Hospitals With Safety Violations Still Get Accreditation
More than 100 psychiatric hospitals have remained fully accredited by the nation’s major hospital watchdog despite serious safety violations that include lapses linked to the death, abuse or sexual assault of patients, a database investigation by The Wall Street Journal has found. The Joint Commission, an Oakbrook Terrace, Ill., nonprofit that evaluates most of the nation’s hospitals, revoked or denied full accreditation to fewer than 1% of psychiatric hospitals it oversaw in fiscal 2014 and 2015, the latest date for which detailed federal data is available. State inspectors found about 16% of those hospitals each year, or about 140 institutions total, operated with such severe safety violations they could put federal funding at risk. (Armour, 12/26)

The Wall Street Journal: Dallas Hospital Amassed A Series Of Violations But Kept Accreditation
In March 2015, the federal government told Timberlawn Behavioral Health System that it was planning to cut off its funding because it was unsafe. The Dallas hospital had amassed 19 violations in 2014 and 2015, according to state inspection records. One patient had reported being raped by another, and an unsupervised suicidal woman hanged herself. The state had proposed a $1 million fine and revocation of the hospital’s license. (Armour, 12/26)

Stat: NIH Hospital's Pipes Harbored Bacteria That Infected Patients
Patients were infected with antibiotic-resistant bacteria living in the plumbing of the National Institutes of Health’s hospital in Bethesda, Md., contributing to at least three deaths in 2016. A study published Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine found that, from 2006 to 2016, at least 12 patients at the NIH Clinical Center, which provides experimental therapies and hosts research trials, were infected with Sphingomonas koreensis, an uncommon bacteria. The paper, written by NIH researchers, suggests that the infections came from contaminated water pipes, where the bacteria may have been living since as early as 2004, soon after construction of a new clinical center building. (Swetlitz, 12/26)

Modern Healthcare: 2018 Year In Review: Healthcare Sees Unconventional Partnerships Rise 
Healthcare's 2018 began with a resounding sentiment that set the tone for the rest of the year: “We're tired of the current healthcare system, so rather than wait for someone to change it, we'll do it ourselves.” Intermountain Healthcare, Ascension, SSM Health and Trinity Health kicked off 2018 by pledging to create a generic-drug company. The providers spoke on behalf of nearly every health system that faces daily shortages of critical drugs and the challenge of working around an unexpected price hike. (Kacik, 12/26)

Modern Healthcare: 2018 Year In Review: Health Insurance Business Defined By Flexibility 
If 2017 was a year of regulatory unknowns, 2018 was when health insurers and other industry stakeholders started getting answers. The Trump administration offered insurers and states extra tools to sidestep the Affordable Care Act in lieu of a full repeal of the healthcare law. And in an environment of rising costs and new competition, insurers sought courtships that further blurred the lines between payers and providers. Still, a Dec. 14 ruling by a federal judge in Texas declaring the ACA unconstitutional thrust the health insurance industry back into an environment of uncertainty that threatens the future stability of the individual market. (Livingston, 12/26)

Bloomberg: J&J's Risk From Tainted-Talc Lawsuits Only Gets Bigger In 2019
Johnson & Johnson paid a steep price this year for claims that its celebrated baby powder was contaminated with asbestos. Problem is, 2019 could be even worse. A jury ordered the company in July to pay $4.69 billion to 22 women who blamed the talc-based product for causing their ovarian cancer. The prospect of similar judgments helped erase $45 billion in J&J’s market value, with the shares headed for their biggest annual loss in a decade. (Feeley and Fisk, 12/21)

The New York Times: In Rehab, ‘Two Warring Factions’: Abstinence Vs. Medication
Just past a cemetery along a country road, an addiction treatment center called JourneyPure at the River draws hundreds of patients a month who are addicted to opioids and other drugs. They divide their days between therapy sessions, songwriting, communing with horses and climbing through a treetop ropes course. After dinner, they’re driven into town in white vans for 12-step meetings. (Goodnough, 12/29)

The Wall Street Journal: Fentanyl’s New Foe: A Quick Test Strip That Can Prevent Overdoses
There is a new tool to help battle the opioid epidemic that works like a pregnancy test to detect fentanyl, the potent substance behind the escalating number of deaths roiling communities around the country. The test strip, originally designed for the medical profession to test urine, can also be used off-label by heroin and cocaine users who fear their drugs have been adulterated with the synthetic opioid fentanyl. The strips are dipped in water containing a minute amount of a drug and generally provide a result within a minute—with one line indicating positive for fentanyl, and two lines negative. (Campo-Flores, 12/31)

The Hill: Opioid Deaths In Children, Teens On The Rise: Study
Opioid-related deaths among teens and young children have nearly tripled since 1999, according to a study published Friday in The Journal of the American Medical Association. Researchers analyzed data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and found that 8,986 children and adolescents under the age of 20 died from opioid-related causes between 1999 and 2016 in what the researchers referred to as an "epidemic" of abuse. (Bowden, 12/28)

The Wall Street Journal: Deaths Level Off—And Even Decline—In Some Opioid Hotspots
New Hampshire is close to posting its first decline in drug deaths in six years, echoing trends in some other states as the national overdose-fatality rate appears to be leveling off. The state medical examiner’s office earlier this month projected there would be 437 drug deaths this year, a 10% decline from 2017, when the fatality rate plateaued. Before that, New Hampshire’s numbers had climbed steadily since 2013. (Kamp, 12/31)

The Washington Post: Time Is Running Out For Federally Funded Mental-Health Clinics
An experimental mental-health and addiction treatment program that has shown early success in combating the opioid crisis is at risk of losing its federal funding. An estimated 9,000 patients could lose access to medication-assisted treatment, and 3,000 clinic jobs could be lost if the funding is not renewed, according to the National Council for Behavioral Health. Some states may feel the impact as early as January, because clinics must give staff 60 to 90 days’ termination notice. (Marcus, 12/27)

Reuters: Drug Use During Pregnancy Not Child Abuse: Pennsylvania Top Court
A divided Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled on Friday that mothers who use illegal drugs during their pregnancies are not committing child abuse against their newly-born children. Reversing a lower court ruling, the 5-2 decision came amid a nationwide opioid crisis, including abuse by pregnant women that can result in preterm labor, stillbirth and withdrawal symptoms for new babies. (12/28)

Stat: How VR May Help Transform The Postpartum Experience For New Mothers
The virtual reality scene was a neat trick — but it’s also at the heart of a technology [Pinar] Yanardag hopes could one day transform the postpartum experience. The first step is what she calls “Virtual Letdown,” an immersive VR app that could let a user pump breast milk both more enjoyably and more effectively. The project aims to address a common problem for new mothers: It’s easiest for the body to release milk, a process controlled by the hormone oxytocin, when a woman is relaxed. But relaxing can be difficult when you’re hooked up to a noisy suction device in a locked office or a bathroom. (Preston, 12/31)

NPR: Death's Dress Rehearsal: Virtual Reality Explores Dying In A Hospice
You wait in the sterile purgatory of your oncologist's office, between your spouse and your daughter, for the doctor to give you the verdict on your latest scans. "I'm afraid it's not good news," she says quietly, hands clasped. Your lung cancer has grown despite your recent chemotherapy. Surgery, chemo and other treatments, she tells you, will likely only make you sicker. (Burge, 12/27)

Stat: What Will 2019 Bring For Science And Medicine? We Asked Experts 
It has been a tumultuous year for science and medicine, and also for the business and politics of both. And with CRISPR babies still in the headlines, Donald Trump still in the White House, and the Dow down again, 2019 is shaping up to be just as turbulent. We asked a whole host of experts — scientists, CEOs, policymakers, and professors — to weigh in on what themes they expect to see emerge in the next 12 months. (12/31)

The Associated Press: Poll: Americans Support Gene-Editing Embryos To Prevent Diseases
Most Americans say it would be OK to use gene-editing technology to create babies protected against a variety of diseases — but a new poll shows they’d draw the line at changing DNA so children are born smarter, faster or taller. A month after startling claims of the births of the world’s first gene-edited babies in China, the poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research finds people are torn between the medical promise of a technology powerful enough to alter human heredity and concerns over whether it will be used ethically. (Neergaard, 12/28)

Los Angeles Times: Nine Science Stories To Watch In 2019
From the edge of Earth to the frontier of the solar system, there’s plenty of science awaiting us in 2019. Some projects have been years in the making. Others were pushed to the forefront by the demands of a fast-changing world. Either way, they promise to change our view of the world — and inspire new questions no one previously thought to ask. (Netburn, Healy and Rosen, 12/28)

The Wall Street Journal: The Dry January Effect
Bottoms down: It’s Dry January. For Heather Molnar that means holding the gin in her gin and tonic for the rest of the month and substituting that end-of-day glass of wine with kombucha. “I like to put it in a wine glass or something fancy,” says Ms. Molnar, a 46-year-old content strategist who lives in Morris Plains, N.J. (Reddy, 1/1)