First Edition: January 29, 2016

Kaiser Health News: California Voters Will Have Their Say On Drug Prices
California voters will weigh in this November on a high-stakes ballot proposition intended to help control the cost of prescription drugs – the latest attempt to limit soaring prices that have prompted public criticism nationwide. The proposition would require the state to drive a harder bargain with drug companies so it doesn’t pay more for medications than the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. The initiative would affect about 5 million people whose health care is covered by the state, proponents said. (Gorman, 1/29)

Kaiser Health News: Federal Officials Clarify Rules On Getting New Health Coverage After A Move
After the open enrollment period ends on Sunday for buying coverage on the health insurance marketplaces, people can generally sign up for or switch marketplace plans only if they have certain major life changes, such as losing their on-the-job coverage or getting married. Following insurance industry criticism, last week the federal government said it will scrutinize people’s applications for such “special enrollment periods” more closely, including one of the most commonly cited reasons — relocating to a new state. (Andrews, 1/29)

Kaiser Health News: Obamacare Sign-Ups Strong In N.C., Despite High Rate Hikes
North Carolina’s average premium increases on the Obamacare exchange are among the highest in the country, according to federal data. The Obama administration warned this open enrollment period, which closes Jan. 31, could be particularly tough because many of the sickest, and therefore most motivated, people already bought plans. And yet, sign-ups in North Carolina are on pace to be substantially higher than the two previous years. (Tomsic, 1/29)

Kaiser Health News: Combined Effects Of Maternal Obesity, Diabetes ‘Substantially' Raise Autism Risks
While the incidence of autism spectrum disorder has increased in recent years, what’s behind it remains relatively mysterious and even controversial. But a major study could shed new light on some of the maternal health factors that may increase children’s risk of developing the condition. (Luthra, 1/29)

Kaiser Health News: Study Finds 'Mortality Gap' Among Middle-Aged Whites
Don’t blame suicide and substance abuse entirely for rising death rates among middle-aged white Americans, asserts a new study out Friday. They’re both factors, but the bigger culprit is almost two decades of stalled progress in fighting leading causes of death -- such as heart disease, diabetes and respiratory disease -- according to a Commonwealth Fund analysis of data from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (Gillespie, 1/29)

USA Today: Feds Seek Insurance Sign-Ups As Clock Ticks Towards Enrollment Deadline
Four days before an enrollment deadline they vow not to extend, federal health officials on Thursday tried to dismiss suggestions Affordable Care Act sign ups slowed in January and emphasized that momentum is building toward Jan. 31. Instead, Andy Slavitt, acting administrator at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, noted that December enrollment was particularly strong and he singled out 14 states where signups are running at least 20% higher than they were last year at this time. And Slavitt noted that Thursday traffic was 50% higher than a week ago, showing how interest is picking up during what he called "the final countdown." (O'Donnell, 1/28)

NPR: Still Uninsured? Buy A Health Plan This Week To Avoid A Tax Penalty
Federal health officials have this message for people who want health insurance: Don't wait. There are just four days left to sign up for an insurance plan under the Affordable Care Act, and officials from the Department of Health and Human Services are stressing that they won't extend the enrollment period this year beyond Jan. 31. (Kodjak, 1/28)

Reuters: Clinton Targets Valeant Price Hikes In Campaign Appearance
Shares of Valeant Pharmaceuticals International Inc fell on Thursday after the campaign of Democratic presidential contender Hillary Clinton posted a blog from an Iowa event detailing exorbitant price hikes for a migraine drug made by the company. At an Iowa town hall over the weekend, Clinton read from a letter saying that the list price for 10 vials of migraine drug D.H.E. 45 had increased to more than $14,000 in December, compared with just over $3,000 in June of 2014. "This is predatory pricing. It is unjustified. It is wrong," Clinton said, according to the post. (Beasley, 1/28)

Politico: Is Zika The New Ebola?
The latest Obama administration crisis comes on the wings of a mosquito. After muted warnings about a mosquito-borne virus in Brazil associated with a surge of babies born with abnormally small heads and brain damage, the World Health Organization on Thursday ramped up the alarm, warning the Zika virus is “spreading explosively” through the Americas — teeing up a familiar playbook of panic over an unfamiliar disease. Federal health officials say they expect Zika spread in the United States but that any outbreak would be limited. The White House and a growing list lawmakers are trying to get ahead of a firestorm, with reassuring images and messages. But as the Ebola panic demonstrated in 2014, it’s hard to communicate subtle public health messages in the best of circumstances. (Kenen and Haberkorn, 1/28)

Reuters: CDC Says In Full Outbreak Mode In Response To Zika
U.S. disease detectives have moved into full outbreak mode over the Zika virus, assembling a team of hundreds of experts to try to better understand its impact as it spreads in the Americas. ... The World Health Organization on Thursday said it would consider next week whether to declare Zika an international health emergency, and estimated that as many as 4 million people could be affected by the virus as it spreads in Latin America and the Caribbean to North America in the coming months. (Steenhuysen, 1/29)

USA Today: Zika Virus Not Causing Outbreaks In Continental U.S.
Although a number of returning U.S. travelers have been infected with the Zika virus while visiting Latin America, the mosquito-borne virus is not causing outbreaks in the continental U.S., health officials said Thursday. Thirty-one Americans in 11 states and Washington, D.C., have been diagnosed with a Zika infection contracted while traveling abroad, said Anne Schuchat, principal deputy director at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Those are isolated cases, however, and very different from the Zika epidemic in Brazil, which had an estimated 1 million Zika infections by the end of last year. (Szabo, 1/28)

NPR: U.S. Health Agencies Intensify Fight Against Zika Virus
A human study of Zika virus vaccine could begin as early as this year, U.S. health officials told reporters Thursday. But the officials cautioned that it could be years before the vaccine is available for wide use. The news came as the Zika virus continues to spread through the Americas. Still, a large outbreak is seen as unlikely in the U.S. "There's still a lot we don't know, so we have to be very careful about making any absolute predictions," says Dr. Anthony Fauci, head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. (Stein, 1/28)

The New York Times: For House Democrats, Support For Obama Agenda Came At A Cost
More than seven years into his presidency, Mr. Obama and House Democrats, led by the onetime speaker Nancy Pelosi, remain steadfastly united against Republicans who have seized control of Congress. ... The allegiance, however, has come at a steep political cost. The much-diminished House Democratic caucus is no longer able to force through major legislation, as it did when Ms. Pelosi used her majority to help a new president stimulate the economy, overhaul health care and impose new rules on financial institutions. (Herszenhorn and Shear, 1/28)

The Associated Press: Democrats Get Obama Pep Talk, Face Long Odds
House Democrats are heading home from their annual issues retreat energized by a pep talk by President Barack Obama but facing steep odds of reclaiming the majority that delivered Obama his greatest victories first-term victories. In Baltimore on Thursday evening, Obama said the country is “doing a lot better” than when he took office, citing progress against Islamic State forces and curbing Iran’s nuclear program — as well as lower gas prices, 18 million people gaining health insurance and 5 percent unemployment. (Taylor, 1/28)

The Associated Press: FDA OKs Merck Hepatitis C Drug, Adding To Patient Choices
Patients with hepatitis C have yet another advanced treatment option, as the Food on Drug Administration has approved a new once-a-day pill developed by drugmaker Merck. The FDA said Thursday Merck can begin marketing Zepatier, its new drug for patients with the liver-destroying virus. The combination pill includes the medications elbasvir and grazoprevir, which attack the virus in two different ways. (1/28)

NPR: California Pays Insurers Millions More For Hepatitis C Drugs
Private health plans invoiced the state of California $387.5 million to cover high-cost hepatitis C treatments in Medi-Cal between July 2014 and November 2015, when just 3,624 patients received the treatments, according to the California Department of Health Care Services. The state's supplemental payments started after managed care plans that cover health services for almost 80 percent of Medi-Cal recipients raised "alarm" about the high cost of the new drugs. The hepatitis C treatments were eating into financial reserves, said Charles Bacchi, president of the California Association of Health Plans, an industry trade group. (Bartolone, 1/28)

The New York Times: Drug Shortages Forcing Hard Decisions On Rationing Treatments
In recent years, shortages of all sorts of drugs — anesthetics, painkillers, antibiotics, cancer treatments — have become the new normal in American medicine. The American Society of Health-System Pharmacists currently lists inadequate supplies of more than 150 drugs and therapeutics, for reasons ranging from manufacturing problems to federal safety crackdowns to drugmakers abandoning low-profit products. But while such shortages have periodically drawn attention, the rationing that results from them has been largely hidden from patients and the public. (Fink, 1/29)

The New York Times: Walgreens Says No Customers’ Tests Will Be Done At Theranos Lab In California
Walgreens, the giant drugstore chain, offered the latest vote of no confidence for Theranos, the Silicon Valley laboratory testing company it had collaborated with to offer blood tests for some of its customers. In a statement issued on Thursday, Walgreens said that none of the tests for its customers could be performed at Theranos’s Newark, Calif., laboratory, which federal regulators just cited for violations of clinical standards. Walgreens said it was also suspending Theranos laboratory testing at its Palo Alto, Calif., store. (Abelson, 1/29)

The Associated Press: Walgreens Tells Theranos To Stop Using Lab Under Scrutiny
The company said Thursday that it told Theranos to either send tests to a certified lab in the Phoenix area that Theranos runs or to an accredited third-party lab. (1/28)

The New York Times: A Single Cell Shines New Light on How Cancers Develop
It was just a tiny speck, a single cell that researchers had marked with a fluorescent green dye. But it was the very first cell of what would grow to be a melanoma, the deadliest form of skin cancer. Never before had researchers captured a cancer so early. The cell was not a cancer yet. But its state was surprising: It was a cell that had reverted to an embryonic form, when it could have developed into any cell type. As it began to divide, cancer genes took over and the single primitive cell barreled forward into a massive tumor. (Kolata, 1/28)

NPR: Texas Tries To Repair Damage Wreaked Upon Family Planning Clinics
For the past five years, the Texas Legislature has done everything in its power to defund Planned Parenthood. But it's not so easy to target that organization without hurting family planning clinics around the state generally. Of the 82 clinics that have closed, only a third were Planned Parenthood. (Goodwyn, 1/28)

The Associated Press: Kentucky House Votes To Amend Informed Consent Law
The Kentucky House voted Thursday evening to amend the state’s informed consent law to allow real-time video consultations between doctors and women as an option at least 24 hours before an abortion. The 92-3 vote reflected a rare compromise between legislative Democrats and Republicans on the polarizing abortion issue. ... House members added so-called telemedicine as an option for women and doctors to comply with the informed consent law. The House version offers the option of face-to-face meetings in person or by video. (Schreiner, 1/28)