First Edition: March 25, 2024

KFF Health News: A Mom’s $97,000 Question: How Was Her Baby’s Air-Ambulance Ride Not Medically Necessary?
Sara England was putting together Ghostbusters costumes for Halloween when she noticed her baby wasn’t doing well. Her 3-month-old son, Amari Vaca, had undergone open-heart surgery two months before, so she called his cardiologist, who recommended getting him checked out. England assigned Amari’s grandparents to trick-or-treat duty with his three older siblings and headed to the local emergency room. (Castle Work, 3/25)

KFF Health News: After Appalachian Hospitals Merged Into A Monopoly, Their ERs Slowed To A Crawl
In the small Appalachian city of Bristol, Virginia, City Council member Neal Osborne left a meeting on the morning of Jan. 3 and rushed himself to the hospital. Osborne, 36, has Type 1 diabetes. His insulin pump had malfunctioned, and without a steady supply of this essential hormone, Osborne’s blood sugar skyrocketed and his body was shutting down. ... After 12 hours in the waiting room, Osborne said, he was moved to an ER bed, where he stayed until he was sent to the intensive care unit the next day. (Kelman and Liss, 3/25)

KFF Health News: A Paramedic Was Skeptical About This Rx For Stopping Repeat Opioid Overdoses. Then He Saw It Help
Fire Capt. Jesse Blaire steered his SUV through the mobile home park until he spotted the little beige house with white trim and radioed to let dispatchers know he’d arrived. There, Shawnice Slaughter waited on the steps, wiping sleep from her eyes. ... Three days earlier, Blaire — a paramedic who leads the fire department’s emergency medical team — met Slaughter at a nearby hospital. She had overdosed on opioids. It took four vials of an overdose reversal medication and dozens of chest compressions to get her breathing again. (Peace, 3/25)

KFF Health News: Journalists Track Efforts To Curb The Opioid Crisis And Put Catholic Hospitals Under The Scope
KFF Health News and California Healthline staff made the rounds on national and local media in recent weeks to discuss their stories. Here’s a collection of their appearances. (3/23)

The Washington Post: Kate Middleton’s Diagnosis Comes Amid Rise In Some Early-Onset Cancers
The cancer diagnosis for Catherine, Princess of Wales, comes amid rising rates of certain cancers among young people globally. Although details of her condition remain sparse, doctors said the illness of the 42-year-old royal underscores the importance of cancer screening for people who have higher risk factors such as a family history of the disease. ... Catherine’s global celebrity and acknowledgment of her cancer, experts said, could shine a light on a troubling rise in certain cancers among people under 50. (Ovalle and Achenbach, 3/22)

The New York Times: Diagnosis Of Princess Kate’s Cancer Followed Familiar Pattern, Doctors Say
Although it is not known what type of cancer Princess Catherine has, oncologists say that what she described in her public statement that was released on Friday — discovering a cancer during another procedure, in this case a “major abdominal surgery” — is all too common. “Unfortunately, so much of the cancer we diagnose is unexpected,” said Dr. Elena Ratner, a gynecologic oncologist at Yale Cancer Center who has diagnosed many patients with ovarian cancer, uterine cancer and cancers of the lining of the uterus. (Kolata, 3/22)

Fortune: Katie Couric Says Too Many People Think Colorectal Cancer Is A Man’s Disease. She's Imploring Women To Get Potential Lifesaving Screenings
The risk of developing colorectal cancer is 1 in 23 for men and 1 in 25 for women, according to the American Cancer Society.  “Women, especially younger women, believe this is an old man’s disease, and that’s simply not true,” she says. “Women are diagnosed with colorectal cancer as often as men. I think sometimes people get colons and prostates confused.” ... Colorectal cancer is the second leading cause of cancer death in the U.S., and over 50,000 people are estimated to die from the diagnosis in 2024. (Mikhail, 3/22)

Fortune: Does Medicare Cover A Colonoscopy? Yes, And Several Other Colorectal Cancer Screening Tests, Too
Colorectal cancer is the third most common cancer worldwide. Older adults should take note: “Most cases of colorectal cancer are detected after age 55, and the risk increases with age,” says Dr. Josh Forman, a gastroenterologist at the University of Maryland St. Joseph Medical Center and GastroHealth Towson. The good news: Early detection can prevent over 90% of colorectal cancer-related deaths. But almost 30% of people between ages 50 and 75 have not gotten screened. (Zable Fisher, 3/22)

Reuters: US FDA Grants Full Approval To AbbVie's Ovarian Cancer Therapy
he U.S. Food and Drug Administration said on Friday it had granted traditional approval for AbbVie's (ABBV.N) "guided missile" cancer therapy, Elahere, for patients with a type of ovarian cancer. Elahere was approved for adult patients with a type of cancer which affects the ovaries, fallopian tube, or walls of the abdomen, and have received one to three prior lines of treatment, according to the FDA. (3/22)

AP: Mifepristone Access Is Coming Before The US Supreme Court. How Safe Is This Abortion Pill? 
The U.S. Supreme Court will take up a case Tuesday that could impact how women get access to mifepristone, one of the two pills used in the most common type of abortion in the nation. The central dispute in the case is whether the Food and Drug Administration overlooked serious safety problems when it made mifepristone easier to obtain, including through mail-order pharmacies. (Ungar and Perrone, 3/24)

Axios: SCOTUS Abortion Pill Case Could Reverse Unexpected Rise In Abortions
Eliminating the federal right to abortion surprisingly hasn't reversed a yearslong rise in the number of legal abortions in the U.S. — but a case the Supreme Court hears on Tuesday just might. (Owens, 3/25)

Modern Healthcare: How FDA Approval Could Jumpstart AI Use In Medical Devices
When it comes to commercializing artificial intelligence solutions, many digital health companies face a long road that runs directly through Silver Spring, Maryland. Silver Spring is the headquarters of the Food and Drug Administration, the agency providing clearances, designations and approvals for an increasing number of AI-enabled medical device and software products. (Perna, 3/22)

CNBC: Nvidia's AI Ambitions In Medicine And Health Care Are Becoming Clear
Last week, Nvidia announced deals with Johnson & Johnson for use of generative AI in surgery, and with GE Healthcare to improve medical imaging. The health care developments at its 2024 GTC AI conference, — which also included the launch of roughly two dozen new AI-powered, healthcare-focused tools — demonstrate just how important medicine is to Nvidia’s non-tech sector revenue opportunities in the future. (Castillo, 3/24)

Politico: Who Pays When AI Steers Your Doctor Wrong?
Doctors using new artificial intelligence tools to help them diagnose and treat their patients say they wish Congress would provide some clarity on a big unanswered question: Who pays if AI makes a mistake? Advancements in AI promise to improve care, but only if doctors trust the systems and are protected from liability, according to the country’s leading physicians’ group, the American Medical Association. (Payne, 3/24)

Modern Healthcare: Congress Passes $1.2T Spending Bill That Includes HHS Funding
Congress passed the final measure early Saturday morning funding Health and Human Services Department operations, among other government programs, for the remainder of the fiscal year. Congress struggled for months to move the 12 annual appropriations bills it is supposed to pass by Sept. 30 every year. Having missed the regular deadline, it repeatedly passed stopgap funding bills to keep the government open. (McAuliff, 3/23)

The Hill: Global AIDS Program Survives, But Backers ‘Not Satisfied’
America’s global AIDS relief program has been authorized for another year in the bipartisan budget deal, but public health advocates say the single year sends a worrying signal about U.S. commitment on the issue moving forward. ... It’s the first time the program has not been given a five-year extension. (Choi, 3/23)

Reuters: US Appeals Court Curtails EPA's Ability To Regulate PFAS Under Toxic Substances Law
A federal appeals court has vacated two U.S. Environmental Protection Agency orders prohibiting a Texas plastics treatment company from manufacturing toxic “forever chemicals” while treating plastic containers used to hold things like pesticides and household cleaners. A unanimous three-judge panel of the New Orleans-based 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Thursday agreed with Inhance Technologies that the EPA overstepped its authority by issuing the orders, since they were rooted in a section of the federal toxic chemical law reserved for regulating "new" chemicals. (Mindock, 3/22)

Newsweek: FDA Settles Lawsuit Over Ivermectin Social Media Posts
The FDA has agreed to delete and never republish several social-media posts suggesting that ivermectin, a drug that some doctors used to treat COVID-19, is for animals and not humans. While the FDA still does not approve of using ivermectin to treat COVID, it settled Thursday a lawsuit brought by three doctors who sued it, as well as the Department of Health and Human Services and its secretary, Xavier Becerra, and FDA secretary Robert Califf. All parties have settled. (Bond, 3/22)

The New York Times: Kamala Harris Visits Parkland And Urges States To Adopt Red-Flag Gun Laws
Vice President Kamala Harris on Saturday toured the still-bloody and bullet-pocked classroom building in Parkland, Fla., where a gunman killed 14 students and three staff members in 2018, using the grim backdrop to announce a new federal resource center and to call for stricter enforcement of gun laws. The freshman building at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School had been preserved as evidence for criminal trials and is set to be demolished this summer. (Shear, 3/23)

The Hill: Biden Campaign Uses ObamaCare Anniversary To Hammer Trump On Health Care
President Biden is using the anniversary of the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) passage to hammer former President Trump’s record on health care and capitalize on his threats to repeal the law. In a new digital ad released Friday ahead of the 14th anniversary of the law, the Biden campaign sought to highlight Trump’s repeated repeal threats and underscore the consequences if he were to win a second term. (Weixel, 3/22)

The New York Times: How A Pandemic Malaise Is Shaping American Politics
In March 2020, when Joseph R. Biden Jr. and Donald J. Trump competed for the White House for the first time, American life became almost unrecognizable. A deadly virus and a public health lockdown remade daily routines with startling speed, leaving little time for the country to prepare. ... Public confidence in institutions — the presidency, public schools, the criminal justice system, the news media, Congress — slumped in surveys in the aftermath of the pandemic and has yet to recover. (Lerer, Medina, and Epstein, 3/24)

The New York Times: U.S. Measles Cases Surpass 2023 Levels, C.D.C. Says
There have now been 64 measles cases in the United States this year, surpassing the total of 58 cases in all of 2023, according to new data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The rise in cases should “alert us, rather than alarm us,” said Dr. Demetre Daskalakis, director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases at the C.D.C. (Blum, 3/22)

Reuters: Measles Cases In US Rise To 62 As Of Thursday, Says CDC
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said on Friday the number of measles cases in the United States has increased to 62 as of Thursday, higher than the whole of last year. The CDC issued a health advisory on Monday urging people, particularly children and international travelers, to get vaccinated against measles due to the increase in cases this year. Total cases were at 58 last week. (3/22)

CIDRAP: US Flu Activity Declines, Along With Other Respiratory Viruses 
Flu activity finally declined last week following a lengthy post-holiday bump, though levels are still elevated, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said today in its latest weekly FluView report. In its weekly respiratory virus snapshot, the CDC said indicators of COVID and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) also declined. (Schnirring, 3/22)

WMFE: More Pollen In Florida? Doctors Seeing More Allergy Complaints 
Has the pollen been worse this year? Doctors think so and are seeing more cases of allergy complaints this year then before. (Pedersen, 3/21)

NPR: Starbucks Mug Recall: More Than 440,000 Mugs Recalled After Injury Reports
Nestlé says it is recalling more than 440,000 Starbucks mugs that were recently sold, following reports of at least a dozen people suffering severe burns or cuts on their hands or fingers after using the product. The mugs were manufactured by Nestlé USA and sold as part of a 2023 holiday Starbucks-branded gift set sold online and at Target, Walmart and Nexcom, a military retail outlet, according to a recall notice posted on Thursday by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission. (Franklin, 3/21)

The New York Times: Patients Hate ‘Forever’ Drugs. Are Ozempic And Wegovy Different? 
Most people, study after study shows, don’t take the medicines prescribed for them. It doesn’t matter what they are — statins, high blood pressure drugs, drugs to lower blood sugar, asthma drugs. Either patients never start taking them, or they stop. ... But that resistance may be overcome by the blockbuster obesity drugs Wegovy and Zepbound, which have astounded the world with the way they help people lose weight and keep it off. (Kolata, 3/24)

CIDRAP: Study Highlights Potential To Reduce Antibiotic Use In Newborns
A large nationwide study in Sweden found that low exposure to antibiotics in newborns treated in neonatal units over a 9-year period was not associated with an increased risk of early-onset sepsis (EOS), researchers reported today in JAMA Network Open. But the study also found that the number of newborns who are treated with antibiotics is higher than it should be, given the low prevalence of EOS and low mortality associated with the condition, a finding the study authors say indicates that efforts to reduce unnecessary antibiotic use in newborns are needed. (Dall, 3/22)

CIDRAP: New Data Show Paxlovid Outperforms Molnupiravir Against Severe COVID-19 Outcomes
A large study yesterday in the International Journal of Infectious Diseases shows that, if prescribed within 5 days of confirmed infection, Paxlovid (nirmatrelvir-ritonavir) is more effective in protecting against all-cause mortality and severe COVID-19 in adults than is molnupiravir, another antiviral drug. The study was conducted in Hong Kong in 2022. (Soucheray, 3/22)

CIDRAP: Study Finds Bivalent COVID Vaccine Not Tied To Stroke Risk
Earlier this week in JAMA, researchers published data on the risk of stroke among Medicare beneficiaries aged 65 years and older in the immediate weeks following a bivalent (two-strain) COVID-19 vaccine dose, finding no significantly elevated risk during the first 6 weeks following injection. (Soucheray, 3/22)

CIDRAP: New Neurologic Issues Less Likely After Severe COVID Than Flu, Research Suggests
Adults hospitalized for COVID-19 were at lower risk of needing medical care for migraine, epilepsy, neuropathy, movement disorders, stroke, and dementia in the next year than matched patients with influenza, researchers from Yale University and the University of Michigan report in Neurology. They point out, however, that their study did not assess the effects of long COVID. (Van Beusekom, 3/22)

The New York Times: What’s Next For The Coronavirus?
Rat droppings from New York City. Poop from dog parks in Wisconsin. Human waste from a Missouri hospital. These are some of the materials that are readying us for the next chapter of the coronavirus saga. More than four years into the pandemic, the virus has loosened its hold on most people’s bodies and minds. But a new variant better able to dodge our immune defenses may yet appear, derailing a hard-won return to normalcy. Scientists around the country are watching for the first signs. (Mandavilli, 3/22)

CNN: Eli Lilly Warns Of Temporary Short Supply Of Two Insulin Products 
Drugmaker Eli Lilly warned this week that two of its formulations of insulin would be temporarily out of stock through the beginning of April, citing a “brief delay in manufacturing.” The 10-milliliter vials of Humalog and insulin lispro injection will be in short supply at wholesalers and some pharmacies, Lilly said in a statement posted online Wednesday. (Tirrell, 3/22)

Reuters: UnitedHealth Unit Will Start Processing $14 Billion Medical Claims Backlog After Hack
UnitedHealth Group (UNH.N) said on Friday its Change Healthcare unit will start to process the medical claims backlog of more than $14 billion as it resumes some software services disrupted by a cyberattack last month. The company has been scrambling to resume services at the technology unit that was hit by a cyberattack on Feb. 21, disrupting payments to U.S. doctors and healthcare facilities and forcing the U.S. government to launch a probe. (Leo, 3/22)

Modern Healthcare: Claim Denials Cost Hospitals $20 Billion In 2022: Premier Report 
Hospitals and health systems spend an estimated $19.7 billion a year managing denied claims for care, a new report shows. Premier, a group purchasing and consulting organization that works with thousands of providers, polled 516 hospitals that offered their 2022 claims data. Nearly 15% of claims, on average, were denied at a cost of close to $44 a claim, excluding related clinical labor expenses, the survey found. (Kacik, 3/22)

Modern Healthcare: Tenet-Leased Facilities Sold To Sila Realty Trust
Five healthcare properties leased by Tenet Healthcare in Arizona and Texas were acquired by Sila Realty Trust Inc. in a $85.5 million deal. The seller was not disclosed. The five facilities operate under local, Tenet-affiliated hospital brands. Tenet does not own any of the acquired properties, a spokesperson for Sila Realty said. (DeSilva, 3/22)

Reuters: Nursing Home Co. Petersen Health Likely To Break Up In Bankruptcy Sale
Elder care company Petersen Health Care plans to sell its nursing homes to new care providers in bankruptcy, likely dividing its assets among multiple buyers, a company attorney said Friday. Petersen believes that its nursing homes may be worth between $215 million and $305 million, as long as they remain operational and continue to provide a high level of care to residents, Petersen attorney Dan McGuire said at the company’s first court appearance since filing for bankruptcy Wednesday in Wilmington, Delaware. (Knauth, 3/22)

The Wall Street Journal: Masimo To Separate Consumer Business
Masimo will look to separate its baby monitor and smart watch businesses, months after the company won its years-long expensive legal battle against Apple over certain features in its watches. The Irvine, Calif.-based medical technology company said Friday that its board had authorized management to evaluate a proposed separation of its consumer business. Masimo expects the separation to include its consumer audio and consumer health products. (Glickman, 3/22)

AP: Using Public Funds Or Facilities For Gender-Affirming Care Banned By GOP-Led Idaho Legislature
The GOP-led Idaho Legislature has passed a bill that would ban the use of any public funds for gender-affirming care, including for state employees using work health insurance and for adults covered by Medicaid. The Senate overwhelmingly approved the measure Friday after it previously passed through the House. It will be sent to Republican Gov. Brad Little’s desk, where he is expected to sign it into law. The governor has said repeatedly he does not believe public funds should be used for gender-affirming care. (3/22)

AP: Texas Medical Panel Won't Provide List Of Exceptions To Abortion Ban
A Texas medical panel on Friday rebuffed calls to list specific exceptions to one of the most restrictive abortions bans in the U.S., which physicians say is dangerously unclear and has forced women with serious pregnancy complications to leave the state. The head of the Texas Medical Board also said that wider issues surrounding the law — such as the lack of exceptions in cases of rape or incest — were beyond the authority of the 16-member panel, twelve of whom are men. Only one member of the board is an obstetrician and gynecologist. (Stengle, 3/22)

AP: Republican Lawmaker Says Kentucky's Newly Passed Shield Bill Protects IVF Services
Kentucky legislation shielding doctors and other health providers from criminal liability was written broadly enough to apply to in vitro fertilization services, a Republican lawmaker said Friday as the bill won final passage. The measure, which now goes to Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear, would accomplish what other bills sought to do to safeguard access to IVF services, GOP state Sen. Whitney Westerfield said in an interview. (Schreiner, 3/22)

AP: Wyoming Governor Vetoes Abortion Restrictions, Signs Transgender Medical Care Ban For Minors
Wyoming’s governor on Friday vetoed a bill that would have erected significant barriers to abortion, should it remain legal in the state, and signed legislation banning gender-affirming care for minors. The abortion bill rejected by Gov. Mark Gordon, a Republican, would have required facilities providing surgical abortions to be licensed as outpatient surgical centers, adding to their cost and the burdens they face to operate. (Gruver, 3/22)