First Edition: May 26, 2017

Kaiser Health News/ProPublica: Strategies To Defend Unpopular GOP Health Bill: Euphemisms, False Statements And Deleted Comments
Earlier this month, a day after the House of Representatives passed a bill to repeal and replace major parts of the Affordable Care Act, Ashleigh Morley visited her congressman’s Facebook page to voice her dismay. “Your vote yesterday was unthinkably irresponsible and does not begin to account for the thousands of constituents in your district who rely upon many of the services and provisions provided for them by the ACA,” Morley wrote on the page affiliated with the campaign of Rep. Pete King (R-N.Y.). “You never had my vote and this confirms why.” (Ornstein, 5/25)

California Healthline: For California Hospitals That Don’t Pass Quake Test, Money’s Mostly At Fault
With a state deadline looming, some California hospitals still need to retrofit or rebuild so that their structures can withstand an earthquake — and money remains a challenge. Some hospital officials are turning to voters to raise money, while others are pursuing more innovative financing schemes.About 7 percent of the state’s hospital buildings — 220 — are still designated as having the highest risk of collapse following an earthquake, according to the Office of Statewide Health Planning and Development. That’s a slight drop from 251 buildings a year ago. (Ibarra, 5/26)

The New York Times: McConnell May Have Been Right: It May Be Too Hard To Replace Obamacare
Shortly after President Trump took office, Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the majority leader, met privately with his colleagues to discuss the Republican agenda. Repealing the Affordable Care Act was at the top, he said. But replacing it would be really hard. Mr. McConnell was right. (Steinhauer and Pear, 5/26)

The Wall Street Journal: GOP Senators Will Contemplate Health-Care Overhaul During Weeklong Recess
The Congressional Budget Office’s latest analysis of the health-care overhaul bill passed by House Republicans underscored for their GOP colleagues in the Senate that they need a different version. They just don’t know yet what it will look like. “We’re not going to pass that bill in the Senate,” Sen. Marco Rubio (R., Fla.) said of the legislation passed by the House earlier this month dismantling and replacing much of the Affordable Care Act. But the Senate’s bill, he added, is a “work in progress.” (Peterson and Armour, 5/25)

Politico: GOP Turns Gloomy Over Obamacare Repeal
A feeling of pessimism is settling over Senate Republicans as they head into a weeklong Memorial Day recess with deeply uncertain prospects for their push to repeal Obamacare. Senators reported that they’ve made little progress on the party’s most intractable problems this week, such as how to scale back Obamacare's Medicaid expansion and overall Medicaid spending. Republicans are near agreement on making tax credits for low-income, elderly Americans more generous, but that might be the simplest matter at hand. (Everett and Haberkorn, 5/25)

The Associated Press: GOP Senators Say Tough Report Complicates Health Care Bill
Republicans senators conceded Thursday that a scathing analysis of the House GOP health care bill had complicated their effort to dismantle President Barack Obama's health care law. "It makes everything harder and more difficult," Sen. Dean Heller, R-Nev., said of a Congressional Budget Office analysis projecting that the House bill would cause 23 million Americans to lose coverage by 2026 and create prohibitively expensive costs for many others. (5/25)

Politico: Senate Republicans Start Their Version Of Obamacare Repeal
Senate Republicans have started writing their Obamacare repeal bill — even though few decisions have been made about how to resolve the biggest policy disagreements. Senate Budget Chairman Mike Enzi, whose committee oversees the budget process that the GOP is using to fast-track the repeal effort through the Senate, told POLITICO he’s starting to draft the legislation. (Haberkorn, 5/25)

NPR: Patient And Doctor Groups Say CBO Score Reveals Health Care Bill's Flaws
Health care groups that represent doctors and patients are warning members of Congress that the House Republicans' plan to overhaul the Affordable Care Act would hurt people who need insurance most. The groups are responding to the latest assessment by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, which concluded that the proposed American Health Care Act would leave 23 million more people without health insurance than under current law and would cut the deficit by $119 billion over 10 years. (Kodjak, 5/25)

The Washington Post Fact Checker: Explaining The CBO’s Vision Of Health-Care Catastrophe In The GOP Plan
The new Congressional Budget Office report on the American Health Care Act, the House GOP replacement for Obamacare, demonstrates how difficult it is to craft a complex law that affects one-sixth of the U.S. economy. There are many variables — and unforeseen outcomes — that can undermine even the most carefully crafted policy initiative. As a service to readers, we are going to explain one surprising element of the CBO report — that in some states, the law’s efforts to protect people with preexisting medical conditions might end up undermining the individual insurance markets so much that effectively there is no protection at all. (Kessler, 5/26)

The Associated Press: GOP Focus On Lowering Health Premiums May Undermine Benefits
Republicans trying to dismantle former President Barack Obama’s health care overhaul have run into the same problem that bedeviled him. Quality health insurance isn’t cheap, especially if it protects people in poor health, older adults not yet eligible for Medicare, and the poor. Something has to give. (Alonso-Zaldivar, 5/26)

The Associated Press: Insurers Continue To Hike Prices, Abandon ACA Markets
People shopping for insurance through the Affordable Care Act in yet more regions could face higher prices and fewer choices next year as insurance companies lay out their early plans for 2018. Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina is asking regulators for a 23 percent price hike next year because it doesn’t expect crucial payments from the federal government to continue. That announcement comes a day after Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Kansas City said it will leave the individual insurance market next year, a decision that affects about 67,000 people in a 32-county area in Kansas and Missouri. (Murphy, 5/25)

The Washington Post: At Trump’s Urging, States Try To Tilt Medicaid In Conservative Directions
Wisconsin is preparing to recast its Medicaid program in ways that no state has ever done, requiring low-income adults to undergo drug screening to qualify for health coverage and setting time limits on assistance unless they work or train for a job. The approach places BadgerCare, as the Wisconsin version of Medicaid is known, at the forefront of a movement by Republican governors and legislatures that is injecting a brand of moralism and individual responsibility into the nation’s largest source of public health insurance. (Goldstein and Eilperin, 5/25)

The Associated Press: Trump Budget Dismays Families Hit By Opioid Addiction Crisis
He slept next to his son's ashes most nights back when Kraig Moss first met Donald Trump. In a hall packed with Iowa voters, the presidential candidate looked the middle-aged truck driver in the eye and vowed to fight the opioid crisis that killed his only son two years earlier. (5/26)

The New York Times: Greg Gianforte, Montana Republican, Captures House Seat Despite Assault Charge
Greg Gianforte, a wealthy Montana Republican who was charged with assaulting a reporter on Wednesday, nonetheless won the state’s lone seat in the House of Representatives on Thursday, according to The Associated Press, in a special election held up as a test of the country’s political climate. ... Mr. Gianforte’s success underscored the limitations of the Democrats’ strategy of highlighting the House’s health insurance overhaul and relying on liberal anger toward President Trump, at least in red-leaning states. (Martin and Burns, 5/25)

The Associated Press: GOP Montana Win May Temper Democrats' Anti-Trump Hopes
Yet Gianforte's single-digit win paled to Trump's 20-point romp in Montana in November, a sign that Republicans will have to work hard to defend some of their most secure seats to maintain control of Congress. The race ultimately turned on the weaknesses of both Gianforte and his opponent, folk singer and Democrat Rob Quist, making it tough to use as a barometer for the nation's political mood. (Calvin and Riccardi, 5/26)

The Wall Street Journal: Republican Greg Gianforte Wins Montana House Special Election Despite Assault Charge
Mr. Gianforte began the race as a weakened candidate, having lost the governor’s race in 2016 in a campaign that portrayed him as an out-of-state millionaire. Still, the Republican remained ahead of Mr. Quist in most polls, if only by single-digit margins. That lead was jeopardized when the Gallatin County sheriff on Wednesday night charged Mr. Gianforte with misdemeanor assault after he allegedly assaulted a reporter, Ben Jacobs of the Guardian, who had asked him about the GOP health-care bill at his campaign headquarters. (Hook and Epstein, 5/26)

Politico: Montana's Special Election: 5 Takeaways
After an intense focus on Montana in the run-up to Thursday’s vote, much of the attention is now likely to shift back to Georgia, where Democrat Jon Ossoff is looking to pick off the seat formerly held by now-HHS Secretary Tom Price in a June 20 special election against Republican Karen Handel. (Debenedetti, 5/26)

The Wall Street Journal: FDA Chief Proposes Rules Changes To Fight High Drug Prices
The new commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration plans a multifaceted effort to restrain high prescription-drug prices, centered on speeding cheaper generic medicines onto the U.S. market. Previous FDA commissioners have largely professed inability to act on drug costs, even as prices of drugs for cancer, hepatitis and other illnesses climbed to as much as hundreds of thousands of dollars per year or even therapeutic course. The FDA’s job, they said, is to assess safety and efficacy, and little else. (Burton, 5/25)

The Wall Street Journal: The Latest Drug Pricing Threat: The FDA
Health-care investors have another clear signal that regulatory scrutiny of high drug prices isn’t going away. Dr. Scott Gottlieb, the new commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, made that clear Thursday morning, unveiling a host of policy plans that would enable the FDA to fight high drug prices in ways that the agency hasn’t done before. These policy changes are less drastic than say, overhauling rules surrounding how Medicare pays for prescription drugs, but they should generally be easier to implement. (Grant, 5/25)

Los Angeles Times: What The DNA Of The Zika Virus Tells Scientists About Its Rapid Spread
A family tree can reveal a lot, especially if it belongs to a microscopic troublemaker with a knack for genetic shape-shifting. DNA sleuthing can outline the route an emerging pathogen might take once it makes landfall in the Americas and encounters a wholly unprotected population. It’s a modern take on old-fashioned public health surveillance strategies that focused on the exhaustive collection and analysis of samples from the field. Now they’ve been bolstered by rapid genome sequencing — and the result can be a picture of an epidemic rendered in exquisite detail, and in near-real time. (Healy, 5/25)

The Wall Street Journal: New York City Issues Zika Travel Warning
In advance of the summer travel season, New York City health officials on Thursday stepped up warnings to would-be parents about the threat of contracting Zika, a mosquito-borne virus that has been linked to serious birth defects in babies and, in some cases, in utero deaths. (West, 5/25)

The New York Times: A Quarter Of U.S. Babies With Zika-Related Birth Defects Were Born In New York
A quarter of all infants in the United States born with defects related to the Zika virus were born to women in New York City, city health officials announced on Thursday, a stark reminder of the dangers posed by the virus. Looking ahead to summer and the threat of the resurgent virus spreading through the Caribbean, the New York City Department of Health said that 402 pregnant women had been infected with the virus and that 32 infants had been infected with the virus and 16 of them had Zika-related birth defects since last spring. (Santora, 5/25)

Los Angeles Times: California Senate, Assembly Advance Their Own Plans On How To Spend Tobacco Tax Revenue
Perhaps the biggest budget skirmish that remains unsolved this year is how California should spend revenue from the tobacco tax voters approved last fall. Gov. Jerry Brown wants to put that money to expand overall spending on Medi-Cal, which provides subsidized healthcare for the poor. But the some of initiative's backers, namely doctor and dental groups, have cried foul, arguing that money is meant to go to increasing payments for providers. (Mason, 5/25)

Los Angeles Times: No One Knows How Many Untested Rape Kits There Are In California. This Bill Aims To Fix That
ens of thousands of rape kits are sitting on shelves in police and sheriff’s department evidence rooms nationwide. And no one has tested them to see what crimes they could help solve. A bill by Assemblyman David Chiu (D-San Francisco) would help determine how many of those unanalyzed exam kits exist in California, part of a national backlog that federal officials have grappled with for nearly two decades. (Ulloa, 5/26)

The Associated Press: Maryland Has New Law To Help Fight Opioid Addiction
Legislation to battle heroin and opioid overdoses in Maryland with education, prevention, treatment and law enforcement was signed into law Thursday by Gov. Larry Hogan. Matt and Cheryl Godbey, whose 24-year-old daughter Emily died in November from a fentanyl overdose, came from Frederick, Maryland, for the bill-signing ceremony. Matt Godbey applauded a new law that will bring stiffer penalties to drug dealers who knowingly sell fentanyl resulting in a death. Fentanyl is a painkiller that is often combined with heroin, with deadly results. (Witte, 5/25)

The Washington Post: ‘I Guess You Are Here For The Opium’: Investigator Stumbles Across $500 Million In Poppy Plants
Cody Xiong cracked open his door, saw the investigator on his porch and 'fessed up, authorities say. “I guess,” Xiong said, “you are here for the opium.” The investigator wasn't. But suddenly, he was intrigued. What followed was a massive opium bust, based entirely on a North Carolina poppy grower who thought prematurely that the jig was up. (Wootson, 5/25)

Reuters: Activists Call On In-N-Out Burger To Join The Superbug Fight
Nearly three dozen consumer, environmental and public health groups on Thursday pressed privately held In-N-Out Burger to make good on its vow to set time lines for phasing out the use of beef raised with antibiotics vital to human health. Some 70 percent of antibiotics needed to fight infections in humans are sold for use in meat and dairy production. Medical researchers say overuse of the drugs may diminish their effectiveness in fighting disease in humans by contributing to the rise of dangerous, antibiotic-resistant bacteria often referred to as "superbugs." (Baertlein, 5/25)

NPR: Many Adults Don't Think Exposure To Vaping Is Bad For Kids
Despite the toxic ingredients commonly found in e-cigarettes and other vaping products, many adults don't think secondhand e-cigarette aerosol poses a risk to children, according to a report published Thursday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. About one-third of adults surveyed didn't know if secondhand aerosol caused harm to children, and 40 percent of the adults said this kind of exposure caused "little" or "some" harm to children. (Columbus, 5/25)

The Wall Street Journal: Does Facebook Make Us Unhappy And Unhealthy?
If you’re one of the almost two billion active users of Facebook , the site’s blend of gossip, news, animal videos and bragging opportunities can be irresistible. But is it good for you? A rigorous study recently published in the American Journal of Epidemiology suggests that it isn’t. Researchers found that the more people use Facebook, the less healthy they are and the less satisfied with their lives. To put it baldly: The more times you click “like,” the worse you feel. (Pinker, 5/25)