First Edition: Thursday, March 6, 2025

KFF Health News: For Seniors With Hoarding Disorder, A Support Group Helps Confront Stigma And Isolation
A dozen people seated around folding tables clap heartily for a beaming woman: She’s donated two 13-gallon garbage bags full of clothes, including several Christmas sweaters and a couple of pantsuits, to a Presbyterian church. A closet cleanout might not seem a significant accomplishment. But as the people in this Sunday-night class can attest, getting rid of stuff is agonizing for those with hoarding disorder. (Boden, 3/6)

KFF Health News: To Patients, Parents, And Caregivers, Proposed Medicaid Cuts Are A Personal Affront
Cynthia Williams is furious with U.S. House Republicans willing to slash Medicaid, the government-run insurance program for people with low incomes or disabilities. The 61-year-old Anaheim resident cares for her adult daughter, who is blind, and for her sister, a military veteran with severe post-traumatic stress disorder and other mental health conditions. Medi-Cal, the state’s version of Medicaid, pays Williams to care for them, and she relies on that income, just as her sister and daughter depend on her. (Wolfson, 3/6)

Stat: Jay Bhattacharya, Nominee As NIH Director, Toes The Party Line In The Senate
The most telling signal from Jay Bhattacharya’s confirmation hearing as nominee to direct the National Institutes of Health on Wednesday lay in what he would not say. He would not say he’d restore funding to grants on LGBTQ issues canceled by the Trump administration — even as he said he didn’t think ideology should determine the direction of science. He would not say that there’s been enough research about the long-debunked link between vaccines and autism, even as a Republican senator declared it would be “pissing away money” on a question that has been extensively studied already. He would not say that he would object if President Trump gave him illegal directives, even as he vowed to follow the law. (Boodman, 3/5)

NBC News: Trump's NIH Pick Doesn't Think Vaccines And Autism Are Linked, But Appeared Open To More Research
Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, President Donald Trump’s pick to lead the National Institutes of Health, on Wednesday appeared to be open to funding new studies investigating links between vaccines and autism — a theory that has been debunked by decades of research. Bhattacharya, a Stanford University professor of medicine, said during his confirmation hearing before the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee that he doesn’t “generally believe” there’s a link between vaccines and autism. (Lovelace Jr., 3/5)

Politico: Another Health Care Disruptor Is Set To Join RFK Jr.’s Team
Jay Bhattacharya is about to get his chance to settle old Covid scores. The Stanford health economist became a celebrity among Americans chafing at Covid lockdowns and school closures when he co-authored an October 2020 letter calling out America’s public health leaders. On Wednesday, he’ll explain to senators why he was right and his critics were wrong — and why they should confirm him to lead the government’s preeminent health research agency, the National Institutes of Health. (Schumaker, 3/5)

Politico: NIH Pick Vows War On 'Frivolous' Research Spending
Dr. Jay Bhattacharya promised to cut wasted research dollars and focus on funding studies to find the root causes of chronic diseases during his confirmation hearing to direct the $48 billion National Institutes of Health this morning. Every dollar wasted on a frivolous study, every dollar wasted on administrative costs that are not needed, is a dollar not spent on research,” Bhattacharya told the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee. (Schumaker and Payne, 3/5)

Modern Healthcare: NIH Funding Cuts Blocked By Federal Judge
A federal judge blocked the National Institutes of Health’s grant funding cuts that academic health systems warn would stymie research. U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts Judge Angel Kelley on Wednesday granted a motion from attorneys general, medical schools and universities requesting a nationwide preliminary injunction. The injunction replaces a national temporary restraining order Kelley issued Feb. 10, likely setting up a win for the states and hospitals and a possible government appeal. (Kacik, 3/5)

The Washington Post: VA Plans To Cut 80,000 Employees, The Latest In Trump’s Efforts To Downsize
The Department of Veterans Affairs announced plans Wednesday to cut roughly 80,000 jobs, more than 15 percent of its employees, the latest in President Donald Trump’s effort to slash the federal workforce. According to a memo obtained by The Washington Post, the cuts are meant to reduce the department’s workforce to just under 400,000 employees, its size in 2019. (Gupta, 3/5)

Bloomberg: Musk’s DOGE Cuts Target FDA Lab Guarding US Drug Supply
A key lab that oversees US pharmaceutical safety is in limbo following moves by the Department of Government Efficiency, raising questions about the fate of the lab and the new administration’s approach to expensive but crucial research that aims to keep America’s product supply safe. The lab’s workers said they were notified Wednesday that the facility wouldn’t be closed, but the lab remains on the government’s target list. Higher-ups with knowledge of the lab’s work have advocated to keep it open, people familiar with the situation said. (Edney, 3/5)

AP: CDC Tells About 180 Fired Employees To Come Back To Work
The nation’s top public health agency says about 180 employees who were laid off two weeks ago can come back to work. Emails went out Tuesday to some Centers for Disease Control and Prevention probationary employees who got termination notices last month, according to current and former CDC employees. ... About 180 people received reinstatement emails, according to two federal health officials who were briefed on the tally but were not authorized to discuss it and spoke on condition of anonymity. (Stobbe, 3/5)

Stat: Stand Up For Science Rallies Show Trump Protests Gaining Momentum 
Since Donald Trump took office in January, researchers across the U.S. have been waiting for scientific leaders to forcefully speak out against the administration’s grant freezes, research funding cuts, and targeting of diversity in their field. Frustrated that there seemed to be no large-scale movement coalescing, Colette Delawalla, a graduate student in clinical psychology, took matters into her own hands. (Oza, 3/6)

Politico: State Department Further Scrutinizes Foreign Aid For DEI, Climate And Transgender Projects
The State Department’s Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor launched a review of its foreign assistance projects Wednesday to determine if they fund climate, transgender or diversity, equity and inclusion-related initiatives, according to an internal email obtained by POLITICO. The results of that screening via a questionnaire to organizations that receive State funding may determine the fate of the remainder of aid projects that President Donald Trump froze for 90 days with an executive order in January. (Kine, 3/5)

Stat: Trump DEI Crackdown Creates Collateral Damage In Medical AI
During his confirmation hearings, health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. called on technology to solve America’s rural health care crisis. “President Trump is determined to end the hemorrhage of rural hospitals, and he’s asked me to do that through use of AI, through telemedicine,” Kennedy told senators, invoking the example of an AI nurse “that has diagnostics as good as any doctor.” (Palmer, 3/6)

Axios: Pre-Trump CDC Website Revived By Volunteers
A team of volunteer archivists has recreated the Centers for Disease Control website, called RestoredCDC.org, as it appeared the day President Trump was inaugurated. A federal judge last month required the HHS to restore webpages and datasets that had been altered or taken offline to comply with executive orders that Trump issued on DEI and gender identity, but several links are broken and the pages are not easy to locate through web searches. (Singh, 3/5)

The 19th: Trump’s Anti-Trans Executive Orders: What They Are And Where They Stand
Federal agencies are carrying out executive orders from President Donald Trump that all share a common goal: removing transgender and nonbinary people from public life wherever possible. Through restricting access to accurate federal identity documents, threatening to withhold hospitals’ federal funding over gender-affirming care, and erasing trans history on federal websites and in schools, the Trump White House is using the federal government as a tool to make it harder for trans Americans to live openly — and safely — without fear of harassment and discrimination. (Rummler and Sosin, 3/5)

Modern Healthcare: Trump's Price Transparency Executive Order Stirs Uncertainty
Health systems and insurers are bracing for tougher enforcement of price transparency regulations. President Donald Trump last week issued an executive order to bolster oversight of price transparency requirements enacted in 2021. Regulators have given too much leeway to hospitals and insurers, limiting the potential price-easing benefits of the law as healthcare companies have been slow to meet the requirements, Trump said in the order. (Kacik and Early, 3/5)

Modern Healthcare: Trump Keeps Pressure On Insurers Through Medicare Advantage Cases
The Justice Department under President Donald Trump is defending the federal government’s position in several Medicare Advantage lawsuits challenging policies that originated during President Joe Biden's term. Given Trump's overall repudiation of the Biden years and Republicans' generally favorable disposition toward Medicare Advantage and preference for light regulation, Wall Street expected the new administration to take it easier on health insurance companies. So far, in court at least, that's not what's happening. (Early, 3/5)

ABC News: Trump Said Childhood Cancer Rates Have Increased 40% Since 1975. Here's What The Data Shows
During his joint address to Congress on Tuesday, President Donald Trump spoke about childhood cancer rates, saying it was a priority of his administration to tackle this issue. ... Although it's unclear where Trump got the 40% figure, data shows that childhood cancer rates have indeed been increasing over the past several decades. However, a pediatric oncologist told ABC News that there's important context missing in that statement, such as the effect of advances in early detection and possible environmental factors. (Kekatos and Kochat, 3/5)

MedPage Today: Who Is Trump's New Doctor?
President Trump's new physician is Sean Barbabella, DO, a Navy emergency physician who served in Afghanistan and Iraq, and has "extensive combat trauma experience," according to reports. Battlefield emergency response experience is apparently important to Trump, who faced two assassination attempts during his recent presidential election campaign. (Fiore, 3/5)

Fierce Healthcare: House Passes Chronic Disease Bill To Expand Coverage Under HDHPs
New legislation advanced by a voice vote March 4 would codify 14 pre-deductible healthcare services through high-deductible health plans (HDHPs). It codifies guidance from President Donald Trump’s first term increasing flexible coverage options for HDHPs. The bill would allow medical products and services like beta-blockers, blood pressure monitors, glucometers, inhalers and cholesterol drugs to be more easily covered by insurance by letting insurers pay for low-cost services before a deductible is reached. (Tong, 3/5)

The Hill: Republicans Need To Cut Medicaid To Hit Budget Savings Target, CBO Finds
Republicans can’t achieve their goal of slashing $2 trillion in federal spending over the next decade without cutting Medicaid, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO). In a report released Wednesday, CBO found that the government spends $381 billion on programs other than Medicaid or the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) that are under the jurisdiction of the Energy and Commerce Committee. (Weixel, 3/5)

Fierce Healthcare: Court Approves $700M Opioid Class-Action Settlement For Hospitals
A federal court has signed off on a $700 million class action settlement that will see drug manufacturers and distributors pay more than 1,000 acute care hospitals over alleged misconduct regarding prescription opioids. The deal consolidates four class-action settlements involving, among other defendants, Cencora (formerly AmerisourceBergen), Cardinal Health, McKesson, Johnson & Johns, Teva and Allergan. (Muoio, 3/5)

Modern Healthcare: BCBSA Antitrust Deal Declined By CommonSpirit, Bon Secours
More than 100 providers filed new antitrust lawsuits against the nonprofit Blue Cross Blue Shield Association and its 33 affiliated insurance companies on Tuesday, alleging the carriers illegally conspired to suppress competition and lower hospital rates. The University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, Cincinnati-based Bon Secours Mercy Health, Chicago-based CommonSpirit Health, Nashville-based physician staffing firm TeamHealth and numerous others filed lawsuits to opt out of a $2.8 billion settlement some providers have reached with the insurance companies. (Tepper, 3/5)

Modern Healthcare: Amazon One Medical CEO Trent Green To Step Down
Amazon One Medical CEO Trent Green is stepping down after less than two years in the role. Green's last day is April 4, an Amazon One Medical spokesperson said. Beginning June 1, Green will assume his new role as CEO of National Research Corp., a healthcare AI and analytics company doing business as NRC Health, according to a news release. (Hudson, 3/5)

Daily Southtown: Advocate Children's Launches Pediatric Heart Transplant Program
Nataly Paramó was preparing to celebrate her 15th birthday in October when she experienced unexpected and alarming fatigue during basketball tryouts. The teen from East Chicago, Indiana, had always been active and loved basketball. So when she couldn’t run a single lap around the gym, a specialist recommended she go to the emergency room at Advocate Children’s Hospital in Oak Lawn, said Steve Pophal, the hospital’s medical director of heart transplantation. ... In December, Nataly became the hospital’s first pediatric heart transplant patient, following a three-year effort to establish the new program, Advocate said in a news release. The hospital has performed three heart transplants since December. (Moilanen, 3/5)

Becker's Hospital Review: What's Overlooked In Nurse Retirements
It's well known that a "silver tsunami" is on the horizon with millions of adults turning 65 each year — but the additional compounding impact of nurse retirements on systems is often overlooked. "I don't think we fully realize the tsunami that’s coming in less than five years," Syl Trepanier, DNP, RN, chief nursing officer at Renton, Wash.-based Providence, told Becker's. "It's underestimated how many nurses will be retiring versus those entering the profession. The time to prepare is now, and I’d argue that the biggest risk we face is maintaining the status quo. The biggest risk we face is doing nothing." (Taylor, 3/4)

The Hill: 31 Million Americans Borrowed Money For Health Care: Survey
More than 31 million Americans borrowed money last year to pay for health care, a new survey found. Those Americans borrowed about $74 billion, despite most of them have some form of health insurance, the West Health-Gallup survey found. Most of the borrowers were ages 18-29, 30-39 and 40-49. Just two percent of Americans who borrowed were over 65 years old. (Irwin, 3/5)

Newsweek: Common Drug Could Prevent Some Cancers From Spreading
A recent study has revealed that an aspirin a day may stop cancer from spreading. In 2025, over 2 million new cancer cases are expected in the U.S., with more than 618,000 deaths—about 1,700 per day—according to the American Cancer Society. The research, conducted by scientists at the University of Cambridge in England, discovered the common drug could reduce metastasis—the spread of cancer cells from the original tumor to other parts of the body—by stimulating the immune system. (Notarantonio, 3/6)

The Wall Street Journal: New Version Of Merck’s Blockbuster Cancer Drug Threatened By Patent Battle
A dispute over a microscopic enzyme is threatening Merck & Co. plans to sell a new version of Keytruda, the cancer drug that generates nearly half of the company’s sales. Merck has been tweaking Keytruda to make it easier to use—and to protect billions of dollars in revenue the company could lose after U.S. patent protection runs out in 2028 and rivals can begin selling copycats. (Hopkins, 3/5)

Stat: New ITM Radiopharmaceutical Heading To The FDA For Review After Phase 3 Win
A pioneer in radiopharmaceuticals said Thursday that it will submit its first drug for approval after reporting the therapy halted tumor progression for nearly two years. The drug from ITM Isotope Technologies Munich SE has been developed as a treatment for gastroenteropancreatic neuroendocrine tumors, or GEP-NETs. These rare cancers grow in the pancreas, stomach, small intestine, and other parts of the gastrointestinal system. (DeAngelis, 3/6)

The Guardian: UK Scientists Develop DNA Sequencing System To Fight Superbugs
Scientists have developed a rapid DNA sequencing system to stem the rise of superbugs by identifying bacterial infections faster and more accurately. Currently, hospital labs can take as long as seven days to specify bacterial infections, while for some infections a definitive diagnosis may take eight weeks. (Gregory, 3/6)

The New York Times: Florida Seeks Drug Prescription Data With Names Of Patients And Doctors
Florida’s insurance regulator has demanded an unusually intrusive trove of data on millions of prescription drugs filled in the state last year, including the names of patients taking the medications, their dates of birth and doctors they’ve seen. The Florida Office of Insurance Regulation in January sought this information from pharmacy benefit managers like UnitedHealth’s Optum Rx and CVS Health’s Caremark, companies that oversee prescription drugs for employers and government programs. (Abelson and Robbins, 3/5)

AP: A Firing Squad Will Be Killing Someone For The First Time In The US In 15 Years
It was a punishment for mutiny in colonial times, a way to discourage desertion during the Civil War and a dose of frontier justice in the Old West. In modern times, some consider it a more humane alternative to lethal injection. The firing squad has a long and thorny history in the U.S. South Carolina on Friday is scheduled to put the first person to death by firing squad in the U.S. in 15 years. Brad Sigmon, who was convicted of killing his ex-girlfriend’s parents in 2001, chose it over the two other methods in South Carolina — the electric chair and lethal injection. The state’s Supreme Court rejected what will likely be his final appeal Wednesday. (Johnson, 3/5)

CIDRAP: Avian Flu Was In Oregon Wastewater Weeks Before State's First Bird Outbreaks, Study Shows 
A retrospective analysis reveals that H5 avian flu surfaced in Oregon wastewater weeks before the state's first outbreak in poultry and wild birds and 2 years before the first outbreak in US cattle. (Van Beusekom, 3/5)

Politico: Bird Flu Spread Is ‘Slowing Down,’ California Officials Say
The bird flu outbreak that has been ripping through California farms since August is starting to abate, state health and agriculture officials said Wednesday, heralding “good news” in a health crisis that has sent egg prices soaring nationwide. “Thankfully, we do see here in California the flu outbreak is slowing down,” said Dr. Erica Pan, the director of the California Department of Public Health, during a committee hearing at the state Senate. (Bluth, 3/5)

WLRN Public Media: Confirmed Measles Case Reported At Palmetto Senior High School In Miami-Dade
A Miami Palmetto Senior High School student has been diagnosed with measles, Miami-Dade County Public Schools confirmed on Tuesday. Parents of students at the school in Pinecrest told WLRN that they received an email blast and automated voicemail on Tuesday from the school’s principal, Victoria Dobbs, who also confirmed the measles case. (La Roche Pietri, 3/5)

CNN: Bacterial Vaginosis: Common Vaginal Condition Is Really An STD, Study Finds
A common but potentially dangerous vaginal infection that affects nearly 1 in 3 women globally should be considered a sexually transmitted disease, a new study says. Bacterial vaginosis, or BV, is currently viewed as a woman’s issue, thus leaving the sexual partner untreated. (LaMotte, 3/5)

The New York Times: Women With Postpartum Depression Experienced Brain Changes During Pregnancy, Study Finds
Postpartum depression affects about one in every seven women who give birth, but little is known about what happens in the brains of pregnant women who experience it. A new study begins to shed some light. Researchers scanned the brains of dozens of women in the weeks before and after childbirth and found that two brain areas involved in the processing and control of emotions increased in size in women who developed symptoms of postpartum depression. (Belluck, 3/5)