First Edition: Tuesday, Feb. 10, 2026

KFF HEALTH NEWS ORIGINAL STORIES

KFF Health News: US Cancer Institute Studying Ivermectin’s ‘Ability To Kill Cancer Cells’
The National Cancer Institute, the federal research agency charged with leading the war against the nation’s second-largest killer, is studying ivermectin as a potential cancer treatment, according to its top official. “There are enough reports of it, enough interest in it, that we actually did — ivermectin, in particular — did engage in sort of a better preclinical study of its properties and its ability to kill cancer cells,” said Anthony Letai, a physician the Trump administration appointed as NCI director in September. (Pradhan, 2/10)

KFF Health News: Obamacare Sign-Ups Drop, But The Extent Won’t Be Clear For Months
More Americans than expected enrolled in Affordable Care Act health insurance plans for this year, after premium subsidies were dramatically cut — but it remains to be seen whether they’ll keep the coverage as their costs mount. It’s all part of a drama that roiled the ACA’s 2026 open enrollment period. Congressional debate over whether to extend more generous subsidies made available under the Biden administration led to the longest-ever government shutdown and focused public attention on rising health care costs and the affordability issue. (Appleby, 2/10)

AFFORDABLE CARE ACT

Modern Healthcare: CMS Proposes Sweeping Coverage, Oversight Rule For ACA Exchanges
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has unveiled numerous potential changes to Affordable Care Act exchange plans that could have far-reaching implications for enrollees and what they pay for coverage. In its draft payment rule for exchange plans in 2027, released Monday, the agency proposed getting rid of standardized coverage and accepting non-network health plans as qualified health plans. CMS also seeks to further broaden access to catastrophic coverage and continue a crackdown on exchange brokers. The proposal also would affect risk adjustment auditing policies for exchange plans. (Early, 2/9)

MORE ON THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION

The New York Times: Trump Administration To Cut $600 Million In Health Funding From Four States 
The Trump administration plans to rescind $600 million in public health funds from four states led by Democrats because it finds the grants “inconsistent with agency priorities,” according to documents reviewed by The New York Times. The programs slated to be cut are in California, Colorado, Illinois and Minnesota. They include grants to state and local public health departments as well as to some nongovernmental organizations. A list of the cuts was shared with relevant congressional committees on Monday. (Mandavilli, 2/9)

Politico: RFK Jr.’s Followers Plan To Back Trump-Endorsed Candidates
The leader of the political engine behind Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s Make America Healthy Again movement plans to favor candidates endorsed by President Donald Trump in this year’s elections. MAHA will work with candidates Trump supports to get “the best possible outcome for public health, for the issues that MAHA has been backing over the last year,” said Tony Lyons, president of the political group MAHA Action, at an event held by the conservative Heritage Foundation think tank in Washington Monday. (Paun, 2/9)

ON CAPITOL HILL

CIDRAP: Updated PASTEUR Act Reintroduced In Congress To Boost Antibiotic Development
A bipartisan group of US lawmakers is taking another shot at legislation that advocates hope could boost antibiotic development efforts. The Pioneering Antimicrobial Subscriptions to End Upsurging Resistance (PASTEUR) Act, reintroduced last week by five members of the US House of Representatives, aims to revitalize the antibiotic and antifungal development pipeline by changing how the federal pays for novel antimicrobials. The bill was first introduced in Congress in 2020 and re-submitted in subsequent years but has never received a floor vote. (Dall, 2/9)

CIDRAP: Lawmakers Want Answers On CDC-Funded Hepatitis B Vaccine Trial In Africa
US lawmakers have sent a letter to federal health officials demanding answers on how and why a controversial vaccine trial in West Africa received federal funding. The letter from Democratic members of the House Energy & Commerce Committee to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Acting Director Jim O’Neill asks for all documentation regarding the decision to award a five-year, $1.6 million grant to a team of Danish researchers conducting the study, which aims to assess the overall health impact of the hepatitis B vaccine birth dose in Guinea-Bissau. (Dall, 2/9)

Roll Call: Trump’s Drug Pricing Plan Gets Lukewarm Reception 
President Donald Trump’s unconventional plan to lower prescription drug prices is being met with a skeptical eye from Republicans as Congress places a greater focus on drug pricing ahead of the midterm elections. (DeGroot, 2/9)

OUTBREAKS AND HEALTH THREATS

CIDRAP: CDC’s FluView Shows 8 More Pediatric Deaths As Flu Activity Drops
The most recent FluView report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) shows an additional eight pediatric deaths last week, raising the season’s total to 60 pediatric deaths from flu complications. Approximately 90% of the 60 children were not fully vaccinated against influenza. The CDC estimates there have been at least 22,000,000 illnesses, 280,000 hospitalizations, and 12,000 deaths from flu so far this season. (Soucheray, 2/9)

CIDRAP: New Analysis Links Flu Vaccination To 18% Lower Odds Of Heart Attack
Influenza vaccination is associated with significantly lower odds of myocardial infarction (MI), according to a large meta-analysis published late last week in BMC Public Health. (Bergeson, 2/9)

The Baltimore Sun: University Of Maryland Seeks Testers For Nasal Spray During Cold And Flu Season
With only a snort a week, a new drug might keep patients safe from several viruses — and the University of Maryland is willing to pay more than $1,000 for people willing to test it. The nasal-spray medicine called INNA-051 may boost immune defenses, reducing illness from respiratory viruses and researchers at the university’s School of Medicine have put out a call for testers. (Hille, 2/9)

HEALTH CARE PERSONNEL

Orange County Register: Kaiser Strike Expands With 3,000 Pharmacy, Lab Workers Joining Nurses 
More than 3,000 pharmacy and lab workers with the United Food and Commercial Workers union in Southern California joined a “second wave” of health care professionals striking against Kaiser Permanente on Monday, Feb. 9, 2026. Meanwhile, the strike is showing signs of spilling over beyond just Kaiser. (Maio, 2/9)

Bloomberg: Tentative Agreement Could End Historic New York City Nurses Strike
Thousands of New York City nurses reached a tentative labor agreement with local hospitals, signaling an end to a weeks-long strike where negotiations were complicated by the Trump administration’s cuts to health-care programs. The New York State Nurses Association said approximately 10,500 of its members reached preliminary agreements with Montefiore Health System and several Mount Sinai hospitals late Sunday and early Monday, according to a statement from the union. Nurses are expected to vote on ratification between Monday and Wednesday and would return to work on Feb. 14 if the contracts are approved. (Sapienza and Davis, 2/9)

MedPage Today: Nurses Say They Might Return To Hospitals If Employers Made These Changes
Adequate staffing, flexible scheduling, and better wages and benefits might entice registered nurses (RN) who recently left hospital employment to return to practice, a cross-sectional study suggested. Among roughly 1,700 RNs who left their jobs in the last 5 years without retiring, 65% said they would be more likely to return if staffing were adequate, according to Karen Lasater, PhD, RN, of the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing in Philadelphia. (Firth, 2/9)

The New York Times: A.I. Is Making Doctors Answer A Question: What Are They Really Good For? 
When it’s time to have a difficult conversation with a dying patient about whether to insert a feeding tube, Dr. Jonathan Chen, an internist at Stanford, practices first with a chatbot. He asks the bot to be a doctor while he plays the role of the patient. Then he reverses the roles. He feels uncomfortable doing it. The bot is so good at finding ways to talk to patients. ... So what is a doctor for? (Kolata, 2/9)

Becker's Hospital Review: Study: AI Chatbots May Give Unsafe Medical Advice
A large study examining the use of AI chatbots for medical advice found that people using large language models did not make better health decisions than those relying on traditional sources and may be exposed to inaccurate and inconsistent guidance. The randomized study, conducted by researchers at the University of Oxford, involved nearly 1,300 participants who were asked to assess medical scenarios and decide on appropriate next steps, such as seeing a general practitioner or going to a hospital. Participants who used large language models, or LLMs, performed no better than those who relied on online searches or their own judgment, according to a Feb. 9 news release on the findings. (Diaz, 2/9)

HEALTH CARE INDUSTRY

Modern Healthcare: Cigna Layoffs To Impact Roughly 2,000 Jobs By The End Of February
Cigna plans to cut about 2,000 positions by the end of February. The reductions make up less than 3% of the healthcare company’s global workforce. Cigna also offered voluntary retirement to an undisclosed number of employees. Cigna did not say how many of the 2,000 positions were filled, which types of roles are affected or who was offered a voluntary retirement option. (DeSilva, 2/9)

Modern Healthcare: What Molina's Medicare Advantage Exit Says About The Market
Molina Healthcare’s decision to exit the Medicare Advantage market is the latest sign that the glory days have come to an end. The health insurance company will not sell standard individual Medicare Advantage with prescription drug coverage plans in 2027 and focus instead on Dual Eligible Special Needs Plans, Molina Healthcare announced when it reported fourth-quarter earnings Thursday. Like other insurers, Molina Healthcare has struggled to make the numbers work in recent years. The company estimates underperformance in the segment will cost it $1 in earnings per share this year. (Tepper, 2/9)

Stat: OHSU Board Votes To Negotiate With NIH And Possibly Transform Its Primate Center Into An Animal Sanctuary 
The Oregon Health and Science University board of directors unanimously passed a resolution authorizing negotiations with the National Institutes of Health that could end all experiments on monkeys and shift the federally funded Oregon National Primate Research Center into a sanctuary. (Silverman, 2/9)

PHARMACEUTICALS

Stat: FDA Rejects Regenxbio’s MPS II Rare-Disease Gene Therapy 
The Food and Drug Administration has rejected a rare-disease gene therapy from Regenxbio, the company said Monday. The one-time treatment, called RGX-121, is designed to replace a malfunctioning gene that causes mucopolysaccharidosis type II, also known as Hunter syndrome, an ultra-rare disorder that causes physical and cognitive impairments. (Feuerstein, 2/9)

The Wall Street Journal: Novo Nordisk Escalates Fight Against Hims & Hers
A lawsuit that drugmaker Novo Nordisk filed on Monday against telehealth firm Hims & Hers shows how fierce the maneuvering over the booming obesity-drug market has become. In the lawsuit filed in a federal court in Delaware, Novo Nordisk accused Hims & Hers of violating the patents covering its Ozempic and Wegovy drugs used for weight loss by trying to sell custom-made versions of those medicines. (Loftus, 2/9)

MedPage Today: Statin Adverse Event Labels May Be Overcautious, Analysis Suggests
Many adverse events listed on statin product labels don't have good evidence that they are actually caused by the drug, a pooled analysis of the clinical trial evidence showed. In individual participant-level data from double-blind randomized controlled trials, only four of 66 assessed side effects attributed to statins on product labels rose above the level of likely false discovery due to multiple comparisons, the Cholesterol Treatment Trialists' (CTT) Collaboration reported in The Lancet. (Phend, 2/9)

CALIFORNIA

The Sacramento Bee: Lawmakers Send $90 Million Grant Package For Planned Parenthood Clinics To Newsom 
Both chambers of the California Legislature voted Monday to send a $90 million grant package for women’s health clinics to Gov. Gavin Newsom’s desk, moving quickly to shore up the state’s reproductive health programs against cuts pushed by President Donald Trump’s administration. (Graham, 2/9)

The Sacramento Bee: Bill In California Legislature Would Make It A Crime To Collect DNA Without Consent 
A new bill proposed by an Orange County assemblymember would make it a crime to steal someone’s DNA — such as collecting genetic material from a discarded cup, straw or strand of hair and submitting it for testing without permission. (Hunt, 2/9)

AP: Lawyer Likens Social Media Platforms To Addictive Drugs In Opening Comments In Landmark Trial
Comparing social media platforms to casinos and addictive drugs, lawyer Mark Lanier delivered opening statements Monday in a landmark trial in Los Angeles that seeks to hold Instagram owner Meta and Google’s YouTube responsible for harms to children who use their products. Instagram’s parent company Meta and Google’s YouTube face claims that their platforms addict children through deliberate design choices that keep kids glued to their screens. TikTok and Snap, which were originally named in the lawsuit, settled for undisclosed sums. (Huamani and Ortutay, 2/10)

San Francisco Chronicle: She Begged California's CARE Court To Help Her Son. He Died 10 Days After It Dismissed His Case
She begged California's CARE Court to help her son. He died 10 days after it dismissed his case. (Bollag, 2/9)

The Sacramento Bee: California Sues Companies That Sell Code For Making 3-D Printed Ghost Guns 
Two Florida companies that provide computer code and designs for making 3-D printed guns and ammunition magazines are being sued by the state of California and the city of San Francisco, who say its products are allowing people to create illegal ghost guns. (Bernstein, 2/9)

MORE STATE NEWS

The Colorado Sun: Hours Of Tearful Testimony Result In Pause To Some Medicaid Cuts For Coloradans With Disabilities
Colorado Medicaid officials are pausing a few proposed cuts that would have affected children and adults with severe disabilities who are cared for at home by family members after state lawmakers found the cuts too painful to support. (Brown, 2/9)

North Carolina Health News: Clinic Offers Same-Day Mental Health Care During Primary Care Visits 
When a patient expresses a mental health concern to their primary care provider, that typically generates a referral to a behavioral health specialist. Then that specialist contacts the patient to schedule an appointment. It can take multiple tries to get the appointment scheduled, and then the first available slot is sometimes weeks away. By then, the opportune moment to engage with the patient has likely passed, or their mental health issue may have escalated into a crisis. (Knopf, 2/10)

St. Louis Public Radio: For Some St. Louisans Living On The Street, Frostbite Can Cause Lasting Harm 
It’s been months since Tonya Henderson has felt her hands. Originally from California, Henderson has been in St. Louis for about a year, sometimes sleeping on church porches and sometimes in a tent near the Wells-Goodfellow neighborhood. “These freeze bites are no joke, these burns are no joke,” Henderson said. “It hurts, it hurts! My toes hurt. Nothing else is cold but my toes and my fingers.” (Fentem, 2/9)

Floodlight: Louisiana Bets Big On ‘Blue Ammonia.’ Communities Along Cancer Alley Brace For The Cost.
From her home in Donaldsonville, La., less than three miles from the world’s largest ammonia plant, Ashley Gaignard says the air itself carries a chemical edge. The odor, she said, is sharp and lingering. Years ago, when her son attended an elementary school about a mile from the massive CF Industries ammonia production facility, he would begin wheezing during recess, she recalled. His breathing problems eased only after he transferred to a school several miles farther away. (Alexander, 2/10)

The 19th: Weaker EPA Rules Put Black Women's Health At Higher Risk
Rhonda Anderson has spent nearly three decades fighting for clean air and water in Detroit. As an environmental justice organizer with the Sierra Club, she led campaigns to raise awareness about lead poisoning of babies and children in the vicinity of steel mills and is part of a Clean Air Act lawsuit against the EES Coke Battery, a local industrial facility. (Kutz, 2/9)

PUBLIC HEALTH

CIDRAP: US Cancer Survival Rate Fell During First 2 Years Of COVID Pandemic
Patients diagnosed as having cancer in the United States in 2020 and 2021 had significantly worse short-term survival than those diagnosed before the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a population-based cohort study published last week in JAMA Oncology. Analyzing data from more than 1 million US patients diagnosed as having invasive cancer in 2020 and 2021, a team led by researchers from the University of Kentucky looked at the patients’ 1-year cause-specific survival (CSS) rates and compared them with those of cancer patients diagnosed from 2015 to 2019. (Bergeson, 2/9)

The New York Times: 2 To 3 Cups Of Coffee A Day May Reduce Dementia Risk. But Not If It’s Decaf
If you think your daily doses of espresso or Earl Grey sharpen your mind, you just might be right, new science suggests. A large new study provides evidence of cognitive benefits from coffee and tea — if it’s caffeinated and consumed in moderation: two to three cups of coffee or one to two cups of tea daily. People who drank that amount for decades had lower chances of developing dementia than people who drank little or no caffeine, the researchers reported. They followed 131,821 participants for up to 43 years.“ (Belluck, 2/9)

NBC News: This Brain Training Game May Help Protect Against Dementia For 20 Years, Study Suggests
A large, long-term study found that playing a brain training video game may help protect the brain against dementia for decades. Experts say the findings are the strongest evidence yet that cognitive training can create lasting changes in the brain. “It’s very surprising,” said Marilyn Albert, director of the Johns Hopkins Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center. “It’s not at all what I would have expected.” (Syal, 2/9)

OLYMPIC GAMES

Undark: For The First Time, Olympics Ban PFAS Waxes In Snow Sports
Tim Baucom has done this before. The Milan Cortina Games will be his third Olympics as a wax technician for the United States’ cross-country ski team, a job characterized by long flights schlepping tools and duffel bags of gear halfway around the world, and even longer days prepping skis. His objective is to help American athletes gain even a fraction of a second in competition. But for the first time at an Olympics, he won’t have what was once one of the most powerful tools in his kit: fluorinated ski waxes. (Winters and Root, 2/10)

NPR: Olympic COVID Restrictions Are Gone, But Some Athletes Still Self-Quarantining
For most people, if not everyone, the pandemic days of masking are behind us. In certain corners of the Winter Olympics in Italy, though, things still look a lot like they did in COVID times. Some athletes are taking extreme measures to stay healthy. (Herz, 2/9)

The 19th and The 74: At The Olympic Games, Mom Athletes Lack Child Care And Other Support
Sarah Newberry Moore had long believed that motherhood would mark the end of her career sailing at the world championship level. A five-time national champion, she didn’t know of many women who had made it to the Olympics as mothers, even as many of her male peers competed at the highest level while raising children. (Gale, 2/6)