Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
First Edition: Wednesday, May 13, 2026
KFF HEALTH NEWS ORIGINAL STORIES
KFF Health News: RFK Jr. Swaps Vaccine Talk For Healthy Foods And Reading To Tots In Push To Woo Voters
The little boy, dressed in a Toy Story sweatshirt, wrapped himself around the nation’s health secretary. “What do you guys want to be when you grow up?” Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. asked a carpet full of preschoolers. “A dinosaur!” the boy replied, squeezing tighter. Just weeks ago, Kennedy sat before lawmakers on Capitol Hill and faced intense questions about a dangerous uptick in infectious diseases among American children. Now, with midterm primaries underway, Kennedy was seated in a toddler-sized chair in Ohio, on a mission to change the subject. (Seitz, 5/13)
KFF Health News: Trump And Kennedy Seek To Relax Safeguards For AI Healthcare Tools
Paul Boyer, a psychotherapist for Kaiser Permanente in Oakland, California, is experiencing the AI revolution firsthand. He’s a little underwhelmed. The health giant has rolled out a new suite of note-taking software, made by healthcare AI pioneer Abridge, intended to summarize a patient’s visit at supersonic speed. For many clinicians, the technology soothes one of the persistent headaches of their lives — administration and paperwork. But the AI scribe caused another headache for Boyer and his colleagues: It is “not super useful.” They end up correcting the computer-written notes. (Tahir, 5/13)
KFF Health News: Listen To The Latest 'KFF Health News Minute'
Zach Dyer reads the week’s news: Millions of cancer survivors battle mounting medical bills, and Nebraska becomes the first state to enforce a Medicaid work requirement under the GOP’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act. (Cook, 5/12)
HANTAVIRUS OUTBREAK
MPR News: Minnesota Monitors Resident Potentially Exposed To Hantavirus Cruise Outbreak
The Minnesota Department of Health is currently monitoring a resident who may have been exposed to hantavirus. The individual journeyed overseas and might have come into contact with someone who was on board the MV Hondius cruise ship, which traveled from Argentina to Europe. This cruise is linked to an outbreak of the rodent-borne Andes virus, a type of hantavirus that has infected passengers and resulted in three fatalities. (Zurek, 5/12)
Chicago Tribune: Potential Case Of Hantavirus Reported In Illinois
Health officials are investigating a potential hantavirus case in Illinois, though the case is not linked to a recent outbreak of the illness on a cruise ship, the Illinois Department of Public Health announced Tuesday. (Schencker, 5/12)
Newsweek: How Hantavirus Misinformation Spreads Faster Than Doctors Can Catch It
In early 2020, Dr. Jerome Adams was about to face one of the toughest challenges in his career, as COVID-19 began spreading across the world during his tenure as surgeon general of the US. Six years later, as a different virus dominates the headlines, Adams and fellow medical experts are still determined to make an impact—but this time in a different way. (O'Connor, 5/12)
The Washington Post: Hantavirus Outbreak Tests Trump Officials Who Criticized Covid Response
The hantavirus outbreak on an expedition ship in the Atlantic Ocean that has killed three passengers is emerging as another test for an administration now led in part by officials who spent years criticizing pandemic-era public health messaging. Some top administration health figures, including Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and interim leader of the CDC Jay Bhattacharya, have argued that federal agencies overstated risks during covid and imposed overly broad preventive measures. (Sun, 5/12)
Bloomberg: Uncertainty Over How Hantavirus Spread Complicates Global Response To Outbreak
Passengers from the Hondius cruise ship are being repatriated under a patchwork of measures that reflect uncertainty over how this strain of hantavirus spreads, complicating efforts to contain the deadly outbreak. Some passengers are being placed in biocontainment units, notably in France, for at least two weeks. Australia plans to quarantine passengers in a purpose-built facility outside Perth. But in the Netherlands, most are being asked to self-isolate for six weeks, with short outdoor walks permitted under masking and distancing rules. (Gale, 5/12)
PHARMA AND TECH
The Washington Post: The Security Gaps Behind Alleged Schemes To Capture Health Records
Ricky Lott received a notice in the mail this year that left him distressed. A cluster of companies he never heard of — with odd names like GuardDog and Mammoth — may have obtained his digital medical records. Treatment details, lab results, notes from his doctor visits — mass amounts of his sensitive information — appeared to have been accessed from the Illinois health system where he receives care. Lott, an employee of a Chicago bike-share company, was stunned. The last thing he expected, he said, was for details of his high blood pressure and back surgery to be circulating in unknown corners of the internet. (Rowland, 5/12)
Modern Healthcare: AHA, West Health Institute Launch Hospital Technology Accelerator
Hospitals and health systems are getting access to a healthcare accelerator program, typically considered the domain of startups and tech companies. The American Hospital Association and West Health Institute have undertaken a three-year initiative to help health systems and hospitals implement technologies, with a focus on virtual care, electronic health record optimization and artificial intelligence. West Health, a nonprofit focused on lowering healthcare costs, has contributed $12 million to the program. (Famakinwa, 5/12)
Modern Healthcare: OpenEvidence’s Travis Zack On Winning Over Clinicians With AI
When OpenEvidence launched in 2021, its goal was to help doctors have easier access to medical information. The artificial intelligence clinical decision support platform has since broadened its ambitions and added products. In March, OpenEvidence introduced Coding Intelligence, a feature to automate the medical billing process. Last year, the company released OpenEvidence Visits, a clinical notes assistant tool. (Famakinwa, 5/12)
Modern Healthcare: Olympus’ Bob White On AI, Robotics And Ambulatory Surgery Centers
Olympus Corp. has widened its focus from selling devices and like other medtech companies, seeks to be a partner with its provider customers. The maker of gastroenterology devices also is pushing deeper into robotics. Last week, it announced an exclusive global distribution agreement with EndoRobotics, a manufacturer of robot-assisted technologies. In July, Olympus unveiled a partnership with investment firm Revival Healthcare Capital, co-founding Swan EndoSurgical to develop a gastrointestinal robotic system. The company is scheduled to report earnings Tuesday. (Dubinsky, 5/12)
THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION
Politico: Makary’s Time Atop FDA Over, Diamantas Named Acting Commissioner
Marty Makary’s nine lives atop his agency are over. The embattled Food and Drug Administration commissioner is resigning from his role Tuesday after 13 months leading the federal agency, according to an administration official granted anonymity to discuss the development. Kyle Diamantas, who previously worked as the top food official at the agency, will lead the FDA in an acting capacity, the administration official said. (Lim and Gardner, 5/12)
AP: Trump’s FDA Chief Is Out After Angering Pharma CEOs, Vaping Lobbyists And Anti-Abortion Activists
The head of the Food and Drug Administration, Dr. Marty Makary, is resigning after a rocky tenure that drew months of complaints from health industry executives, anti-abortion activists, vaping lobbyists and other allies of President Donald Trump. News of Makary’s departure Tuesday came just 13 months after he was confirmed to lead the powerful regulatory agency. (Perrone and Min Kim, 5/13)
The 19th: FDA Commissioner Marty Makary's Exit Could Threaten Abortion Access
Food and Drug Commissioner Marty Makary’s planned resignation creates a new opening for anti-abortion activists to push for national restrictions on the procedure — and in particular, limit the availability of a key abortion drug. The move comes as anti-abortion groups became angry over what they viewed as his agency’s failure to curb access to the drug. (Luthra and Rodriguez, 5/12)
Fox News: FDA Approves First Non-Antipsychotic Drug For Alzheimer's Agitation
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has green-lit the first-ever non-antipsychotic drug treatment for agitation in Alzheimer’s disease patients. The drug, Auvelity, was originally FDA-approved in 2022 for treating adults with major depressive disorder. Most recently, its use has been expanded for agitation associated with dementia. Agitation is a common and "distressing" symptom in adults with Alzheimer’s, according to the agency. The condition is characterized by excessive motor activity, or verbal or physical aggression. (Stabile, 5/12)
CIDRAP: FDA Clears First AI-Based Early Warning System For Sepsis
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has cleared an artificial intelligence (AI)-based sepsis detection system for approval. The Targeted Real-Time Early Warning System, developed by researchers at Johns Hopkins University and commercialized by Bayesian Health, integrates electronic health records with advanced clinical AI to continuously monitor patients and flag sepsis up to 48 hours before a clinician suspects it. A 2022 study of more than 764,000 patient encounters at five US hospitals found that when clinicians acted on the tool’s alerts, sepsis patients were 18% less likely to die in the hospital. (Dall, 5/12)
PUBLIC HEALTH
NPR: 7 Million Children Live In A Home With An Unlocked, Loaded Gun, A Study Finds
An estimated 32 million children in the United States live in homes with firearms, nearly 7 million of whom have at least one firearm in the household that's unlocked and loaded. That's according to a new study published in JAMA Network Open. "This study sheds further light on the fact that there are millions of kids living in this country, in households where weapons are readily available and often not locked up," says Dr. Chethan Sathya, a pediatric surgeon and director of the Center for Gun Violence Prevention at Northwell Health, a health system in New York. "Many of these families don't know the risk of having that gun not being locked up." (Chatterjee, 5/12)
Stat: Study Examines Why Males, More Prone To Suicide, Seek Help Less
Death by suicide is a male emergency. Although three times as many women as men report suicidal ideation and attempts, the vast majority of deaths by suicide in the U.S. — up to 80% — are among men. The reasons: higher impulsivity, lower reported fear of death, and, crucially, easy access to guns. (Merelli, 5/12)
The New York Times: Why So Many Guys Are Obsessed With Testosterone
In January, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. joined Katie Miller, the wife of Stephen Miller, the White House deputy chief of staff for policy, on her podcast. He was there to celebrate his MAHA victories, but he soon veered into the singular, seemingly indestructible biology of President Donald J. Trump. “He has the constitution of a deity,” Kennedy marveled. And the key to the president’s inexplicable vigor, Kennedy suggested, could be found in his hormones. (Ghorayshi, 5/12)
The New York Times: ‘Trimester Zero’: What To Expect When You’re Expecting To Expect
Two millenniums ago, in the foothills of ancient Greece, the physician and philosopher Hippocrates described pregnancy in terms of bread-making. In the thousands of years since, “a bun in the oven” has emerged as a euphemistic image for childbearing. That is, until a study suggested, in 2019, that pregnancy more closely resembles completing an ultramarathon. (Hew-Low, 5/12)
MedPage Today: Autism-Vaccine Researcher Arraigned In The U.S.
Poul Thorsen, MD, PhD, a Danish researcher who co-authored key papers demonstrating no links between childhood vaccines and autism, was arraigned on federal wire fraud and money laundering charges after his extradition from Germany, the Department of Justice said. Thorsen was a co-author of a 2002 study published in the New England Journal of Medicine that offered strong evidence based on a cohort of 500,000 Danish children that refuted the hypothesis that measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccination caused autism. (George, 5/12)
CANCER
The New York Times: How An ‘Impossible’ Idea Led To A Pancreatic Cancer Breakthrough
Pancreatic cancer is one of the most dire diagnoses in medicine. There are few available treatments, and they do little to help. For decades, experimental drugs flopped in trials. Many researchers believed the biological obstacles could not be surmounted. In what seems the blink of an eye, all that has changed. A drug nearing regulatory approval, daraxonrasib, is the first to substantially extend the lives of patients with pancreatic cancer. It works by targeting a cellular protein that fuels not just nearly all pancreatic tumors, but also many lung and colon cancers. Those three are the leading causes of cancer deaths. (Kolata and Robbins, 5/12)
MedPage Today: Metastatic Breast Cancers On The Rise, U.S. Study Shows
Despite improvements in survival, the incidence of stage IV breast cancer increased significantly from 2010 through 2021, according to a U.S. population-based cohort study. (Bassett, 5/12)
MedPage Today: Study On GLP-1s And Breast Cancer 'Too Good To Be True'?
Use of GLP-1 receptor agonists in breast cancer patients was linked to lower mortality and recurrence risk in a retrospective study, but experts are questioning the quality of the underlying data. (Bassett, 5/12)
SCIENCE AND INNOVATIONS
Bloomberg: Gut Bugs And Lilly’s Foundayo Both Help Curb Yo-Yo Diet Effect
As millions of people lose weight on powerful new obesity drugs, most are asking: what comes next? New findings show they have options to combat the dreaded yo-yo effect, including a surprising potential benefit from a humble gut bacteria supplement. A pair of Eli Lilly & Co. studies released Wednesday showed that while medicine is the best way to keep weight steady, some patients might be able to reduce their dose or switch to a pill. And a small, provocative trial found that a bacteria called Akkermansia muciniphila helped people who’d slimmed down just by dieting keep some weight off. (Kresge, 5/12)
CIDRAP: Nirsevimab May Protect Babies From Severe RSV Better Than Maternal Vaccination
Immunization with the long-acting monoclonal antibody nirsevimab may provide stronger protection against hospitalizations for respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) in infants than maternal RSV vaccination during pregnancy, though the difference appears to disappear when maternal vaccination occurs at least eight weeks before delivery. (Bergeson, 5/12)
CIDRAP: RTS,S Malaria Vaccine Averted 1 In 8 Deaths Among Eligible Kids In 3 African Nations Over 4 Years
An international group of researchers estimates that, despite only moderate uptake of three doses and low uptake of the fourth, the RTS,S/AS01E malaria vaccine saved the lives of one in eight eligible children in the first three African nations to offer the vaccine from 2019 to 2023. For the observational study, published late last week in The Lancet, the research team randomly assigned 158 administrative-unit clusters, each with a birth cohort of roughly 4,000 children, in Ghana, Kenya, and Malawi to either roll out the RTS,S malaria vaccine in 2019 (79 implementation areas) or to implement it later (79 comparison [control] areas). (Van Beusekom, 5/12)
CIDRAP: Candidemia Cases Are Rising, Becoming Deadlier, Study Finds
Candidemia incidence and associated 30-day mortality have risen in the United States since 2015, according to a study published yesterday in Clinical Infectious Diseases. For the study, a team led by researchers with Houston Methodist Hospital examined data from a nationwide database of electronic health records to analyze trends in candidemia incidence from 2015 through 2014. Candidemia is a severe and life-threatening bloodstream infection caused by species of Candida yeast. Most often found in medically vulnerable and chronically ill patients, Candida species cause an estimated 23,000 bloodstream infections every year in the United States, with mortality rates ranging from 25% to 40%. (Dall, 5/12)
HEALTHCARE INDUSTRY
Modern Healthcare: Health Systems Redefine Physician Leadership Roles
Physician leaders inside health systems are seeing their roles shift as they take on more duties, leaving them less time for leadership. Their roles increasingly have become more focused on the financial priorities of their organizations, according to a survey of 70 chief medical officers, chief clinical officers and chief physician executives by executive search firm WittKieffer. The research comes as hospitals and health systems looks for ways to cut costs and use artificial intelligence and other technologies to handle some administrative and clinical duties. (DeSilva, 5/12)
STATE WATCH
Fierce Healthcare: UC Health Workers Prepare For Launch System-Wide Strike
Less than two days away from deadline, tens of thousands of University of California workers show little interest in calling off their system-wide strike. About 42,000 university workers represented by AFSCME Local 3299, including 25,000 who are employed at a UC Health care facility or other healthcare role, are set to walk off the job at midnight, May 14. (Muoio, 5/12)
Central Florida Public Media: 'Who Takes Care Of Me?' Florida Nurses Talk About Underappreciation
A nursing shortage and the difficulties of the job, along with low pay compared to nurses in other states, are adding to the feelings of burnout. (Pedersen, 5/12)
The 19th: NYU Langone Faces First Known Criminal Investigation Over Gender-Affirming Care
The federal government is escalating efforts to seek private medical data for children undergoing gender-affirming care, as at least one hospital faces the first known criminal probe of its kind. Last week, NYU Langone Hospitals in New York City received a grand jury subpoena for information about young patients who received gender-affirming care at their facilities anytime in the past six years. (Rummler, 5/12)
Stateline: State Lawsuits Over Gender Dysphoria Could Threaten Disability Rights
Charlotte Cravins’ son Landry turned 2 in January. He’s a smiley little boy who loves singing “Itsy Bitsy Spider” and recently got his first pair of glasses. Landry was born with Down syndrome and has impaired vision. He receives publicly funded therapies that have helped him learn to crawl, to pull himself up to stand, and to use American Sign Language. (Vollers, 5/12)
Fierce Healthcare, Uncloseted Media: The Broken Pipeline Of Mental Healthcare For LGBTQ Teenagers
The first panic attack Quinn Pulsipher remembers having was at 8 years old. They describe it as “a pitch-black ghost that hugs them all over and tries to control their mind.” At the beach on vacation with their family, the wind suddenly picked up, and Quinn began hyperventilating, screaming and crying uncontrollably. Nothing could calm them down. After that first episode, the panic attacks occurred whenever there was a storm, sometimes even when there was just a light breeze. By the time Quinn was 14, they were “spiraling down.” They began failing most of their classes. They rarely left their room, even avoiding going to the store with their mom. Quinn, who is nonbinary, said the deterioration of their mental health was related to the rejection they received for their identity. (Gliadkovskaya and Donndelinger, 5/12)
North Carolina Health News: After A Pioneering Program Collapses, NC Organizations Build A New Path Forward
When Christina Schnabel’s son began having gastrointestinal problems a few years ago, his doctor didn’t prescribe medication. Instead, he prescribed a food box. Schnabel, a single mother living in public housing in Henderson County, enrolled in North Carolina’s Healthy Opportunities Pilot after that visit. Through local food bank Caja Solidaria, she received boxes of healthy food — and her son’s symptoms cleared up. (Baxley, 5/13)
