Latest KFF Health News Stories
Puerto Ricans Rationing Medications, Food As Lawmakers Battle Over Disaster Funding Bill
The island is still attempting to recover from being hit by category-4 Hurricane Maria in 2017. Meanwhile, Democrats and Republicans dig in their heels over adding more money for Puerto Rico into a larger disaster aid package.
Guatemalan Girl Who Died In U.S. Custody Would Have Been Visibly Sick For Hours, Doctors Say
An autopsy finds that Jakelin Caal Maquin died of strep-induced sepsis. “Something like that takes hours to progress,” said Dr. Lee Sanders, the chief of general pediatrics at Stanford University.
On Friday, the Trump administration awarded $250 million in Title X federal family planning grants, including as much as $5.1 million to a nonprofit organization funded by allies of the Catholic Church. Both supporters and opponents of abortion rights cast it as a potentially significant move to try to defund medical clinics that provide abortions. Meanwhile, Utah offers an example of how hard the new rules dictating who gets family planning grants will hit red states even if they might not realize it yet. And in other news, the administration is asking a judge to throw out a lawsuit over contraception-coverage rules.
Not only is there no such plan in the works, according to insiders there’s no plan to draft any legislation. White House officials say efforts are underway though. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) — acutely aware of the political perils that health care poses for Republicans — does not intend to wade extensively into the issue.
Democrats, Fractured Over Health Care Differences, Come Together In Face Of Trump’s Decision On ACA
House Democrats plan to vote on a largely symbolic resolution that condemns President Donald Trump’s surprise decision to tell the Justice Department to argue the whole health law should be invalidated rather than just parts of it.
Trump’s Own Health Agenda Could Be Sabotaged By His Continuing Push To Gut The Affordable Care Act
President Donald Trump has said that certain health issues — like ending the HIV epidemic, curbing the opioid crisis and cutting high drug prices — are some of his top priorities. But key elements to battling those problems rely on the health law that he wants to nullify.
Utah voters approved expanding the state’s Medicaid program through a ballot initiative last year, but state lawmakers scrambled to add restrictions to the program. One of those was work requirements. The waiver also has a novel feature to control costs: Utah can freeze enrollment of newly eligible beneficiaries if the projected costs of their coverage exceed the funds appropriated by the state Legislature.
Stat talked to patients and their families, many of whom found out the hard way last week when news broke that the anticipated drug was not effective at slowing or preventing neurodegenerative decline. Hopes were high for the trials because there’s nothing else in the pipeline. Public health also focuses on grim prison conditions, DNA tests, new depression treatment, diet and asthma, blood cancer research, FDA food safety concerns, brain-healthy diets, gut health, widespread burnout and hearing loss.
Today’s early morning highlights from the major news organizations.
Opinion writers weigh in on these public health issues and other health issues.
Editorial writers weigh in on issues surrounding the health law.
Each week, KHN’s Shefali Luthra finds interesting reads from around the Web.
Media outlets report on news from Mississippi, Alabama, Hawaii, Florida, Tennessee, Massachusetts, Missouri, Wisconsin, Arizona, New Hampshire and D.C.
Whether it’s conversation at this week’s Academy Health’s Datapalooza conference or on Twitter, medical experts are weighing in about the positives and not-so-positive roles being played by artificial intelligence and other forms of technology in health care settings.
How Viruses Tag-Team With Bacteria To Trick Immune System By Providing A Decoy
A chance observation a few years ago has provided insight into how viruses and bacteria work together during infections. In other public health news: pain, pedestrian deaths, mental health, allergies, ADHD, genetics, and mosquitoes.
Measles Outbreaks Tests Already Fractured Trust Orthodox Jewish Community Has With Local Governments
Rockland County, New York, besieged by one of the country’s largest measles outbreaks, took the unusual step of banning all vaccinated children from public places. Many of those effected by the outbreak are from the Orthodox Jewish community, and advocates worry the government’s response could strain an already distrustful relationship.
First Liver Transplant From An HIV Donor Succeeds; Leaving This Kind Of Legacy ‘Was Quite Important’
There used to be a ban on using organs from people with the AIDS virus. “Here’s a disease that in the past was a death sentence and now has been so well-controlled that it offers people with that disease an opportunity to save somebody else,” said Dr. Dorry Segev, a Johns Hopkins surgeon.
New York Attorney General Letitia James in her lawsuit says the Sackler family’s monetary moves were fraudulent, on the basis that the company was already insolvent or close to it. The suit is just the latest legal fight facing the Sackler family for its role in the opioid crisis. Meanwhile, departing FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb has laid out his vision for a new brand of painkillers.
From April through December 2018, outside inspectors found deficiencies that caused “actual harm” to veterans at 52 out of the 99 VA nursing homes they reviewed. “That is really bad. It’s really bad,” said Richard Mollot, executive director of the Long Term Care Community Coalition, a New York-based nonprofit advocate of nursing home care improvement.
The commercial also states that most patients pay between zero and $47 a month, depending on insurance coverage and eligibility for financial-assistance programs. Listing drug prices in TV ads has been a topic of fierce debate recently: proponents see it as a way to increase transparency, but critics say it’s meaningless at best and confusing for consumers at worst.
