Latest KFF Health News Stories
Florida has also been hit with multiple natural disasters recently: extreme drought but also Hurricane Michael. And New York can expect to be hit by four climate crises at a time by 2100 if carbon emissions continue at their current pace, a new study finds. While wealthy nations will be burdened with the costs of such disasters, poorer nations will experience great loss of life from them, the authors say. Meanwhile, California’s poor air quality is drawing attention to the lasting negative health toll it can take.
The Camp Fire has destroyed more than 15,000 structures, including more than 11,700 homes, according to the Monday evening incident report. As survivors begin returning home, media outlets report on updates from the scene of the disaster, from evacuees’ rough living conditions to the transmission line that may be linked to the blaze.
N.H. Senator Expresses Hope And Caution About Health Law’s Future In Response To Voters’ Concerns
Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.) spoke to voters about their health concerns, saying it’s less likely Congress will repeal the health law. She cautioned, though, that there are threats in the courts that could undermine it. Other health law news focuses on state-level individual mandates, medicaid expansion and short-term plans.
The Justice Department’s decision earlier in the year not to defend the ACA against a suit challenging the law’s constitutionality prompted three Justice Department career attorneys to withdraw from the case. Now Rep Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) says the House Judiciary Committee will investigate the department’s refusal to defend a federal statute.
First Edition: November 20, 2018
Today’s early morning highlights from the major news organizations.
Editorial writers weigh in on these health topics and others.
Opinion writers focus on the public health dangers of e-cigarettes and menthol flavored cigarettes.
Opinion writers focus on the health law.
Media outlets report on news from Connecticut, Tennessee, Massachusetts, Ohio, Texas, California, Florida, Washington and Iowa.
The outbreak at a North Carolina school where many families have chosen to claim religious exemption from vaccines is now ranked as the worst in the state’s history since the vaccine became available more than 20 years ago. Other children’s health news comes from New Jersey, Iowa and Texas.
“It is often not easy for hospital staff who see themselves as helpers of their patients to move into a very different role of complainant in a criminal case,” said Paul Appelbaum of Columbia University. “That switch is often accompanied by a great deal of guilt.” In other public health news: migrant children, diabetes, standing desks, appendectomies and more.
Violence-Related Setbacks Keep Derailing Global Ebola Response Efforts
The virus has taken advantage of the response teams’ violence-related limitations in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. As of Saturday there have been 358 confirmed and probable cases in this outbreak, and 213 of those people have died, making it the third largest Ebola outbreak on record.
New Drug May Offer Hope To Parents As Life-Threatening Peanut Allergies Become More And More Common
However going through the drug-induced desensitization process was not easy on patients.
Nearly 88 percent of Americans are expected to eat turkey Thursday. Many want to know which brands to avoid as the yearlong outbreak spreads to 35 states. Without a source or supplier of the products that are making people sick, officials say the best advice for consumers is to handle raw turkey carefully.
As Lifespans Increase, Baby Boomers Finding Themselves Caring For Both Aging Parents, Adult Children
The number of 60-somethings with living parents has more than doubled since 1998, to about 10 million. Meanwhile, the boomers are also more and more bearing the burden of adult children who have had health setbacks or other financial crises. In other health care costs news: insurance discounts for walking, waivers to help people with costs, and direct-to-consumer marketing.
Republicans Dismayed By Scope Of FDA Crackdown On Tobacco Products
The FDA has been aggressively targeting electronic tobacco products and flavored cigarettes in an effort to curb an emerging epidemic of teenagers vaping, but some conservatives think the administration has gone too far. “I am concerned the FDA’s proposed actions could limit adult Americans’ access to e-cigarette products that help them quit a more dangerous habit. I am also concerned about regulatory overreach,” said Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.).
Earlier this year in Brockton, Mass., Veterans Affairs investigators found two nurses fast asleep during their shifts, even though the facility knew it was under scrutiny and inspectors were coming to visit. The six big veteran advocacy groups are demanding the VA take swift action to improve quality of care at the agency’s nursing homes. In other veterans’ health news: a class action lawsuit and a troubling trend in the military’s readiness.
A new report found that Kaleo, a Virginia pharmaceutical company, raised the price of its opioid overdose reversal drug by more than 600 percent in 2016 as a way to “capitalize on the opportunity.”
The company will raise the price of 41 of its drugs — about 10 percent of its portfolio of treatments. Trump administration officials did not take kindly to the announcement. The move illustrates the “perverse incentives of America’s drug pricing system,” said a spokeswoman for Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar. In other drug cost news: brand-name price hikes drive up spending; an analysis looks at EpiPen’s cost-value ratio; the FDA wants more funding so the agency can review influx of gene therapy products; and more.
The Department of Housing and Urban Development has fielded complaints for years about flaws with its inspection system, particularly with respect to its complicated scoring algorithm that struggles to tell the difference between unsafe properties and decent ones. An investigation by The Southern Illinoisan and ProPublica reveals the dangerous conditions that low-income families, seniors and people with disabilities are living in.
