State Highlights: Michigan Clinics Offer Low-Cost Direct Primary Care To Those With No Insurance; D.C. Joins Growing List Of Places Where Addresses Can Be Kept Private From Abusers

Detroit Free Press: These Detroit Doctors Help Those With No Insurance, High Deductibles
Plum Health, which doesn't bill or accept health insurance, is one of roughly 15 direct primary care clinics in Michigan where doctors see fewer patients than in a typical primary care office, and can spend more time with each one. This type of service is called direct primary care because doctors deal directly with patients, without any insurance companies in the middle. It is similar yet distinct from so-called concierge care, a higher-end health care service with bigger fees that is more popular with wealthy people. (Reindl, 8/6)

The Washington Post: Victims Of Violence, Abuse Will Soon Have Help Keeping Their Addresses Private In D.C.
For nearly a decade after Jessica Tunon broke up with her boyfriend, the messages kept arriving. She moved across the country and asked him to stop contacting her. She changed her email address and phone number. She temporarily deleted her LinkedIn account. She filed a civil protection order against him, hoping it would finally bring an end to the stalking. (Schmidt, 8/5)

North Carolina Health News: NC Children’s Hospital ‘In Compliance,’ But Complex Pediatric Heart Surgeries Still On Hold 
The North Carolina Children’s Hospital got a bit of good news last week from a state agency that sent a team of investigators on-site for 11 days of questioning and review of the pediatric heart surgery program. The state Department of Health and Human Services says the program currently is in compliance with U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services requirements. (Blythe, 8/5)

Sacramento Bee: Health Care Industry Groups Spend Millions To Protect Profits
Drug companies, hospitals and dialysis companies spent millions of dollars in the first half of the year fighting bills that would have hurt their bottom lines, according to lobbying reports filed last week. ...All involved agree on what’s at stake: California drug prices, the cost of hospital care and the rules governing of dialysis care. (Bollag, 8/5)

Boston Globe: Union, Republicans Agree On This: More Child Welfare Workers Needed In Rhode Island
Union leaders and Republican lawmakers find themselves in unusual agreement, calling for the state to hire more front-line child-welfare workers after a damning report about the death of an adopted 9-year-old who was left in a bathtub for up to eight hours. Union members in the state Department of Children, Youth and Families plan to hold a “caseload/workload crisis rally” on the State House steps at 4 p.m. Thursday — one hour before the House Oversight Committee meets to see what action DCYF has taken on the report’s recommendations.(Fitzpatrick, 8/6)

The Washington Post: Vision To Learn: Kids Get Free Eye Exams, Glasses From Nonprofit
Ja’karri was among two dozen children at the camp in Severn, Md., to get free vision screenings and exams from a mobile clinic operated by the national nonprofit Vision to Learn. With 25 mobile clinics in 13 states, the organization tries to help children learn by making sure they can see — one pair of glasses at a time. Vision to Learn was born in 2012 when philanthropist Austin Beutner, then the deputy mayor of Los Angeles, had lunch with state education leaders. When one of them mentioned some students struggled to see the boards in their classrooms because they didn’t have glasses, Beutner was surprised that the problem hadn’t already met a policy fix. He told The Washington Post that he and his wife, Virginia Beutner, bought an out-of-use mobile clinic from a hospital and staffed it with optometrists. Vision to Learn was born. (Iati, 8/5)

The Associated Press: Class Action Lawsuit Filed Against UCLA Gynecologist
Two women say in a federal class action lawsuit they were sexually assaulted by a former gynecologist who worked for the University of California, Los Angeles. The lawsuit says that Dr. James Heaps sexually assaulted the women and made sexually inappropriate comments during their appointments. The class action lawsuit is the latest lawsuit to be filed against Heaps and UCLA, though others have been pursued through state court. (8/5)

The CT Mirror: Twenty-Six Years After FMLA, Paid Leave Is Coming To CT
Today is the 26th anniversary of the implementation of the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), the landmark federal law that provides up to 12 weeks of job-protected, unpaid leave to eligible workers. Now, 26 years later, there’s something to celebrate: paid family and medical leave is on its way to Connecticut. (Granato, 8/5)

Miami Herald: Is The Homestead Detention Center Truly Shutting Down?
In less than four weeks, about 2,700 children were rapidly transferred to other detention centers across the country or reunited with a sponsor after a weather disturbance was detected in the Atlantic Ocean. As a result, per the government’s hurricane plan, the 200-plus children that remained there Friday were abruptly bused to airports in the middle of the night. Seeing the facility’s population dip to zero was a significant moment for people across the country, including members of Congress, presidential candidates and international leaders. (Madan, 8/5)

The Hill: New York Health Department Says Exposure To Criminal Justice System 'Associated With Lasting Harm' 
A report from the New York City Department of Health found contact with the criminal justice system, however brief, is associated with major health risks, according to BuzzFeed News. “The data show that involvement with the criminal justice system – even brief contact with the police or indirect exposure – is associated with lasting harm to people’s physical and mental health,” City Health Commissioner Oxiris Barbot told the news outlet in a statement. (Budryk, 8/5)

The Advocate: Here's Where New Orleans Hospitality Workers Can Get Free Health Screenings Tomorrow 
Hospitality workers in New Orleans will have access to free health screenings and testings at a launch event tomorrow for the city’s new Healthy Hospitality initiative. The initiative is an effort by Mayor LaToya Cantrell, the New Orleans Tourism Marketing Corporation (NOTMC) and health care nonprofit 504HealthNet to increase access to health care for hospitality workers. (Poche, 8/5)

North Carolina Health News: As The Rate Of Lifestyle Diseases Rises, One Obesity Prevention Strategy Is Gaining Ground 
Money for the park’s rehabilitation in 2017 came from an unlikely source. A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention grant funded a partnership between North Carolina State University, N.C. State Extension and the community made a $12,000-facelift to the park possible. The Tarboro Department of Parks and Recreation contributed roughly $4,500 in materials and personnel, installing the new playground equipment, swing set, signage and more. The program, dubbed Health Matters, worked on dozens of similar initiatives across four North Carolina counties, creating environments that promote physical activity, healthy eating and recreation, with the goal of eventually decreasing obesity rates, said co-leader Annie Hardison-Moody, assistant professor and extension specialist at the N.C. State’s Department of Agricultural and Human Sciences. (Engel-Smith, 8/6)

Modern Healthcare: Beaumont Lays Off 175 In Ongoing Job Realignments, But Hiring Up As Well
Beaumont Health is the latest health system in Southeast Michigan to adjust to competitive pressures, laying off employees in some areas and hiring in others in a systemwide restructuring plan. At least 175 employees have been given pink slips over the past several months and more may be coming, Crain's has learned. The eight-hospital health system also says hiring is up by 3%, or 126 workers, this year compared with hirings during the same period in 2018. (Greene, 8/5)

Los Angeles Times: Two L.A. County Residents Are Sick With West Nile — The County's First Cases Of 2019
Two people in Los Angeles County have been diagnosed with West Nile virus, in what officials say are the first two cases in the county this year. Both people became ill with West Nile, which is transmitted to humans through a mosquito bite, late last month and are recovering, officials said Monday. One lives in the San Fernando Valley and the other in the southeastern region of L.A. County, they said. (Karlamangla, 8/5)

Des Moines Register: Marshalltown's Hospital To Close Birthing Center, The 33rd Since 2000
Marshalltown will soon join the growing list of Iowa towns without birthing centers. The Marshalltown hospital announced Monday that it would close its obstetrics unit and women's health clinic in September. The hospital, purchased in 2017 by the UnityPoint system, said the facility can't afford to keep the unit open because too few women are choosing to have their babies there. (Leys, 8/5)

The Associated Press: Louisiana Launching Medical Marijuana After Years Of Waiting
Louisiana is becoming the first Deep South state to dispense medical marijuana on Tuesday, four years after state lawmakers agreed to give patients access to therapeutic cannabis. Nine pharmacies are licensed to dispense medical marijuana across Louisiana and most are expected to open this week. Louisiana joins more than 30 other states that allow medical marijuana in some form. And though marijuana is banned at the federal level, a congressional amendment blocks the Justice Department from interfering with states’ medical marijuana programs. (Deslatte, 8/6)