Reuters: Healthcare Providers Hit By Frozen Payments In Ransomware Outage
Healthcare providers across the United States are struggling to get paid following the week-long ransomware outage at a key tech unit of UnitedHealth Group, with some smaller providers saying they are already running low on cash. Large hospital chains are also locked out of processing payments with some absorbing the upfront costs of being unable to collect, according to the American Hospital Association, which represents nearly 5,000 hospitals, healthcare systems, networks and other providers. (Satter, Bing and Wingrove, 2/29)

CBS News: Cyberattack On UnitedHealth Still Impacting Prescription Access: "These Are Threats To Life"
A cyberattack on the health technology provider Change Healthcare is wreaking havoc nationwide, as some hospitals and pharmacies cannot get paid, and many patients are unable to get prescriptions. Change Healthcare is a subsidiary of the UnitedHealth Group, one of the nation's largest healthcare companies. In a federal filing this week, UnitedHealth said that Change Healthcare first discovered the hack on Feb. 21, disconnecting impacted systems "immediately." (Sganga and Triay, 2/29)

Stat: Change Healthcare Cyberattack Outage Could Last Weeks
The outage caused by the Change Healthcare cyberattack could last weeks, a top UnitedHealth executive suggested in a Tuesday conference call with hospital cybersecurity officers, according to a recording obtained by STAT. (Trang, 2/29)

NPR: Montana Judge Declares 3 Laws Restricting Abortion Unconstitutional
Three Montana laws restricting abortion rights, including a ban on abortions after 20 weeks, have been struck down in court as unconstitutional. ... Alexis McGill Johnson, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, called the Thursday ruling a critical victory. "As we celebrate today, we will continue to build on this win to fight for equitable abortion access in Montana and beyond," McGill said in a statement, adding that Montana will remain a crucial access point for those seeking abortion in the Rocky Mountain West. (Ragar, 2/29)

Reuters: Missouri Accuses Planned Parenthood Of 'Trafficking' Minors To Get Abortions
Missouri's Republican attorney general on Thursday sued a Planned Parenthood affiliate, accusing it of helping minors travel to Kansas to get abortions without notifying their parents in violation of state law. The lawsuit by Attorney General Andrew Bailey cites undercover footage released by the conservative Project Veritas last year purporting to show a Planned Parenthood Great Plains employee offer to arrange an abortion for a 13-year-old in Kansas. Missouri law bans nearly all abortions, as well as helping a minor get an abortion out of state without parental consent. (Pierson, 2/29)

AP: Texas Prosecutor Is Fined For Allowing Murder Charges Against A Woman Who Self-Managed An Abortion
A Texas prosecutor has been disciplined for allowing murder charges to be filed against a woman who self-managed an abortion in a case that sparked national outrage. Starr County District Attorney Gocha Ramirez agreed to pay a $1,250 fine and have his license held in a probated suspension for 12 months in a settlement reached with the State Bar of Texas. Ramirez will be able to continue practicing law as long as he complies with the terms of the January settlement, which was first reported by news outlets on Thursday. (Mulvihill, 2/29)

NPR: W.Va. Senate Passes Bill Requiring Schools Show A Fetal Development Video
West Virginia's Republican-supermajority Senate approved a bill that would require public schools to show a video on fetal development produced by an anti-abortion rights group. The bill, referred to as the "Baby Olivia" bill, would require public schools to show a three-minute, high-definition video showing the "development of the brain, heart, sex organs, and other vital organs in early fetal development" to eighth graders and tenth graders. (Heaney, Rosenbaum, Watkins, and Sostaric, 3/1)

The Washington Post: Police Investigate Killing Of 23-Year-Old Pregnant Amish Mother
Police opened an investigation into the killing of Rebekah A. Byler, a pregnant Amish woman who was found dead in her rural Pennsylvania home this week, rocking the small community. The incident is being treated as a “criminal homicide,” Pennsylvania State Police said in a statement. They did not release a cause of death or identify any suspects, adding that they were “aggressively investigating all available leads.” (Suliman, 2/29)

The Wall Street Journal: Alabama Senate, House Pass Bills To Protect IVF 
Both chambers of the Alabama Legislature passed bills intended to protect in vitro fertilization providers after the state Supreme Court ruled that embryos qualify as children. The Republican-sponsored bills were fast-tracked through the Senate and the House this week. The companion bills, introduced Tuesday, grant civil and criminal immunity to those providing IVF treatments. (Otis and Ansari, 2/29)

Al.com: Alabama Lawmakers Remove Automatic Repeal Date From Bill To Provide Immunity To IVF Clinics
State lawmakers scrambling to provide legal protection for in vitro fertilization clinics passed bills in the Alabama House and Senate on Thursday after removing automatic repeal dates that were in earlier versions of the legislation. One of the two bills could become law as soon as next Wednesday. (Cason, 2/29)

The 19th: Could The Alabama Supreme Court Ruling On IVF Impact Access In Other States?
An Alabama Supreme Court has effectively ended access in the state to IVF, leaving families navigating infertility in limbo. Outside of Alabama, IVF patients have begun to question the security of their own treatment. Amanda Zurawski, the lead plaintiff in a case challenging Texas’ abortion bans, said this week she is moving her frozen embryos in case her state is next to curb access to IVF. (Luthra, 2/29)

KFF Health News: KFF Health News' 'What The Health?': Alabama’s IVF Ruling Still Making Waves
Reverberations from the Alabama Supreme Court’s first-in-the-nation ruling that embryos are legally children continued this week, both in the states and in Washington. As Alabama lawmakers scrambled to find a way to protect in vitro fertilization services without directly denying the “personhood” of embryos, lawmakers in Florida postponed a vote on the state’s own “personhood” law. And in Washington, Republicans worked to find a way to satisfy two factions of their base: those who support IVF and those who believe embryos deserve full legal rights. (2/29)

Also —

KCRA: Lincoln Woman's Last Embryo Stuck In Alabama After IVF Ruling
Heather Maurer moved to Lincoln, California, from Columbus, Mississippi, two years ago while she was pregnant with her now 19-month-old son.Her husband is in the Air Force and got short-notice orders to report to the Golden State. They had two months to move. Before the move, they had been referred to the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) for fertility treatments. After years of struggling to conceive, the couple began IVF. "We retrieved 11 eggs and seven fertilized and three developed into embryos," Maurer told KCRA 3. "After genetic testing, only two very viable." One of those two is her son Maximus. The other is still frozen at UAB. (Hope, 2/26)

CNN: Without IVF, This Alabama Uterine Transplant Patient Loses Her Hope For A Second Baby 
Time is running out for Elizabeth Goldman to have one more baby with the uterus she received in a transplant two years ago. Her IVF treatments were halted after a state Supreme Court ruling last month, and it’s a delay she says her family can’t afford. When she was 14, she was told that she had been born without a uterus and that she would never get pregnant. “I was told that it would basically be impossible,” said Goldman, who has a condition called Mayer-Rokitansky-Küster-Hauser syndrome that affects the reproductive system. “I always dreamed of carrying my own baby, so I was completely heartbroken.” (Musa and Rosales, 3/1)

USA Today: When IVF Felt Hopeful, Couple Lost Embryos. Here's Who They Blame.
The tears were automatic. Kearsten Walden couldn't hold them back when the doctor called on Thanksgiving morning to say she'd lost the last of her six embryos. She'd already experienced so much loss during a long journey with infertility. Doctors couldn't tell the Norfolk, Virginia, woman what went wrong. Kearsten and her husband Zach, both 39, later learned they were not alone, other couples undergoing in vitro fertilization at the same fertility clinic had also inexplicably lost their embryos. (Rodriguez, 2/27)

Modern Healthcare: Spending Bill Leaves Out CHC Funding, Medicaid DSH Cut Delays
Doctors, hospitals and community health centers will have to wait a little longer to learn their fates in full-year funding bills Congress is trying to hash out. That's because the short-term funding agreement Congress passed Thursday, which keeps parts of the government open until March 8 and the rest until March 22, is silent on key issues such as Medicaid disproportionate share hospital payments, Medicare physician reimbursements and community health center funding. (McAuliff, 2/29)

The Hill: Senate Passes Spending Bill, Punting Shutdown Threat To Next Week
The Senate on Thursday passed a short-term spending bill that punts this weekend’s shutdown threat to later in the month, but leaves questions about how Congress will fund the government through the rest of the year. Senators voted 77-13 to send the funding measure to President Biden’s desk for his signature, just hours after the House voted overwhelmingly to pass the bill 320-99 and just a day before a tranche of government funding was set to expire. (Folley and Weaver, 2/29)

More news from the federal government —

Reuters: Republicans Blast US Defense Secretary Austin Over Health Secrecy
Republican lawmakers slammed U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin at a hearing on Thursday for failing to disclose his prostrate cancer diagnosis, his surgery and his subsequent hospitalization to President Joe Biden or even his deputy at the Pentagon. Austin, with support from Democrats on the House of Representatives Armed Services Committee, sought to dispel accusations that his secrecy jeopardized national security or that his unnoticed absence demonstrated his lack of influence in Biden's Democratic administration. (Stewart and Ali, 2/29)

The Boston Globe: About Fresh Commits $60 Million To White House Anti-Hunger Effort
Boston-based nonprofit About Fresh this week committed $60 million to support the White House’s Challenge to End Hunger and Build Communities over five years through its Fresh Connect program that will generate data for research on how food can be used as medicine. The nonprofit also pledged $2.2 million over three years to support its Fresh Truck program, which it is spinning off as a new independent nonprofit, that deploys retrofitted school buses as mobile markets bringing fresh food to neighborhoods. (Walia, 2/29)

KFF Health News: With Medical Debt Burdening Millions, A Financial Regulator Steps In To Help
When President Barack Obama signed legislation in 2010 to create the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, he said the new agency had one priority: “looking out for people, not big banks, not lenders, not investment houses.” ... But as the U.S. health care system turns tens of millions of Americans into debtors, this financial watchdog is increasingly working to protect beleaguered patients, adding hospitals, nursing homes, and patient financing companies to the list of institutions that regulators are probing. (Levey, 3/1)

The New York Times: R.S.V. Vaccines May Slightly Increase Risk Of Rare Neurological Condition 
Vaccines for respiratory syncytial virus may have caused a few cases of Guillain-Barré syndrome, a rare neurological condition, federal health officials said on Thursday. The numbers were small, on the order of two cases per 100,000 vaccinated people or fewer, and much more data is needed to pin down the risk, the officials said. In May 2023, the Food and Drug Administration approved two vaccines against R.S.V.: Abrysvo, by Pfizer, and Arexvy, by GSK. (Mandavilli, 2/29)

Reuters: Pfizer Says Its RSV Shot Is Protective Through A Second Year 
Pfizer on Thursday said a single dose of its new respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) vaccine Abrysvo maintained its ability to protect against the illness through a second year of respiratory disease season. The company said in a press release that the vaccine's efficacy against RSV-associated lower respiratory tract disease with three or more symptoms was 77.8% through season two, compared with efficacy of 88.9% after the first RSV season, which led to the shot's U.S. approval. (2/29)

On covid and measles vaccines —

CIDRAP: Monovalent XBB.1.5 Vaccine Shows 51% Protection Against COVID Hospitalization 
A new interim estimate of vaccine effectiveness (VE) of the monovalent (single-strain) XBB.1.5 COVID-19 vaccine shows the shot was 51% effective in preventing emergency department and urgent care visits among adults without compromised immune systems. The study was published today in Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. (Soucheray, 2/29)

Roll Call: Post-Pandemic Vaccine Hesitancy Fueling Latest Measles Outbreak 
Cases of measles are rising across the country and seem to be striking counties at random, but experts say there is one thing the public health system can do to turn the tide, and that’s to stem the post-pandemic vaccine lag and get parents to vaccinate their kids. (Cohen, 2/29)

The New York Times: Nursing Home Staffing Shortages And Other Problems Still Persist
Many Americans prefer to believe the Covid pandemic is a thing of the past. But for the nation’s nursing homes, the effects have yet to fully fade, with staffing shortages and employee burnout still at crisis levels and many facilities struggling to stay afloat, according to a new report published Thursday by federal investigators. The report, by the inspector general’s office at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, found that the flawed infection-control procedures that contributed to the 170,000 deaths at nursing homes during the pandemic were still inadequate at many facilities. (Jacobs, 2/29)

The Boston Globe: In R.I. Nursing Homes, Deficiencies Are On The Rise. Advocates Demand Better Standards
Nursing homes in Rhode Island are increasingly failing to meet federal requirements that govern patient care, including preventable deaths. Deficiencies cited by federal regulators at the state’s nursing homes increased 138 percent from 2022 to 2023. Simultaneously, since 2020, Rhode Island’s nursing homes have lost 20 percent of their workforce, and six nursing homes have closed due to an unprecedented labor crisis. (Gagosz, 2/29)

The CT Mirror: CT Lawmakers Unveil Bill Overhauling Aspects Of Elder Care Sector
As advocates and industry officials testified Thursday on Gov. Ned Lamont’s wide-ranging bill to boost transparency in nursing home operations, lawmakers unveiled another sweeping measure that would overhaul numerous key aspects of the elder care sector, including requiring more oversight of home care workers, creating a speedier process for accessing Medicaid and expanding the long-term care ombudsman’s office. (Carlesso and Altimari, 2/29)

St. Louis Post-Dispatch: Northview Nursing Home Owners Paid Themselves Before Crash
In the years leading up to the chaotic closure of the Northview Village Nursing Home, revenues fell and resident counts dropped. Still, the owners of the north St. Louis nursing home, the largest in the city, were sending at least $1.5 million annually in rent and other payments to their companies. (Barker and Merrilees, 2/29)

In other health care industry news —

Modern Healthcare: CMS Quality Measures Report Sees Performance Drop In 2021
Health systems saw deepened racial disparities and worse care outcomes during the COVID-19 pandemic as their performance on the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services' quality measures steeply declined, according to a recent report. Hospitals and post-acute care providers were showing improvement—or at least stability—on almost 90% of CMS' quality measures from 2016 through 2019, according to the agency's 2024 national impact assessment, published Wednesday. (Devereaux, 2/29)

Axios: Why Medicare Is Adding Pre-Treatment Approval Requirements
Medicare is taking the rare step of adding pre-treatment approval requirements before patients can get care at certain outpatient surgical facilities that have seen a sharp uptick in billings. Medicare's decision shows that it still sees prior authorization as a useful tool for controlling costs, even as the Biden administration cracks down on misuse of a practice detested by health care providers and patients. (Goldman, 3/1)

Bloomberg: American Academy Of Dermatology Pushes To Pull DEI Programs, Citing Antisemitism 
America’s largest association of dermatologists is considering scrapping its diversity and inclusion initiatives, threatening to end programs designed to improve representation in one of the least diverse specialties in medicine. A group of doctors raised a resolution to end the American Academy of Dermatology’s diversity, equity and inclusion programs. The proposal, to be debated at the organization’s upcoming annual meeting, cited unease around the politicization of DEI and raised antisemitism as a concern. (Butler and Rutherford, 2/29)

The Philadelphia Inquirer: Camden's Cooper Health Gets An 'A' Credit Rating From From Standard & Poor's
Standard & Poor’s gave Cooper Health an ‘A’ credit rating this week, citing the sustained strength of the South Jersey nonprofit’s financial results while it expands market share in the region, in part by hiring more doctors and other clinical staff. The new rating assess the Cooper’s overall creditworthiness. S&P’s previous ‘A-’ rating for Cooper, from 2022, applied only to a specific issue of municipal bonds. (Brubaker, 3/1)

Reuters: Exclusive: Musk's Neuralink Brain Implant Company Cited By FDA Over Animal Lab Issues 
U.S. Food and Drug Administration inspectors found problems with record keeping and quality controls for animal experiments at Elon Musk's Neuralink, less than a month after the startup said it was cleared to test its brain implants in humans, according to an agency report reviewed by Reuters. The inspectors identified quality control lapses at the company's California animal research facility. A similar inspection at Neuralink's Texas facility did not find problems, according to agency records. (Taylor, 3/1)

In other biotech and pharma news —

Stat: Biotech Companies Concerned About China Biosecurity Crackdown
The federal government increasingly is scrutinizing Chinese businesses and their interactions with American companies, including in the biotech sector. Chinese biotechnology companies, the thinking goes, could threaten national security by giving the Chinese government access to the genetic and health information of Americans. (Wilkerson, 2/29)

Stat: Medical Device Lobby: We're Tired Of Waiting On Medicare Coverage
Medical technology lobby AdvaMed is fed up with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. In a letter sent to the agency and shared with STAT, the group urged CMS to act on finalizing a pathway that would make reimbursement for breakthrough devices easier. (Lawrence, 3/1)

Reuters: Pharma Companies Ask Court Not To Break Up US States’ Price-Fixing Lawsuits
A group of major pharmaceutical companies want an appeals court to force Connecticut and other states to remain in a coordinated legal proceeding over generic drug pricing, arguing that allowing them to pursue their claims separately would upend years of legal work and cause delays. Drug companies Upshur-Smith, Teva, Glenmark and more than a dozen others in a petition urged the Philadelphia-based 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to keep Connecticut and 45 other states a part of the antitrust litigation in Pennsylvania. (Scarcella, 2/29)

Stat: Pfizer Highlights Cancer Drugs It Thinks Could Reignite Investor Interest 
Pfizer spent more than four hours Thursday laying out its oncology program to investors. But the company also spent some time talking about the effects of the Inflation Reduction Act on its pipeline. (Herper, 2/29)

The Philadelphia Inquirer: Every Cure, Led By Penn's David Fajgenbaum, Will Use AI To Find New Treatments For Rare Diseases
Every Cure, a Philadelphia-based disease research nonprofit, has received a $48.3 million federal contract to develop an artificial intelligence-powered matchmaking program to help doctors find new uses for already approved medications. Algorithms will scan tens of thousands of approved medications and rare diseases to find potential matches. The approach would automate and expedite a process that is currently done on a case-by-case basis, when a medical team needs to find a new treatment for a patient’s rare disease. (Gantz, 2/29)

Also —

Bloomberg: Trudeau Introduces Bill On National Drug Coverage Program 
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government has introduced a bill in Parliament that moves Canada closer to a national drug coverage program. The legislation sets up “foundational principles” for a national drug program. As a first step, the bill establishes that the government will start negotiations with provinces to provide universal, single-payer coverage for a number of contraception and diabetes medications, Health Minister Mark Holland said Thursday at a press conference in Ottawa. (Platt and Dhillon Kane, 2/29)

CNN: Excessive Alcohol Drinking Drove About 488 Deaths Per Day During The Pandemic, CDC Says
While dry January and damp lifestyles have taken off on TikTok, the United States has already experienced a spike in deaths related to excessive alcohol. In 2020-21, at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, there were an average of about 488 deaths per day from excessive alcohol drinking, according to a new report from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Alcohol is a leading cause of preventable death. (Christensen, 2/29)

Bloomberg: Obesity Drugs Won’t Solve Problem That Affects 1 Billion People, WHO Warns
Effective, popular obesity medications won’t be enough to solve a worldwide problem that now affects more than 1 billion people, World Health Organization officials warned. Obesity has quadrupled among children and teens and more than doubled among adults since 1990, with about one in every eight people in the world living with the condition, the health agency said Thursday in the first global public analysis of the condition since 2017. (Kresge and Feliciano, 2/29)

Fox News: Hair Loss And Prostate Medication Could Also Reduce Heart Disease Risk, Study Finds
A drug that has long been used to treat two common men’s health conditions could have some unexpected benefits. Finasteride — more commonly known as Propecia or Proscar — has treated male pattern baldness and enlarged prostate in millions of men. In a recent study, researchers from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign have also linked the "miracle drug" to cholesterol-lowering effects and reduced heart disease risk. (Rudy, 2/29)

CNN: Which Diseases Can Pets Transmit To Their Owners?
Health officials in Alaska recently reported the first known human death from a virus called Alaskapox. The man, who died in January, lived in a wooded area and cared for a stray cat that hunted small animals, according to health officials. He had a weakened immune system and is thought to have contracted Alaskapox through contact with animals. At around the same time, an individual living in Oregon was diagnosed with bubonic plague. Health officials suspect this person was infected by a cat. (Hetter, 2/29)

AP: Zyn Nicotine Pouches Are All Over TikTok, Sparking Debate Among Politicians And Health Experts 
There’s nothing complicated about the latest tobacco product trending online: Zyn is a tiny pouch filled with nicotine and flavoring. But it has stoked a debate among politicians, parents and pundits that reflects an increasingly complex landscape in which Big Tobacco companies aggressively push alternative products while experts wrestle with their potential benefits and risks. (Perrone, 3/1)

NPR: The Human Cost Of Climate-Related Disasters Is Undercounted, A New Study Finds
A new study published in Nature Medicine looks directly at the human health impacts from severe weather like hurricanes, floods, and intense storms. The study examined Medicare records before and after weather disasters that incurred more than $1 billion of damages from 2011 to 2016. ... "Based off experience that we've seen unfold in the U.S. and elsewhere, we see that there's destruction and disruption to our ability to deliver the high-quality care we want to give patients in the weeks following the weather disasters," says Renee Salas, an emergency department physician at Massachusetts General Hospital. (Borunda, 2/29)

Bloomberg: Rising Sea Levels Increase Threat Of Arsenic In Drinking Water
Rising seas due to climate change could exacerbate the threat of arsenic in drinking water, according to a study published in PLOS ONE in January. Researchers focused on arsenic in well water in Bangladesh, where up to 97% of the population relies on such water for drinking. Arsenic occurs naturally in the earth’s crust, but how much arsenic is present in groundwater depends on geology, fertilizer habits and land use patterns, among other factors. (Pierre-Louis, 2/29)

Reuters: Kimberly-Clark Factory Where Kleenex Made Pollutes Town With PFAS, Lawsuit Says
Kimberly-Clark has been hit with a proposed class action filed by Connecticut residents living near a facility where it makes Kleenex accusing the consumer goods company of contaminating their properties and drinking water with toxic “forever chemicals.” The lawsuit filed in Connecticut federal court on Wednesday alleges the company has used per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, to make tissues at its plant in New Milford. PFAS are released into the air via smokestacks, and may seep into the ground via paper sludge dumped at a nearby landfill, the lawsuit said. (Mindock, 2/29)

News Service of Florida: Florida Senate Approves A Bill Creating ‘Rural Emergency Hospitals’ 
The Florida Senate on Wednesday unanimously passed a bill that would create a new category of “rural emergency hospitals” in the state, with supporters saying it would help ensure access to health care in rural areas. (2/29)

In news from California —

Los Angeles Times: Children’s Hospital Los Angeles Creates Dedicated Small Baby Unit To Care For Its Tiniest, Most Fragile Babies
Children’s Hospital Los Angeles (CHLA) has launched a dedicated Small Baby Unit to provide the highest level of specialized care to critically ill premature babies. The program is located within the Steven & Alexandra Cohen Foundation Newborn and Infant Critical Care Unit (NICCU) and is supported by a specialized team of clinicians trained in the care of children born before 32 weeks. (2/29)

CBS News: Santa Cruz Health Officials Monitor Bacteria Outbreak Among Homeless
An outbreak of infectious bacteria is being monitored by the Santa Cruz County Public Health Division, county officials said Thursday. At least 27 cases of shigellosis have been recorded in the county since late January, mostly among people who have experienced homelessness. Of those, 16 have been lab-confirmed and 11 remain under investigation, according to the public health division. (2/29)

KFF Health News: California Hospitals, Advocates Seek Stable Funding To Retain Behavioral Health Navigators
Health providers and addiction experts warn the funding structure is unstable for a California initiative that steers patients with substance use disorder into long-term treatment after they are discharged from emergency rooms, which has already led some critical employees to leave their jobs. Supporters of CA Bridge’s behavioral health navigator program, which launched in 2022, say its reliance on one-time funding makes it hard for hospitals to retain navigators amid a growing drug crisis. (Sánchez, 3/1)

More health news from across the U.S. —

Houston Chronicle: LGBTQ Group Sues Texas AG To Shield Identity Of Transgender Families
An LGBTQ advocacy group is suing the Texas attorney general after his agency requested information that the group said would reveal the identities of its members, including those who sought to stay anonymous in recent suits. The suit, filed Wednesday by PFLAG, argued that the requests violate its members’ right to free speech, to petition and to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures. (Goldenstein, 2/29)

The Washington Post: Michigan Wants To Study Marijuana’s Health Benefits. It’s Not Easy
When Michigan voters approved recreational marijuana six years ago, the measure included an innovative mandate: using cannabis tax revenue to pay for research into the health benefits of the drug for military veterans. State officials later committed $40 million. Not a single veteran has received marijuana in a trial. Critics blame federal restrictions on marijuana research. (Ovalle and Nirappil, 2/29)

The Philadelphia Inquirer: Endo International Agrees To $2 Billion Opioid Marketing Settlements
Endo International, a pharmaceutical company whose U.S. headquarters is in Malvern, has agreed to pay the government up to $465 million to settle civil and criminal investigations into the sales and marketing of an opioid drug, federal authorities said Thursday. As part of the deal — which must be approved by a bankruptcy judge — an Endo affiliate would plead guilty to a single misdemeanor charge of introducing misbranded drugs into interstate commerce. (Seidman, 2/29)

St. Louis Post-Dispatch: Autism Diagnoses Are Soaring. Here’s How Some Colleges Are Responding
The first time Hailey Hall went to college, it was 2008. She lived in Georgia and had been diagnosed with autism four years before. ... Since Hall was diagnosed two decades ago, the number of children with autism has shot up from 1 in 125 to 1 in 36. Now, college administrators across the country are responding, training staff, adapting to learning differences and promoting self-advocacy. A few local universities are even touting some success: Small steps, they say, appear to be working. (Schrappen, 2/28)

KFF Health News: How A Friend’s Death Turned Colorado Teens Into Anti-Overdose Activists
Gavinn McKinney loved Nike shoes, fireworks, and sushi. He was studying Potawatomi, one of the languages of his Native American heritage. He loved holding his niece and smelling her baby smell. On his 15th birthday, the Durango, Colorado, teen spent a cold December afternoon chopping wood to help neighbors who couldn’t afford to heat their homes. McKinney almost made it to his 16th birthday. He died of fentanyl poisoning at a friend’s house in December 2021. (Bichell, 3/1)

The Wall Street Journal: This Doctor Found His Own Miracle Drug. Now He Wants To Do It For Others
Kaila Mabus, an athletic teenager in the Chicago area, went to the emergency room in 2019 in renal failure. It took another month before she was diagnosed with Castleman disease, a rare disorder that causes the immune system to attack vital organs. The Food and Drug Administration has approved just one drug to treat Castleman. It didn’t help Kaila. Her parents feared she might die. Her doctors sought help from Dr. David Fajgenbaum, an immunologist at the University of Pennsylvania and fellow Castleman patient who studies the disease. He has matched rare-disease patients with drugs that are already in pharmacies for other conditions for over 10 years, starting with himself. (Marcus, 2/28)

CIDRAP: Case Study Highlights The Potential—And Challenges—Of Phage Therapy
For over two decades, Lynn Cole was in a protracted battle with bacteria and her own immune system. Diagnosed as having the autoimmune disease Sjogren's syndrome in 1999, Cole suffered from pulmonary fibrosis, was oxygen dependent and highly susceptible to pneumonia, and frequently needed antibiotics for recurrent lung and urinary tract infections. Her daughter, Mya, was there for all of it. But around 2010, Lynn Cole began to have recurrent bloodstream infections caused by the bacterium Enterococcus faecium. From 2013 to 2020, she underwent several hospitalizations at University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) for E faecium bloodstream infections and received multiple courses of intravenous antibiotics. At some point in her complex medical history, the bacterium had colonized her gut and become the source of the recurrent infections. (Dall, 2/28)

The Washington Post: How Ants’ Healing Power Could Give Insight Into Drug-Resistant Bacteria 
Sub-Saharan Matabele ants are known to be precision hunters, but it’s their tender side that recently caught the attention of scientists. The ants, officially called Megaponera, often get hurt hunting termites — their sole source of food — because termites fight back ferociously, often inflicting serious damage on their attackers. But the ants have a special skill for healing their wounded comrades: They can detect when an injury is infected and treat it with antimicrobials they make themselves. (Cimons, 2/24)

The New York Times: High Blood Pressure: How To Recognize It And Lower Your Level 
Nearly half of American adults have high blood pressure — but only a quarter of those with hypertension have it under control, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. High blood pressure “is a smoldering public health crisis,” said Dr. Rishi K. Wadhera, an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and an author of new research showing that blood pressure screenings have not returned to what they were before the coronavirus pandemic. (Szabo, 2/29)

The 19th: Meet The Woman Behind Some Of The Biggest Changes For Disabled Travelers In Over 30 Years
Though few people know her name, Emily Voorde helped shape Secretary Pete Buttigeg’s views on disability long before he was advancing policy for the Department of Transportation. (Luterman, 2/27)

The Washington Post: Indigenous People Sue Radiologists Over Nonconsensual MRI Scans Of Livers
In a lawsuit, dozens of Pictou Landing First Nation members accused two radiologists of conducting MRI scans of their livers without their consent in Nova Scotia. (Sands, 2/27)

The New York Times: How Tribeca Pediatrics Became A Vast Business Empire 
Last year, the practice opened 12 new offices, including in areas that are typically not considered gentrified, like Morris Park in the Bronx and Rahway, N.J. Five more are planned for 2024, including the first Tribeca Pediatrics branch on Long Island. It currently operates 48 offices in New York and its suburbs, employing around 400 people, including 112 doctors and nurse practitioners, who treat more than 100,000 patients. ... In a city where health care often means faceless corporate medicine (see: CityMD), Tribeca Pediatrics has built a recognizable, trendy brand. But as it expands into a vast empire, is it at risk of losing its personal touch? (Kurutz, 2/24)

The Washington Post: The Legend Of The Empty CVS In Washington D.C. 
There is almost nothing left to steal at the CVS in Columbia Heights, and that gives you an idea of which items have actual value. Blank CDs, for example — the thieves don’t even bother with them. The greeting card section has been left alone. The good magazines like Vogue and GQ and Sports Illustrated are gone, but there are still a few copies of Traditional Home, some special issues of Life devoted to Willie Nelson, and a Woman’s World that declares: “Bye bye, jiggly fat!” No soft drinks, but three gallon-sized jugs of Arizona green tea are still on the shelves on one recent visit. Other shelves, stretching entire aisles, are totally empty. It has been like this since at least October, when the Legend of the Empty CVS of Washington began to spread beyond the District’s borders. (Judkis, 3/1)

On Kawasaki disease —

The New York Times: A Doctor’s Lifelong Quest To Solve One Of Pediatric Medicine’s Greatest Mysteries 
It looked like a scene from the TV crime show “CSI.” Dr. Jane Burns was peering into a multiheaded microscope at the San Diego County medical examiner’s office, scrutinizing autopsy samples from an array of mysterious deaths. This one was from the heart of a 20-year-old jujitsu fighter who was last seen at the gym and was found dead in his bed two days later. There were no signs of foul play or self-harm. The blood vessel tissue on the slide looked abnormal. Dr. Burns turned to the examiner: “I think this was likely one of mine.” Dr. Burns is an expert in a rare childhood illness called Kawasaki disease, which is the most common cause of acquired heart disease in children worldwide. It is also one of pediatric medicine’s greatest mysteries: No one knows what causes it. (Baumgaertner, 2/27)

The New York Times: How To Spot Kawasaki Disease In Your Child 
Doctors across the United States are seeing a rise in Kawasaki disease, a mysterious condition that primarily affects children under 5. The illness is the most common cause of acquired heart disease in children worldwide but it is often unrecognized or misdiagnosed. Kawasaki disease is rare, but cases are climbing in the United States. Here are the important things to know about Kawasaki disease. (Baumgaertner, 2/27)

Stat: Why Getting Cancer Drugs Just Got Harder For Rural Patients 
I recently started a patient with metastatic triple-positive breast cancer on a targeted therapy regimen consisting of capecitabine and neratinib, both oral chemotherapy pills that are dosed on a 21-day cycle. Given that her cancer also thrives on estrogen, I chose to continue her monthly fulvestrant injections (which targets estrogen) in my clinic in Dickson, Tennessee, a small town 40 minutes outside Nashville. (Samyukta Mullangi, 3/1)

The New York Times: Moral Hazard Has No Place In Drug Addiction Treatment
Dr. Winograd, who is now the director of addiction science at the University of Missouri-St. Louis’s Missouri Institute of Mental Health, had encountered a concept known as moral hazard, the idea that reducing exposure to the negative consequences of a risk makes people more likely to take that risk. (Maia Szalavitz, 3/1)

The New York Times: The Politics Of ‘Embryos On Ice’ 
When the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, the Republican Party declared victory. But the Alabama Supreme Court’s decision last month that frozen embryos are considered “extrauterine children,” which prompted hospitals to suspend I.V.F. procedures, has complicated that victory. (Michelle Cottle, Ross Douthat, Carlos Lozada and Lydia Polgreen, 3/1)

Newsweek: Am I A Murderer? It May Be Up To Donald Trump 
When I was diagnosed with colon cancer at age 34, all I wanted was to be a mom. Now, a recent Alabama Supreme Court ruling means that the decisions I made to preserve my fertility pre-chemo could have made me a criminal. (Bethany Robertson, 2/29)