AP: Georgia Medicaid Program With Work Requirement Off To Slow Start Even As Thousands Lose Coverage 
Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp signed paperwork creating a new state health plan for low-income residents to much fanfare at the state Capitol three years ago. But public health experts and advocates say since it launched on July 1, state officials appear to be doing little to promote or enroll people in the nation’s only Medicaid program that makes recipients meet a work requirement. (Thanawala, 8/19)

Axios: 140,000 People Lose Medicaid Amid Virginia Review 
Virginia has booted 140,000 residents from Medicaid this year. ... Patient advocates told the Virginia Mercury they've heard reports that patients aren't receiving renewal paperwork until a few days before it's due. "We are in the process of asking the state how widespread these mailing delays may be, as they affect Virginians' access to care," the Virginia Poverty Law Center's Eleanor Sullivan told the publication.

Missouri Independent: Paperwork Issues Meant More Than 16,000 Missourians Lost Medicaid Coverage In July 
When Rebecca Uccello got a call that her daughter’s Medicaid coverage was in jeopardy, she said it “sent me into a tailspin.” Her 13-year-old daughter, Izabella, has been on Medicaid since age two because of severe developmental disabilities, including a birth defect which prevents her spinal cord from properly developing and a neurological condition which causes fluid build-up in the brain. Uccello, of Springfield, said she received renewal paperwork to verify Izabella’s eligibility on July 7 by mail. She signed, scanned and uploaded it to the state’s website the next day. (Bates, 8/18)

Health News Florida: More Than Half Of Medicaid Recipients Terminated May Still Qualify, State Data Shows
As Florida continues its Medicaid redetermination process, state data shows more than half of those removed from Medicaid, were terminated for so-called “procedural,” reasons, like not responding to mail, outdated contact information or computer glitches. New data shows that when people reach out to the Department of Children & Families, help is hard to find despite DCF's plans and efforts to contact recipients. (Pedersen, 8/18)

Wisconsin State Journal: 44,000 Lose Medicaid Coverage In Wisconsin As Renewal Process Resumes
Of about 97,000 Wisconsin residents asked to renew their Medicaid eligibility in July, about 44,000 lost coverage and another 44,000 retained coverage, the state Department of Health Services said Thursday. More than 8,000 cases are pending. (Wahlberg, 8/19)

On prescription costs and medical debt —

Reuters: AARP Urges Court To Uphold Drug Price Negotiation Program
AARP, the leading lobbying group for older Americans, on Friday urged a federal judge not to block a new law that for the first time gives Medicare the power to negotiate drug prices with pharmaceutical companies in response to a lawsuit by business groups. AARP in a filing in federal court in Dayton, Ohio, argued that granting a request by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and other groups to block negotiations would frustrate Congress's intent to bring down drug prices, harming older Americans. (Pierson, 8/18)

Axios: Medical Debt Is Squeezing The Middle Class, Report Says
Middle-class Americans are the most likely to be saddled with medical debt, with nearly 1 in 4 — or roughly 17 million people — having unpaid medical bills, according to a report shared first with Axios from center-left think tank Third Way. Middle-income Americans, who earn $50,000-$100,000 a year, are more likely than those with lower incomes to seek care but don't qualify for Medicaid or charity care to help pay for it. (Reed, 8/21)

On SNAP benefits and food deserts —

The Hill: SNAP Changes Coming Sept. 1
The changes only affect one group of SNAP recipients: able-bodied adults without dependents (or ABAWDs, as the agency calls them), ages 50 to 54. ABAWDs between the ages of 18 and 49 already need to prove they are working at least 80 hours a month, pursuing an education or in a training program to qualify for SNAP for more than three months. Now, starting on Sept. 1, able-bodied childless workers who are 50 years old will also need to meet those work requirements to receive SNAP benefits. Starting on Oct. 1, the age requirements will be expanded up to 52. Then next year, on Oct. 1, 2024, the age requirement will expand again to 54. (Elmore and Martichoux, 8/20)

St. Louis Public Radio: Pritzker Signs Law To Fight Food Deserts Across Illinois
Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed the Illinois Grocery Initiative into law on Friday — a $20 million state program to invest in local grocery stores across the state to curb food deserts and food insecurity. “Too often residents have to cross county lines — sometimes state lines — to pick up bread, milk and produce,” said Pritzker, who signed the bill in Venice, a Metro East town of around 1,500 along the Mississippi river. The entirety of Venice sits in a food desert, more than a mile from a store or supermarket, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. (Bauer, 8/18)

Advocate: Nebraskans Ask State Supreme Court To Overturn Abortion, Trans Care Restrictions
Planned Parenthood of the Heartland and its medical director, Dr. Sarah Traxler, are appealing the dismissal of their lawsuit challenging a Nebraska law that bans most abortions after 12 weeks of pregnancy and restricts gender-affirming care for transgender people under age 19. ... The Planned Parenthood group and Traxler filed a notice of appeal Friday with the Nebraska Supreme Court. They are represented by the American Civil Liberties Union, its Nebraska affiliate, and Powers Law.

The Hill: Nebraska Abortion Rights Group Begins 2024 Ballot Initiative Push
An abortion rights group in Nebraska is taking initial steps to put the issue on the ballot in 2024. A political campaign committee called Protect Our Rights filed paperwork earlier this month in support of a ballot initiative that would amend the state constitution to protect the right to an abortion. (Weixel, 8/18)

Health News Florida: AHCA Fines Clinic $193,000 Over Abortion Rule - Triple The Judge's Recommendation 
Health regulators Monday ordered an Orlando abortion clinic to pay a $193,000 fine for violating a law that requires women to wait 24 hours before having abortions, nearly three times the fine recommended by an administrative law judge. The state Agency for Health Care Administration issued a final order requiring the Center of Orlando for Women to pay a $1,000 fine for each of 193 violations shortly after the law took effect in April 2022. Administrative Law Judge J. Bruce Culpepper this spring issued a recommended order that said the clinic should pay a $67,550 fine — $350 for each violation. But under administrative law, the recommended order had to go to AHCA for a final decision. (Saunders, 8/18)

Time: Restrictions On Abortion Pill Could Set Off A Domino Effect 
The ruling has no immediate effect on the availability of mifepristone. ... But what is clear, experts say, is any restriction on mifepristone would have ripple effects for the entire abortion-care system. In 2020, 53% of all facility-based U.S. abortions used medication, rather than surgical methods. If mifepristone becomes harder or impossible to access, providers would either have to change their standards of care to continue offering medication abortions, or find a way for an already overburdened clinical network to squeeze in hundreds of thousands of extra procedural-abortion appointments. “This could ultimately be a cataclysm for U.S. abortion access,” says Caitlin Myers, who researches the issue at Middlebury College. “Or it might be nothing.” (Ducharme, 8/18)

In other reproductive health news —

Alabama Reflector: Alabama Health Department Approves Birth Center Regulations
The Alabama Department of Public Health (ADPH) on Thursday approved a set of rules that would require birthing centers to have oversight by a physician or medical director at its State Committee of Public Health meeting in Montgomery. The rules proposed would also require birth centers to be within 30 minutes of a hospital with OB-GYN services. (Rocha, 8/18)

USA Today: Postpartum Depression Affects Dads, Too. It Can Put Child At Risk.
As a new postpartum pill for women gains national attention, health experts say it’s also important to highlight men’s mental health needs after having a baby, with researching showing 1 in 10 fathers experience postpartum depression and anxiety. A new study also suggests addressing paternal mental health is vital for baby's health after finding children born to dads with depression are at increased risk of developing depression themselves. (Rodriguez, 8/19)

The New York Times: The Next Frontier For Corporate Benefits: Menopause
In her late 40s, Celia Chen began experiencing unexplained symptoms like anxiety, a spike in blood sugar, acne and chronic pain in her shoulder — all of which she attributed to her high-pressure job as a marketing executive at a start-up, which involved red eye flights and long hours. After switching to a new gynecologist, at 48, she learned that these changes were related to her transition to menopause, known as perimenopause. And that the stress of the job was only making them worse. Ms. Chen says her doctor told her, “‘your body is screaming for you to stop.’” (Gupta, 8/19)

CNN: Ban Spanking In All Schools, Pediatrician Group Urges. Do This Instead
Spanking or striking children in school, or corporal punishment, should be “abolished in all states by law,” according to an updated policy statement by the Council on School Health and released Monday by the American Academy of Pediatrics. The use of corporal punishment has dropped over the years, but it is “either expressly allowed or not expressly prohibited in 23 states,” US Education Secretary Miguel A. Cardona said in March before Colorado banned the practice. “Furthermore, researchers have determined that the use of corporal punishment in schools is likely underreported.” (LaMotte, 8/21)

The Washington Post: Study: Kids Who’ve Been Assaulted More Likely To Develop Mental Illness
Children and adolescents who have been physically assaulted are nearly twice as likely as their peers to develop mental illness after the assault — and the risk is even higher in the first year after an incident, research suggests. The analysis, published in JAMA Network Open on Wednesday, looked at the medical records of 27,435 children in Ontario, Canada, including 5,487 kids who had been at an emergency room or hospital after a physical assault between 2006 and 2014 before age 14. (Blakemore 8/19)

Columbus Dispatch: Suicide May Be On The Rise Among Ohio's Children. Here's What We Know
Many kids and families struggling with mental health don't get treatment right away and often they're confronted with long wait times. On average, it takes about 11 years from the onset of symptoms for a child struggling with his or her mental health to obtain treatment, according to the U.S. Surgeon General's office. That's due in part to a longstanding nationwide shortage of childhood psychiatrists has left the health care system unprepared for the rise of mental health crises among kids, according to the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. (Filby, 8/21)

The Washington Post: More Obituaries Acknowledge Suicide As Openness On Mental Health Grows
When Deborah and Warren Blum’s 16-year-old died by suicide in November 2021, they went into shock. For two days, the grief-stricken Los Angeles couple didn’t sleep. But when it came time to write a death notice, Deborah Blum was clearheaded: In a heartfelt tribute to her smart, funny, popular child, who had recently come out as nonbinary, she was open and specific about the mental health struggles that led to Esther Iris’s death. (Waldman, 8/20)

The Hill: Four Possible Reasons Women Are More Stressed In College Than Men
Students across the country are grappling with feelings of depression and anxiety, especially following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic — and women, it appears, are being hit by those feelings particularly hard.   This past spring, 72 percent of female students in four-year undergraduate programs reported feeling stress “a lot of the prior” day while 56 percent of male students said the same, according to recently released Gallup poll findings. (O'Connell-Domenech, 8/20)   

New Hampshire Public Radio: After Push From Sununu, NH Mental Health Board Moves Ahead On Licensing Rules
Two years after a new law called for changes in New Hampshire’s mental health licensing, the board that oversees those rules is now taking action to implement it, after pressure from Gov. Chris Sununu. The 2021 law created two new categories of licenses for social workers, as well as a system of conditional licenses for clinicians who are still working toward full licensure. But those changes have yet to take effect, because the New Hampshire Board of Mental Health Practice hasn’t adopted the necessary rules. (Cuno-Booth, 8/18)

If you are in need of help —

Dial 9-8-8 for 24/7 support from the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. It's free and confidential.

NPR: Maui Wildfires Have A Huge Mental Health Toll
Survivors are still dealing with physical challenges like where they'll be living in the coming weeks and months. But size of the emotional and psychological toll here is coming into sharper focus as the need for mental health support is growing. Mental health administrator Oliver calls it "the worst mental health disaster in our state's modern history." (Westervelt, 8/21)

The Washington Post: Maui Fire Survivors Face Trauma And Cognitive Woes Dubbed ‘Fire Brain’ 
The harmful effects of wildfire exposure don’t disappear once the flames are extinguished, experts said. There is growing research that suggests breathing in the tiny particles from wildfire smoke can produce cognitive deficits, which may appear in as little as six to 12 months or even years later. Surviving a near-death experience also raises the risk of post-traumatic stress, with such symptoms as depression, sleep disorders, anxiety and survivor’s guilt, researchers said. (Cimons and Bellware, 8/20)

Reuters: Maui Children Face Grief, Destruction As Schools Start Up After Wildfire 
Before wildfire ravaged the Hawaiian community of Lahaina last week, high school teacher Mike Landes was always the guy arguing that academics come first - before worries about the social and emotional development of the students. But as parents, teachers and students begin trickling back to school after wildfires ravaged the community in the western part of Hawaii's island of Maui, mental health, he now insists, must take priority. (Bernstein, 8/19)

NPR: 'Give Yourself Grace': Camp Fire Survivors Offer Advice To People In Maui
What do you do after wildfires have destroyed your home, your community and the life you knew? ... For some, the events unfolding in Maui serve as a painful reminder of what they went through and the lessons they learned. That's especially true for survivors of the 2018 Camp Fire, which killed 85 people and virtually destroyed the California towns of Paradise and Concow. (Treisman and Rao, 8/18)

Also —

Reuters: The Doctors, Dentists And Anthropologists Striving To Identify Maui's Victims 
Inside a temporary morgue near the Maui County coroner's office, a team of specialists – including forensic pathologists, X-ray technicians, fingerprint experts and forensic dentists – labor 12 hours a day to identify the charred remains of the victims of this month's cataclysmic wildfire. They are members of the federal Disaster Mortuary Operational Response Team program, or DMORT, deployed when a mass fatality incident overwhelms local authorities. (Ax, 8/20)

NBC News: Maryland Reports First Locally Acquired Malaria Case In 40 Years
Another case of rare "locally acquired" malaria, this one in the Washington, D.C., area, has been reported amid a string of such infections since May, officials said Friday. The unidentified patient had not traveled recently outside the U.S., the Maryland Health Department said in a statement. The person was hospitalized and is recovering, it said. (Romero, 8/20)

Health News Florida: New Cases Of Locally Acquired Dengue Were Reported In Broward And Miami-Dade
Four new cases of the locally acquired mosquito-borne illness dengue fever were reported in Broward and Miami-Dade counties between July 30 and Aug. 5 by the Florida Department of Health. There have been 10 locally acquired cases in Florida this year. Eight in Miami-Dade and two in Broward. (Herrera, 8/18)

CBS News: Salmonella Outbreak Across 11 States Linked To Small Turtles
An 11-state salmonella outbreak has been linked to small turtles, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned Friday. At least 26 illnesses have been reported, with nine hospitalizations, the health organization said. The outbreak spans the country. Tennessee, with six cases, has been hit hardest. There are also cases in Missouri, Illinois, Ohio, Kentucky, Virginia, North Carolina, Georgia, California, Pennsylvania and New York. (Chasan, 8/20)

San Francisco Chronicle: South Bay Airport Sparks Controversy In Fight To Ban Leaded Fuel
Two years ago, children in the heart of Silicon Valley were found to have blood lead levels higher than those found at the peak of the Flint, Mich., water crisis. One likely culprit: an airport where local pilots fill up their planes with fuel containing lead, embedded among schools, homes, parks, a Boys & Girls Club and a mall in a largely Latino community in East San Jose. (Hao, 8/19)

WUSF Public Media: An 'Alarming Level' Of PFAS Found In Some Florida Drinking Water, A Scientist Says
In Florida, the latest drinking water results show an “alarming level” of PFAS compounds at the Orangewood Water System in Holiday and in the city of Pembroke Pines. (Meszaros, 8/18)

St. Louis Public Radio: Wash U Scientists Cite Dangers Of Brown Carbon From Wildfires
Wildfire smoke may produce more damaging smoke particles than scientists had thought, according to a study led by Washington University scientists. The research team worked with NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in 2019 to examine wildfire smoke across California, Idaho, Oregon and Arizona. Scientists analyzed the smoke produced by megafire events and the carbon emitted into the atmosphere and observed more light absorption from dark brown carbon, a previously overlooked particle. (Davis, 8/21)

On the heat wave —

Kansas City Star: 169 People Treated During Heat Warning At Garmin KC Air Show
More than 100 people were initially treated for medical concerns at the Garmin KC Air Show Saturday amid an extreme heat wave. The show went on Sunday as sweltering temperatures continued, and dozens more people were treated. Of those who received medical attention Saturday, five had to be transported to the hospital, Johnson County MED-ACT said in a post on Facebook reporting patient numbers. A sixth person was hospitalized Sunday. (Spoerre, 8/20)

NBC News: Hot Classrooms Are Impairing Student Learning And Health Amid Record-Hot Year, Teachers Say
Research has shown that hot classrooms can impair student learning. In one study published in 2020, researchers found that "students who experience hotter temperatures during the school year before their exams exhibit reduced learning" and that students scored lower with each additional day of temperatures around 80 degrees or above. The study also found that heat "has substantially larger impacts on the achievement of students in lower-income school districts," especially Black and Latino students. (Silva, 8/19)

CNN: Covid-19 Linked With Higher Risk Of High Blood Pressure, Study Finds
When it comes to developing high blood pressure, Covid-19 might play an outsized role, a new study says. The report, published Monday in the medical journal Hypertension, found that more than 1 in 5 patients who were hospitalized with Covid-19 – and over 1 in 10 who were not – had been diagnosed with high blood pressure six months later. Compared with people who had influenza, another upper respiratory virus, those hospitalized with Covid-19 were over twice as likely to develop hypertension. (Viswanathan, 8/21)

CIDRAP: COVID-19 Tied To Dangerous Blood Clots In Cancer Patients
The risk of developing venous thromboembolisms—potentially serious blood clots in the veins—is elevated among cancer patients hospitalized with COVID-19 and taking anticancer drugs, according to a study yesterday in JAMA Oncology. (Wappes, 8/18)

More on the spread of covid —

CIDRAP: US COVID Markers Continue Slow Rise As UK Reports First BA.2.86 Case
COVID hospitalizations and death rose last week, along with other indicators and the proportion of newer Omicron variants such as EG.5, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said in its latest data updates. Also, scientists in the United Kingdom have identified the country's first case involving BA.2.86, an Omicron variant under close watch due to its many mutations and the possibility that it may already be circulating in multiple world regions. (Schnirring, 8/18)

Axios: COVID Hospitalizations Spike In Tennessee
COVID-19 hospitalization rates across Tennessee rose 48% between June and July amid signs of a late summer wave sweeping the country. The average COVID-19 hospitalization rate nationwide rose about 17% between June and July, per the latest available Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data. (Fitzpatrick, Beheraj and Rau, 8/18)

The Boston Globe: Moderna Readies Its Updated COVID Vaccine For Fall, But Demand Could Be Tepid
Analysts point to broad-based “COVID fatigue” ― dimming enthusiasm for another round of vaccinations. Fatigue has taken hold even as COVID hospital admissions nationwide have trended up in August, climbing 14.3 percent to 10,320 for the week ending Aug. 5, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But virus-related hospitalizations remain far below the 42,813 during the same period last summer. (Weisman, 8/18)

The New York Times: How Nursing Homes Failed To Protect Residents From Covid
The first terrifying wave of Covid-19 caused 60,000 deaths among residents of nursing homes and other long-term care facilities within five months. As the pandemic wore on, medical guidelines called for promptly administering newly approved antiviral treatments to infected patients at high risk of severe illness, hospitalization or death. Why, then, did fewer than one in five nursing home residents with Covid receive antiviral treatment from May 2021 through December 2022? (Span, 8/19)

KFF Health News: The CDC Works To Overhaul Lab Operations After Covid Test Flop 
In early February 2020, Kirsten St. George and her team at New York state’s public health lab received a test developed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to diagnose people infected with the new, rapidly spreading coronavirus. But, like many labs around the country, it quickly found the test gave inaccurate results. So test samples had to be sent back to the CDC for processing, wasting time and leaving state officials “sort of blind to what the situation was with the disease,” said St. George, chief of the laboratory of viral diseases at the Wadsworth Center, one of the nation’s largest state public health labs. (Whitehead, 8/21)

USA Today: Physician Assistants, Nurse Practitioners Or Doctors: What To Know
The nurse practitioner will see you now. It’s not the phrase most people are accustomed to hearing, but it’s increasingly the case, with patients more likely than ever to see providers with advanced degrees, such as physician assistants and nurse practitioners, instead of doctors. The physician shortage, a growing demand on health care and more people graduating with advanced degrees helped expand their presence at physicians offices. But what does that mean for patients? (Rodriguez, 8/20)

The Washington Post: Medicine Without Doctors? State Laws Are Changing Who Treats Patients.
Arlene Wright has been a nurse for more than 20 years in Fort Myers, Fla. She began working in hospitals as a teenage candy striper in Upstate New York, progressing through an associate’s degree in nursing, then a bachelor’s, then a master’s, then finally a doctorate of nursing practice in 2013.Wright has always told patients she’s a nurse practitioner, she says. She doesn’t flaunt her doctorate or try to mislead patients into thinking she has an MD. Still, when Florida lawmakers began considering a bill that would have prevented her from using her title, Wright was taken aback. (Avi-Yonah, 8/20)

More news about health care workers —

Los Angeles Times: Nurses Start 10-Day Strike At Garfield Medical Center 
Nurses launched a 10-day strike Friday at Garfield Medical Center in Monterey Park, accusing hospital management of failing to address short staffing that they said could jeopardize patients, broken and substandard equipment, and inadequate safeguards to protect nurses from violent attacks. (Reyes, 8/18)

KFF Health News: Tribal Health Workers Aren’t Paid Like Their Peers. See Why Nevada Changed That
Linda Noneo turned up the heat in her van to ward off the early-morning chill that persists in northern Nevada’s high desert even in late June. As the first rays of daylight broke over a Christian cross on the top of a hill near the Fallon Paiute-Shoshone colony, she drove toward her first stop to pick up fellow tribal members waiting for transportation to their medical appointments. Noneo is one of four community health representatives for the Fallon Paiute-Shoshone, which the tribe said includes about 1,160 enrolled members. The role primarily involves driving tribal members to their health appointments, whether in Fallon, a city of just under 10,000, or Reno, more than 60 miles west. Noneo said she and her colleagues have also taken patients as far away as Sacramento, California, and Salt Lake City, round trips of nearly 400 and 1,000 miles, respectively. (Rodriguez, 8/21)

A British nurse is found guilty of killing seven babies —

CNN: 'I Am Evil,' Wrote British Nurse Found Guilty Of Murdering Seven Babies In Her Care 
 A British nurse has been found guilty of murdering seven babies and attempting to kill six others at the hospital where she worked, making her the country’s worst baby serial killer in recent times. Lucy Letby, 33, harmed babies in her care by injecting air into their blood and stomachs, overfeeding them with milk, physically assaulting them and poisoning them with insulin, Manchester Crown Court in northern England heard. ... The UK government has ordered an independent inquiry into the murders, including “how concerns raised by clinicians were dealt with.” (Wilkinson and Haq, 8/18)

AP: Cyberattack Keeps Hospitals' Computers Offline For Weeks 
Key computer systems at hospitals and clinics in several states have yet to come back online more than two weeks after a cyberattack that forced some emergency room shutdowns and ambulance diversions. Progress is being made “to recover critical systems and restore their integrity,” Prospect Medical Holdings said in a Friday statement. But the company, which runs 16 hospitals and dozens of other medical facilities in California, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and Texas, could not say when operations might return to normal. (Eaton-Robb, 8/18)

In other health care industry news —

Modern Healthcare: Mayo Clinic Continues Expansion As Patient Volumes Improve
Mayo Clinic is the latest nonprofit health system seeing the benefits of improved patient volumes. The Rochester, Minnesota-based system saw a 10.4% year-over-year jump in patient service revenue, to $3.54 billion in the second quarter, and a 10% increase to $6.96 billion in the first half of the year, according to financial results released Thursday. (Hudson, 8/18)

Axios: Legacy Health-OHSU Merger Shakes Up Health Care In Oregon
Two of Portland's largest health care systems, Legacy Health and Oregon Health & Science University, announced plans to merge, raising questions about the future of health care services in Portland. While many details of the merger remain unknown, it requires regulatory approval under Oregon's year-old oversight program of health care industry mergers. Until then, it's unclear how patients and providers will be impacted. (Gebel and Harris, 8/18)

Axios: Rural Hospitals Feel Squeeze From Medicare Advantage
Already struggling rural hospitals see an increasing financial threat from the steady growth in Medicare Advantage enrollment. Lacking the bargaining powers of their larger peers who depend on commercial payers to turn a profit, some rural hospitals are losing money on private coverage like Medicare Advantage. The Medicare alternative's popularity with seniors is cutting into a typically better funding source for rural hospitals — traditional Medicare — as hundreds of rural hospitals face down financial calamity. (Dreher, 8/21)

CBS News: Life In A Rural "Ambulance Desert" Means Sometimes Help Isn't On The Way
That single ambulance station in Carrollton serves all of Pickens County, dispatching one and sometimes two ambulances to serve just under 20,000 residents spread across 900 square miles. The farthest reaches of the county line are 25 to 30 miles away on two-lane country roads. In rural areas where hospitals have shuttered, like Pickens County, the nearest surviving facilities are long drives away, ambulance coverage is sparse, and residents in the throes of medical emergencies often find their situations even more precarious. (8/21)

Modern Healthcare: Gundersen Health System, Xcel Energy Turning Trash Into Utilities
Fifteen years ago, Alan Eber watched from his car window as excess methane from the La Crosse County landfill was ignited into a five-foot flame. An engineer by trade, Eber knew he could use the natural gas at Gundersen Health System’s nearby campus in Onalaska, Wisconsin. “When you're driving down the interstate and see a large flame come out of a stack, you think to yourself, ‘Man, there must be energy there somehow,’” said Eber, director of Gundersen Envision, a for-profit subsidiary of the La Crosse-based seven-hospital nonprofit organization focused on sustainability. (Tepper, 8/21)

NBC News: Using Stem Cells, Doctors Restore Vision To People Blinded In One Eye
In a study published Friday in the journal Science Advances, Dr. Ula Jurkunas and colleagues have demonstrated that the procedure  — known as cultivated autologous limbal epithelial cell, or CALEC, transplantation — is safe. In a Phase 1 or “proof of concept” trial, four patients who all had chemical burns in one eye underwent CALEC transplants. (Tamkins, Klingbaum and Dahlgren, 8/18)

AP: Stem Cells From One Eye Show Promise In Healing Injuries In The Other 
Phil Durst recalled clawing at his face after a chemical from a commercial dishwashing machine squirted into his eyes, causing “the most indescribable pain I’ve ever felt — ever, ever, ever.” His left eye bore the brunt of the 2017 work accident, which stole his vision, left him unable to tolerate light and triggered four to five cluster headaches a day. Then he underwent an experimental procedure that aims to treat severe injuries in one eye with stem cells from the other. “I went from completely blind with debilitating headaches and pondering if I could go another day — like really thinking I can’t do this anymore” to seeing well enough to drive and emerging from dark places literally and figuratively, he said, choking up. (Ungar, 8/18)

In pharmaceutical industry news —

Stat: As Obesity Drug Market Grows, Telehealth Companies Court Payers
To much of the public, the promise of telehealth is all about convenience — get the prescription you need quickly, and get it delivered right to your door. But as digital health companies build out their weight loss businesses, capitalizing on the popularity of drugs like Wegovy and Ozempic, they’re courting a very different audience: payers and employers who have a vested interest in preventing quick scripts. (Palmer, 8/21)

The (Cleveland) Plain Dealer: ‘Living Life To The Fullest:’ Sickle Cell Gene-Editing Study At Cleveland Clinic, UH Offers Hope Of Pain-Free Living
Like many young women, Danielle Lee often makes decisions that worry her elders. Like traveling alone to Mexico to snorkel in the ocean, despite having been born with sickle cell anemia, a chronic genetic condition that destroys organs and curtails life spans. The chilly ocean water set off a sickle cell episode — severe, bone-crushing pain that at times forces her to crawl to the bathroom. She’s endured frequent emergency room trips and hospitalizations, too often encountering physicians who assume she’s seeking drugs. (Washington, 8/21)

Fox News: Heart Drug Combining 3 Medications In One Is Added To World Health Organization’s List Of Essential Medicines
A heart drug that combines three medications in one pill — otherwise known as a polypill — has been included in the List of Essential Medicines from the World Health Organization (WHO). The unique polypill is designed for those who have had a prior heart attack or other heart-related event, with the goal of preventing a repeat occurrence. It took 15 years of intense study and several versions to create it. (McGorry, 8/18)

Modern Healthcare: Viome Life Sciences Lands $86.5M For Diagnostic Tests
Viome Life Sciences, a startup diagnostics company, closed an $86.5 million Series C funding round Friday. Viome has developed multiple diagnostic tests for gut and oral health, which are meant to inform a user’s diet and lifestyle decisions. After taking the diagnostic test, Viome provides results directly to consumers via its mobile app. (Turner, 8/18)

The Washington Post: Smithsonian Secretary Lonnie Bunch: Human Remains Are Darkest History
As a historian, I have always felt that a full, unvarnished, honest telling of history is the only way for us to move forward as a people, as a nation and as institutions. All of us are profoundly shaped by the past, for good and for ill, and the Smithsonian — like so many other museums and universities — is grappling with a legacy once deemed acceptable but that is so clearly ethically wrong today. The Post’s recent coverage regarding the human remains still housed in our collections is certainly illustrative of the Smithsonian’s darkest history. This is our inheritance, and we accept the responsibility to address these wrongs to the fullest extent possible. (Lonnie G. Bunch III, 8/20)

Bloomberg: Fracking Linked To Lymphoma Cancer In Kids
America’s fracking boom has given the country inexpensive and secure energy. It has also spewed climate-wrecking greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. And evidence is mounting that it is gravely harming the health of people who live nearby. Is this a price we’re willing to pay for cheap gas? (Mark Gongloff, 8/18)

The Washington Post: How To Address America's Maternal Mortality Crisis 
Over the past two decades, most countries have made great strides in maternal health, bettering outcomes for mothers and children. The most glaring exception to this trend is, disappointingly, the United States. (8/18)

The New York Times: G.O.P. Candidates Don’t Want To Talk About Abortion — Kristan Hawkins Demands They Do
It’s a quandary for many of the 2024 Republican presidential candidates set to debate this Wednesday night: how to talk about abortion in America now that their long-held goal of overturning Roe v. Wade has been achieved. What should new abortion laws and limits look like? (Jane Coaston, 8/21)

USA Today: As A Pediatrician, I Remember Every Gunshot Victim I've Treated. Our Gun Laws Must Change.
I’ve always wanted to be a pediatrician – children bring me immense joy and hope. When I became a pediatrician, I was trained for treating sick kids with illnesses such as diabetes, asthma and pneumonia. I was not, however, prepared to treat kids with gunshot wounds. (Dr. Kelsey Gastineau, 8/19)

Bloomberg: Not All Covid 'Misinformation' Is Equal - Or Even Misinformation
Thousands of Americans have died because they didn’t get Covid vaccinations. A sea of anti-vaccine misinformation contributed to the problem, from rumor-mongering about the shots causing mass death to propaganda touting the benefits of ivermectin. Public health officials seemed powerless to stem the tide of lies. One of the big challenges public health officials now face is how to restore trust so that people listen to future guidance on everything from flu shots to childhood vaccines. (F.D. Flam, 8/19)

Stat: Hospital At Home Shows How To Bring Innovation To Health Care
As a health care economist who studies innovation, and as a management consultant who helps health systems and insurers adopt new technologies, we have had a ringside seat to a frustrating phenomenon: The large private sector of the U.S. health system can move faster to adopt valuable innovations than the public sector burdened by red tape and politics. But before adopting an innovation at scale, the private sector too often waits for the public sector to take the first step — sometimes for decades. (James B. Rebitzer and Robert S. Rebitzer, 8/21)