CNBC: Pfizer Covid Vaccine Safely Generates Robust Immune Response In Kids, Pfizer Says
Pfizer and BioNTech’s Covid-19 vaccine is safe and generates a “robust” immune response in a clinical trial of kids ages 5 to 11, the drugmakers announced Monday. The companies tested a two-dose regimen of 10 micrograms — about a third the dosage used for teens and adults — administered three weeks apart. The shots were well tolerated and produced an immune response and side effects comparable to those seen in a study of people ages 16 to 25, they said. (Lovelace Jr., 9/20)

The New York Times: Covid Vaccine Prompts Strong Immune Response In Younger Children, Pfizer Says
The Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine has been shown to be safe and highly effective in young children aged 5 to 11 years, the companies announced early Monday morning. The news should help ease months of anxiety among parents and teachers about when children, and their close contacts, might be shielded from the coronavirus. The need is urgent: Children now account for more than one in five new cases, and the highly contagious Delta variant has sent more children into hospitals and intensive care units in the past few weeks than at any other time in the pandemic. (Mandavilli, 9/20)

AP: Pfizer Says COVID-19 Vaccine Works In Kids Ages 5 To 11
For elementary school-aged kids, Pfizer tested a much lower dose -- a third of the amount that’s in each shot given now. Yet after their second dose, children ages 5 to 11 developed coronavirus-fighting antibody levels just as strong as teenagers and young adults, Dr. Bill Gruber, a Pfizer senior vice president, told The Associated Press. The kid dosage also proved safe, with similar or fewer temporary side effects -- such as sore arms, fever or achiness -- that teens experience, he said. (Neergaard, 9/20)

CNN: Moderna's Vaccine Is The Most Effective, But Pfizer And J&J Also Protect Well, CDC-Led Study Says 
A head-to-head study of all three authorized coronavirus vaccines in the United States finds the Moderna vaccine is slightly more effective than Pfizer's in real-life use in keeping people out of the hospital, and Johnson & Johnson's Janssen vaccine comes in third, but still provides 71% protection. Pfizer's vaccine provided 88% protection against hospitalization, and Moderna's was 93% effective. (Fox, 9/17)

CIDRAP: CDC: Moderna COVID Vaccine Most Protective Against Hospital Cases 
All three COVID-19 vaccines currently in use in the United States offer significant protection against hospitalization for COVID-19, but Moderna is the most effective among US adults who are not immunocompromised, according to new data published today in Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. ... In a study involving a case-control analysis of 3,689 adults who were hospitalized at 21 US hospitals at some point from Mar 11 through Aug 15, the vaccine effectiveness (VE) against COVID-19 hospitalizations was 93% for Moderna, 88% for Pfizer/BioNTech, and 71% for the single-dose Johnson & Johnson (J&J) vaccine. (Soucheray, 9/17)

Axios: CDC: Moderna Vaccine Most Effective Against Hospitalization In U.S. 
The higher effectiveness of Moderna could be due to the higher mRNA content or the difference between the timing between doses, the authors note. ... The higher effectiveness of Moderna could be due to the higher mRNA content or the difference between the timing between doses, the authors note. (Fernandez, 9/17)

AP: Top Doctors Say Not So Fast To Biden's Boosters-For-All Plan
Just one month ago, President Joe Biden and his health advisers announced big plans to soon deliver a booster shot of the coronavirus vaccine to all Americans. But after campaigning for the White House on a pledge to “follow the science,” Biden found himself uncharacteristically ahead of it with that lofty pronouncement. Some of the nation’s top medical advisers on Friday delivered a stinging rebuke of the idea, in essence telling the White House: not so fast. (Miller, 9/18)

NPR: FDA Panel Says Pfizer COVID Booster OK For Older People And Those At High Risk
In a surprising vote, a panel of advisers to the Food and Drug Administration on Friday recommended against approval of a booster dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for people 16 years and older. The 16-2 vote against broad use of the booster, which would be given about six months after completion of the two-dose immunization regimen, dealt a setback to Pfizer and complicates the FDA's approach to boosters. After a brief intermission following the rejection, FDA officials returned to the meeting with a revised booster question. The panel then voted 18-0 in support of the agency authorizing a booster shot of the vaccine for people 65 and older or at high risk of severe COVID-19. (Hensley, 9/17)

Stat: FDA Advisory Panel Recommends Booster Doses Of Covid-19 Vaccine Only For Older And High-Risk Americans
An advisory panel to the Food and Drug Administration on Friday recommended against a booster dose of a Covid-19 vaccine for most Americans at this time — a major rebuke to the Biden administration — but voted unanimously to recommend one to Americans who are 65 or older. The FDA is not required to follow the recommendation of its advisory committees but generally does. If the recommendation is adopted by the FDA and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, it would put the U.S. policy on a par with countries like the United Kingdom. (Branswell and Herper, 9/17)

Officials and lawmakers react to the panel's votes —

CNBC: Fauci Defends FDA Panel Decision To Reject Third Doses For All Americans
Dr. Anthony Fauci defended the Food and Drug Administration panel’s decision to reject offering a third booster shot of the Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine to the general U.S. population. “I don’t think they made a mistake,” the White House chief medical adviser told CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday. Fauci added that he would support a third dose if future data shows it’s effective. As the FDA continues to gather new information on boosters, convincing unvaccinated Americans to get vaccinated remains the priority. (Subin, 9/19)

Politico: Collins, Fauci Endorse And Explain FDA’s Recommendation For Limited Use Of Boosters 
U.S. health officials supported the recommendation from the FDA advisory panel that booster vaccines be limited to those 65 years and older and individuals at high risk for severe disease despite the expectation that the additional shots would be suggested for everyone who received the initial vaccination. National Institutes of Health Director Francis Collins said Sunday that the guidance issued Friday by the Food and Drug Administration is in line with what the Biden administration planned for a booster rollout, though not identical. (Crummy, 9/19)

Politico: Confusion Over Biden's Booster Plan Riles Governors
The combination of aggressive state action and health experts’ pushback against Biden’s plan has amplified confusion about who needs boosters now, as the highly contagious Delta variant rips across the country. Some doctors are already recommending or administering boosters to patients outside of the small group of severely immunocompromised people who already qualify for the shots. (Gardner, 9/19)

CBS News: Francis Collins, NIH Chief, Expects FDA To Expand COVID-19 Booster Recommendation In "Coming Weeks"
Dr. Francis Collins, head of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), predicted Sunday that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) will widen its recommendation on who should receive a COVID-19 booster shot in the "coming weeks" after the agency recommended the additional doses for the elderly and high-risk Americans. In an interview with "Face the Nation," Collins said it was "very significant" that an FDA advisory committee unanimously voted in favor of offering the extra vaccine doses to people 65 and older, as well as to those who are at high-risk for exposure, but the panel wasn't convinced the boosters were needed for the general public. (Quinn, 9/19)

USA Today: Fauci Confident FDA Will Back Booster Shots For All
Dr. Anthony Fauci on Sunday defended the Biden administration's booster rollout plans, downplaying confusion over the initial target date and who should actually get the additional jabs. "That was a plan that was always contingent, and every one of us said that, contingent upon the FDA’s normal regulatory process," Fauci, who made the rounds of the Sunday morning news shows, said on NBC News' "Meet the Press."President Joe Biden previously said boosters would be available to all this week. Fauci said Sunday that it was always up to the FDA with their advisers to determine "exactly what that rollout would look like." (Bacon and Santucci, 9/19)

Dr. Fauci says general population should wait for boosters —

The New York Times: Fauci Urges Americans Not To Get Boosters Before They Are Eligible 
Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease doctor, defended President Biden’s decision last month to announce the availability of Covid booster shots before regulators had weighed in, and he urged vaccinated Americans to wait until they were eligible for an extra shot before getting one. Dr. Fauci’s remarks on three Sunday morning news shows followed a vote Friday by an advisory panel to the Food and Drug Administration, which recommended that those who received the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine get a booster dose if they are over 65 or are at high risk of developing severe Covid-19. The panel’s recommendation, represented a more limited plan than one that Mr. Biden had announced over the summer, in which he said that, beginning Sept. 20, all Americans who had been fully vaccinated would be eligible for booster shots eight months after their last dose. (Thomas, 9/19)

Axios: Fauci: Vaccinating The Unvaccinated Remains The "Highest Priority" 
NIAID director Anthony Fauci said Sunday that while the coronavirus vaccine booster rollout is important, the "highest priority" is to vaccinate the unvaccinated. Fauci's statements on NBC's "Meet the Press" come days after an FDA advisory panel voted against recommending Pfizer vaccine booster shots for younger Americans, pouring cold water on the Biden administration's plan to begin administering boosters to most individuals. (Reyes, 9/19)

Also —

The Washington Post: Fauci Says Data On Moderna, Johnson & Johnson Boosters ‘A Few Weeks Away’ From FDA Review
Anthony S. Fauci, the White House’s chief coronavirus medical adviser, said data about booster shots for those who had received the Moderna or Johnson & Johnson coronavirus vaccines could be a few weeks away from being reviewed by the Food and Drug Administration, days after an FDA panel approved booster shots for a limited population of those who had received the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. “The actual data that we’ll get [on] that third shot for the Moderna and second shot for the J & J is literally a couple to a few weeks away,” Fauci said on NBC News’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday. “We’re working on that right now to get the data to the FDA, so they can examine it and make a determination about the boosters for those people.” (Wang, 9/19)

Axios: The COVID Booster Vaccine Discussion Is Far From Over 
An FDA advisory panel may have green-lit a third shot of the Pfizer vaccine for a somewhat narrow slice of the population, but the messy process of figuring out who should get another shot of the vaccine — and when — has likely just begun. Many vaccinated Americans are worried about their level of protection as the pandemic continues to rage. The piecemeal booster decision-making process may be the best way to keep pace with the science, but it's also at risk of becoming extremely confusing. (Owens, 9/20)

The Texas Tribune: Texas Abortion Law Spurs Feds To Send Funds For Emergency Contraception
The federal government announced Friday it is providing additional funding to Austin nonprofit Every Body Texas to address a potential increase in clients’ need for emergency contraception and family planning services now that Texas prohibits abortions as early as six weeks into pregnancy. Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra said in a release Friday that the Office for Population Affairs will award funding to the group, which is the statewide administrator of the federal Title X funding program, which provides family planning and reproductive health services to low-income patients. (McGee, 9/17)

Axios: Biden's HHS Issues New Protections For Texas Abortion Providers, Patients 
The Biden administration's latest move to bolster support for abortion providers and patients in Texas include funding for clinics, protections for health care workers and reinforcement of legal statutes specific to pregnant people, Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra announced Friday. The Biden administration has vowed to fight Texas' new abortion law, the U.S.'s most restrictive since 1973, on multiple fronts. (Chen, 9/17)

Houston Chronicle: 'Abort Abbott': Protesters Rally At City Hall To Decry Texas' Strict Abortion Law
About 50 people gathered Sunday outside Houston City Hall to protest Texas Senate Bill 8, which outlaws abortions after six weeks and puts the power of enforcement in the hands of individual citizens. Bearing signs and shirts with slogans such as “Abort Abbott” and “Don’t Mess With Uterus,” the protesters decried what they feel is a tyrannical exertion of control over women’s bodies. “This is not about ‘saving lives,’ this is about controlling the lives of women, and we will fight back against it just as we have done before,” said Khloe Liscano, 27, one of the organizers of Sunday’s event, to the crowd. (González Kelly, 9/19)

NPR: A Texas Doctor Says He Defied The Abortion Law, Risking Lawsuits
Texas outlawed abortions past the six-week mark in a law that went into effect on Sept. 1. Dr. Alan Braid, a Texas physician, says he performed one anyway just a few days later. In an opinion piece for The Washington Post on Saturday, Braid, who's been practicing for more than 40 years, explained his decision as a matter of "duty of care." The new law, known as S.B. 8, not only makes performing an abortion after about six weeks illegal, but makes it so that anyone who aids anyone else in getting one — by performing the procedure or even by giving them a ride to the clinic where they have the procedure done — runs the risk of being sued for at least $10,000. (Pruitt-Young, 9/19)

Politifact: Fact-Checking How Texas Ranks For Children's Health In Light Of New Abortion Law
The claim: "Let’s get this straight: (Texas is) a state that criminalizes abortion but ranks 50th in baby wellness checks, ranks 50th in clinical care for infants, ranks 50th in uninsured women, ranks 43rd in maternal mortality, ranks 44th in school funding per child, and ranks 46th in child hunger .. " — Occupy Democrats social media post. The post decried a new Texas law restricting abortion, and the Supreme Court’s recent decision to let it take effect. PolitiFact rating: Half true. It was correct about the women’s health insurance rankings and school spending, and it was close for child hunger. However, the most recent data shows that Texas is closer to the middle than to the bottom for baby wellness checks and maternal mortality. And a claim about clinical care for infants was unsupported. (Jacobson, 9/20)

In related news about abortion —

AP: Cecile Richards: Court's Texas Move Could Mean End Of Roe
A year after the death of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, one of the country’s top abortion-rights activists warned that the Supreme Court’s recent inaction on Texas’ extremely restrictive new abortion law could signal the end of judicial checks and balances on the issue. “For a lot of people, they’ve always assumed that, even if they lived in a state that passed restrictions on reproductive care, that there was always a judicial system that would be there to protect them and declare these laws unconstitutional,” Cecile Richards, former president of Planned Parenthood, told The Associated Press in an interview this week. “That isn’t happening any more.” (Kinnard, 9/18)

The New York Times: With Abortion Rights Under Threat, Democrats Hope To Go On Offense 
Democrats in Virginia and beyond are focusing in particular on suburban women, who played a large role in electing President Biden, but whose broader loyalty to his party is not assured. With Republicans smelling blood in next year’s midterm elections as Mr. Biden’s approval ratings slip and the economy faces a potential stall over the lingering pandemic, Democrats are looking for issues like abortion to overcome their voters’ complacency now that Donald J. Trump is gone from office. (Gabriel, 9/19)

In abortion news from other states —

Louisville Courier Journal: Abortion Protesters Mostly Ignore New Safety Zone At Louisville Clinic
On the first Saturday after a new "safety zone" law went into effect at a Louisville abortion clinic, some protesters ignored the 10-foot-wide restricted area at the entrance as they followed patients to the door, shouting and berating them. No police were present to enforce the zone meant to ensure safe access to EMW Women's Surgical Center, where patients often must pass through shouting, jostling anti-abortion protesters waving graphic signs of fetuses. (Yetter, 9/19)

Columbus Dispatch: Ohio Bill To Require Women Be Told Abortions Cause Depression, Cancer
Ohio Republicans are considering a bill to add requirements that doctors tell women that terminating their pregnancies could lead to feelings of guilt, depression, suicidal ideation and breast cancer. State Rep. Jennifer Gross, R-West Chester, introduced House Bill 421 on Thursday with 15 co-sponsors, all Republicans. It drew an immediate rebuke from NARAL Pro-Choice Ohio Executive Director Kellie Copeland. (Bischoff, 9/19)

NBC News: 'We've Been Preparing For A Post-Roe World': Ripples From Texas Abortion Law Spread To Illinois Safe Haven
The day was jampacked at a Planned Parenthood clinic in southern Illinois when a woman who had just driven over 12 hours from Louisiana for an abortion procedure erupted into tears during her health intake. Kawanna Shannon, the surgical services director at the Reproductive Health Services of Planned Parenthood of the St. Louis Region, dropped her tasks and led the woman into a private room to talk. The woman said she was panicking because she had used her rent money to pay for child care for her two kids, rent a car, buy gas and drive to the clinic in Fairview Heights. The days leading up to and after Texas’ restrictive abortion law went into effect, clinics in surrounding states became overbooked, diverting patients further away, including this patient who only had one extra day off work to get the procedure done, Shannon said. The woman's only option was Illinois, but it cost her her rent, she said. (Samee Ali, 9/19)

Axios: Manchin Wants To Pause Voting On $3.5T Spending Bill Until 2022
Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) is privately saying he thinks Congress should take a “strategic pause” until 2022 before voting on President Biden’s $3.5 trillion social-spending package, people familiar with the matter tell Axios. Why it matters: Manchin’s new timeline — if he insists on it — would disrupt the plans by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) to vote on the budget reconciliation package this month. (9/19)

Politico: Clyburn, Yarmuth Say Congress Might Miss Sept. 27 Infrastructure Deadline
Reps. Jim Clyburn and John Yarmuth both said Sunday that there is a chance Congress will not vote in time to meet the Sept. 27 deadline for the bipartisan infrastructure bill. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi set a date of Sept. 27 for the infrastructure bill the Senate passed in August, which some progressives in the party only agreed to support if the $3.5 trillion budget reconciliation bill was voted on as well. Appearing on CNN’s “State of the Union,” Clyburn (D-S.C.) , the House majority whip, said that the passage of the infrastructure bill may not be doable in the time frame since the reconciliation package won’t be done by that time. (Crummy, 9/19)

Politico: Sinema Tells White House She’s Opposed To Current Prescription Drug Plan 
The White House has a new headache as it struggles to get its multitrillion-dollar party-line spending bill passed: Sen. Kyrsten Sinema's objections to drug pricing reforms that are already struggling to make it through the House. The Arizona Democrat is opposed to the current prescription drug pricing proposals in both the House and Senate bills, two sources familiar with her thinking said. They added that, at this point, she also doesn’t support a pared-back alternative being pitched by House Democratic centrists that would limit the drugs subject to Medicare negotiation. (Barron-Lopez, 9/19)

CBS News: Sanders Says Democrats Are "Going To Come Together" On Reconciliation Bill
Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, the chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, predicted Sunday that Democrats will "come together" to pass the $3.5 trillion social spending package under consideration in Congress, even as two key Senate Democrats remain steadfast in their opposition to the plan's cost. "I expect, because of the pressure of the American people, we're going to come together again and do what has to be done," Sanders, an independent who votes with the Democrats, said in an interview on "Face the Nation." Democratic-led House committees completed work last week in crafting their respective portions of the massive $3.5 trillion package, which includes President Biden's plans for universal pre-K, expanding Medicare, child and elder care, and the environment. (Quinn, 9/19)

Also —

AP: Democrats Push To Retool Health Care Programs For Millions
Dental work for seniors on Medicare. An end to sky’s-the-limit pricing on prescription drugs. New options for long-term care at home. Coverage for low-income people locked out of Medicaid by ideological battles. Those are just some of the changes to health care that Democrats want to achieve with President Joe Biden’s massive “Build Back Better” plan. The $3.5 trillion domestic agenda bill touches almost all aspects of American life, from taxes to climate change, but the health care components are a cornerstone for Democrats, amplified during the COVID-19 crisis. (Alonso-Zaldivar and Mascaro, 9/19)

The Washington Post: A Once-In-A-Decade Chance To Overhaul Health Care Gets Personal For Democrats And Advocates
Trapped in his California house by worsening paralysis, Ady Barkan has a fervent wish: that Congress spend $400 billion so more poor and disabled Americans can get home health aides of their own. “Home care is keeping me alive. I don’t think I could tolerate my paralysis if I were isolated in a nursing home instead of surrounded by the love of my children and wife every day,” Barkan wrote to The Washington Post, in a message the ALS patient typed using eye movement. “But millions of disabled people and their families aren’t as lucky as me.” (Diamond, Roubein and Goldstein, 9/19)

Politico: Battle Over Biden’s Massive Child-Care Bill Takes New Turn With Virus 
Working women, whose child care duties vastly expanded during the pandemic, are bracing for a new hit to their incomes and careers as the resurgent coronavirus jeopardizes plans to keep kids in school full time. After 18 months of shutdowns, online learning and canceled summer camps, the return to classrooms was supposed to be a turning point for women, whose participation in the labor force plunged to its lowest level in more than three decades during the pandemic. But as Covid-19 cases rose in the summer, more than 40,000 women dropped out of the labor force between July and August, even as Americans flocked back to work, government data shows. Men returned to the job over that period at more than three times that rate. (Cassella, 9/18)

Stat: Drug Pricing Reform Advocates Scramble To Reset After Setback In Congress
For the cadre of progressive groups fighting to bring down drug prices in a big way, this week was a massive setback. The broad coalition, which includes consumer advocates, employers, and labor unions, was blindsided Wednesday when a trio of moderate House Democrats formally opposed Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s sweeping drug pricing package — a consequential move, since Democrats’ razor-thin majority means that even three opponents could force leadership to water down or abandon an otherwise popular policy. (Florko and Cohrs, 9/18)

Modern Healthcare: Large Insurers Prepare To Profit From Democratic Proposal To Expand Medicaid
Private insurers are set to win big if House Democrats' plan to close the Medicaid expansion coverage gap passes Congress. The proposal, which passed a key committee this week, would create a new federal Medicaid look-alike program in non-expansion states, with its administration to be outsourced to managed care organizations and other third parties by the Health and Human Services Department through a bidding process. Managed-care organizations, which deliver Medicaid benefits on the behalf of states, already cover 54 million people, nearly 70% of Medicaid beneficiaries, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. (Hellmann and Tepper, 9/17)

Stat: Senate Broadens Its Plans To Penalize Pharma For Hiking Drug Prices
A key Senate panel is expanding its plans to punish drug makers that hike prices faster than inflation, according to an internal Senate document described to STAT. The policy, which is being considered as part of Democrats’ efforts to include drug pricing reforms in a sweeping government spending package, has the potential to change the way drug makers set launch prices for drugs, and how they choose to adjust prices over time. (Cohrs, 9/20)

In related news about the immigration crisis —

The Wall Street Journal: Immigration Measure Can’t Be Included In $3.5 Trillion Package, Senate Parliamentarian Says 
The arbiter of Senate procedural rules said Sunday that Democrats’ plan to provide a pathway to citizenship for millions of immigrants living in the country illegally couldn’t be included in a wide-ranging $3.5 trillion proposal expanding the safety net and responding to climate change. The decision from the office of Senate parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough said that the plan to legalize a group including young immigrants, farmworkers, essential workers and those living in the U.S. on humanitarian grounds didn’t comply with the chamber’s rules. (Hackman and Hughes, 9/19)

AP: Haitians On Texas Border Undeterred By US Plan To Expel Them
Haitian migrants seeking to escape poverty, hunger and a feeling of hopelessness in their home country said they will not be deterred by U.S. plans to speedily send them back, as thousands of people remained encamped on the Texas border Saturday after crossing from Mexico. Scores of people waded back and forth across the Rio Grande on Saturday afternoon, re-entering Mexico to purchase water, food and diapers in Ciudad Acuña before returning to the Texas encampment under and near a bridge in the border city of Del Rio. (Lozano, Gay and Spagat, 9/19)

The Washington Post: Covid Hospital Bills Arrive For Patients As Insurers Restore Deductibles And Copays 
Jamie Azar left a rehab hospital in Tennessee this week with the help of a walker after spending the entire month of August in the ICU and on a ventilator. She had received a shot of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine in mid-July but tested positive for the coronavirus within 11 days and nearly died. Now Azar, who earns about $36,000 a year as the director of a preschool at a Baptist church in Georgia, is facing thousands of dollars in medical expenses that she can’t afford. (Rowland, 9/18)

Modern Healthcare: FEMA Agrees To Cover COVID-19 Expenses For NYC Public Hospitals
New York City's public hospital system will receive additional government support for the expenses it accrued during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic. Following pressure from New York lawmakers and health system officials, the Federal Emergency Management Agency agreed to cover almost all of the hospitals' excess costs from that period of the pandemic, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-N.Y.) said during a news conference Wednesday. In October 2020, NYC Health + Hospitals submitted a reimbursement request to FEMA, asking for about $900 million to offset expenses related to hiring extra staff and expanding bed capacity to treat hospitalized COVID-19 patients. (Devereaux, 9/17)

Antibody treatments are running short in some areas —

The New York Times: They Shunned Covid Vaccines But Embraced Antibody Treatment 
Vaccine-resistant Americans are turning to the treatment with a zeal that has, at times, mystified their doctors, chasing down lengthy infusions after rejecting vaccines that cost one-hundredth as much. Orders have exploded so quickly this summer — to 168,000 doses per week in late August, up from 27,000 in July — that the Biden administration warned states this week of a dwindling national supply. (Mueller, 9/18)

Fox News: States Warn Of COVID-19 Antibody Drug Shortage
State officials across the country are sounding the alarm over shortages of monoclonal antibody drugs used for the treatment of COVID-19, with some warning unvaccinated folks not to count on having such treatments available in the instance that they contract the virus in the near future. With demand far outpacing supply for the drugs, namely Regeneron's REVG-COV and Eli Lilley's Bamlanivimab, the Biden administration announced this week that the Department of Health and Human Services would be "transitioned from a direct ordering process to a state/territory-coordinated distribution system" for the treatments. The agency promising the switch would give "health departments maximum flexibility to get these critical drugs where they are needed most." (Dumas, 9/18)

WUSF 89.7: Fried Asks Biden To Delay Reductions To COVID-19 Treatments 
A day after Gov. Ron DeSantis pledged to “fight like hell” to maintain Florida’s supply of monoclonal antibody treatments for people with COVID-19, Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried asked President Joe Biden to hold off on changing Florida’s allotment of the therapeutics. Fried, who is seeking the Democratic nomination for governor in 2022, asked for planned changes to the national distribution of antibody drugs to be delayed until the COVID-19 caseload is “further reduced” in Florida. (9/19)

In news about ivermectin —

Fox News: Horse Tranquilizer Crops Up In Overdose Deaths Around US
A horse tranquilizer drug often found mixed with opioids is increasingly involved in overdose deaths in some U.S. states. The drug, called xylazine, is a sedative used in veterinary medicine, and it is not approved for use in humans. Recently, the tranquilizer began popping up in the U.S. illegal drug supply, frequently in combination with heroin or fentanyl (both types of opioids), a mixture sometimes referred to as "tranq dope," Live Science previously reported. (Rettner, 9/18)

The Washington Post: Ivermectin Coronavirus Conspiracies Frustrate Horse Owners 
Equine ivermectin comes in small tubes and syringes and helps eliminate “many types of worms,” often for less than $10. And lately it’s been hard to find. Amid the recent clamor for the deworming agent — commonly used on horses, livestock and sometimes dogs and cats — as an unproven covid-19 treatment for humans, people who need to treat their horses with the substance have been faced with empty shelves and the fear that they could be mistaken for the people who are using the drug on themselves. (Pietsch, 9/19)

And hospitals are at the breaking point or beyond —

CNN: Covid-19 Cases Forcing Hospitals To Ration Care Is Unfair And Unacceptable, Expert Says 
With the spread of the Delta variant and lagging vaccination rates, Covid-19 cases have strained many hospitals across the US -- which one expert called unfair and unacceptable. Montana's health care system is under that strain, including St. Peter's Health in Helena, which is operating under crisis standards of care. "We are at the point where not every patient in need will get the care we might wish we could give. It is not business as usual at your local health care system," Dr. Shelly Harkins, chief medical officer of St. Peter's Health, said. (Holcombe, 9/20)

Anchorage Daily News: Impossible Choices Inside Alaska’s Inundated Hospitals
Now people in the state’s medical community say they’re watching a sophisticated hospital system stumble under low staffing levels and a crush of COVID-19 patients spurred by the highly infectious delta variant. Young pregnant women so sick with the virus they need a ventilator to breathe. People experiencing chest pain, a major heart attack symptom, waiting for hours in the ER. Gravely ill patients dying before they get care — or because someone else with better survival odds was prioritized for treatment. Alaska is experiencing one of the sharpest surges of COVID-19 in the United States, with more people hospitalized with COVID-19 than at any other time during the pandemic and vaccination rates in the nation’s bottom third. (Hollander, 9/17)

CNN: After 169 Hospitals, A Dad Finally Got The Covid-19 Care He Needed -- And Changed Dozens Of Skeptics' Minds 
Every breath Robby Walker takes is one that almost didn't happen. Just a few weeks ago, the Florida father of six was on a ventilator with Covid-19 pneumonia in both lungs. Like most Americans hospitalized with Covid-19, Walker was not vaccinated. "He is in dire need of an ECMO treatment, which is not available at the hospital that he is in," his wife Susan Walker told CNN in August. ECMO treatment uses an external machine that can function as the body's heart and lungs. It can be used for organ transplant patients, victims of severe heart attacks and seriously ill Covid-19 patients -- including young adults. (Yan, 9/19)

Stat: Seeing The Butterfly Effect In Hospital Transfers For Covid-19 Patients 
Can a young man with Covid-19 pneumonia in the emergency department of an Oklahoma hospital have an effect on an elderly woman with chest pain in Connecticut? An early-morning call from the head of my Connecticut hospital makes me think he can, and this butterfly effect is something many hospitals will be experiencing in the weeks and months ahead as Covid-19 and the Delta variant continue to surge throughout parts of the U.S. (Dutta, 9/20)

The Boston Globe: Coronavirus Was The Top Cause Of Law Enforcement Deaths In The First Six Months Of 2021, Report Says
COVID-19 was the leading cause of law enforcement deaths in the first six months of 2021, higher than the next two top causes combined, according to a report by the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund. The report states that 71 officers died nationwide in the first six months of the year as a result of contracting the coronavirus while executing official duties. That marks a 7 percent decrease compared to 2020, when 76 officers died of COVID-related causes during the first half of the year and no vaccines were available. “However, this would still make COVID-19 related fatalities the single highest cause of law enforcement deaths occurring in the first six months of 2021,” the report released this summer states. (Sweeney, 9/20)

In other news about the spread of the coronavirus —

The New York Times: Average Daily Deaths In The United States Surpass 2,000. 
The average U.S. daily death toll from Covid-19 over the last seven days surpassed 2,000 this weekend, the first time since March 1 that deaths have been so high, according to a New York Times database. Texas and Florida, two of the hardest-hit states in the country, account for more than 30 percent of those deaths: Florida, where 56 percent of the population is vaccinated, averages about 353 deaths a day, and Texas, where 50 percent of the population is vaccinated, averages about 286 deaths a day. In the United States as a whole, 54 percent of all people are vaccinated. (9/20)

The New York Times: Memorial Along National Mall Honors Pandemic Victims 
Peering at a sea of white flags blanketing the National Mall, Dr. Laura A. Valleni recalled the scores of pregnant women who had contracted the coronavirus at her hospital in South Carolina. Babies have been born prematurely, mothers have died and a surge of children has overwhelmed the pediatric unit for the past two months, she said. “I’ve been grappling with when it became OK for even one person to die of preventable illness,” said Dr. Valleni, a neonatal physician at Prisma Health Children’s Hospital–Midlands in Columbia, S.C. “There’s such tremendous grief.” (Cameron, 9/17)

Daily Yonder: Rural COVID-Death Rate Twice As High As Urban One 
Rural residents are currently dying from Covid-19 at twice the rate of metropolitan residents, according to a Daily Yonder analysis. And the rate of new infections in rural counties is 50 percent higher than the metropolitan rate. This stark divergence between rural and urban areas comes as the summer surge appears to be abating. (9/18)

Bangor Daily News: Maine Isn’t Changing COVID-19 Strategy Despite Surge Hitting Unvaccinated People Hard
Maine is sticking with its COVID-19 strategy as the virus rages through Maine’s unvaccinated population in a first major peak of cases since shots began and restrictions went away. While Maine has maintained the third-lowest case rate among states during the pandemic, it is being hammered on what looks like the back end of a summer wave of cases in the U.S. driven by the contagious delta variant, seeing the highest two-week growth rate in transmission of any state as of Thursday and setting a new record for critical COVID-19 patients on Friday. (Andrews, 9/20)

Also —

CIDRAP: Long COVID Linked To Age, Comorbidities, Women
Long COVID-19 was more likely to occur in those 40 and older, women, and those with at least one underlying health condition, according to an MMWR study today. The researchers looked at a random selection of 366 adults in Long Beach, California, who had COVID-19 from Apr 1 to Dec 10, 2020. Two months later, 35.0% said they still experienced an average of 1.30 symptoms. Then at a median of 202 days after the initial diagnosis, 31.4% still had symptoms, with the most common being fatigue (13.7% of total cohort), shortness of breath (10.4%), and a distorted sense of smell (9.6%). (9/17)

Stat: Winter Is Coming, Again: What To Expect From Covid-19 In The New Season
Winter is coming, again. A year ago, experts warned that the United States faced a grim winter if Americans didn’t mask up and social distance to slow transmission of the SARS-CoV-2 virus before “indoor weather” — aka winter — settled in for its long stay. We all know how well that warning was heeded. In January, cases topped 300,000 a day; Covid ended the lives of about 95,000 Americans before the month was out. Now indoor weather again looms in many parts of this country, and daily case counts are rising well into the six figures. (Branswell, 9/20)

The Wall Street Journal: The Real Reason You And Your Neighbor Make Different Covid-19 Risk Decisions
People’s assessment of what is safe has varied wildly during the Covid-19 pandemic—often leaving us baffled about why our risk decisions differ so sharply from those of our neighbors, friends and family members. Now, scientists are starting to better understand why. Recent research shows that, while politics and geography play a role, other factors are often more important in determining how we make decisions about Covid-19 risks. Personality traits that are shaped by genetics and early life experiences strongly influence our Covid-19-related decisions, studies from the U.S. and Japan have found. (Petersen, 9/19)

CNN: Chris Rock Says He Has Covid. 'Trust Me You Don't Want This,' Comedian Tweets
Comedian and actor Chris Rock revealed Sunday that he has tested positive for Covid-19, and he is using the opportunity to urge others to get vaccinated against the virus. On his verified Twitter account, Rock posted, "Hey guys I just found out I have COVID, trust me you don't want this. Get vaccinated." The former "Saturday Night Live" cast member didn't comment on his condition, and his representatives did not immediately return a request from CNN for further comment. (Hackney, 9/19)

KHN: I Got A ‘Mild’ Breakthrough Case. Here’s What I Wish I’d Known. 
The test results that hot day in early August shouldn’t have surprised me — all the symptoms were there. A few days earlier, fatigue had enveloped me like a weighted blanket. I chalked it up to my weekend of travel. Next, a headache clamped down on the back of my skull. Then my eyeballs started to ache. And soon enough, everything tasted like nothing. As a reporter who’s covered the coronavirus since the first confirmed U.S. case landed in Seattle, where I live, I should have known what was coming, but there was some part of me that couldn’t quite believe it. I had a breakthrough case of covid-19 — despite my two shots of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, the second one in April. (Stone, 9/20)

USA Today: 'Hog Wild': Insurers, Consumers Decry Coronavirus Test Costs As Labs Charge Up To $14,750
When Congress passed emergency legislation last year to get people quick and free access to COVID tests amid a nationwide shortage, lawmakers mandated key stipulations. Health insurance companies had to cover the test with no financial obligation to consumers and pay the list price for labs outside the insurers' networks. But some insurers and cost-conscious consumers are fighting what they consider high-priced tests from labs that charge 10 times or more than Medicare’s rate of $51 per test. The insurers allege in lawsuits that some labs are profiteering in the midst of a pandemic, but labs contend insurers are withholding payments for legitimate services desperately needed to protect patients and help public health track the virus. (Alltucker, 9/20)

The Washington Post: Pre-Flight Testing Can Reduce The Number Of Covid-Infected Passengers, Study Shows
A study of Italy-bound Delta Air Lines passengers found that a mandatory PCR coronavirus test taken within three days of flying weeded out the vast majority of covid-infected travelers. The study examined data from the airline’s program that allowed travelers to avoid quarantine in Italy if they provided proof of a negative molecular test within 72 hours and got a rapid test at the airport in Atlanta or New York before departing. Passengers had to undergo another rapid test after landing in Italy. (Sampson, 9/17)

In other travel news —

The Hill: White House Debates Vaccines For Air Travel
The Biden administration is facing an internal debate over whether to impose vaccine mandates for air travel, with President Biden’s chief medical adviser, Anthony Fauci, saying he would support a mandate but the White House claiming a new policy isn’t forthcoming. The potential of a mandate for domestic air travel would be fiercely opposed by Republicans and the travel industry and could add to the pushback Biden has received over his mandate on COVID-19 vaccines and testing for companies with at least 100 employees. (Gangitano, 9/19)

KHN: Ask KHN-PolitiFact: Is My Cloth Mask Good Enough To Face The Delta Variant?
In recent months, some European airlines have banned the use of cloth face coverings to control the spread of the coronavirus during air travel, instead favoring surgical masks — sometimes referred to as medical or disposable — and N95 respirators. It’s another salvo in the debate over the effectiveness of the ubiquitous cloth mask, which sprang into fashion when surgical masks and N95s were harder to find in the pandemic’s early days. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention still promotes cloth face coverings in its guidance about masks. (Gomez, 9/20)

The Washington Post: American Samoa, One Of The Last Places Without Coronavirus, Has First Infection 
American Samoa reported its first coronavirus case, 18 months into the pandemic, after a traveler tested positive after flying to the U.S. territory from Hawaii. The positive case was discovered during a quarantine period required upon arrival in American Samoa. The traveler was fully vaccinated, according to a news release published Friday by American Samoa’s Department of Homeland Security, and the positive result was confirmed by the Health Department Thursday. Officials say the individual tested negative before traveling. The traveler was asymptomatic when tested, according to the news release, and will continue to be monitored. (Firozi and Shammas, 9/19)

AP: Many Faith Leaders Say No To Endorsing Vaccine Exemptions
As significant numbers of Americans seek religious exemptions from COVID-19 vaccine mandates, many faith leaders are saying: Not with our endorsement. Leaders of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America said Thursday that while some people may have medical reasons for not receiving the vaccine, “there is no exemption in the Orthodox Church for Her faithful from any vaccination for religious reasons.” The Holy Eparchial Synod of the nationwide archdiocese, representing the largest share of Eastern Orthodox people in the United States, urged members to “pay heed to competent medical authorities, and to avoid the false narratives utterly unfounded in science.” (Smith, 9/17)

Oklahoman: OKC Catholics Are Discussing COVID-19 Vaccine Religious Exemptions
Some parishioners in the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City are having discussions about COVID-19 vaccine religious exemptions with their priests, while the faith group's archbishop has also spoken on the issue. Religious exemptions for COVID-19 vaccines have been in the news recently after an Oklahoma political candidate and pastor said he has distributed numerous exemptions in the wake of a new federal mandate. President Joe Biden recently announced vaccination requirements for federal workers and companies with more than 100 employees. (Hinton, 9/19)

Axios: International Mission Board To Require COVID Vaccine For Missionaries 
The International Mission Board, which deploys thousands of missionaries, announced that its plans to require COVID-19 vaccinations for those they're sending into the field. COVID-19 refusal rates are among the highest among white evangelical Christians and the requirement by the International Mission Board may be the first U.S. missionary agency known to have such a mandate. The policy from the International Mission Board applies to both current and future missionaries as well as some staff members. (Frazier, 9/17)

In other news about vaccine and mask mandates —

Axios: Footage Shows New Details After NYC Restaurant Incident Over Proof Of Vaccination 
Three tourists were arrested after allegedly assaulting a New York City restaurant hostess when she asked for proof of their vaccination status before they could be seated indoors, the New York Times reports. On Saturday, lawyers for the restaurant and the three women revealed that the tourists had in fact shown proof of vaccination and been allowed into Carmine's Italian restaurant, according to the Times. They were then joined by three men, only one of whom showed a vaccine card. The group then left the restaurant and that's where the fight broke out, per the Times. (Frazier and Saric, 9/19)

Politico: Mississippi’s Governor Criticizes Biden’s Vaccine Mandate While Suggesting People Get Vaccinated 
Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves argued against the White House’s vaccine mandate, calling the "unilateral action" an attack on the people of his state and threatening to sign onto a Republican-led lawsuit against it, despite the state having the country’s highest death rate per capita. In a contentious interview on CNN’s “State of the Union,” Reeves on Sunday criticized President Joe Biden’s push for more vaccinations by requiring employers with over 100 employees to require their workers to be vaccinated. (Crummy, 9/19)

Louisville Courier Journal: Nearly Half Of Kentucky Prison Staff Unvaccinated Against COVID-19
Nearly half of Kentucky Department of Corrections employees remain unvaccinated against COVID-19, despite a rule requiring workers without a vaccine in the state's 13 prison facilities to be tested up to twice per week. While 54% of workers in state prisons have been vaccinated, that figure is well below half in four facilities, with just 33% of staff vaccinated at the Eastern Kentucky Correctional Facility in West Liberty. At a press conference last week, Gov. Andy Beshear acknowledged that state corrections officers "are some of the lowest vaccinated populations by percentage, and I wish that wasn't the case." (Sonka, 9/20)

Salt Lake Tribune: Protesters In Salt Lake City Decry Vaccine And Mask Mandates
About 100 protesters waving American flags and holding signs decrying mask and vaccine mandates gathered along the curb of 700 East in Liberty Park Saturday, making Salt Lake City one of dozens of cities around the world protesting public health-related restrictions. The international group World Wide Demonstration promoted such events — called the Rally for Freedom — everywhere from Denmark to South Africa to Taiwan Saturday. The group held other rallies throughout the pandemic also protesting public health mandates. (Mesch, 9/18)

CIDRAP: Key Nursing Home Staff Lag In COVID-19 Vaccination, Study Shows 
A study yesterday in JAMA Internal Medicine finds that substantially higher proportions of US nursing home residents are vaccinated against COVID-19 than health workers, with certified nursing assistants (CNAs), who perform the vast majority of direct resident care, lagging considerably. ... Sixty percent of staff and 81.4% of residents, on average, from more than 14,900 nursing homes were fully vaccinated. Mean vaccination rates were lowest among CNAs (49.2%) and registered and licensed practical nurses (61.0%), while therapists, physicians, and independent practitioners had 70.9% and 77.3% coverage, respectively. (Van Beusekom, 9/17)

Philadelphia Inquirer: Penn Health System’s COVID-19 Vaccine Mandate Gets Near Total Compliance
About 99% of the University of Pennsylvania Health System’s 38,000 employees have complied with its COVID-19 vaccine mandate, including about 760 who got exemptions or deferrals for medical or religious reasons. Less than 1%, or about 380, were fired or quit rather than get the shots. UPHS provided that update on Friday, 17 days after the deadline for compliance. Officials are still analyzing final data for another 6,000 workers who are in UPHS facilities and thus required to be vaccinated, but are not paid by the health system. (McCullough, 9/17)

Philadelphia Inquirer: Philly's School Nurses Are Exhausted As Shortages And COVID-19 Double Their Workload
As the only medical professional in a building with nearly 900 students, Girls’ High school nurse Anne Smith is busy every day in a regular year. With a pandemic raging, Smith is now drowning, she said. Smith left work at 8 p.m. on Tuesday. She had been at school more than 12 hours, seen 21 students, tested 10 for COVID-19. There were jobs left to do when she walked out the door, but she was too exhausted to continue. And the veteran nurse — who has 21 years as a school nurse, and nearly 40 in the profession — sees a crisis in the Philadelphia School District. “They don’t have the manpower to handle the pandemic,” Smith said. “One nurse in each school can’t do it.” (Graham, 9/20)

NBC4 WCMH-TV: 100+ Nurses At Columbus Schools ‘Burnt Out’ From Handling COVID-19, Says Letter To Superintendent And Board 
More than 100 nurses working for Columbus City Schools say they’re overwhelmed handling COVID-19. A letter to Superintendent Talisa Dixon and the school board, signed by 115 school nurses, demands changes to protocol. Less than a month into the school year, the scathing letter says the virus is running “rampant” through school buildings and the current situation is not sustainable. (Ostroff, 9/17)

In other K-12 school news —

Las Vegas Review-Journal: CCSD Teachers Say COVID-19 Reporting Tool Forcing Them To Miss Work
Approximately 42,000 district employees must answer a series of questions via the emocha Mobile Health app, including whether they’re experiencing certain symptoms associated with COVID-19 or have been exposed to someone who tested positive. Depending on their responses, they receive a color-coded digital badge. If an account is flagged as yellow, it can trigger actions such as an employee being required to stay home and undergo testing. But three district employees, who spoke with the Review-Journal on condition of anonymity because they feared reprisals at work, say they’ve faced struggles getting cleared to return to work — even after testing negative. (Wootton-Greener, 9/19)

The New York Times: A New Covid Testing Model Aims To Spare Students From Quarantine 
When the schools in Marietta, Ga., opened their doors on Aug. 3, the highly contagious Delta variant was sweeping across the South, and children were not being spared. By Aug. 20, 51 students in the city’s small school district had tested positive for the coronavirus. Nearly 1,000 others had been flagged as close contacts and had to quarantine at home for seven to 10 days. (Anthes, 9/19)

Las Vegas Review-Journal: COVID Cases Rise In Clark County Schools, But Big Picture Cloudy
The Clark County School District has reported 728 COVID-19 cases among students and staff so far this month — nearly 450 more than a week ago — but it continues to provide no information on its online dashboard on the numbers forced to stay away after possible exposures. As of Friday evening, the district had reported 2,655 cases since July 1 on its online case dashboard. That represents less than 1 percent of its roughly 304,000 students and more than 42,000 employees. The district hasn’t disclosed how many cases have been reported since school started Aug. 9. Nor has it made public any information on the number of staff and students who have been required to quarantine or otherwise excluded from attending classes. (Wootton-Greener, 9/18)

Axios: Most Kentucky School Boards Vote In Favor Of Mask Mandates 
A majority of school boards in Kentucky voted in favor of mask mandates, according to the Kentucky School Board Association. A week ago, Kentucky's Republican-dominated legislature voted to revoke a statewide mask mandate in public schools that was meant to help prevent the spread of COVID-19. The decision on masks would instead be left up to individual districts. (Frazier, 9/18)

Modern Healthcare: Kaiser Permanente's Labor Woes Worsen As Union Authorizes Strike Vote
The labor union representing 24,000 Kaiser Permanente employees is pausing participation in its labor-management partnership with the integrated health system and is prepared to ask its members to vote on a strike, union leaders said Friday. The United Nurses Associations of California/Union of Health Care Professionals, which includes registered nurses, pharmacists, rehab therapists, midwives and optometrists, also said the landmark labor-management partnership created in 1997 is "on life support." (Christ, 9/17)

In other health care industry news —

Bloomberg: CDC To Spend $2.1 Billion On Push To Curb Hospital Infections
U.S. health authorities plan to spend $2.1 billion to improve infection prevention and control across American health care, by far the largest single such outlay in the country’s history. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention plans to distribute the funds over the next several years to health departments and medical providers, including hospitals and nursing homes. The money was authorized as part of the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan President Joe Biden signed in March. Money will begin flowing as soon as October to help bolster staff at nursing homes stretched by Covid-19 cases and labor shortages, the CDC said. (Tozzi, 9/17)

The Wall Street Journal: New Stanford Health Care CIO Oversees Covid-19 Support, Digital Transformation 
Stanford Health Care’s new chief information officer is balancing support to caregivers while continuing to advance the organization’s digital transformation. Michael Pfeffer, the former CIO at UCLA Health Sciences in Los Angeles, joined Stanford Health Care on Aug. 1. Dr. Pfeffer succeeds Eric Yablonka, who retired in May after more than three years in the role. (McCormick, 9/16)

Crain's Detroit Business: DMC CEO Audrey Gregory Stepping Down To Lead Central Florida Health System
Detroit Medical Center CEO Audrey Gregory is leaving the organization after two years at the helm of the investor-owned hospital on Oct. 22. DMC said Thursday afternoon that Gregory will become president and CEO of a health system in central Florida. She will be replaced on an interim basis by Brittany Lavis, the organization's CFO. Gregory joined DMC in October 2019 as president, and CEO of DMC Detroit Receiving Hospital, DMC Harper University Hospital, DMC Heart Hospital and DMC Hutzel Women's Hospital. Prior to that, she was market CEO of DMC parent company Tenet Healthcare's Saint Francis Healthcare System in Memphis, Tenn. and CEO of St. Francis Hospital - Memphis. (Pinho, 9/17)

Modern Healthcare: Percy Allen II, Longtime Healthcare Executive, Dead At 80
Percy Allen II always tried to honor those who propelled his career in healthcare by encouraging young administrators. Allen, a longtime healthcare executive known for building morale at financially troubled healthcare organizations, spent much of his time in recent years taking calls from emerging leaders seeking his advice, his wife Fay Allen said." He advocated for people of color to be part of this diverse world and for them to be a part of this corporate system," Fay Allen said. "They all learned from Percy's example and emulated some of his ideas and thoughts about equality at the corporate level for people of color." (Kacik and Ross Johnson, 9/17)

USA Today: Chantix Recall: Pfizer Recalls Smoking Cessation Drug For Cancer Risk
Pfizer is voluntarily recalling all lots of its popular anti-smoking drug Chantix for high levels of nitrosamine, which can increase the risk of cancer. According to the notice posted on the Food and Drug Administration website, the recall is for all lots of 0.5 mg and 1 mg varenicline tablets. The recall notice says that long-term ingestion can lead to a "potential increased cancer risk in humans, but there is no immediate risk to patients taking this medication." (Tyko, 9/17)

Stat: New Colon Cancer Study Suggests Mirati Has The Best KRAS-Blocking Drug
A drug from Mirati Therapeutics designed to block the cancer protein called KRAS shrank tumors in 22% of patients with advanced colon cancer, according to results from a clinical trial presented Sunday. When the Mirati drug, a pill called adagrasib, was combined with another targeted medicine, the colon cancer response increased to 43%. The adagrasib study results are the strongest reported to date for a new class of cancer drugs that work by blocking the effects of a specific type of KRAS alteration called G12C. The Mirati drug is potentially superior to a competing drug from Amgen that won U.S. approval in May to treat patients with KRAS-targeted lung cancer. (Feuerstein, 9/19)

In legal news —

AP: Use Of OxyContin Profits To Fight Opioids Formally Approved
A judge formally approved a plan Friday to turn OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma into a new company no longer owned by members of the Sackler family and with its profits going to fight the opioid epidemic. U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Robert Drain officially confirmed the reorganization Friday, more than two weeks after he announced he would do so pending two largely technical changes to the plan presented by the company and hashed out with lawyers representing those with claims against the company. (Mulvihill, 9/17)

Stat: Former Mylan IT Exec Pleads Guilty To Insider Trading
A former Mylan information technology executive pleaded guilty to an insider trading scheme in which he acted on tips from another executive ahead of public announcements about earnings, drug approvals, and a pending merger with a Pfizer (PFE) division. In court documents, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission alleged that Dayakar Mallu, 51, was tipped by an unnamed senior manager at Mylan and acted on the information four separate times between September 2017 and July 2019. In exchange for the inside information, the former Mylan executive shared a portion of the profits with the manager through cash transactions in India. (Silverman, 9/19)

CIDRAP: Highly Resistant Bacteria From Pet Store Puppies Continue To Cause Illness
A new study led by researchers with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) indicates that strains of extensively drug-resistant (XDR) bacteria linked to pet store puppies have been circulating for a decade and continue to cause illness. The study, published this week in JAMA Network Open, identified 168 patients who had XDR Campylobacter jejuni infections with epidemiologic or molecular links to pet store puppies from 2011 to 2020. Analysis of bacterial isolates from the patients found resistance to seven classes of antibiotics, including antibiotics that are recommended for treatment of Campylobacter infections. (Dall, 9/17)

In other public health news —

Bloomberg: Facebook Rebuffs Journal Reports, Citing Policy Trade-Offs
Facebook Inc. pushed back on reports that the company was aware of the negative impact of its products, claiming that the allegations don’t tell the whole picture. The issues of content moderation, mental health risks and misinformation are complex and defy simple policy solutions, according to a statement from Nick Clegg, Facebook’s head of global affairs, posted Saturday. He said the series of articles published by the Wall Street Journal last week is based on incomplete information about difficult subjects. (Edgerton, 9/18)

CNN: Uncontrollable Vomiting Due To Marijuana Use On Rise, Study Finds 
An unusual illness is on the rise in the United States, especially in states that have legalized marijuana. Habitual users of cannabis, including teenagers, are showing up in emergency rooms complaining of severe intestinal distress. "They are writhing, holding their stomach, complaining of really bad abdominal pain and nausea," said Dr. Sam Wang, a pediatric emergency medicine specialist and toxicologist at Children's Hospital Colorado, who treats adolescents with the condition. (LaMotte, 9/17)

Fox News: Study Suggests Microbiome Could Be Key To Losing Weight
Results from a new study indicate that a person's ability to shed pounds could have to do with what's in their guts – specifically, their microbiome.Microbiome are microorganisms that help us break down food, and each has an army of these tiny assistants. Researchers from the Institute for Systems Biology in Seattle decided to take a look at what role microbiome might play when it comes to weight loss. The scientists tracked the baseline microbiome of 105 people who were trying to lose weight and found that despite the entire group implementing healthier diet changes, roughly half of them did not lose weight. In looking at the participants' baseline gut microbiome, the researchers discovered that the people whose bodies were resistant to weight loss had microbiome with lower bacterial growth rates than their now-thinner counterparts. (Dumas, 9/18)

CIDRAP: Pneumonic Plague Case Identified In Wyoming
One pneumonic plague case in Fremont County, Wyoming, was reported to the Wyoming Department of Health (WDH) Sep 15, according to a WDH notice. This marks the seventh human case in Wyoming since 1978, with the most recent being an imported case in 2008.The patient was in contact with sick pet cats and is reported to have serious illness. (9/17)

AP: Justice Department Reviewing Policies On Transgender Inmates
The Justice Department is reviewing its policies on housing transgender inmates in the federal prison system after protections for transgender prisoners were rolled back in the Trump administration, The Associated Press has learned. The federal Bureau of Prisons’ policies for transgender inmates were thrust into the spotlight this week after a leader of an Illinois anti-government militia group — who identifies as transgender — was sentenced to 53 years in prison for masterminding the 2017 bombing of a Minnesota mosque. (Balsamo and Ibrahim, 9/17)

CNBC: Need For Long-Term Care Among Retirees Varies Widely, Research Shows
One of the biggest unknowns for retirees may be whether they’ll eventually need long-term care — that is, help with daily living activities — and to what degree. Many people may end up requiring little care if they need any at all, according to new research from the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College. About 20% of 65-year-olds will not need any long-term care during the rest of their life, and another one in five will need only minimal support. At the same time, though, about 25% will need significant help for more than three years. Another 38% will fall somewhere in the middle, needing a moderate amount of care for one to three years, the study shows. (O'Brien, 9/17)

North Carolina Health News: More Emergency Surgeries In States Without Medicaid Expansion 
There’s a big difference between getting a scheduled knee replacement surgery or back surgery and having an emergency gallbladder removal or cardiac catheterization. The orthopedic surgeries tend to be non-emergency, elective procedures that are planned in advance. On the other hand, gallbladder removals are often emergency surgeries, as patients are usually in excruciating pain. Emergency cardiac catheterizations are done on patients who are at high risk of imminent heart attack, a condition that often could be prevented by ongoing cardiac care. (Hoban, 9/20)

In updates from Florida, Louisiana, California and New York —

WJCT 89.9 FM Jacksonville: Jacksonville’s Overdose Death Rate On Par With Last Year’s Spike 
At least 270 people have died from overdoses so far this year in Jacksonville; 271 people had died from an overdose at the same point last year. Dr. Raymond Pomm is the medical director for Project Save Lives, Jacksonville’s initiative to prevent drug overdose deaths. He told a City Council committee Thursday there aren’t enough treatment beds for all of the patients that opt into the program. (Heddles, 9/19)

New Orleans Times-Picayune: 'They Were Forgotten': For People With Disabilities, Few Good Options During Disaster
It was four days after Hurricane Ida, and Grace Hollins worried her son couldn’t take one more day in the heat. Carl, 28, has severe intellectual and developmental disabilities. His seizures are aggravated by the heat, and Hollins had just one syringe of diazepam left to treat them. Adult diapers, usually delivered at the first of the month, were running low. Ida had broken a window and torn a hole through her roof in New Orleans' St. Roch neighborhood, and mosquitoes were coming in. She didn’t know where to turn. “It was scary. It was horrible. My son was not understanding,” said Hollins, 55, who is also disabled due to a back injury. “He just couldn’t grasp it. I couldn’t grasp it, either.” (Woodruff, 9/20)

CNBC: California Counties With High Covid Vaccination Rates Helped Newsom Win Recall Election
California Gov. Gavin Newsom has called his decisive victory in this week’s recall election a win for vaccines and science. The data backs him up. A CNBC analysis of county-level results — which are preliminary as mail-in ballots continue to be tallied — found a strong link between support for Newsom and counties with high Covid vaccination rates as of Election Day, Sept. 14. (Constantino and Rattner, 9/17)

Axios: Hochul Orders Release Of 191 Rikers Island Inmates 
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) ordered the release of 191 inmates from Rikers Island on Friday, and announced an agreement that could move up to 200 more to state prisons. COVID has deepened a crisis at the prison, which had years of neglect and dysfunction prior to the pandemic. Ten people have died at Rikers since December, the New York Times reported. (Garfinkel, 9/17)

Bloomberg: N.Y. Gubernatorial Candidate Zeldin Reveals Leukemia Treatment
Republican Representative Lee Zeldin said Saturday he was diagnosed with chronic myeloid leukemia and is in “complete remission” after nine months of treatment. The statement from the congressman seeking the Republican nomination to run for New York governor was the first time he publicly disclosed his diagnosis. Zeldin, 41, said his health is “phenomenal” and he has continued to campaign across the state. “Over the last nine months, I have achieved complete remission, am expected to live a normal life, and my doctor says I currently have no evidence of this disease in my system,” Zeldin said. (Edgerton, 9/18)

CNN: Vaccine Gap Stokes Super Spreader Fears Ahead Of UN's First Post-Covid Meeting 
US fears that this week's annual world leader jamboree at the United Nations could spark a super spreader event will highlight the stark inequality of global access to Covid-19 vaccines — even as developed nations begin offering booster shots. Scores of presidents, prime ministers and foreign ministers are set to ignore an American suggestion to stay home and address the UN General Assembly virtually and will converge on New York City in person this week. (Collinson, 9/20)

Bloomberg: Biden’s Vaccine Booster And Export Plans Collide At Summit
President Joe Biden will set a new course for global vaccine allocation this week, hosting a summit on the shortage of shots in poorer countries even as the U.S. moves to give booster doses to millions of fully inoculated Americans. The U.S. plan for boosters will steer tens of millions of doses into the arms of many U.S. adults starting as soon as Friday. That has angered nations where many people are still struggling to obtain a first shot. As world leaders gather for the United Nations General Assembly in New York this week, Biden aims to counter their criticism by hosting a virtual summit on Wednesday where he’ll propose a target of fully vaccinating 70% of the world by September 2022. (Wingrove, 9/19)

In other covid news from around the world —

CNBC: Singapore's Daily Covid Cases Breach 1,000 Levels Over The Weekend
Singapore reported more than 1,000 Covid cases for two straight days over the weekend —the first time infections breached that level since April 2020, at the height of the pandemic. The Southeast Asian country confirmed 1,009 new infections on Saturday, and 1,012 new cases on Sunday, according to data from the health ministry. That’s the highest number since April 23 last year. At that time, majority of Singapore’s cases were detected in migrant worker dormitories. Infections hit a record high of 1,426 on April 20, 2020. (Ng, 9/20)

CNBC: Top Glove Shares Fall As Covid-Induced Demand Eases
Shares of Malaysia’s Top Glove, the world’s largest medical glove maker, have fallen by more than 50% this year as the rollout of Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide dampened demand for gloves. “Like in every business, there’re always highs and lows. And you cannot expect super profits to continue for a long, long time. So, we’re glad that we had a good run last year,” Lee Kim Meow, Top Glove’s managing director, told CNBC’s “Street Signs Asia” on Monday. (Lee, 9/20)

Bloomberg: Bats In Laos Caves Harbor Closest Relatives To Covid-19 Virus
Bats dwelling in limestone caves in northern Laos were found to carry coronaviruses that share a key feature with SARS-CoV-2, moving scientists closer to pinpointing the cause of Covid-19. Researchers at France’s Pasteur Institute and the University of Laos looked for viruses similar to the one that causes Covid among hundreds of horseshoe bats. They found three with closely matched receptor binding domains -- the part of the coronavirus’s spike protein used to bind to human ACE-2, the enzyme it targets to cause an infection. (Gale, 9/18)

Reuters: Cambodia Bat Researchers On Mission To Track Origin Of COVID-19 
Researchers are collecting samples from bats in northern Cambodia in a bid to understand the coronavirus pandemic, returning to a region where a very similar virus was found in the animals a decade ago. Two samples from horseshoe bats were collected in 2010 in Stung Treng province near Laos and kept in freezers at the Institut Pasteur du Cambodge (IPC) in Phnom Penh. (Liu and Thul, 9/20)

Fox News: Lancet Article Calls For ‘Objective, Open And Transparent’ Debate Over COVID-19 Origins 
The Lancet medical journal has published an article calling for an "objective" and "transparent" debate about the true origins of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, more than a year and a half after its controversial article condemning "conspiracy theories" that suggest the virus leaked from a laboratory in China. The article published Friday, titled, "An appeal for an objective, open and transparent scientific debate about the origin of SARS-CoV-2," is signed by 16 scientists arguing that a laboratory-related accident is "plausible," as is the virus having a natural origin, and that neither theory should be ruled out yet. (Chasmar, 9/19)

In other global developments —

AP: UK Court Rules Under-16s Can Get Puberty Blocking Drugs
Britain’s Court of Appeal ruled Friday that doctors can prescribe puberty-blocking drugs to children under 16, overturning a lower court’s decision that a judge’s approval should be needed. Appeals judges said the High Court was wrong to rule last year that children considering gender reassignment are unlikely to be able to give informed consent to medical treatment involving drugs that delay puberty. The December 2020 ruling said because of the experimental nature of the drugs, clinics should seek court authorization before starting such treatment. (9/19)

Stat: U.K. Government Launches New System To Monitor Clinical Trial Reporting
After a prolonged effort, the U.K. government is now tracking whether clinical trial sponsors are reporting results, the latest sign that transparency campaigns are forcing greater disclosure by universities and companies. The move comes after a 2018 analysis found many trial sponsors — some of which were funded by the government — failed to report their findings. U.K. law requires all study results to be reported within one year. The disclosure prompted a key lawmaker to issue a blistering report criticizing the Health Research Authority for failing to enforce rules and impose penalties on wayward trial sponsors and investigators. (Silverman, 9/17)

NPR: Afghan Health Care Is 'On The Verge Of Collapse' Says Health Minister : Goats And Soda
Dr. Wahid Majrooh is acting minister of public health in Afghanistan, and he faces two looming challenges: leading the country's COVID response and maintaining health-care services in the wake of the Taliban takeover in mid-August. The COVID situation is daunting: over 150,000 cases and 7,000 deaths so far. The overall health-care picture is critical as well. To prevent the Taliban from gaining access to aid money, the World Bank and other international aid organizations suspended $600 million in funding, including support for the Sehatmandi project, which paid salaries for 20,000 health-care workers at 2,800 facilities across the country. Because of the suspension in funds, more than 2,000 of these facilities are shutting down, leaving the Afghan people bereft of care, both because of the inability to pay staff and the general lack of funding for health-care resources. (Thiagarajan, 9/18)

Chicago Tribune: Have Unvaccinated Health Care Workers Forgotten The First Rule Of Medicine? 
Everything we do in medicine carries risks. We continuously weigh the benefits of tests, procedures and medications against those risks. If the benefit outweighs the risk, we proceed. If the risk outweighs the benefit, we pause and consider other options. I was disturbed to read a headline last weekend that a hospital in upstate New York is pausing their maternity services — they said they will not be able to deliver babies. Why not? Because a critical number of their staff quit. Why? Because they would rather leave their positions than receive COVID-19 vaccines, which were recently mandated for health care providers in New York. Gerald Cayer, the Lewis County Health System CEO, said, “We are unable to safely staff the service after Sept. 24.” Sadly, there will be many more health care systems that issue similar statements. (Robert J. Citronberg, 9/17)

USA Today: COVID And ED: Why Getting Vaccinated Could Improve Your Sex Life
We need more studies to confirm it, but it looks like there is another important reason to get the COVID-19 vaccine — it could help prevent erectile dysfunction. As soon as doctors realized that the virus threatened the endovascular system, we started wondering if COVID-19 infection could cause ED. And anecdotally, since the pandemic began in March 2020, urologists like myself had noticed an uptick in patients who were experiencing erectile dysfunction. But while we suspected that COVID and ED might be related, it hadn't been proven yet. (Marcos Del Rosario Santiago, 9/18)

Newsweek: Psychedelics May Treat The Post-COVID Mental Health Crisis 
The COVID pandemic has left another pandemic in its wake: mental health. With unprecedented demands on our mental health services by a generation left traumatized, we need to look at new effective treatments for those affected. One of these new effective treatments is the use of psychedelics. There is a growing body of research that shows that psychedelics can be a safe and effective treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression, anxiety and various forms of addiction. What's more, this new way of treating those affected could create thousands of jobs and an entirely new sector within the health care industry. All we need to do is fund further research that can pave the way for wider mainstream adoption by medical professionals. (Ron Bauer, 9/18)

Scientific American: Vaccinate The World Before Starting COVID Booster Shots 
Earlier the World Health Organization set a goal of having at least 10 percent of every country‘s population vaccinated against COVID-19 by the end of  this month. It aimed to then raise that figure to 40 percent by the end of the year and to 70 percent by the middle of 2022. Sadly, these targets have little chance of being met. Of the more than 5.8 billion doses of COVID vaccines that have been administered across the world by mid-September, the vast majority (about 80 percent) have gone to people living in high- and upper-middle-income countries. Fewer than 0.5 percent of doses have gone to people in low-income countries. (Soumya Swaminathan, Ana Maria Henao-Restrep and Mike Ryan, 9/17)

NBC News: The FDA Covid Vaccine Booster Ruling Is The Right Call. The World Needs The Shots More
A Food and Drug Administration advisory group on Friday voted against calling for all adults to get a Covid-19 booster shot, after President Joe Biden announced last month that booster shots would be made widely available starting Sept. 20. At the time, he also said federal health authorities were considering approving a shortened timeline for boosters to allow Americans to receive a third dose of the Moderna or the Pfizer vaccines as soon as five or six months after full vaccination. (Leslie Bull and Gunisha Kaur, 9/17)

The New York Times: Booster Shots For Covid Leave Africa With Few Options 
As the rich world rolls out Covid-19 booster shots, hundreds of millions of Africans remain dangerously exposed, still awaiting their first vaccine dose. This not only adds to the litany of harsh disparities we’ve seen around this virus, but it is also a scandalous injury to global solidarity and vaccine equity. While early data on waning immunity is emerging around some vaccines, there’s no conclusive evidence to justify giving boosters to fit, healthy people. Third doses should be given only to the small number of people facing a high risk of severe illness and death, despite being fully vaccinated, including those with compromised immune systems. Boosters for the healthy are, effectively, a hopeful “why not.” Political decisions are getting ahead of science, diverting doses and leaving Africans with few options. (Matshidiso Moeti, 9/19)

The Boston Globe: Caring For New Moms Shouldn’t Depend On Who Pays The Bill
Hollywood celebrities brought the issue of postpartum depression out of the shadows, but that does little to help the moms in poverty who are trying to cope with an infant and feelings of overwhelming sadness at the same time. Their struggle is a far lonelier one, made more difficult by federal Medicaid rules that limit the medical treatment covered by that insurance to 60 days past the birth of the child — despite a strong body of evidence that for many women the symptoms may not appear for months and can last for a year or more. (9/20)

USA Today: Terminal Patients Deserve Death With Dignity. N.M. Law Sets Standard.
"I couldn’t take her pain away." Those were the words of Danny King after his wife Sharon King died. She is reportedly one of the first New Mexico residents to use the state’s new groundbreaking law that allows terminally ill adults to have better access to medical aid in dying. The law – which allows patients to take prescription medication that ends unbearable suffering – is already serving as a model for other states to improve current medical aid-in-dying laws or pass new ones. (Kim Callinan, 9/18)

Scientific American: How Music Can Literally Heal The Heart 
In a maverick method, nephrologist Michael Field taught medical students to decipher different heart murmurs through their stethoscopes, trills, grace notes, and decrescendos to describe the distinctive sounds of heart valves snapping closed, and blood ebbing through leaky valves in plumbing disorders of the heart. (Elaine Chew, Psyche Loui, Grace Leslie, Caroline Palmer, Jonathan Berger, Edward W. Large, Nicolo F. Bernardi, Suzanne Hanser, Julian F. Thayer, Michael A. Casey and Pier D. Lambase, 9/18)

Dallas Morning News: If We Regulate Abortion As A Medical Procedure, We Must Understand Medical Terms
The word abortion is a medical not a political term. Abortion can be a spontaneous abortion, sometimes called a miscarriage. An elective termination is also called an elective abortion. So proper use of the terminology is important. The Texas Heartbeat bill went into effect September 1, stating that a pregnancy cannot be terminated once a fetal heartbeat is detected. Using the terminology “heartbeat” can be misleading. When an adult goes to a doctor’s visit, the doctor listens to the adult’s heart with a stethoscope. The sound heard on a stethoscope is the sound of the heart valves opening and closing. (Dorette Noorhasan, 9/19)

The Washington Post: Alan Braid: I Violated Texas’s Abortion Ban. Here’s Why
Newly graduated from the University of Texas medical school, I began my obstetrics and gynecology residency at a San Antonio hospital on July 1, 1972. At the time, abortion was effectively illegal in Texas — unless a psychiatrist certified a woman was suicidal. If the woman had money, we’d refer her to clinics in Colorado, California or New York. The rest were on their own. Some traveled across the border to Mexico. At the hospital that year, I saw three teenagers die from illegal abortions. One I will never forget. (Alan Braid, 9/18)

Los Angeles Times: Bridging The Divide Between Mental Health Care And Addiction Treatment 
My son Aaron was 19 years old when he died. His death certificate says the cause of death was asphyxia. The actual cause was meth addiction and mental illness. There was more to Aaron than that, just as there is more to so many like him. As a new report from the California Health Care Foundation shows, there is also much more we could be doing to help people who live with both mental illness and substance use disorder. It’s not just a California problem or an American challenge. Throughout the world, far too many people have suffered because they were treated primarily for one diagnosis rather than for their intertwined conditions. Integrated care is hard to achieve, but a few states — including California — are pursuing promising approaches. (Katherine Haynes, 9/19)

The New York Times: Our Generic Drug Supply Is Sick 
The American health care system is built on the idea that a pill is a pill. Generic drugs are considered equal to and interchangeable with one another — and also with the name brand. This gospel has existed since 1984, when a law known as Hatch-Waxman was passed, allowing companies to make drugs that had gone off patent without having to replicate the same expensive clinical trials. For the most part, all they had to do was prove that the generic was manufactured using good practices and worked in the body in a similar way, within an acceptable range. (Farah Stockman, 9/18)