The Associated Press: Senate Study Faults Government Care Of Migrant Children
The government has made only incremental improvements to its troubled efforts to care for thousands of migrant children detained entering the U.S. without their parents, perpetuating a problem the Trump administration has aggravated with its “zero tolerance” immigration crackdown, a bipartisan Senate report said Wednesday. The 52-page study said no federal agency takes responsibility for making sure children aren’t abused or used in human trafficking once the government places them with sponsors, who sometimes aren’t their parents or close relatives. (Fram, 8/15)

The Hill: Senate Dems Demand Immediate Reunification Of Remaining Separated Children 
A group of Senate Democrats is demanding that the Trump administration immediately work to reunify the more than 500 immigrant children in federal custody who were separated from their parents after crossing the southern border. The 17 Democrats, led by Sen. Kamala Harris (Calif.) sent a letter to Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen calling for immediate action to reunite the families of 539 immigrant children still in government custody because of the Trump administration’s “zero tolerance” policy. (Weixel, 8/15)

In other news —

NPR: A Lack Of Interpreters Can Mean Subpar Care For Immigrants
Long before he began studying for a career in health care, Marlon Munoz performed one of the most sensitive roles in the field: delivering diagnoses to patients. As an informal interpreter between English-speaking doctors and his Spanish-speaking family and friends, Munoz knew well the burden that comes with the job. He still becomes emotional when he remembers having to tell his wife, Aibi Perez, she had breast cancer. (Eldred, 8/15)

The New York Times: Bleak New Estimates In Drug Epidemic: A Record 72,000 Overdose Deaths In 2017
Drug overdoses killed about 72,000 Americans last year, a record number that reflects a rise of around 10 percent, according to new preliminary estimates from the Centers for Disease Control. The death toll is higher than the peak yearly death totals from H.I.V., car crashes or gun deaths. Analysts pointed to two major reasons for the increase: A growing number of Americans are using opioids, and drugs are becoming more deadly. It is the second factor that most likely explains the bulk of the increased number of overdoses last year. (Sanger-Katz, 8/15)

The Hill: CDC: Drug Overdoses Hit New Record 
More than 40,000 people died from opioid overdoses last year, and nearly 30,000 people died from overdoses of synthetic opioids, like fentanyl. The overdose deaths involving synthetic opioids rose sharply from 2016, while deaths from heroin, prescription opioid pills and methadone fell, the CDC said. (Weixel, 8/15)

The Washington Post: Fentanyl Use Drove Drug Overdose Deaths To A Record High In 2017, CDC Estimates
The increase was driven primarily by a continued surge in deaths involving synthetic opioids, a category that includes fentanyl. There were nearly 30,000 deaths involving those drugs in 2017, according to the preliminary data, an increase of more than 9,000 over the prior year. Deaths involving cocaine also shot up significantly, putting the stimulant on par with drugs such as heroin and the category of natural opiates that includes painkillers such as oxycodone and hydrocodone. One potential spot of good news is that deaths involving those latter two drug categories appear to have flattened out, suggesting the possibility that opiate mortality may be at or nearing its peak. (Ingraham, 8/15)

In other news on the crisis —

The Washington Post: New Haven Mass Overdose: More Than 70 People Hospitalized For K2 In A Single Day
Hour after hour, people kept dropping. Sirens blared. There were so many overdoses — people passed out, vomiting, convulsing — that emergency workers could hardly sprint fast enough to keep up. “Even while we were trying to return people to service, they were passing victims on the ground,” Fire Chief John Alston told reporters. Over the course of 24 hours in New Haven, Conn., Wednesday, more than 70 people overdosed on what authorities believe to be synthetic marijuana, also known as K2 or spice. Dozens of those overdoses took place on the New Haven Green, a historic downtown park bordering the Yale University campus. (Schmidt, 8/16)

The New York Times: Laced K2 Tied To Dozens Of Drug Overdoses In New Haven
A park in the shadow of Yale’s Old Campus became the scene of a mass overdose on Wednesday as ambulance crews rushed from person to person, desperately treating dozens of semiconscious and disoriented drug users in New Haven. More than 70 people overdosed in the city during a 24-hour span, beginning Tuesday evening, and the authorities said they suspect a virulent batch of synthetic marijuana, possibly laced with an opioid, was the cause. (Linton, 8/16)

New Hampshire Public Radio: N.H. Plots New Approach To Addiction, Relying On Millions More In Federal Funds
Governor Chris Sununu and state Health Commissioner Jeff Meyers on Wednesday announced a major overhaul of New Hampshire's addiction treatment infrastructure. The state will funnel tens of millions in newly available federal funds into a coordinated system of care that tracks patients for months, if not years, through their recovery. (Greene, 8/15)

Arizona Republic: Blue Cross Blue Shield Of Arizona Commits $10 Million To Opioid Crisis
Blue Cross Blue Shield of Arizona announced Tuesday that it will be investing $10 million over the next three years in an initiative to help reduce opioid misuse in the state. At least two people per day have died of an opioid overdose in Arizona since June 15, 2017, when the state began collecting opioid data. (Innes, 8/15)

The Associated Press: Best Buy To Buy A Provider Of Health Devices For The Aging
Consumer electronics retailer Best Buy is pushing more into the health field, acquiring a company that provides emergency response devices for the aging. Best Buy said Wednesday it's paying $800 million for GreatCall. The San Diego, California-based company, which has more than 900,000 paying subscribers, offers services like an easy connection to operators who can connect users to caregivers, answer questions, and more. (8/15)

The Wall Street Journal: Best Buy To Acquire Jitterbug Parent GreatCall For $800 Million
Best Buy on Wednesday said the deal would be neutral to its adjusted earnings in fiscal 2019 and 2020 and boost them by 2021. The electronics retailer said the deal is part of its Best Buy 2020 strategy, which aims to use technology to address key human needs, specifically among the U.S.’s aging population. Last year, Best Buy introduced Assured Living, a service that helps adult children remotely check in on the health and safety of their parents. That service is now available in 21 markets, Best Buy said Wednesday. (Barba, 8/15)

In other health industry news —

The Wall Street Journal: Health Insurer Shuns Amniotic-Tissue Product From MiMedx
United Healthcare, one of the nation’s largest insurance companies, has determined that amniotic tissue products made by MiMedx Group Inc. and other manufacturers are “unproven and/or not medically necessary for any indication,” and won’t reimburse patients for their use, according to the insurer’s most recent medical policy update bulletin. (Morgenson, 8/15)

The Wall Street Journal: New Rules Look To Make Insurance Contracts More Transparent For Investors
Investors should see clearer and more up-to-date numbers about the financial health of U.S. life insurers under a long-planned set of changes to insurance accounting unveiled Wednesday, rule makers say. The changes, which take effect in 2021, will affect the way companies value their long-term insurance contracts like life insurance, long-term care policies and annuities. They are intended to provide “increased transparency and better understanding of the economics,” said James Kroeker, vice chairman of the Financial Accounting Standards Board, the panel that sets accounting rules for U.S. companies. (Rapoport, 8/15)

Modern Healthcare: Few Hospitals Dedicate Space For Family Caregivers, But That Could Change 
Dedicated spaces for family caregivers are rare. Fewer than 20 acute-care hospitals have them, according to experts in the field, and Burke says theirs, which opened in June, is the first such caregiver center inside a rehab hospital. Even so, caregiver advocates believe several factors are coming together to convince hospitals such investments make economic sense even as margins are increasingly crunched. The Affordable Care Act put in place penalties for avoidable readmissions, which caregivers can help prevent, and some encouraging programs are cropping up to pay caregivers for their work. (Bannow, 8/15)

Kaiser Health News: Energy-Hog Hospitals: When They Start Thinking Green, They See Green
Hospitals are energy hogs. With their 24/7 lighting, heating and water needs, they use up to five times more energy than a fancy hotel. Executives at some systems view their facilities like hotel managers, adding amenities, upscale new lobbies and larger parking garages in an effort to attract patients and increase revenue. But some hospitals are revamping with a different goal in mind: becoming more energy-efficient, which can also boost the bottom line. (Appleby, 8/16)

In other news —

Modern Healthcare: Young Nurses Seek Advanced Degrees, Leaving Gaps In Direct Patient Care 
More young nurses are opting to obtain advanced degrees, which could help fill gaps in primary care. But it could also take them away from the patient's bedside. Nearly half of millennial nurses (ages 19-36), 35% of those in Generation X (ages 37-53), and 12% of baby boomers (ages 54-71) plan to become advanced-practice nurses, according to AMN Healthcare, a healthcare staffing agency that polled nearly 3,400 nurses in April 2017. (Kacik, 8/15)

The New York Times: Report Finds Traces Of A Controversial Herbicide In Cheerios And Quaker Oats
An environmental research and advocacy group has found traces of a controversial herbicide in Cheerios, Quaker Oats and other breakfast foods that it says could increase cancer risk for children. The report comes amid longstanding debate about the safety of the chemical glyphosate, which federal regulators maintain is not likely to cause cancer. (Zaveri, 8/15)

The Hill: Group Finds Weed-Killing Chemical In Dozens Of Breakfast Foods 
Out of those products, 31 had levels above what the EWG’s scientists consider safe for children, which is .01 milligrams per day. Some of the products affected included Cheerios, Quaker Old Fashioned Oats, Quaker Dinosaur Egg Instant Oats and Back to Nature Classic Granola, according to CBS News. (Anapol, 8/15)

The Associated Press: Study: Smokers Better Off Quitting, Even With Weight Gain
If you quit smoking and gain weight, it may seem like you're trading one set of health problems for another. But a new U.S. study finds you're still better off in the long run. Compared with smokers, even the quitters who gained the most weight had at least a 50 percent lower risk of dying prematurely from heart disease and other causes, the Harvard-led study found. (Stobbe, 8/15)

The Washington Post: Children Who Lived With Smokers Are More Likely To Die Of Lung Disease As Adults, Study Says
Childhood exposure to secondhand smoke is linked to lung disease decades later, according to a study published Thursday by the American Cancer Society. For 22 years, researchers have been following more than 70,000 adults who have never smoked. At the beginning of the study, they were asked whether they lived in a household with a smoker while they were children. Those who did were 31 percent more likely to die of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). This is the first study to find a correlation between the two. (Furby, 8/16)

The New York Times: ‘Let Us Have A Childhood’: On The Road With The Parkland Activists
Six months and a day after a gunman massacred 17 of their classmates and staff, the students of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School woke up Wednesday and began a new year. For the past two months, a busload of them have traveled the country in pursuit of stricter gun laws, connecting with local activists, holding rallies, debating counterprotesters and, above all, registering voters. (Astor, 8/15)

The New York Times: Why Sitting May Be Bad For Your Brain
Sitting for hours without moving can slow the flow of blood to our brains, according to a cautionary new study of office workers, a finding that could have implications for long-term brain health. But getting up and strolling for just two minutes every half-hour seems to stave off this decline in brain blood flow and may even increase it. Delivering blood to our brains is one of those automatic internal processes that most of us seldom consider, although it is essential for life and cognition. Brain cells need the oxygen and nutrients that blood contains, and several large arteries constantly shuttle blood up to our skulls. (Reynolds, 8/15)

Politico: U.S. Limits Diplomatic Tours In Cuba Following Mysterious Illnesses
The Trump administration is slashing the amount of time U.S. diplomats are posted in Cuba to one year, an unusually short time frame typically applied to war-torn or otherwise dangerous nations. The change to the “standard tour of duty” puts Cuba in league with countries such as Iraq, Afghanistan and South Sudan. It follows a series of mysterious, seemingly sound-related injuries that have injured at least two dozen Americans who spent time in the country. (Toosi, 8/15)

The Washington Post: Children Can Be Swayed By Robot Peer Pressure, Study Says
When the robot revolution arrives, we all know the plot: Smarter machines will supersede human intelligence and outwit us, enslave us and destroy us. But what if it's not artificial intelligence we have to fear, but artificial stupidity? What if it isn't robot overlords that pose the greatest risk but our willingness to trust robots, even when they are clearly wrong? As huggable social robots tricked out with humanlike facial expressions and personalities have begun to infiltrate our homes, experts are beginning to worry about how these machines will influence human behavior — particularly in children and the elderly. (Johnson, 8/15)

The New York Times: Any Weight Loss Can Be Healthful, But More Can Be Much Better
When it comes to losing weight, more can be better. A lot better, according to a new study. Researchers studied 7,670 overweight or obese people who wanted to lose weight. Using data on current weight, weight a year ago and maximum lifetime weight, they tested the association of long-term weight loss with lowering the risk for metabolic syndrome — a constellation of unhealthy conditions that includes high blood pressure, insulin resistance, excess fat around the waist, high triglycerides and low HDL, or “good,” cholesterol. (Bakalar, 8/15)

Los Angeles Times: 30 More Women Sue USC Over Former Gynecologist As New Interim President Welcomes Freshmen To Campus
An additional 30 women sued USC on Wednesday, claiming that the university failed to protect them from abuse and mistreatment by the longtime campus gynecologist, Dr. George Tyndall. The new claims bring the total number of patients suing USC to more than 340 and come as students return to the Los Angeles campus for the start of the fall semester. (Hamilton, 8/15)

The Washington Post: Numerous Children Have Been Poisoned By Lead In Homes Approved By D.C. Housing Inspectors
Chanelle Mattocks remembers everything about that night in 2014, when lead poisoned her son. She was giving Alonzo, then 3, a bath in a tub that her landlord had just painted to pass a housing inspection. She turned to find a washcloth, and when she swiveled back, she found the boy with bits of peeling paint in his mouth. She tried get it out, but it was too late. (McCoy, 8/15)

Seattle Times: How Washington State Made Its Abortion Laws Trump-Proof 
But in Washington, something else would come into play: a 27-year-old state law intended to defend abortion rights from challenges at the national level. Initiative 120 declared that a woman has a right to choose physician-performed abortion before fetal viability. The law emerged from a political climate not unlike today’s, and was passed narrowly in 1991 by a vote of the people. (Burbank, 8/15)

The New York Times: Should Coffee Come With Cancer Warnings? California Says No
In every cup of coffee, there is a chemical linked to cancer. That undisputed fact led a Los Angeles judge to rule this spring that coffee companies must provide cancer warnings to coffee drinkers. The ruling cast a shadow on a daily and often essential rite for more than 100 million Americans. (Hus, 8/15)

Houston Chronicle: Houston's Best Hospitals, According To U.S. News 
Seven Houston hospitals are being recognized as the city's best. On Tuesday, U.S. News & World Report released its annual ranking of the best hospitals in America, breaking down top healthcare locations by major cities. Familiar faces in Bayou City made the list, including the Memorial Hermann-Texas Medical Center and Houston Methodist Hospital. (Ramirez, 8/15)

The Associated Press: Unhealthy Smoky Air Blankets Northwest
Unhealthy air filled with smoke from wildfires blanketed the Northwest again on Wednesday. Washington state had the worst air quality in the country, according to the National Weather Service. In the central Washington cities of Chelan and Wenatchee the air quality Wednesday reached the hazardous level, prompting Chelan County officials to distribute masks. (8/15)

The Associated Press: After McNair Death, Maryland Focuses On Safety At Practice
Maryland interim coach Matt Canada has taken steps to ensure that the Terrapins are poised to deal with the heat of summer during his practices following the death of offensive lineman Jordan McNair. In the first workout since Maryland publicly accepted responsibility for mistakes that contributed to McNair’s death, two tents were in the place at the practice field Wednesday to provide shade. Underneath the awnings are several fans, along with liquids and ice. (Ginsburg, 8/15)

MPR: Mayo Disputes CNN Story On 'Medical Kidnapping,' Calling It Inaccurate And Irresponsible
Mayo Clinic on Wednesday slammed a CNN report alleging the health system "medically kidnapped" a teen patient who suffered a potentially fatal ruptured brain aneurysm in 2016. ...The story described repeated disputes between the patient's family, especially her mother, and Mayo clinic staff. (Richert, 8/15)

Nashville Tennessean: Nashville Unveils Behavioral Care Center To Treat Mentally Ill
Nashville unveiled a new Behavioral Care Center on Wednesday designed to divert mentally ill arrestees from the criminal justice system. Davidson County Sheriff Daron Hall was joined by Mayor David Briley and Councilman Freddie O'Connell to express their support of the new center, which is on track to be open in 2020. The center will house 60 beds and will be used as an alternative to jail for mentally-ill arrestees. The goal is to provide treatment for those arrested because of behaviors caused by mental illness, rather than enter them into the criminal justice system. (Pair and Bliss, 8/15)

New Hampshire Union Leader: Home Health Care Company Drops Veteran Patients Over VA Payment
A home health care company based in Londonderry, Right at Home, has stopped taking veteran patients because they say the the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs has been too slow at paying their claims. Janet Sullivan, the co-owner of the New Hampshire home care franchise, said communication with the Manchester VA Medical Center and New England regional office in Boston has increased over the past week and since a Boston Globe story first told her story on Tuesday. (Lessard, 8/15)

Tampa Bay Times: Two New Cases Of Measles Reported In Pinellas, With The Possibility Of More
Health officials have identified two more confirmed cases of measles in Pinellas County, bringing the total to three, and they are preparing for the possibility of more. The two additional cases are from the same household, and are separate from the original case announced Monday, the Florida Department of Health said Wednesday. (Griffin, 8/15)

Miami Herald: CDC Urges People To Get Vaccinated For Measles
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported 107 people from 21 states have contracted the measles from Jan. 1 to July 14, 2018. Last year saw 118 cases — in a 12-month period. Florida is one of those 21 states. (Marr, 8/15)

The Star Tribune: Help Is On The Way For Large Homeless Encampment In South Minneapolis
A hastily formed coalition of medical and social service agencies plans a major outreach effort Friday at a homeless camp in south Minneapolis that has alarmed local authorities and American Indian leaders because of its growing size and health risks. Health and social workers plan to sweep through the sprawling settlement, offering to help the tent dwellers find housing, medical care and other social services in a concerted push before any attempt by the state to force people off the site, which is situated on land owned by the Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT). (Serres, 8/15)

California Healthline: Voters To Settle Dispute Over Ambulance Employee Break Times 
If private-ambulance workers take a break from work, even for 10 minutes, it can mean the difference between life and death. So, they routinely accept emergency calls during their meal and rest breaks — just as firefighters, policemen and other public emergency workers do. But labor laws guarantee most California workers uninterrupted breaks, and multiple lawsuits are challenging whether private ambulance companies have the right to interrupt their employees’ breaks. (Matthews, 8/15)

Health News Florida: Veterans Push Feds To Recognize Marijuana As A Treatment
Even with medicinal marijuana legal in Florida, the federal government says it's a crime. [Charles] Claybaker and other soldiers can't get a prescription from the VA and their insurance won't cover it. (Ochoa, 8/16)

Stat: State Review Boards Can Help Reduce Pregnancy-Related Deaths In The U.S. 
Despite having the most advanced medical technology in the world, the U.S. has the highest rate of pregnancy-related deaths of any high-income nation — and the problem has gotten worse even as the rate has declined globally. When a woman dies from pregnancy-related causes in this country, the factors that led to this tragic event often go unexamined. We need better data to understand what happened, and then use what we’ve learned to save women’s lives. Promising efforts underway are helping states get to the root causes of these deaths and determine what can be done to prevent them in the future. Several states are taking bold steps to establish review committees to examine every pregnancy-related death, identify trends, and use the findings to change policy and clinical practice. (Mary-Ann Etiebet, 8/16)

The Washington Post: Obamacare Forgot About You. But Trump Didn’t.
For all the discussion of Obamacare since its passage, it is too rarely known that the law effectively split the United States’ individual insurance market in two. One group of Americans — about 8 million enrollees in 2017 — now pay, on average, less than a quarter of the cost of their health insurance, receiving ever-growing taxpayer subsidies to insulate them from Obamacare’s high premiums. But there is a second group of Americans who have faced the full premium increases driven by the law’s broken regulations. Roughly 5 million Americans, as of 2017, have chosen to pay those premiums without any subsidies, while 28 million other Americans remain uninsured, many priced out of coverage entirely. (HHS Secretary Alex Azar, 8/15)

USA Today: National Debt Growing Due To Social Security And Medicare
The debate about the presidency of the President Donald Trump distracts us from other important issues. One such issue on August 14, which marked the 83rd birthday of Social Security, is whether its record of paying full benefits will make it to the 100th birthday. When the first Gen Xers retire in the 2030s, they may well be the first  generation to get fleeced. The Social Security trust fund is currently in deficit yet will receive enough general revenue transfers (financed annually by your taxes) to pay full benefits until 2034. Medicare’s trust fund will go belly up in 2026. (David Schoenbrod and Brian Riedl, 8/15)

The Hill: Health Insurers Are Using Diabetes Drug Coupons To Pad Profits 
Health insurance companies have complained they are burdened with the high cost of diabetes care as a way to justify new programs that shift more of the cost of care to patients themselves. But these programs are actually padding profits in the insurance industry and placing a huge strain on diabetes patients already struggling to meet their health care needs.Insurance companies are hiding this new effort behind opaque and confusing jargon. They call their new policies “copay accumulators,” “Out-of-Pocket Protection Programs” or “Coupon Adjustment: Benefit Plan Protection Programs.” (Christel Marchand Aprigliano, 8/15)

Dallas Morning News: Don't Let Fear Of Concussions Keep Kids Out Of Sports
Headline-grabbing media coverage about the serious effects of concussions on professional football players has made some parents hesitant to let their kids play football or other sports. Nationwide, the number of teenagers playing high school football has declined about 5 percent since 2008, according to a study published this year in JAMA Pediatrics. And even in Texas, home to Friday Night Lights, we have seen a falloff in participation. As both a researcher who studies brain injuries and as a parent, I believe these fears have become somewhat overblown. While every head injury must be taken seriously, most concussions result in short-term symptoms that typically go away within a couple of weeks. (Munro Cullum, 8/16)

New England Journal of Medicine: Parenteral Opioid Shortage — Treating Pain During The Opioid-Overdose Epidemic
The opioid shortage is not expected to be resolved in the near future, so hospitals will need to implement mitigation strategies. The shortage has serious consequences for patients and physicians. Parenteral opioids provide fast and reliable analgesia for patients admitted to the hospital with poorly controlled pain, patients who have undergone painful procedures such as major surgery, and those who were previously on oral opioid regimens but are unable to continue treatment by mouth. Shortages of the three best-known parenteral opioids may increase the risk for medication errors when it becomes necessary to switch a patient to a less familiar drug or to use opioid-sparing drug combinations. Opioids are already among the drugs most frequently involved in medication errors in hospitals. There are also increased risks of delayed time to analgesia and of side effects resulting in unnecessary patient suffering and delayed hospital discharge. Physicians’ burden and stress increase when they are forced to make sudden changes in practice.

San Jose Mercury News: California Must Seize Opportunity For Bail Reform
This week, the California State Assembly is likely to vote on Senate Bill 10, a bill that we had hoped would bring an end to the unjust money bail system and significantly reduce the number of people incarcerated in California’s jails. But the final version of SB 10 trades in the exploitative money bail system for a new pretrial regime — one that will lead to more incarceration and entrench racial, gender, and socioeconomic bias in our system. (Gina Clayton-Johnson and Raj Jayadev, 8/15)

The Federalist: Study Pokes Huge Hole In Assertions That California Is An Obamacare Success Story
Liberals have cited California as the prototypical Obamacare success story for years now, but a new study puts that assertion very much in doubt. ... The study, conducted by the California Health Care Foundation, examined emergency department usage over the ten years from 2006 to 2016. While the report, perhaps quite deliberately, didn’t highlight this conclusion — it mentioned Obamacare once, and only in passing — the data indicate that emergency department usage since Obamacare has not only not decreased, it has accelerated, rising at a faster rate than in prior years. (Christopher Jacobs, 8/14)

Portland Press Herald: Ignoring Climate Change Puts Mainers In Danger 
Policy driven by research works better than science driven by politics. Witness Maine, which experienced a historic explosion in its tick population, and not coincidentally, a 20-fold increase in Lyme disease diagnoses between 2000 and 2016 – going from 71 cases a year to 1,487. Lyme is spread by a single species of tick that has been common in parts of southern New England, but was unknown to most of Maine just 20 years ago. Even though science has established a clear link between a warming climate and the spread of tick-borne disease, the state has demonstrated a terminal lack of interest in conducting any research that touches on man-made climate change. (8/15)