The New York Times: Trump Proposes Ways To Improve Care For Kidney Disease And Increase Transplants
President Trump issued a sweeping set of proposals aimed at improving medical care for the tens of millions of Americans who have kidney disease, a long-overlooked condition that kills more people than breast cancer. “This is a first, second and third step. It’s more than just a first step,” Mr. Trump said in a speech Wednesday, which was attended by patients, advocates and industry executives. (Abelson and Thomas, 7/10)

The Washington Post: Trump Signs Executive Order Revamping Kidney Care, Organ Transplantation
In an executive order signed by President Trump Wednesday morning, the administration also committed to move many people receiving kidney dialysis away from commercial centers to less expensive, more convenient in-home care. By 2025, the administration wants 80 percent of newly-diagnosed kidney failure patients to receive a transplant or get dialysis at home. Trump, speaking at a morning ceremony at the Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center, said the order delivers “groundbreaking action to millions of Americans suffering from kidney disease. It’s a big deal.” (Bernstein, 7/10)

The Wall Street Journal: Trump Signs Executive Order On Kidney Disease
The order seeks to improve efforts to prevent, detect and treat kidney disease. It includes a public awareness campaign and will encourage the development of artificial kidneys, with the goal of doubling the number of available kidneys—real and artificial—by 2030, Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar told reporters in a briefing Wednesday. The order will grant reimbursements to individuals who donate kidneys for costs associated with the transplant, such as lost wages. (Ballhaus, 7/10)

CNBC: Trump Signs Executive Order Overhauling Kidney Transplant, Dialysis Market
The administration is pushing for the development of artificial kidneys and earlier diagnosis of kidney disease. Federal health officials aim to double the number of available kidneys, including artificial, by 2030, Azar said. Under the order, the administration says it will also streamline and expedite the process of kidney matching in order to help increase transplants. (Lovelace, 7/10)

The Hill: Trump Signs Executive Order Aimed At Improving Kidney Disease Treatment
A key part of the plan would shake up a multibillion-dollar industry, run by two dialysis companies, that favors expensive treatment in health centers instead of home-based services that can be easier for patients. Currently, only 12 percent of dialysis patients receive treatment at home. Patients who receive dialysis in centers often go multiple times a week. (Hellmann, 7/10)

USA Today: Trump Signs Executive Order Aimed At Helping Kidney Disease Patients
Officials cited a study that suggests long term it may be possible to find 17,000 more kidneys and 11,000 other organs from deceased donors for transplant every year. “It’s truly an exciting day for advancing kidney health in our country,” Trump said. (Cummings, 7/10)

The Associated Press: Trump Signs Order Directing Government To Overhaul Care For Kidney Disease
More than 94,000 of the 113,000 people on the national organ waiting list need a kidney. Last year, there were 21,167 kidney transplants. Of those, 6,442 were from living donors, according to the United Network for Organ Sharing, which oversees the nation's transplant system. "The longer you're on dialysis, the outcomes are worse," said Amit Tevar, a transplant surgeon at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, who praised the Trump administration initiatives. (Neergaard, 7/10)

CNN: Trump Signs Executive Order To Transform Kidney Care, Increase Transplants
When patients don't learn they're ill until it gets to a critical stage, they cannot take preventive steps, and often need dialysis or a transplant. Of the 100,000 Americans who start dialysis each year, 50% die within five years, according to the president. The goal of the executive order is to reduce the number of end-stage renal disease patients by 25% by 2030. (Christensen and Klein, 7/10)

Modern Healthcare: Kidney Disease Care Overhaul Proposed By Trump Administration
More than 30 million Americans have some stage of kidney disease. In 2016 it was the ninth-leading cause of death in the United States. Medicare spent $113 billion in 2016 to cover people with kidney disease, including end-stage renal disease, representing more than one-fifth of its spending. Azar had stated that current payment policies were biased toward center-based dialysis, and that dialysis companies were disincentivized from helping patient get ready for and find a transplant. (Hirsch, 7/10)

PBS NewsHour: Trump’s Plan To Combat Kidney Disease Aims To Save Money And Lives. Can It?
The president said the order is part of his administration’s broader health care policies, including efforts to reduce prescription drug prices. Some of those efforts, such as requiring drug companies to list prices in TV ads, have been criticized for trying to solve complex problems with oversimplified solutions. (Frazee, 7/10)

NPR: Trump Executive Order To Encourage In-Home Dialysis And More Kidney Donations
Better prevention of kidney failure is desperately needed, according to Dr. Holly Mattix-Kramer, a kidney specialist at Loyola University Chicago and the president of the National Kidney Foundation. Mattix-Kramer was among dozens of kidney specialists and patient advocates who attended the announcement Wednesday. "We're extremely excited," she says. "For so long we felt like no one was paying attention to this epidemic of kidney disease." (Simmons-Duffin and Wroth, 7/10)

CNBC: Kidney Dialysis Stocks Soar As Investors Cheer Trump Executive Order
Shares of Davita, which fell by more than 5% after the news of the pending order broke Tuesday, rebounded Wednesday. The stock closed up by 4% Wednesday to $54.65 a share. U.S. traded shares of Fresenius Medical Care gained 2.5% Tuesday, closing at $38.41, after dropping by 5% Tuesday. (Combs, 7/11)

Kaiser Health News: Using Obamacare Authority, Trump Aims To Shift Dialysis Care To Patients’ Homes
Dr. Mark Rosenberg, president of the American Society of Nephrology, said he was pleased that some of the new payment models offered by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services have only “upside” potential for doctors. He said doctors now get paid more to see their patients at the dialysis center than at home. As a result, there is little incentive to promote home dialysis options. “I have been a kidney doctor for 35 years, and this is the most game-changing thing ever to happen,” he said. (Galewitz, 7/10)

Meanwhile, the president is relying on a system set in place by the health law for his ambitious health goals while at the same time trying to destroy it —

The New York Times: Trump’s Assault On Obamacare Could Undermine His Own Health Initiatives
In court, the Trump administration is trying to get all of Obamacare erased. But at the White House, President Trump and his health officials are busily using the law to pursue key proposals. Last week, the president highlighted a policy in the works meant to narrow the gaps between what drugs cost in the United States and overseas. On Wednesday, he signed an executive order to transform care for patients with kidney disease. Both measures were made possible by a provision in the Affordable Care Act, and both would be effectively gutted if the administration’s position prevailed in court. (Sanger-Katz, 7/11)

Modern Healthcare: FCC Moves Forward With $100 Million Connected Care Proposal
The Federal Communications Commission on Wednesday unanimously voted to move forward with plans for a $100 million pilot program to promote telemedicine services. The FCC voted to adopt a notice of proposed rulemaking for a program dubbed the Connected Care Pilot. "The future of healthcare is connected care, and this is the future that I want the FCC to support," agency Chairman Ajit Pai said at an open meeting Wednesday. "The $100 million budget we propose for the Connected Care Pilot program is a smart investment for us and for the country." (Cohen, 7/10)

Modern Healthcare: HHS Launches Summit To Overhaul Federal Quality Programs
HHS on Tuesday created a summit that will enlist federal and private healthcare leaders to determine how to streamline and improve the agency's quality programs. The group, which will be called the Quality Summit, is in response to a recent executive order from President Donald Trump calling on federal health agencies to develop a strategy within six months that will align quality measures across Medicare, Medicaid, the Children's Health Insurance Program, the health insurance marketplace, the Military Health System and the Veterans Affairs health system. (Castellucci, 7/9)

In other news on the administration —

Stat: Supreme Court Ruling May Make It Harder To Get Info From The FDA 
Anyone seeking certain information about a medicine from the Food and Drug Administration may have a harder time getting what they want, thanks to a recent decision by the U.S. Supreme Court that expanded the ability of federal agencies to withhold confidential data from the public. At issue is an exemption in the Freedom of Information Act that permits the government to withhold trade secrets and commercial or financial information obtained from someone who considers the material to be confidential. As a result, the FDA regularly redacts portions of documents that pertain to, say, approval applications or review procedures. (Sherman, 7/9)

Dallas Morning News: 'My Daughter Is Gone': House Hearing On 'Kids In Cages' Spotlights Infant Who Died After ICE Custody
As Yazmin Juárez spoke, an image of her brown-eyed baby girl, Mariee, was put up on television screens in the hearing room. The baby had fallen ill with a high fever, vomiting and diarrhea when mother and daughter were detained in a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility last year. (Gillman, 7/10)

Reuters: 'World Should Know,' Migrant Tells U.S. Congress Of Toddler's Death
Yazmin Juarez told a House of Representatives subcommittee that it was “like they tore out a piece of my heart” when just weeks after they were released her daughter Mariee died at 19 months old. She said she left a hospital with nothing but a piece of paper with two handprints in pink paint that staff had made for her, and described through a translator how she missed her daughter’s hugs. (Pietsch, 7/10)

The Associated Press: Asylum-Seeker Talks About Daughter's Death After US Custody
A Guatemalan mother seeking asylum told a House panel Wednesday that she came to the United States seeking safety, but instead watched her infant daughter die slowly and painfully after the baby received shoddy medical care while they were in immigration custody. As Yazmin Juárez spoke, an image of her brown-eyed baby girl, Mariee, was put up on television screens in the hearing room. (Long, 7/10)

The Hill: Mother Of Toddler Who Died After ICE Detainment Testifies Before House Subcommittee
"Mariee was a healthy baby girl when she was taken into ICE custody. But 20 days later, she left with a life-threatening infection," she said. Small children do not belong in detention. But if ICE’s detention center had just been safe and sanitary – and if they’d given my daughter the proper medical care she needed – Mariee might still be here today, preparing to celebrate her third birthday in August." (Frazin, 7/10)

CNN: Mother Recalls Death Of Toddler After Being Released From ICE Custody In Emotional Testimony
Juarez's testimony came during a hearing on the treatment of children at the southern border. Over recent weeks, government and media reports have sparked a national outcry about conditions at border facilities. Juarez said she fled Guatemala with her daughter to seek asylum in the United States. "We made this journey because we feared for our lives. The trip was dangerous, but I was more afraid of what might happen to us if we stayed. So we came to the United States where I hoped to build a better, safer life for us," she said. "Unfortunately, that did not happen." (Alvarez, 7/10)

NBC News: Migrant Mom Details Daughter's Death After ICE Detention In Emotional Testimony
At the hearing, which was titled “Kids in Cages: Inhumane Treatment at the Border,” Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., described allegations of "dangerous overcrowding," widespread sickness, "pervasive medical inattention," sexual assaults and the "systemic abuse of migrants." "We hope to shine a bright light this afternoon on these dark developments," he said. (Silva, 7/10)

USA Today: Guatemalan Migrant Testifies About Daughter's Illness, Eventual Death
“Your story has broken the heart of America,” said the subcommittee chairman, Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md. “But your courage has given us a second chance to get it right.” Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, called for a consensus on border security and asylum laws. He noted that Customs and Border Protection had rescued 3,000 people this year despite how thin its resources are stretched. “I cannot possibly imagine what you have gone through,” Roy said. “We have a broken immigration system and must act quickly.” (Jansen, 7/10)

The Washington Post: ‘Kids In Cages’: House Hearing Examines Immigration Detention As Democrats Push For More Information
No Trump administration officials testified at Wednesday’s hearing, but former acting ICE director Ronald Vitiello appeared at the request of Republican committee members. Vitiello retired in April after President Trump pulled his nomination to lead the agency; Trump said he wanted to go in a “tougher” direction on immigration enforcement. (Sacchetti, 7/10)

The Associated Press: New Holding Center For Migrant Children Opens In Texas 
A former oilfield worker camp off a dirt road in rural Texas has become the U.S. government's newest holding center for detaining migrant children after they leave Border Patrol stations, where complaints of overcrowding and filthy conditions have sparked a worldwide outcry. (Merchant, 7/10)

The Hill: Newly Opened Facility For Migrant Children Expected To Cost Up To $300 Million
The shelter, which was formerly used as a lodging facility for oil field workers, is one of two temporary “influx” shelters, the other being the Homestead facility in Florida. That facility is the administration's largest for unaccompanied children and currently houses around 2,300 children, but the number changes daily. (Weixel, 7/10)

The Wall Street Journal: New Shelter For Migrant Teenagers Lacks Residents
For the first 60 days the facility is open, BCFS will be paid up to $50 million, according to federal contracting records. The records show the contract could be worth as much as $300 million through January. The dorms, which previously housed oil workers, have three-bedroom suites, each with two sets of bunk beds and a private bathroom. The young residents have decorated the rooms with drawings, including some of family, and flags from their home countries, which include Guatemala and El Salvador. (Caldwell, 7/10)

The Washington Post: ‘I Hate This Mission,’ Says Operator Of New Emergency Shelter For Migrant Children
As he stood before reporters in a newly opened emergency shelter for unaccompanied migrant children, the chief executive of the contracting firm that could be paid up to $300 million to run the facility was far from thrilled about the task before him. “I hate this mission,” Kevin Dinnin, head of the San Antonio-based nonprofit BCFS Health and Human Services, said on Wednesday in this remote Texas town. “The only reason we do it is to keep the kids out of the Border Patrol jail cells.” (Satija, 7/10)

Reuters: U.S. Holding 200 Children At Border, Down From 2,500 In May
Almost all detained unaccompanied children picked up by border officers are being turned over to U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) officials within 72 hours of apprehension, the official told reporters on a conference call, speaking on the condition he not be named. Criticism mounted after government inspectors and immigration lawyers found evidence children were being held long past legal limits at border facilities not equipped to house them. (Trotta and Chavez, 7/10)

Dallas Morning News: Is The Carrizo Springs Migrant Facility 'Too Much, Too Late' For The Southern Border Crisis?
Federal officials in charge of caring for and reuniting unaccompanied migrant children with their parents on Wednesday happily gave reporters a tour of the spotless migrant holding facility recently opened in this southwest Texas town. They highlighted the high standards of medical and child care while showing off the facility, and noted the recently reduced length of stay for migrant children in federal custody. (Barragán, 7/10)

In other news on the immigration crisis —

ProPublica: Border Patrol Condemns Secret Facebook Group, But Reveals Few Specifics
Long known for its insular culture and tendency toward secrecy, the U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency is saying little in the aftermath of news reports exposing a vulgar and hateful Facebook group for current and retired Border Patrol agents, including supervisors. While CBP officials have publicly condemned the offensive social media posts, they’ve disclosed few details about the steps the agency has taken to identify employees who behaved inappropriately online and hold them accountable. (Thompson, 7/10)

ProPublica: Immigrant Children Sent To Chicago Shelters Are Traumatized And Sick, In Some Instances With Chicken Pox Or Tuberculosis
The Trump administration is sending immigrant children who are alone, afraid and sick with fever, chicken pox and even tuberculosis to shelters in Chicago, where they are further isolated to prevent the spread of disease, according to one of the nonprofit organizations caring for them. In yet another byproduct of the administration’s immigration policy, many of those children also are arriving increasingly traumatized after spending a week or longer in dirty and overcrowded U.S. Border Patrol facilities. (Sanchez, Cohen and Eldeib, 7/11)

Politico: House Appropriators Plan Visit To Florida Shelter For Migrant Kids
House appropriators on Monday will visit a federal shelter for unaccompanied immigrant children, ahead of a hearing on oversight of the Department of Health and Human Services program that handles care for those kids. Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.), chairwoman of the spending panel that funds HHS, will lead a group of subcommittee members on the trip to a temporary shelter in Homestead, Fla., where up to about 2,500 kids are kept in federal care at any one time. (Scholtes, 7/10)

The New York Times: A Drastic Drop In Migrant Arrivals On The Border: What’s Happening?
At its peak, the nonprofit shelter run by Jewish Family Service of San Diego held more than 300 migrants dropped off by United States immigration authorities after they crossed the border from Mexico. Some days this spring were so busy that new arrivals had to be sent to overflow sites. Now, the shelter is almost eerily empty. The number of people arriving there has plunged in recent weeks amid a precipitous decline in arrivals along the southern border, where the Department of Homeland Security said that apprehensions dropped 28 percent in June. (Jordan and Semple, 7/10)

Politico: Border Arrests Dropped Sharply In June
A summer falloff in border arrests isn’t unusual. May-to-June declines occurred in nine of the last 10 years. But a senior CBP official argued Wednesday that June's decline was due partly to new border security measures put in place by Mexican and U.S. authorities following talks last month. “I would attribute Mexico to making some difference,” the official told reporters on a background call. (Hesson, 7/10)

The New York Times: U.S. Prepares To Arrest Thousands Of Immigrant Family Members
Nationwide raids to arrest thousands of members of undocumented families have been scheduled to begin Sunday, according to two current and one former homeland security officials, moving forward with a rapidly changing operation, the final details of which remain in flux. The operation, backed by President Trump, had been postponed, partly because of resistance among officials at his own immigration agency. (Dickerson and Kanno-Youngs, 7/11)

The Washington Post: Abortion Support Is The Highest It’s Been In Two Decades As Challenges Mount
Support for legal abortion stands at its highest level in more than two decades according to a Washington Post-ABC News poll, even as numerous states adopt restrictions that challenge the breadth of rights established by the Supreme Court’s 1973 Roe v. Wade decision. The Post-ABC poll finds a 60 percent majority who say abortion should be legal in most or all cases, up from 55 percent in a 2013 Post-ABC poll, and tying the record high level of support from 1995. The latest survey finds 36 percent say abortion should be illegal in all or most cases, also tying a record low. (Guskin and Clement, 7/10)

For detailed results of the Washington Post–ABC News poll click here.

ABC News: Support For Legal Abortion Matches Its 24-Year High: Poll
While support for legal abortion now matches its high in fall 1995, trends since then have not been consistent. The long-term average, in 32 ABC/Post polls over this period, is 55%, compared with today’s 60%. In terms of state-level action, 41% say laws on women’s access to abortion should be left as they are now. Thirty-two percent say access to abortion should be easier than it is now, for a total of 73% favoring either no change or fewer restrictions. Twenty-four percent say abortion access should be harder. (In an ABC/Post poll last summer, 30% said they would like to see the Supreme Court make it harder to get an abortion, down from 42% in 2005.) (Filer, 7/10)

The Hill: Support For Abortion Rights At Highest Point In Decades: Poll
The poll released Tuesday shows 60 percent of Americans consider abortion to be an important issue when considering how they will vote for president. A majority also said they disapprove of the way President Trump is handling abortion, 54 percent to 32 percent. (Hellmann, 7/10)

Boston Globe: On Beacon Hill And Beyond, Everyone Has A Stake In Women’s Rights
In Massachusetts, abortion rights advocates who are countering the national trend by trying to expand abortion access actively sought a male ally to sponsor legislation on Beacon Hill. ...On Beacon Hill, men are lead sponsors of numerous issues once regarded as female concerns. Representative Jack Patrick Lewis, a Framingham Democrat, teamed up with Representative Natalie Higgins, a Leominster Democrat, to sponsor a bill that aims to end sexual violence by teaching students about sexual consent, starting in kindergarten. (Ebbert, 7/10)

In other news —

The Washington Post: Abortion Access Is More Difficult For Women In Poverty
Women living below the federal poverty level are being disproportionately affected by tightening antiabortion regulations, particularly as clinics across the country have been closing in recent years. Poor women of childbearing age are more likely than other women to have to drive more than an hour to reach the closest abortion provider, according to drive-time analysis by The Washington Post. (Keating, Meko and Rindler, 7/10)

The Washington Post: ‘There’s A Lot Of Screaming Into The Void’: Toddler’s Parents Battle For Coverage Of $2.1 Million Gene Therapy
When a $2.1 million gene therapy offering the chance of a cure for her daughter’s rare disease won government approval in May, Lauren Sullivan was struck by a sense of “dangerous hope.’’ But after UnitedHealthcare said it would not cover the treatment, Sullivan’s hope has given way to an anxious race against the calendar. The Food and Drug Administration said the new drug, which works by replacing the defective gene that causes Daryn’s spinal muscular atrophy with a good one, must be administered by age 2. Daryn’s second birthday arrives in early October. (Rowland, 7/10)

The New York Times: This Drug, Underused In The U.S., May Help Make H.I.V. Very Rare In Australia
It took universal health care, political will and a health campaign designed to terrify the public, but nearly four decades into the H.I.V. crisis, Australian researchers say the country is on a path toward making transmissions of the virus vanishingly rare. The fight is not yet won, the experts caution, and the last stretch of disease eradication efforts is often the toughest. (Albeck-Ripka, 7/10)

Boston Globe: Charlie Baker’s Plan To Curb Drug Prices Strains His Relationship With Biotechs
A proposal by Governor Charlie Baker to curb drug prices paid by the state Medicaid program has biotech leaders up in arms. As state lawmakers meet behind closed doors to hash out a final version of the plan, they are also grappling with this question: How does Massachusetts hold accountable an industry that it helped to build? (McCluskey, 7/10)

Stat: Pharma Still Gets Poor Grades On Sharing Clinical Trial Data
Amid ongoing concerns that clinical trial data is too often kept under wraps, an analysis found that most large drug makers continue to do a poor job of sharing study data after new medicines were approved, adding further pressure on the pharmaceutical industry to improve disclosure practices. Specifically, just three of a dozen companies shared data within a reasonable time frame, according to the analysis published in BMJ. (Silverman, 7/10)

Stat: Every Data Point Has A Face: What Michael Becker Taught Us
Michael Becker was a biotech executive before he was a patient advocate. When he discovered he had head and neck cancer, he decided to go public, and in doing so made an impact — both within the drug industry and beyond. Cancer, Becker once said, takes away a lot more than it gives. But he wanted his own experience to show people the risks of the human papillomavirus, which caused his disease, and the importance that preteens get the vaccine that prevents HPV infection. (Herper, 7/10)

The Hill: Children Urge Congress To Renew Funds For Diabetes Research
More than 160 children with type 1 diabetes made a personal plea for lawmakers to approve more funding to research the disease at a hearing Wednesday before the Senate Special Committee on Aging. The children were dressed in blue shirts and Committee Chairwoman Susan Collins (R-Maine) also sported a light blue jacket in solidarity. “Your passion and hope for a cure are contagious,” Collins said. “I’m inspired by that sea of blue that is out there.” (Siegel, 7/10)

Roll Call: ‘I Learned To Inject Oranges With Insulin Syringes’: Victor Garber On Type 1 Diabetes
If you ever went to the movies in the ’90s or the early aughts, you may recognize Victor Garber as the “bad guy” from “Legally Blonde” or “the ship designer” from “Titanic,” but on Wednesday the award-winning actor came to Capitol Hill with a script that was a little more personal. Garber says he’s lived with Type 1 diabetes for nearly 60 years. Joined by kid-advocates with the disease, he urged Chairwoman Susan Collins and ranking member Bob Casey of the Senate Special Committee on Aging to renew the Special Diabetes Program at the National Institutes of Health. (Lyons, 7/10)

San Francisco Chronicle: Legislation To Stop Patients Getting Massive ER Bills Is On Life Support
The attempt by two San Francisco politicians to stop hospitals around California from sticking patients who receive emergency care with outrageous bills is on life support. Assemblyman David Chiu on Tuesday said he is holding back his bill that was inspired by news of San Francisco General Hospital’s unfair billing practices after intense lobbying from hospital CEOs around the state urging his colleagues to kill it. (Knight, 7/10)

The Associated Press: California Effort To Stop Surprise Hospital Bills Stalls
Democratic Assemblyman David Chiu said Wednesday that he’s pulling his bill for now due to staunch opposition from hospitals. Chiu plans to continue negotiations on the bill and try again next year. He says the bill faced opposition from hospitals trying to protect profits over patients. The California Hospital Association did not immediately respond to a request for comment. (7/10)

California Healthline: Hospitals Block ‘Surprise Billing’ Measure
Hospitals focused their opposition on a provision of the bill that would have limited what they can charge insurers for out-of-network emergency services, criticizing it as an unnecessary form of rate setting. (Ibarra, 7/10)

The Associated Press: Shortening Trainee Doctor Hours Hasn't Harmed Patients
When reforms shortened working hours for U.S. doctors-in-training, some worried: Was that enough time to learn the art of medicine? Would future patients suffer? Now a study has answers, finding no difference in hospital deaths, readmissions or costs when comparing results from doctors trained before and after caps limiting duties to 80 hours per week took effect. (7/11)

Stat: Study Says Limits On Residency Work Hours Didn't Affect Doctor Performance
They compared the outcomes for patients of two groups of physicians: those trained before 2003, when the typical work week was 100 hours; and those trained later under the new rules, which capped weekly hours at a mere 80, with no individual shift exceeding 30 hours. For the three quality measures examined — mortality within 30 days of being hospitalized, readmissions, and hospital services used (a measure of efficiency) — they found no differences between the groups. (Joseph, 7/11)

In other news —

The Wall Street Journal: Doctor Visits Could Provide Relief To Uber And Lyft
Uber and Lyft have long been competing to take riders to work, to the movies or to the airport. Increasingly, they also are jockeying for the chance to give patients subsidized rides to the doctor’s office. Both ride-share giants have been hard at work to build a footprint in an industry known as nonemergency medical transportation (NEMT), which helps mostly elderly and low-income patients lacking reliable transportation options to get to medical appointments. (Forman, 7/10)

The New York Times: How Cameron Boyce’s Epilepsy May Have Caused His Death At 20
The actor Cameron Boyce, 20, who died on Saturday, had epilepsy, and his death was caused by a seizure that occurred during his sleep, his family said in a statement. Mr. Boyce starred in shows on the Disney Channel, including “Descendants” and “Jessie,” and appeared in a number of movies. “Cameron’s tragic passing was due to a seizure as a result of an ongoing medical condition, and that condition was epilepsy,” a Boyce family spokesperson told ABC News in a statement on Tuesday night. (Grady, 7/10)

CNN: Cameron Boyce's Death: How Seizures Can Kill People With Epilepsy
Most of these deaths occur during or after seizures, which can cause people to stop breathing and can trigger dangerous irregular heart rhythms. An estimated 3.4 million Americans have epilepsy, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and those with uncontrolled seizures are at higher risk for unexpected death. "What appears to happen most of the time is people just stop breathing at the end of the seizure, and they never start breathing again," said Dr. Jacqueline French, chief medical officer at the Epilepsy Foundation and a professor of neurology at NYU Langone Health. "Their respiratory drive just goes away and never comes back." (Azad, 7/11)

Today: What Causes Epilepsy? Why Do People Have Seizures?
“It’s somewhat similar to SIDS in infants, where they aren’t sick with anything else at the time,” Henry told TODAY. Each year, more than one in 1,000 people with epilepsy die from SUDEP. Individuals who miss doses of medication, are sleep deprived or suffer from tonic-clonic seizures — the type that cause convulsions — are most at risk. (Abrahamson, 7/10)

The New York Times: Sugary Drinks Linked To Cancer Onset
A new study suggests there may be a link between the consumption of sugar-sweetened drinks and fruit juices and the development of cancer. The study is observational and does not claim that drinking sugary drinks causes cancer. But after controlling for known variables, French researchers did find an association. (Bakalar, 7/10)

Bloomberg: Now Fruit Juice Is Linked To A Higher Cancer Risk
Increased daily consumption of about 3.4 ounces of soda -- roughly a third of a can of Coke -- was associated with an 18% greater risk of some cancers in a study published in the British Medical Journal. The likelihood of breast tumors alone rose even more, by 22%. When people drank the same amount of unsweetened fruit juice, they were also more likely to develop cancer, the researchers found. (Fourcade, 7/10)

CNN: Study Links A Small Glass Of Juice Or Soda A Day To Increased Risk Of Cancer
"The results indicate statistically significant correlations between the consumption of sugar-sweetened drinks and risk of all cancers combined, and of breast cancer," said Ian Johnson, nutrition researcher and emeritus fellow, Quadram Institute Bioscience, who wasn't involved in the research. "Surprisingly perhaps, the increased risk of cancer in heavier consumers of sugary drinks was observed even among consumers of pure fruit juice -- this warrants more research," Johnson told the Science Media Centre in the UK. (Avramova, 7/10)

Stateline: How Disaster Warnings Can Get Your Attention
Gerardo Ramirez, a central Texas dairy worker, was near his home but taking an unusual route to a children’s hospital in April when he drove his Volkswagen Jetta into a flooded section of road, not seeing in the pre-dawn dark that heavy rains had turned a tiny creek into a death trap. Ramirez survived, but his wife and two children drowned.In March, 800 miles away in Lee County, Alabama, 23 people ranging in age from 6 to 93 were killed in a 170 mph tornado — despite an evacuation warning by local authorities just like ones that many residents had heeded in previous storms this year. (Henderson, 7/9)

Stat: Case Highlights The Risks Of Experimental Stem Cell Therapy
Stem cell therapies have the potential to treat many conditions, but so far there’s little proof that they do. Even so, clinics around the world offer stem cell-based treatments for a host of medical problems. New research warns that some of these treatments might not be effective and can, in fact, cause harm — sometimes many years down the line. (Flaherty, 7/11)

The New York Times: Rolling Out The Welcome Mat For Travelers With Autism
When Nicole Thibault had her first child, she imagined traveling everywhere with him. But by age 2, he would become upset by simply passing a restaurant that smelled of garlic. Waiting in line elicited tantrums and crowded places overwhelmed him. Autism was diagnosed within the year. “I thought maybe our family dream of travel wouldn’t happen,” said Ms. Thibault, 46, of Fairport, N.Y., who now has three children. But she spent the next three years learning to prepare her son for travel by watching videos of future destinations and attractions so that he would know what to expect. (Glusac, 7/11)

CNN: Addicted To The Internet? Behavioral Therapy Could Work, Researchers Find
Many people spend hours on the internet every week -- but some people can't pull away. For individuals with internet addiction, there's a type of short-term therapy that can be an effective treatment, according to a small study published Wednesday in medical journal JAMA Psychiatry. Researchers found that 69.4% of men with internet addiction entered remission if they received short-term cognitive behavioral therapy, compared to 23.9% of men who entered remission while being on a waitlist to receive therapy. (Nigam, 7/10)

CNN: Many Sudden Cardiac Deaths Linked To Prior Silent Heart Attacks, Study Says
Many people who die of sudden cardiac arrest may have had a heart attack earlier in life without ever realizing it, according to a new study. In the study, almost half -- 42.4% -- of people who had no prior knowledge of coronary artery disease, but died of sudden cardiac arrest, showed signs of having had a prior silent heart attack. The study published Wednesday in the journal JAMA Cardiology. (Howard, 7/10)

Lexington Herald Leader: The Coal Industry Is Dying But Still Hurting Miners On The Way Out.
President Donald Trump promised that he would renew the coal economy, but we can see that he’s no match for the free market. And now politicians should turn their attention back to what they will do to help coal miners through these last painful throes of a post-coal economy. (Blackford, 7/10)

The New York Times: Even Moderate Air Pollution May Lead To Lung Disease
Even moderate levels of air pollution can cause lung function impairment that rivals the damage caused by smoking, a new study found. Researchers studied 303,887 British men and women, with data on lung health gathered by physical examination and air pollution statistics geographically coded to the participants’ home addresses. (Bakalar, 7/10)

The Baltimore Sun: Mosby Tells U.S. House Members That Baltimore Exemplifies Nation’s Failed War On Drugs
Baltimore State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby told a U.S. House panel Wednesday that the city exemplifies the nation’s failed drug policies, and called on the government to decriminalize marijuana at the federal level. “The reason I’m here today is because there is no better illumination of this country’s failed war on drugs than the city of Baltimore, Maryland,” Mosby told a House Judiciary subcommittee. “A mere 45 minutes away from our nation’s capital, Baltimore currently leads the nation in per capita homicides, rising opioid deaths and is one of the most impoverished cities in the nation.” (Barker, 7/10)

CNBC: How Ohio Is Coping With High Opioid Overdose Rate Slamming Its Economy
Montgomery County, in southwest Ohio, is ground zero for the opioid crisis. The region has one of the highest overdose death rates in the country — mostly due to the illicit use of these narcotics. This statewide plague has rocked communities as prison populations for drug offenders swell. It has employers grappling with ways to hire and keep their workforces productive and in lockstep with economic demand. (Ioannou, 7/10)

The Wall Street Journal: U.S. Reaches $1.4 Billion Opioid-Drug Settlement With U.K.’s Reckitt
Reckitt Benckiser Group RBGLY 0.56% PLC will pay up to $1.4 billion to settle U.S. investigations into whether its former pharmaceuticals unit organized a multibillion-dollar fraud to drive up sales of an opioid-addiction treatment. The U.K. consumer-goods company—which owns Lysol cleaner and Durex condoms—on Thursday said it struck a deal with the U.S. Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission to resolve their long-running investigations into the sales and marketing of Suboxone Film. (Chaudhuri, 7/11)

The New York Times: When Patients Need Opioids To Ease The Pain
My patient, a yoga instructor, had already received a week of chemotherapy, so he couldn’t be called a complete newcomer to the side effects of his treatment. But he was still bracing himself for what was yet to come. He was in his 70s and had a rare variety of a rare cancer: acute lymphocytic leukemia, which affects fewer than 3,000 adults yearly in the United States, along with the more common acute myeloid leukemia. Usually, leukemia chooses to corrupt only one tribe of our white blood cells: myeloid or lymphoid, the soldiers of the immune system; his had chosen both. (Sekeres, 7/10)

Kaiser Health News: Medicare Going In ‘Right Direction’ On Opioid Epidemic
Prescriptions for two drugs used to treat opioid addiction increased significantly from 2016 to 2018 for people on Medicare, according to a federal report out Wednesday. About 174,000 Medicare beneficiaries received such a medication — either buprenorphine or naltrexone — to help them with recovery in 2018, according to the Office of Inspector General in the Department of Health and Human Services. (Bebinger, 7/10)

Arizona Republic: Phoenix Police To Expand Use Of Narcan, Opioid Overdose Reversal Drug
The Phoenix Police Department has begun training and certifying patrol officers in how to use an opioid overdose reversal drug. The police department was the largest law enforcement agency in Arizona with officers who didn't carry the opioid overdose reversal drug. (Curtis, 7/10)

New Hampshire Public Radio: Dover Youth Work To Bust Myths About Teen Substance Use
Members of the Dover youth advocacy group Youth to Youth gathered this morning in Dover’s Henry Law Park, in an attempt to change public perception about teen substance use. They chanted “Monsters, aliens, just aren’t real. Most teens don’t drink, that’s the deal!” To accompany their words, students held signs, posters and and inflatable mythical creatures. (Fam, 7/10)

The Wall Street Journal: PG&E Knew For Years Its Lines Could Spark Wildfires, And Didn’t Fix Them
PG&E Corp. knew for years that hundreds of miles of high-voltage power lines could fail and spark fires, yet it repeatedly failed to perform the necessary upgrades. Documents obtained by The Wall Street Journal under the Freedom of Information Act and in connection with a regulatory dispute over PG&E’s spending on its electrical grid show that the company has long been aware that parts of its 18,500-mile transmission system have reached the end of their useful lives. The failure last year of a century-old transmission line that sparked a wildfire, killed 85 people and destroyed the town of Paradise wasn’t an aberration, the documents show. (Blunt and Gold, 7/10)

The Wall Street Journal: Judge Orders PG&E To Respond To Journal Article
A federal judge on Wednesday ordered PG&E Corp. to respond, “on a paragraph-by-paragraph basis,” to a Wall Street Journal article that said the company has failed to upgrade hundreds of miles of high-voltage power lines despite knowing they could fail and spark wildfires. (Blunt, 7/10)

The Wall Street Journal: Parents Sue Over Ban On Religious Exemptions For Vaccinations
The first of several anticipated lawsuits challenging a recently passed New York state law that eliminated religious exemptions from school-vaccination rules was filed Wednesday in Albany. The suit, which was filed in state Supreme Court and seeks class-action status, says the law is unconstitutional and violates religious freedom. Fifty-five families who had used a religious exemption for their children are represented in the suit. (West, 7/10)

Stat: University Of Calif. Loses Access To New Journal Articles From Elsevier
Researchers in the University of California system on Wednesday lost subscription access to the major publisher Elsevier, the result of a closely watched fight between the two parties over how academic research should get read and paid for. The UC system, one of the largest in the country, has long paid Elsevier so that its affiliates could access hundreds of Elsevier journals. (Robbins, 7/10)

The Baltimore Sun: Maryland Attorney General Sues Provider Of Services For Disabled Students, Alleging ‘Dickensian’ Conditions
A residential and educational facility for disabled students operated under “Dickensian” conditions, failing to provide children with required medication or appropriate supervision and attempting to cover up assaults, according to a lawsuit filed Wednesday by the Maryland Attorney General’s office. AdvoServ Inc. ran a program for people and students with disabilities in Delaware. Dozens of Maryland children with cognitive disabilities and mental illnesses were sent to their facilities for treatment and education after the state determined their needs couldn’t be met at home or in their local schools. (Richman, 7/11)

Arizona Republic: New Arizona Prison Health-Care Provider Has History Of Problems
A new contractor takes over the health-care needs of Arizona inmates this month, after years of accusations against Corizon for inadequate care. Lawsuits have accused Corizon of contributing to patients' deaths, and leaving at least one woman to give birth alone. (Castle, 7/10)

KQED: Kaiser Permanente Therapists Hold One-Day Strike In San Francisco Over Staffing Shortages
Kaiser Permanente therapists held a one-day strike on Wednesday to protest what they said were conditions that make it difficult for children and adults in San Francisco to access mental health care services, including staffing shortages and weeks-long waits for appointments. Chanting “What’s this about? Patient care!” a few dozen people, including psychiatrists, psychologists and social workers, protested outside Kaiser’s mental health clinic on Geary Boulevard— the hospital's only one in San Francisco. Several city supervisors observed, including board president Norman Yee. (Klivans, 7/10)

Modern Healthcare: Bill Targeting Kaiser Executive Compensation Disclosure Moves Forward
California's Senate Judiciary Committee passed a bill that aims to boost not-for-profit health systems' public disclosure requirements for executives' deferred compensation. AB 1404, drafted by California state Assembly member Miguel Santiago, a Democrat, would close an alleged loophole that allows not-for-profit systems to hide deferred compensation when not-for-profit entities are used to provide a supplemental retirement plan to employees that work for a for-profit arm of the company. (Kacik, 7/10)

Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Bottoms Signs Legislation To Ban Smoking In Public Places
Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms has signed legislation for a broad ban on smoking and vaping in restaurants, bars, workplaces, the airport and many other public places in the city. The smoke-free ordinance takes effect Jan. 2, 2020. (Yamanouchi, 7/10)

North Carolina Health News: Budget Stalemate Gumming Up Health Care Policies, Priorities, Bills
As the days tick by since Gov. Roy Cooper vetoed the state budget and there’s little movement on resolving some of his issues with the spending plan delivered by the Republican-led legislature, some lawmakers and advocates are working to mitigate the effects of the stalemate on vital health care policies and priorities. In years past, if there was no budget agreement by the July 1 start of North Carolina’s fiscal year, legislators would pass short term resolutions to continue the prior year’s budget while negotiations on a spending plan proceeded. (Hoban, 7/11)

North Carolina Health News: Lawmakers Strong-Arm Over Budget, Medicaid Expansion, But Come Up Empty-Handed
After years of trying, a group of moderate Republicans in the state House of Representatives finally held a committee hearing on expanding the state’s Medicaid program to cover about a half million additional low-income residents. In a lopsided 25-6 vote both Republicans and Democrats moved the NC Health Care for Working Families Act through the House Health committee Tuesday morning after about an hour of presentations and debate. “This [bill] assumes about 300,000… who are working would take advantage of this product,” said Rep. Donny Lambeth (R-Winston-Salem), a former hospital president. He is also one of the four sponsors of House Bill 655, a version of which was first introduced in 2017. (Hoban, 7/10)

Iowa Public Radio: Iowa Officials Increase Payment To Medicaid Management Companies By 8.6 Percent
The state of Iowa has agreed to pay an additional $386 million in state and federal dollars to the two private insurance companies that manage the state’s Medicaid program for low-income and disabled residents. It’s a total 8.6 percent increase, more than the 8.4 percent agreed upon last year. (Sostaric and Krebs, 7/10)

Los Angeles Times: Desperate To Get Rid Of Homeless People, Some Are Using Prickly Plants, Fences, Barriers
With dirt, they can weigh hundreds of pounds. The makeshift planter boxes are Peter Mozgo’s creations — roughly 140 of them lined up on the sidewalk to prevent homeless people from pitching tents outside his business. Mozgo acquires the boxes from a Bell Gardens company that imports ginger, paints them firetruck red, pays $120 per cubic yard for dirt and then uses a $900 trailer to haul it all back to his neighborhood on the south end of downtown Los Angeles. (Oreskes, 7/10)

Los Angeles Times: To Block Homeless Shelter, San Francisco Residents Are Suing On Environmental Grounds
A group of San Francisco residents filed a lawsuit Wednesday to block construction of a 200-bed temporary homeless shelter, another instance of the state’s environmental laws being used to derail such projects. The coalition, Safe Embarcadero for All, had been threatening for months to bring the case as the planned homeless shelter, proposed for a parking lot on the Embarcadero, wound its way through the approval process. They raised at least $100,000 and organized robust protests at city meetings since Mayor London Breed first proposed it in March. (Oreskes, 7/10)

Stateline: Oregon Marijuana Surplus A Cautionary Tale For Other States
Five years after Oregon legalized recreational marijuana, its lawmakers now are trying to rein in production, fearing the state’s big weed surplus will tempt some licensed businesses to sell their products out of state or on the illegal market. Such diversions could invite a crackdown from the federal government and cast a pall over the legal pot industry. Last year, the U.S. attorney for the District of Oregon put the state on notice when he announced that curbing interstate trafficking was his top cannabis law enforcement priority. (Quinton, 7/11)

The Associated Press: Report: No Police Misconduct In Hospital Patient's Arrest
An independent investigator has found no evidence of police misconduct or racial bias in the arrest of a black patient who was accused by a white security officer of stealing equipment when he stepped outside a northern Illinois hospital last month while still attached to an IV stand, according to a report released Wednesday. (7/10)

The Associated Press: Inmate Who Was Suing Prison Over Poor Medical Care Has Died
An inmate who was suing her Virginia prison over allegations of poor medical treatment has died. The Richmond Times-Dispatch reports that 39-year-old Margie Ryder died Monday at a Richmond hospital. Ryder suffered from terminal pulmonary arterial hypertension, which causes high blood pressure in the lungs. (7/10)

The Associated Press: Wisconsin High School To Offer Free Condoms
A high school in Madison, Wisconsin, plans to offer students free condoms as part of a pilot program this year. The Wisconsin State Journal reports Madison West High School will provide condoms for free to students upon request. The Madison Metropolitan School District's health services coordinator, Sally Zirbel-Donisch, says students will be told about reproductive health, proper condom use and sexual consent when they request the contraceptives. (7/10)

The Associated Press: Court Rules Against Florida Officials On Medical Marijuana
A Florida appellate court ruled that the state's approach to regulating marijuana is unconstitutional, possibly allowing more providers to jump into a market positioned to become one of the country's most lucrative. If the ruling stands, it could force state officials to lift existing caps on how many medical marijuana treatment centers can operate in Florida. (7/10)

Health Affairs: Physicians’ Well-Being Linked To In-Basket Messages Generated By Algorithms In Electronic Health Records
Despite concerns about physicians’ workload associated with electronic health records (EHRs), little attention has been paid to the relationship between physicians’ well-being and the in-basket messages physicians receive—specifically, their volume and sources. (Seale et al, 7/1)

Pediatrics: Implementing Evidence-Based Strategies To Improve HPV Vaccine Delivery
High-quality evidence indicates that intervening with health care providers improves human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine delivery. However, scaling up evidence-based strategies in real-world clinical practice remains challenging. We sought to improve the reach and impact of strategies for HPV vaccination quality improvement (QI) through local adaptation and implementation in a large, not-for-profit health care system. (7/1)

Health Affairs: A National Examination Of Long-Term Care Setting, Outcomes, And Disparities Among Elderly Dual Eligibles
The benefits of expanding funding for Medicaid long-term care home and community-based services (HCBS) relative to institutional care are often taken as self-evident. However, little is known about the outcomes of these services, especially for racial and ethnic minority groups, whose members tend to use the services more than whites do, and for people with dementia who may need high-intensity care. (Gorges et al, 7/1)

Urban Institute: Evicting Mixed-Status Families Won’t Make Housing Assistance Waiting Lists Disappear
In May, the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) proposed a rule that would make “mixed-status” families ineligible for public housing or housing choice vouchers, among other programs. Mixed-status families (in this context) are those whose members have a mix of eligible and ineligible immigration statuses—for example, a US citizen child with siblings who are not citizens or parents and children with different citizen and immigration statuses who reside together. (Galvez, 7/8)

Bloomberg: Winning The Obamacare Lawsuit Would Be A Disaster For The GOP
There’s an important bit of contingency planning that Republicans have neglected to do. Neither in the White House nor on Capitol Hill are they prepared for the possibility that their lawsuit against Obamacare will succeed. Most observers don’t expect the courts to strike down the law, and Tuesday’s oral arguments in a New Orleans federal courtroom didn’t change many minds. If the suit is successful, however, it will create an acute problem for a lot of people. Insurers will again be able to discriminate against people with chronic conditions. Many states’ budgets will be thrown into turmoil as Washington stops covering most of the tab for the expansion of Medicaid coverage to households just above the poverty line. People who get their insurance through Obamacare’s exchanges will stop receiving the tax credits that make it affordable. (Ramesh Ponnuru, 7/10)

USA Today: Affordable Care Act Lawsuit: GOP Risks American Lives
There has been so much tawdry and titillating news this week, you may not have noticed that people you elected took another step toward killing your health care. And perhaps indirectly ... you. Republican attorneys general (supported by President Donald Trump) filed a lawsuit to kill the Affordable Care Act, a case heard this week by a federal appeals court in New Orleans. If the lawsuit succeeds (it may well end up at the Supreme Court), the prohibitions against being denied health care coverage for preexisting conditions will disappear and Obamacare would suddenly cease to exist, more than 20 million Americans could find themselves without health insurance. Just like that.  (EJ Montini, 7/10)

The New York Times: Obamacare’s Precarious Fate
Two federal judges in one of the most conservative appeals courts in the nation appeared ready on Tuesday to fall for the most specious legal challenge that the Affordable Care Act has faced — which is saying something. The two Republican-appointed judges on the three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit — Jennifer Elrod (appointed by George W. Bush) and Kurt Engelhardt (appointed by President Trump) — seemed to have little patience for the arguments in defense of Obamacare presented by lawyers for the House of Representatives and a group of blue-leaning states. (7/10)

The Washington Post: GOP Lies And Bad Faith Are Set To Unleash An Epic Health-Care Disaster
You know that feeling you get from witnessing something so shocking that it makes you feel the world has gone mad, even as you simultaneously feel incapable of greeting it with the appropriate outrage because you’ve suffered through so many equally outrageous things recently? Perhaps there’s a long word in German for this. Whatever that word might be, it’s what anyone following the Republican lawsuit seeking to strike down the entire Affordable Care Act is now feeling. (Paul Waldman, 7/10)

The Washington Post: Would Republicans Prefer Socialized Medicine?
When President Barack Obama conceived of the Affordable Care Act, he did everything he could to bring Republicans to his side. He created a system that was market-friendly and drew on ideas that members of the GOP had endorsed in the past. His conciliatory efforts bought him nothing except a long delay in getting a bill through the Senate, a lag that nearly killed the entire enterprise. (E.J. Dionne, 7/10)

The Washington Post: The Trump Administration Is Actually Doing Something Great On Health Care
The Trump administration’s latest proposal to reduce the cost of treating kidney disease by encouraging earlier, more convenient interventions and to improve the organ transplant process is extraordinary. It’s not just that the administration has proposed a reasonable policy to rein in health-care costs. And it’s not just that it’s specifically targeting powerful business interests to do so. Rather, what’s most striking — even inspiring — is that the proposal puts much effort toward improving a single, narrow segment of health care that affects only a small portion of Americans. It’s exactly the type of policy we often need but don’t have the will to implement. (Robert Gebelhoff, 7/10)

Bloomberg: Amazon's Alexa Is An Unhealthy Choice For Britain's NHS
The idea of turning to Amazon.com Inc.’s gaffe-prone Alexa in a medical emergency has always seemed to be a bit of a sick joke. YouTube is packed with examples of amusing ways in which the “black, always-on cylinder the size of a Pringles can” – that’s CEO Jeff Bezos’s own description of the smart speaker – fails the Turing Test. “Alexa, I need medical assistance immediately,” says one user, before getting the soothing yet robotic answer: “I added ‘medical assistance immediately’ to your shopping list.” That hasn’t dissuaded Britain’s National Health Service from trying out the technology for everyday health questions about common illnesses. On Wednesday it announced a partnership with Amazon to help patients get information from the NHS website via voice commands. Ideally, you should be able to ask Alexa things like “how do I treat a migraine?” and get a response sourced from the website in seconds. (Incidentally, the NHS website’s answer to that question is: “There’s currently no cure for migraines, although a number of treatments are available to help ease the symptoms.”) (Lionel Laurent, 7/10)

The Washington Post: Migrant Children Drew Pictures Of Bars And Cages. They Also Drew These Bright Scenes.
In one, a bright green-and-yellow caterpillar with the letters “USA” written on its body crawls across the page. In another, a heart with wings bears the words “Love Love,” because one apparently wasn’t enough to convey how much it carried. Both drawings were done by children after they were released from U.S. Customs and Border Protection custody and both strike at a universal truth: Hand children a piece of paper and a box of crayons, and they may draw what scares them most. Or, they may sketch what makes them smile. (Theresa Vargas, 7/10)

Los Angeles Times: Taxing Tampons Isn’t Just Unfair, It’s Unconstitutional 
If the government were to require that only men or only women had to pay a tax of several hundred dollars a year solely because of their sex, that would be an unconstitutional denial of equal protection under the 14th Amendment. Yet that is exactly the effect of the so-called tampon tax. Currently, residents of 35 states must pay sales tax on purchases of tampons and pads because they are not deemed necessities worthy of an exemption. And that’s in addition to the roughly $5 to $10 for these products that women have to shell out each month. States collectively profit upwards of $150 million a year from taxing menstrual products. In California alone, women pay $20 million annually. (Erwin Chemerinsky and Jennifer Weiss-Wolf, 7/11)

Bloomberg: Reckitt's $1.4 Billion Opioid Settlement Offers Some Relief
Reckitt Benckiser Plc has taken the medicine. The company has settled with U.S. authorities to resolve a long-running investigation into the sale and marketing of an opioid addiction treatment by former subsidiary Indivior Plc. (Andrea Felsted, 7/11)

The Washington Post: Trump Republicans Help Democrats Yet Again — This Time On Abortion
The Affordable Care Act wasn’t popular with a majority of Americans. Then along came President Trump and the Republican-led Congress, which tried to yank it up by the roots. Support for the ACA spiked. Trump accomplished what President Barack Obama and Democrats could not, namely highlighting the benefits — if not the necessity — of an imperfect bill that extended coverage to tens of millions of people. The same thing is now happening with regard to abortion rights. (Jennifer Rubin, 7/10)

Bloomberg: Blame Sugar Consumption And Obesity On Food Companies
Americans tend to associate our health problems with sin. It’s hard to find a health story in the press that doesn’t blame greed and lack of willpower for our ongoing epidemics of obesity and diabetes as well as a recent upturn in the rate of heart disease. But the problems stem more from a greedy food industry than from any weakness in consumers. Our supermarket shelves are filled with items made with cheap ingredients, especially sugar and corn syrup, whether people want it or not. A fascinating new study out of the Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia showed that among 400,000 food reviews on Amazon.com, the primary complaint was that food was too sweet. People used terms like “syrupy, overwhelmingly or cloyingly sweet,” said behavioral geneticist Danielle Reed, who led the research. (Faye Flam, 7/10)