Reuters: Super PAC To Tout Rubio's Efforts Against Obamacare In Early-State Ad
A Super PAC supporting Republican Marco Rubio will tout the White House hopeful's fight against President Barack Obama's health care law in an advertisement set to run in Iowa and New Hampshire starting on Tuesday, a source familiar with the plan said. "On Obamacare, some Republicans gave up. Some talked tough but got nowhere," an announcer says in the ad.

Reuters: Health Care Costs A Top Concern For Republican And Democratic Voters
Americans want to know what the next U.S. president will do to lower their rising healthcare costs, a priority shared by Republican and Democratic voters and second only to keeping the country safe, according to a recent Reuters/Ipsos poll. In all, 62 percent of people surveyed said they would want to know about a presidential candidate's plan for reducing healthcare costs, according to the online poll conducted Dec. 14-18. (Mincer and McPike, 12/21)

Reuters: Obamacare, Tech Stocks Boost Wall Street
U.S. stocks ended stronger on Monday, helped by bounces in Apple and Microsoft as well as a rally in hospital stocks after more Americans signed up for subsidized health insurance. ... About 6 million people have signed up for subsidized health insurance, including 2.4 million new customers, the U.S. government said on Friday. Tenet Healthcare Corp jumped 11.6 percent, its best day since June. Universal Health Services Inc rose 3.64 percent. (Randewich, 12/21)

Bloomberg: Obamacare Heals Hospital Stocks As 6 Million Signs Up For Plans
Shares of the three biggest publicly traded hospital companies rose Monday after the government said that about 6 million people have signed up for Obamacare coverage for next year on U.S.-run markets, a good sign after concerns that the industry’s benefit from the program was shrinking. Tenet Healthcare Corp. gained 8.9 percent to $29.86 at 11:57 a.m. in New York, after earlier rising 10 percent in the biggest intraday gain since June 25. Community Health Systems Inc. rose 5.6 percent to $26.60. HCA Holdings Inc. shares rose 4 percent to $67.05. Obamacare, also known as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, is in its third year of offering coverage. (Lauerman, 12/21)

PBS NewsHour: Popular Health Insurance Co-Ops ‘Orphaned By Politics’
As consumers rush to enroll in the insurance exchanges, one change that's complicating signups is that more than half of the state-run health co-ops -- an alternative to private insurers -- were forced to shut down this year. The government was supposed to offset the costs, but Congress sharply curtailed that money. Special correspondent Mary Jo Brooks reports on the effects in Colorado. (12/21)

The Seattle Times: Calls, Clicks Flood State Health Exchange As Deadline Looms
More than 9,000 calls a day have been coming into the Washington Health Benefit Exchange and a nearly equal number of users have logged in online ahead of Wednesday’s deadline for insurance coverage that begins Jan. 1. More than 150,000 people have signed up for health plans on Washington’s state-run exchange since the start of open enrollment Nov. 1. The sign-up period runs through Jan. 31. (Aleccia, 12/21)

Reuters: Independent Group Says New Glaxo Drug Far Too Expensive
An independent nonprofit organization that evaluates clinical and cost effectiveness of new medicines found the price of GlaxoSmithKline's new drug for severe asthma should be as much as 76 percent lower to justify its value, according to the group's latest draft report. The Boston-based Institute for Clinical and Economic Review (ICER) said its analysis indicated that Glaxo's Nucala should be priced at $7,800 to about $12,000 a year, far below the drug's list price of $32,500 a year. (12/21)

Reuters: Novartis Sees Different Drug Pricing Models: CEO
Drug companies have taken too great a share of the benefits of new drug treatments but are moving to different models involving sharing more with health systems and insurers, the head of Swiss-based Novartis was quoted saying on Sunday.(12/21)

The Wall Street Journal: Valeant Taking Titles To Drugs On Walgreens’ Shelves
Buried in the details of a new 20-year distribution agreement between Valeant Pharmaceuticals International Inc. and Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc. is a $150 million financial hit to Valeant that underscores the unusual nature of the deal. The amount reflects the one-time revenue impact on Valeant of the drug-distribution pact. Essentially, Valeant is buying back its own drugs from Walgreens and then reselling them on consignment to the pharmacy, said a person familiar with the matter. (Rockoff, 12/21)

Having trouble understanding the hopelessly complex world of drug pricing? Even for the experts it's a struggle —

STAT: Inside The Impossibly Byzantine World Of Prescription Drug Prices
When Martin Shkreli’s Turing Pharmaceuticals hiked the price of its anti-parasitic drug to $750 a pill, there was public outcry. So Turing and its backers resorted to a talking point employed across the drug industry: That was the list price. Nobody actually pays that. Forgive the confusion. Even for people whose job requires them to know this stuff, drug pricing is hopelessly complex. That helps explain why, for all the debate over drug costs these days, there’s surprisingly little detail about what anybody actually is paying for prescription medicines. (Scott, 12/21)

CNBC: Martin Shkreli Is Out As CEO Of Another Biotech Company He Founded
Martin Shkreli, the embattled health care businessman, has been let go by KaloBios Pharmaceuticals — one of the companies he had headed. KaloBios, which has a market cap of less than $100 million, hasn't traded since last Thursday. It was halted about 10 minutes after news of Shkreli's arrest. (Rosenfeld, 12/21)

The Wall Street Journal: Norwegian Biotech Company Flags Evidence For Efficacy Of ‘Kick And Kill’ HIV Treatment
A small Norwegian biotechnology firm said Monday it had the first evidence of real promise in a new approach widely considered to be a potential cure for HIV, prompting both cautious optimism and skepticism from experts. One approach thought to be a possible route to a cure, known as “kick and kill” or “shock and kill,” seeks to expose these latent HIV-infected cells so they can be cleared away by the immune system. Bionor Pharma ASA said its method had reduced the size of the latent HIV reservoir by an average of 40% across 17 patients. (Roland, 12/21)

The Wall Street Journal: Why A Drug To Prevent HIV Infection Is In Low Demand
Public-health officials are pushing for much wider use of a drug that has proved effective at preventing HIV infection. PrEP, or preexposure prophylaxis, is a daily medication that people at high risk for HIV can take to protect against acquiring the virus. Still, fewer than 22,000 people are estimated to have taken PrEP for prevention. (Reddy, 12/21)

The Associated Press: Support For Legal Abortion At Highest Level In 2 Years
Support for legal abortion in the U.S. has edged up to its highest level in the past two years, with an Associated Press-GfK poll showing an apparent increase in support among Democrats and Republicans alike over the last year. Nearly six in 10 Americans — 58 percent — now think abortion should be legal in most or all cases, up from 51 percent who said so at the beginning of the year, according to the AP-GfK survey. (12/22)

The Columbus Dispatch: Fetus-Disposal Rules On Ohio Legislators’ Agenda
Republicans who control the Ohio legislature are pushing new measures to regulate the disposal of fetal remains by both abortion clinics and hospitals. But, essentially, only abortion facilities would be affected, judging by current practices of the four largest central Ohio hospital groups. (Johnson, Siegel and Candisky, 12/22)

Kaiser Health News: Pharmacists Prescribing Birth Control And What It Means For Wider Access To The Pill
KHN staff writer Julie Rovner joins The Diane Rehm Show to discuss California and Oregon's laws allowing women to bypass their doctors and get birth control prescribed by a pharmacist. Many doctors say this is safe, but others argue that these measures don’t go far enough in ensuring women have access to these contraceptives and would prefer birth control pills be offered over the counter. (Rovner, 12/21)

USA Today: FDA: Gay, Bisexual Men Can Donate Blood, But Only After A Year Without Sex With Men
Gay and bisexual men in the United States are no longer barred from donating blood, under a policy change announced Monday by the Food and Drug Administration, but there's a big catch: Men still cannot donate if they have had sex with other men in the previous 12 months. (Painter, 12/21)

The Associated Press: FDA Eases Restrictions On Blood Donations From Gay Men
Monday's policy shift was first proposed in late 2014 and follows years of lobbying by medical groups and gay rights groups, who said the previous ban was outdated and perpetuated negative stereotypes. (12/21)

NPR: FDA Lifts Ban On Blood Donations By Gay And Bisexual Men
"Relying on sound scientific evidence, we've taken great care to ensure the revised policy continues to protect our blood supply," said Peter Marks, deputy director of the FDA's Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research. In 1983, the FDA banned gay and bisexual men from ever being eligible to donate blood to protect people receiving blood transfusions from the possibility of getting infected with the human immunodeficiency virus, which causes AIDS. (Stein, 12/21)

Reuters: For Low-Risk Pregnancies, Home Births Just As Safe As Hospital
When women have no major risk factors in pregnancy and give birth with a midwife, their risk of stillbirth, neonatal death or serious injury to the baby are the same whether delivering at home or in a hospital, a new Canadian study finds. Planned home births were tied to fewer interventions, like resuscitation of the baby or cesarean delivery, the researchers note. (Doyle, 12/21)

The Associated Press: Drug May Give Those Leaving Jail A Better Shot At Recovery
Three days before his release from the Barnstable County Correctional Facility, Ryan Lonergan received a powerful injection, intended to change his life. He took the shot willingly, because he knew that for 28 days afterward, the drug, Vivitrol, would make it impossible to get high on the Percocet that had been his life's downfall. Now, Lonergan would not have to decide each day whether to use drugs. Vivitrol made the decision for him, and cleared a path to recovery. (Freyer, 12/20)

Reuters: Gum Disease Linked To Breast Cancer
Middle-aged and older women with gum disease are slightly more likely than those without gum problems to develop breast cancer, suggests a new study. The risk increase was most pronounced for women with gum disease who smoked cigarettes or had quit within the past 20 years, although the authors caution that the reasons for the links are still not known. (Doyle, 12/21)

The Associated Press: Thermometer, Smartphone App Provide 24-7 Monitoring Of Fever
A Maine company is using a crowdfunding campaign to launch a high-tech thermometer. Brunswick-based Check-My-Temp is marketing a thermometer that's worn like an armband and monitors temperature, body position and movement. The information is sent to a smartphone app that allows users to receive detailed history including fever spikes. (12/21)

The Associated Press: Study: Some Cardiac Arrest Victims Ignore Warning Symptoms
Sudden cardiac arrest may not always be so sudden: New research suggests a lot of people may ignore potentially life-saving warning signs hours, days, even a few weeks before they collapse. Cardiac arrest claims about 350,000 U.S. lives a year. It's not a heart attack, but worse: The heart abruptly stops beating, its electrical activity knocked out of rhythm. CPR can buy critical time, but so few patients survive that it's been hard to tell if the longtime medical belief is correct that it's a strike with little or no advance warning. (Neergaard, 12/20)

Sacramento Bee: No Easy Task: End-Of-Life Talks Between Doctors, Patients
It was a death Dr. David Grube will never forget. One weekend more than 20 years ago, a neighbor’s son appeared at his front door near Corvallis, Ore., asking for help with his father, who was terminally ill with bone cancer. Grube rushed over to find a horrific scene: Unable to cope any longer, the pain-wracked neighbor had shot himself. (Buck, 12/22)

In employee health news, media outlets report on working with advanced cancer and revived OSHA safety rules —

Reuters: Even With Advanced Cancer, Many Patients Still Want To Work
Many patients with advanced cancer may still want to work, but symptoms from their disease or related treatment prevent them from doing so, a U.S. study suggests. The study focused on almost 700 adults aged 65 and under with metastatic cancer, meaning tumors had already spread to other parts of the body, and found that more than one-third of them continued to work after their diagnosis. (Rapaport, 12/21)

The Hill: OSHA Revives Controversial Safety Rules
The Obama administration is moving forward with long-delayed rules intended to protect workers from exposure to harmful silica dust. The Labor Department’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) confirmed Monday that it has sent the rules to the White House for final approval, a step that comes after years of delays. (Devaney, 12/21)

The Associated Press: Branstad: Remaining 3 Companies Will Offer Medicaid Services
Gov. Terry Branstad on Monday said Medicaid recipients enrolled with a private company that had its state contract terminated can be covered by one of three remaining companies set to take over Iowa's $4.2 billion Medicaid program. Branstad said three is an adequate number of companies providing managed care of Medicaid services in the state. He said he can't predict the outcome of an expected legal challenge from WellCare of Iowa, the company whose services were formally dropped on Friday. (Rodriguez, 12/21)

The Des Moines Register: Medicaid Delay Makes Some Iowa Kids' Coverage Uncertain
The two month delay in Iowa's effort to privatize management of Medicaid means that most of the 37,000 children enrolled in a special health care program must transition to a new insurance carrier Jan. 1. But some of those children may face situations where their doctors don’t accept their new insurance carrier. (Clayworth, 12/21)

Tampa Bay Tribune & Sarasota Herald Tribune: 'Definition Of Insanity'
Every year, Florida courts send hundreds of people accused of minor crimes to high security mental hospitals. Forced to live among violent offenders, they get medication to stabilize their symptoms, but little therapy or long-term support to help them manage their illnesses. Instead, the hospitals run patients through drills, day after day, to teach them how a courtroom works. “What is a bailiff?” “What is the role of a judge?” The singular goal: to get them deemed legally competent so they can return to face their charges. (Braga, Cormier and Anton, 12/18)

Health News Florida: Mental Hospital Focus On Court, Not Treatment
Florida is spending more than $50 million a year getting defendants charged with nonviolent crimes declared competent for trial and not providing these same people significant mental health treatment, according to an investigation by the Tampa Bay Times and Sarasota Herald-Tribune. The current system has defendants spend two hours a day watching courtroom procedure videos reminiscent of game shows, and cuts off care once they are removed from mental hospitals. The result is that about 200 of these individuals a year are returning to state mental hospitals within 12 months, the investigation reports. (12/21)

The Kansas Health Institute News Service: Mental Health System At Crossroads As Session Approaches
Kansas mental health advocates will enter the 2016 session at a critical juncture, 25 years into the state’s effort to move away from institutionalization to community-based care. Crowded prisons and state hospitals have helped create momentum for statewide reforms to fill the gaps in that system — to provide a “continuum of care” to keep Kansans with persistent mental illness out of crisis. (Marso, 12/21)

The Charleston Gazette-Mail: DHHR Brings Down Patient Numbers At Psych Hospitals
The number of staff vacancies at the state’s two psychiatric hospitals have dropped since court-ordered raises were introduced for current and prospective employees in January, according to testimony from state officials in Kanawha County Circuit Court Thursday. (Nuzum, 12/20)

Health News Florida: Medicaid Complaints From Health Providers Drop In Florida
The number of health care providers complaining about the state’s Medicaid insurers is on the decline. The report comes in response to complaints of providers who say they aren’t getting paid. First, a quick primer: Florida privatized its health care program for 3 million poor residents in 2014. (Aboraya, 12/21)

The Des Moines Register: VA Hires Ex-Iowa Surgeon Accused Of Incompetence
A former Des Moines-area surgeon accused of incompetence by Iowa regulators has been hired by a Department of Veterans Affairs hospital in South Carolina. Alan Koslow recently agreed to pay a $5,000 fine and undergo re-training to settle allegations of incompetence and disruptive behavior. He is the second former Des Moines surgeon to take a job with an out-of-state VA hospital in recent years after being accused of incompetence by Iowa regulators. (Leys, 12/21)

California Healthline: State Urged To Protect Consumers In Proposed Centene-Health Net Merger
Consumer advocates are urging the Department of Managed Health Care to "use its full authority to impose comprehensive requirements to protect consumers before allowing the merger between Centene and Health Net to move forward." (Lauer, 12/21)

The Washington Post: Three Virginia Lawmakers Propose Changes In Pre-Approval Of Hospital Expansions
The move reflects a national push to eliminate regulations that require state pre-approval of hospital expansions, surgery centers and certain medical services. Some hospitals say that the regulations, known as “certificate of public need” laws, prevent providers from artificially increasing prices and protect facilities that care for indigent patients. (Portnoy, 12/21)

The Associated Press: Wisconsin Officials Get OK To Extend Prescription Program
Wisconsin officials say the state has received federal approval to extend a prescription drug assistance program for older residents. The state Department of Health Services said in a statement Monday that SeniorCare helps about 60,000 people each month by reducing prescription costs for low-income state residents who are 65 or older. DHS spokeswoman Claire Yunker says the action from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services will allow SeniorCare to operate through 2018. (12/21)

The Kansas Health Institute News Service: Security Concerns Central To Halted Medicare Payments For Osawatomie Hospital
The reported rape of an employee at Osawatomie State Hospital in October exposed security concerns that federal officials cited when they decided last week to stop sending Medicare payments to the facility after Monday. Osawatomie had submitted a correction plan for the security issues to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, but federal inspectors who visited the hospital Dec. 15 and Friday to follow up decided to proceed with cutting payments, said Angela de Rocha, spokeswoman for the Kansas Department for Aging and Disability Services. (Marso, 12/21)

Health News Florida: FL Cancer Lab Pays $20M Over False Bills
A Fort Myers-based integrated cancer care services provider accused of billing for tests that were not needed will pay nearly $20 million to the federal government to settle allegations from a whistleblower that it violated the False Claims Act, according to a news release from the U.S. Department of Justice. (12/21)

St. Louis Public Radio: The Ones Who Survived: Study Looks At Firearm Injuries Among Children In St. Louis
For a long time, physicians at the major trauma centers in St. Louis say they have cared for an alarming number of people with gunshot wounds — including many children. "Some weeks we’ll operate more on gunshot wounds than we will for simple things like appendicitis,” said Dr. Pamela Choi, a surgery resident at Washington University.(Bouscaren, 12/21)

The Courier-Journal: Glitch Blocks Plan To Increase Child Care Funds
A last-minute plan by Gov. Steve Beshear to increase child care assistance for poor working parents has collapsed because state officials failed to enact it before his administration ended Dec. 7. Beshear announced Dec. 3 that his administration planned to use about $15 million in surplus federal money to boost payments to centers that accept children whose parents qualify for help through the Kentucky Child Care Assistance Program. The higher payments were supposed to begin Jan. 1. (Yetter, 12/21)

The Kansas City Star: Independence Becomes Third Area City To Raise Legal Smoking Age To 21
Independence on Monday banned the sale of tobacco products to anyone younger than 21, the third metro city to do so in less than a month. By a 6-1 vote, the Independence City Council passed the ordinance to raise the legal smoking age from 18 to 21 years old. Karen Deluccie cast the only dissenting vote. “I believe that if you’re 18, you’re an adult, you have to make decisions including the decision to buy a product that people don’t agree with but it’s a product,” Deluccie said before the vote. (Cronkleton, 12/21)

STAT: Why Ted Cruz's Plan To Overhaul The FDA Would Jeopardize Public Health
Under [a bill offered by Sen. Ted Cruz,] ... the FDA would have to approve “life-saving” products for which is there an unmet medical need if those drugs or devices have already been endorsed in “trusted, developed countries,” including European Union member states, Canada, Israel, Australia, and Japan. ... To be sure, the FDA review process is not perfect. What is? But the agency is still considered the gold standard by which other regulators are measured. Rubberstamping an approval that was made in, say, Japan or Romania may speed access, but may not always ensure a medicine is safe or effective. (Ed Silverman, 12/21)

USA Today: America's Deadliest Drug Problem: Our View
America's deadliest drug problem grew even deadlier last year, as overdose deaths from opioids hit a record 28,647, or 78 people a day. This epidemic is fueled as much by well-meaning doctors as it is by dope pushers. Overdoses of the most popularly prescribed legal painkillers, such as oxycodone and hydrocodone, accounted for more deaths last year than heroin, according to numbers released Friday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (12/21)

USA Today: Don’t Tie The Hands Of Clinicians: Opposing View
Prescription drug abuse and overdose is a tragic public health crisis, as is inadequately treated chronic pain. In addressing these two intertwined crises, we must avoid ameliorating one problem while worsening the other. Unfortunately, CDC’s proposed opioid prescribing guideline may not reach that goal. (Bob Twillman, 12/21)

The Oakland Tribune: Quality Health-Care Coverage Is Available, But You Must Sign Up
As chair of the California State Assembly Health Committee, I believe that affordable, accessible and high-quality health care coverage is a right for everyone, not a privilege. Having true access to a doctor when you need one can improve, extend and even save one's life. California's implementation of the Affordable Care Act has brought us closer than ever to providing health care coverage to all over the past three years, but many of us still need to take the critical step and sign up for coverage through Covered California. (Rob Bonta, 12/21)

Miami Herald: Medicaid Expansion Makes Good Sense
In November, Montana became the 30th state to extend healthcare coverage to low-income, working uninsured people. Last week, Michigan and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) entered into an agreement to continue its program that insures more than 600,000 people. Both states are led by Republicans. Medicaid expansion is not a partisan issue. ... Earlier this year, the debate on coverage between the Florida Senate and House of Representatives brought the 2015 legislative session to an impasse. Lawmakers have yet to agree on a solution, but Florida’s healthcare challenges aren’t going away anytime soon. (Julio Fuentes, 12/21)

The New York Times: Parents, Stop Obsessing Over Concussions
I have been a pediatric neurologist for 40 years, and over the past five years, I have evaluated dozens of children for potential neurological complications of concussion. Most had no serious problems. Obviously, concussions are a real concern. But what’s also worrisome is that excessive fear of concussions may discourage parents and medical professionals from letting kids play healthy team sports. (Steven M. Rothman, 12/22)

The Philadelphia Inquirer: Are 'Concierge' Practices Good For Patients?
A new survey finds that physician dissatisfaction with practice “has reached a tipping point with more than half of US physicians experiencing professional burnout.“ And this is bad news for patients: “Given the extensive evidence that burnout among physicians has effects on quality of care, patient satisfaction, turnover, and patient safety . . .There is an urgent need for systematic application of evidence-based interventions addressing the drivers of burnout among physicians. These interventions must address contributing factors in the practice environment rather than focusing exclusively on helping physicians care for themselves and training them to be more resilient.” (Bob Doherty, 12/21)

JAMA: Value Promotion In Health Care
The US Congress also has expressed support for value promotion, with both the House and the Senate passing legislation requiring the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services to pilot test value-based insurance designs in Medicare Advantage plans (the private insurance plans that contract with Medicare to provide enrollees with health care benefits). Although advocates of value-driven health care may embrace the idea of value-based insurance designs, the proposed Medicare Advantage pilot is likely too asymmetrical to create many savings. The bills promote the use of high-value health care services without creating strategies to reduce the use of low-value ones. (Peter A. Ubel, 12/21)