Modern Healthcare: Biden, Trump Clash Over Healthcare Plans In First Debate
President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden clashed over their agendas for healthcare reform as the issue took center stage during the first presidential debate on Tuesday. Biden used the first question of the night about the impending Senate fight over Trump's Supreme Court nomination as an opportunity to raise concerns about the future of the Affordable Care Act. He criticized Trump for supporting a lawsuit that could upend the ACA and for not presenting a comprehensive replacement plan if the law is struck down. The Supreme Court hears oral arguments Nov. 10 in a case that could determine the law's fate. (Cohrs, 9/29)

Kaiser Health News and PolitiFact: The First Presidential Debate: A Night Of Rapid-Fire Interruptions And Inaccuracies 
Tuesday night, President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden appeared for the first presidential debate, offering voters their first side-by-side comparison of the candidates. Little was said about what either candidate would do if elected; at one point, Biden’s attempts to explain his health care plan were drowned out by Trump’s persistent interruptions about Biden’s Democratic primary opponents. (9/30)

The Hill: Biden Blames COVID-19 Death Toll On Trump: 'It Is What It Is Because You Are Who You Are' 
Democratic nominee Joe Biden blamed President Trump for the COVID-19 death toll Tuesday night, arguing that more than 200,000 people in the U.S. are dead because the president failed to take the virus seriously. Biden drew attention to comments Trump made privately to veteran journalist Bob Woodward in February, only recently published, that he knew the coronavirus was “more deadly” than the flu, even though he said otherwise in public. (Hellmann, 9/29)

Politico: The Biggest Falsehoods And Exaggerations In The First Trump-Biden Showdown 
Trump defended his administration’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic by claiming a Covid-19 vaccine was only weeks away from being available. But several of his own health experts have cast doubt on that timeline. Dr. Robert Redfield, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said a vaccine could be ready by next month, but it wouldn’t likely be available to the majority of Americans until the summer or fall of next year. Trump himself previously claimed a vaccine wouldn’t be available to “every American” until at least April — and that’s on an optimistic timeline. (Forgey and Choi, 9/30)

NBC News: Fact-Check: Trump Says GOP Health Plans Protect People With Pre-Existing Conditions
Trump claimed: "Obamacare is no good. We made it better. And I had a choice to make very early on. We took away the individual mandate. We guarantee pre-existing conditions." It's true that Republicans eliminated the Affordable Care Act's individual mandate — a provision designed to force people to purchase health care coverage or pay fines through their taxes — as part of their 2017 tax bill. But Trump is wrong about pre-existing conditions. We've fact-checked this at length before, and it's still false. (Timm and Kapur, 9/30)

USA Today: Presidential Debate: Trump, Biden Clash On Masks, Rallies
Asked why he continues to hold large rallies against the advice of his own health experts, Trump responded: “Because people want to hear what I have to say.” He claimed that his rallies have had no negative effect on Americans, explaining "so far, we have had no problem whatsoever."  (Hayes, 9/29)

The Hill: Biden Mocks Trump Over Disinfectant Remark; Trump Says He Was Being Sarcastic 
Joe Biden mocked President Trump's suggestion earlier this year that people might inject disinfectants to prevent COVID-19 in one of the testier moments of a nasty debate on Tuesday, to which Trump protested he was being sarcastic. The exchange took place during a discussion about the development of a vaccine for the coronavirus. (Chalfant, 9/29)

Stat: Debate Highlights Trump’s Hunger For An Election-Eve Vaccine
President Trump spoke on Tuesday as if his campaign depends on a Covid-19 vaccine. Specifically, a vaccine approval by Election Day. Throughout a turbulent, disorganized, and hostile debate, Trump highlighted his government’s efforts on vaccine development, pledging, dubiously, that the country is “weeks away from a vaccine” and contradicting high-level officials within his own government who have suggested it will be months, at least, before a vaccine is available. (Facher, 9/29)

Stat: Trump Claims Insulin Is ‘Cheap .. Like Water.’ But It Still Costs Just As Much
Not only has he lowered drug prices, President Trump claimed in the first 15 minutes of Tuesday’s debate — but he has helped lower the price of insulin, specifically, so that it is so cheap that it’s “like water.” In reality, insulin still retails for roughly $300 a vial. Most patients with diabetes need two to three vials per month, and some can require much more. (Florko, 9/29)

Vox: It’s True: 1 In 1,000 Black Americans Have Died In The Covid-19 Pandemic
During a discussion on race in America in the first presidential debate, former Vice President Joe Biden cited a horrific statistic to punctuate his case that President Donald Trump has not been good for Black Americans: 1 in 1,000 Black Americans have died in the Covid-19 pandemic. “You talk about helping African Americans — 1 in 1,000 African Americans has been killed because of the coronavirus,” the Democratic nominee said Tuesday. “And if he doesn’t do something quickly, by the end of the year, 1 in 500 will have been killed. 1 in 500 African Americans.” (Scott, 9/29)

Time: The Trump-Biden Debate Was a Missed Opportunity to Provide Americans With Clarity on COVID-19 
If Americans were hoping to get some reassurance, clarity, or even hope from this year’s presidential candidates about how the U.S. will make it through the coronavirus pandemic, then Tuesday night’s first debate fell woefully short. During the 15-minute segment dedicated to COVID-19—which is still killing hundreds of Americans each day, and stands to worsen once again—neither President Donald Trump nor Former Vice President Joe Biden provided any substantive plans for what health experts say will be a critical next few months, and possibly years, in the fight against the coronavirus. Instead of thoughtful plans for addressing the deadliest and most disruptive public health crisis the world has faced in a century, viewers got a mud-slinging brawl between two candidates who were mostly more interested in landing jabs than in providing any reassurance to an already edgy public reeling from lost loved ones, lost jobs and disrupted lives. (Park, 9/30)

The Atlantic: Why Trump Has No Real Health-Care Plan
There’s a reason Donald Trump has never produced a health-care plan that protects consumers with preexisting medical conditions: Ending protections for the sick is the central mechanism that all GOP health-care proposals use to try to lower costs for the healthy. Every alternative to the Affordable Care Act that Republicans have offered relies on the same strategy—retrenching the many ACA provisions that require greater risk- and cost-sharing between healthy and sick Americans—to lower the cost of insurance for healthier consumers. Put another way: Reducing protections for patients with greater health needs isn’t a bug in the GOP plans; it’s a key feature. (Brownstein, 9/29)

Vox: Presidential Debate: Joe Biden’s Plan To Beat Covid-19 In The US 
Joe Biden’s plan to beat back the Covid-19 pandemic in the United States is founded on a simple premise: leadership matters. President Donald Trump has badly botched the response thus far, according to most experts, and the numbers tell the tale: 200,000 Americans are dead. He’s tried to discredit the scientific institutions tasked with managing the response. Millions of people are still out of work. Thousands of businesses have closed that will never reopen. Biden’s campaign has spent the last six months coming up with its plan to fix it. (Scott, 9/28)

Politico: Pelosi Eyes Last-Ditch Shot At Stimulus Deal With Mnuchin 
Speaker Nancy Pelosi is holding out one more day for an eleventh-hour agreement with Republicans on a coronavirus relief package, hoping to clinch a longshot deal as talks with Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin drag on this week. After a 50-minute conversation on Tuesday, Pelosi and Mnuchin will speak again Wednesday in what is likely the final chance to deliver trillions of dollars in relief to struggling Americans ahead of the November election. (Caygle, Zanona and Ferris, 9/29)

The Hill: House GOP Leaders Rally Opposition To Democrats' Scaled-Down COVID Bill 
House Republicans are rallying members to oppose a new scaled-down coronavirus relief package from Democrats. The GOP effort comes as negotiations between Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin showed signs of progress Tuesday on a COVID-19 aid bill after a weeks-long impasse. (Brufke, 9/29)

In other news from Capitol Hill —

Politico: Schumer Aims To Squeeze GOP On Obamacare
It's not often the minority leader takes control of the Senate floor. But that's just what Chuck Schumer did Tuesday. Schumer moved to set up a vote on legislation that would block the Justice Department from supporting litigation to overturn Obamacare, a rare procedural step for Democrats. The move is a not-so-subtle rebuke of the Trump administration’s backing of a high-stakes lawsuit to strike down the entire law, which is slated to go up before the Supreme Court just one week after Election Day. (Levine and Luthi, 9/29)

Stat: Drug Industry CEOs Set To Testify About Controversial Medicines
The House Oversight Committee will hold two days of hearings this week with six drug industry CEOs. The hearings are the presumptive climax of an 18-month investigation first launched by the late Rep. Elijah Cummings in 2019. The hearing could be the most perilous yet for drug makers, who have managed to avoid any major missteps at the multiple congressional drug pricing hearings that preceded this one. (Florko, 9/29)

NPR: How Operation Warp Speed's Big Vaccine Contracts Could Stay Secret
The Trump administration has compared Operation Warp Speed's crash program to develop a COVID-19 vaccine to the Manhattan Project. And like the notoriously secretive government project to make the first atomic bomb, the details of Operation Warp Speed's work may take a long time to unravel. One reason is that Operation Warp Speed is issuing billions of dollars' worth of coronavirus vaccine contracts to companies through a nongovernment intermediary, bypassing the regulatory oversight and transparency of traditional federal contracting mechanisms, NPR has learned. (Lupkin, 9/29)

Axios: CDC Director Overruled On Cruise Ship Ban
Robert Redfield, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, was overruled when he pushed to extend a "no-sail order" on passenger cruises into next year, according to two sources with direct knowledge of the conversation today in the White House Situation Room. (Swan, 9/29)

USA Today: CDC Will Extend 'No-Sail' Order Through October 31 In Compromise With White House
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will extend its "no-sail" order for the U.S. cruise industry through Oct. 31, a person familiar with the situation but not authorized to speak publicly told USA TODAY. The CDC's previous order had been scheduled to expire Sept. 30 after extensions to the original mid-March order in April and again in July. The CDC requested that the order be extended to February 15, but compromised with the White House Task Force to extend until Oct. 31 four days before the Nov. 3 election. (Hines, 9/29)

Politico: HHS Ad Blitz Sputters As Celebrities Back Away 
They made a list of more than 30 celebrities including Justin Timberlake, Taylor Swift and Billy Joel to appear in their ad campaign to "inspire hope" about coronavirus, but they ended up with only Dennis Quaid, CeCe Winans and Hasidic singer Shulem Lemmer. The health department’s $300 million-plus, taxpayer-funded vehicle to boost confidence in President Donald Trump’s response to the pandemic is sputtering. Celebrities are refusing to participate, and staff are arraying against it. (Diamond, 9/29)

In updates on other health-related programs from the Trump administration —

Politico: The Surprisingly Limited Success Of Trump’s Signature Anti-Poverty Program 
Donald Trump has spent months on the campaign trail touting his signature anti-poverty program as a way to attract support from Black voters. Opportunity zones, he has said, have drawn “$100 billion of new investment … into 9,000 of our most distressed neighborhoods” and created “countless jobs." ... Opportunity zones were created in 2017 to allow wealthy investors to avoid the federal capital gains tax by reinvesting their profits in funds that invest in designated census tracts that are high poverty or low income, or next door to a tract that meets those standards. (Trickey, 9/29)

Bloomberg: Trump Shines Up A 'Platinum Plan' For Black Voters 
In his efforts to woo African-American voters before the election, on September 25 President Donald Trump unveiled a plan to shovel capital, jobs and opportunities into Black communities — a program that his campaign is calling the “Platinum Plan for Black America.” For Black communities, the Platinum Plan commits to unlocking $500 billion in access to capital, creating 3 million new jobs, and bridging historic disparities in health care and education. (Capps, 9/29)

Modern Healthcare: CMS Changes Nursing Home Testing Guidance Over Rural Concerns
Nursing homes will face new COVID-19 testing guidelines based on their community spread, CMS said Tuesday. The agency revised its facility staff testing standards to account for community spread in its color-coded system. If a county has 20 or fewer tests over 14 days, it will be considered green. Counties with fewer than 500 tests, fewer than 2,000 tests per 100,000 residents and a positivity rate above 10% over 14 days also will be considered green. Previously, counties meeting those standards would have been considered yellow. (Christ, 9/29)

More on Medicare —

CNBC: Congress May Limit Medicare Part B Premium Increase For 2021
Congress may be poised to head off a potential premium spike for some Medicare beneficiaries. As part of a short-term government funding bill passed by the House last week and expected to be considered by the Senate on Wednesday, any increase in Medicare Part B premiums for 2021 would be capped. While it’s still uncertain what the standard premium would be for 2021 — it is based on an actuarial formula and typically revealed in early November for the next year — estimates have proved tricky this year due to economic upheaval from the coronavirus pandemic. (O'Brien, 9/29)

In other nursing home news —

The New York Times: Federal Program To Supply Coronavirus Tests To Nursing Homes Led To Unexpected Costs And ‘Testing Hell’ 
After months of enduring a dearth of protective medical gear and staggering death tolls from the coronavirus pandemic, nursing home operators and employees across the United States experienced something close to elation as rapid-result test machines paid for by the federal government began arriving last month at 14,000 residential facilities that serve the elderly. The hand-held testing devices, which spit out results in as little as 15 minutes, were intended to quickly diagnose and isolate patients, and alter the deadly calculus of a contagion that has taken the lives of 77,000 nursing home residents and workers, more than 40 percent of the nation’s fatalities from Covid-19. (9/30)

Modern Healthcare: Nursing Home Volumes Taking Longer To Recover Than Home Health
Even as home health providers had recovered most of the volume lost during the pandemic by July, a new study finds skilled nursing volumes had not seen nearly the same improvement. The analysis by consultancy Avalere Health found the skilled nursing industry suffered a bigger volume hit than home health providers at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic and patients are taking longer to return to nursing homes. In July, skilled nursing facilities were taking in 34% fewer Medicare fee-for-service patients from hospitals compared with a year earlier. Home health's volumes from hospital discharges, meanwhile, were down just 1.8% in that time. (Bannow, 9/29)

Modern Healthcare: AHRQ Creates COVID-19 Training Network For Nursing Homes
The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality along with the University of New Mexico's Project ECHO and the Institute for Healthcare Improvement have partnered to establish a network that will provide training on COVID-19-related safety practices for nursing home employees. The network, dubbed the National Nursing Home COVID Action Network, was established as part of $2 billion in congressional funding HHS received from Congress under the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act to improve infection control in nursing homes. The network is part of an AHRQ contract valued up to $237 million. (Castellucci, 9/29)

Stat: For Two Decades, The FDA Approval Process For Opioids Had Numerous Shortcomings, Study Finds
Over more than two decades, the Food and Drug Administration approved opioid painkillers based on relatively brief pivotal clinical trials that relied on narrowly defined patient groups and rarely assessed key safety outcomes, according to a new study. Specifically, the study found that, for opioids approved between 1997 and 2018 as treatments for chronic pain, none of the trials lasted longer than three months. Moreover, the trials often excluded patients who could not tolerate the painkillers and generally failed to systematically evaluate such known risks as tolerance, drug diversion and so-called non-medical uses. (Silverman, 9/29)

Becker's Hospital Review: FDA Opioid Approvals Relied On Short Trials, Patient Exclusions, Study Contends
None of the clinical trials for opioids the FDA approved to treat chronic pain from 1997 to 2018 lasted longer than three months, according to research published Sept. 29 in Annals of Internal Medicine. Researchers discovered that only 21 of the 39 opioids approved by the FDA from 1997 to 2018 were supported by at least one pivotal trial. The median length of the trials conducted for opioids during this time was 84 days. (Adams, 9/29)

In other news on the opioid crisis —

The New York Times: Coronavirus Pandemic Drives Hike In Opioid Deaths 
On the first Friday in June, Jefrey Cameron, 29, left his home around midnight to buy heroin. He had been struggling with addiction for seven years but had seemingly turned a corner, holding down a job that he loved at Basil’s Pizzeria, driving his teenage sister to the mall to go shopping and sharing a home with his grandmother. But then the coronavirus pandemic hit. When he returned home that night and tried the product, it was so potent that he fell and hit his head in the bathroom. Mr. Cameron texted a friend soon after, saying that he had messed up and would go to a 12-step meeting with a friend that weekend. (Swift and Goodnough, 9/29)

Stat: An FDA Safety Program Is Failing To Stem The Opioid Crisis, Report Finds
A mandated safety program regulators rely on to minimize opioid abuse and misuse is not “well suited” to quickly address the ongoing crisis across the U.S. And the shortcomings reflect a lack of cooperation from opioid makers that made it difficult for the Food and Drug Administration to assess key data, according to a new federal government report. At issue are REMS, or risk evaluation and mitigation strategy programs, which the FDA requires companies to develop when the agency approves a new medicine that may pose a safety risk. When the FDA decides a REMS program is necessary, drug makers must devise a program to provide physician and patient education, sometimes monitor distribution, and send the agency regular assessments. (Silverman, 9/29)

CNBC: Regeneron Says Its Coronavirus Treatment Reduces Viral Levels, Improves Symptoms
Regeneron on Tuesday said its experimental two-antibody cocktail reduced viral levels and improved symptoms in non-hospitalized patients with mild-to-moderate Covid19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus. When asked whether the company would apply for emergency use authorization from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, the company said it plans to “rapidly” discuss the early trial results with regulatory agencies, including the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. (9/29)

CNN: Regeneron's Antibody Cocktail For Coronavirus: Early Data Shows Promising Results 
The greatest improvements were seen in patients who hadn't already mounted a natural response to the infection, the company said. The results only involve 275 patients of the 1,000 they have enrolled in this particular trial, but appear "very promising," Dr. Jeanne Marrazzo, the director of the division of infectious diseases at University of Alabama at Birmingham, told CNN. (Christensen, 9/29)

In COVID vaccine development news —

Reuters: Moderna COVID-19 Vaccine Appears Safe, Shows Signs Of Working In Older Adults 
Results from an early safety study of Moderna Inc’s coronavirus vaccine candidate in older adults showed that it produced virus-neutralizing antibodies at levels similar to those seen in younger adults, with side effects roughly on par with high-dose flu shots, researchers said on Tuesday. The study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, offers a more complete picture of the vaccine’s safety in older adults, a group at increased risk of severe complications from COVID-19. (Steenhuysen, 9/29)

The New York Times: Will Pfizer's Vaccine Be Ready In October? Here's Why That's Unlikely.
And yet by all other accounts, the idea that it will be ready in October is far-fetched. Even if the vaccine shows promising signs in clinical trials — still a big if — the company will not have collected enough data by then to say with any statistical confidence that it is safe and effective. By repeating a date that flies in the face of most scientific predictions, [chief executive, Dr. Albert Bourla] is making a high-stakes gamble. If Pfizer puts out a vaccine before it has been thoroughly tested — something the company has pledged it will not do — it could pose a major threat to public safety. (Thomas, 9/30)

FiercePharma: Johnson & Johnson Signs On Michigan's Grand River To Help With COVID-19 Vaccine Finishing Work 
With all eyes on the hunt for a COVID-19 vaccine, drugmakers like New Jersey's Johnson & Johnson are scouring the market for manufacturing partners to help meet what would be global demand for their shots. With a couple already in hand, J&J is now turning to a Michigan CDMO to help keep up. Johnson & Johnson has partnered with Michigan's Grand River Aseptic Manufacturing (GRAM) to handle fill-finish duties for the New Jersey drugmaker's recombinant COVID-19 vaccine, the partners said last week.  (Blankenship, 9/29)

Becker's Hospital Review: UnitedHealth Acquires Competitor To Amazon's PillPack
UnitedHealth Group has acquired DivvyDose, a startup that delivers medications in presorted packages, CNBC reported. The deal was valued at just over $300M, according to CNBC. A spokesperson for UnitedHealth declined to comment. Retailers have increasingly been acquiring pharmacy startups, with Amazon acquiring PillPack, a competitor to DivvyDose, in 2018, and Walmart recently acquiring medication management technology from CareZoe.  (Anderson, 9/29)

Becker's Hospital Review: FDA Grants Emergency OK Of Hologic's Asymptomatic COVID-19 Test
The FDA has granted emergency authorization to Hologic's COVID-19 test to treat asymptomatic people. It's the first test widely available specifically for screening asymptomatic people and those without other reasons to suspect COVID-19 infection. Hologic said it expects the test to play a key role in identifying early infection and helping to reopen schools, workplaces and the broader economy. The test, called the Panther Fusion test, can return results in about three hours, and machines can process more than 1,000 test results in 24 hours, Hologic said. (Anderson, 9/29)

Stat: Telehealth Startup Ro Expands Generics Partnership With Pfizer
Telehealth startup Ro is expanding its partnership with pharma giant Pfizer’s generics arm to offer its generic versions of commonly prescribed blood pressure and cholesterol medications. Through its virtual mail-order pharmacy, Ro will supply Pfizer-produced generics of Lipitor, a cholesterol drug, and Norvasc, a hypertension medication. The medications will be made available through Ro’s $5-per-month prescription drug service, which launched earlier this year and which doesn’t take insurance. (Runwal, 9/30)

Stat: Catalyst Loses Lawsuit Accusing The FDA Of Unfairly Approving Rival Drug
In a blow to Catalyst Pharmaceuticals (CPRX), a federal judge dismissed its lawsuit accusing the Food and Drug Administration of violating the law when it approved a similar medicine by a small, family-run rival company. The lawsuit has been closely watched because Catalyst raised thorny questions about regulatory standards and the vagaries of orphan drug designations, while also playing into the heated national debate over the rising cost of prescription medicines. (Silverman, 9/29)

AP: Even Before Pandemic Struck, More US Adults Were Uninsured
About 2.5 million more working-age Americans were uninsured last year, even before the coronavirus pandemic struck, according to a government report issued Wednesday. The study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that 14.5% of adults ages 18 to 64 were uninsured in 2019, a statistically significant increase from 2018, when 13.3% lacked coverage. (Alonso-Zaldivar, 9/30)

In other health industry news —

FierceHealthcare: UnitedHealthcare Teams With St. Luke To Create New Commercial Narrow Network Plan 
UnitedHealthcare partnered with St. Luke’s Health System and Children’s Mercy in Kansas City to create a new narrow network commercial plan intended to offer a cheaper option. The plan would only provide care at the St. Luke system that includes 18 hospitals and 130 physician offices and the children’s hospital. (King, 9/29)

Houston Chronicle: Two Years After Cutoff Amid Patient Deaths, St. Luke's Heart Transplants Again Funded By Medicare  
The storied but tarnished heart transplant program at Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center is again receiving Medicare funding, roughly two years after the federal agency cut it off following an unusually high rate of patient deaths. In a letter made public Tuesday, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services informed St. Luke’s leadership that the program has been approved for participation effective Aug. 25. That is the date CMS surveyors concluded an inspection of the program that found no deficiencies. (Ackerman, 9/30)

Modern Healthcare: Why Molina Is On A Medicaid Plan Buying Spree
Molina Healthcare is on a roll. The health insurer announced plans Tuesday to buy Affinity Health Plan, a small Medicaid company in New York, which would mark the fifth acquisition deal that Molina has disclosed this year. The Long Beach, Calif.-based Medicaid giant will pay $380 million in cash for nearly all of the assets of Affinity, which serves about 284,000 Medicaid beneficiaries in six New York counties and brings in annual premium revenue of $1.3 billion. Molina expects the deal to close in the second quarter of next year, following approval from regulators. (Livingston, 9/29)

Houston Chronicle: Nurse Navigator To Give Patients Extra Resource During Cancer Treatment At St. Luke’s The Woodlands Hospital  
With the addition of a new nurse navigator, patients at the Dan L Duncan Comprehensive Cancer Center at St. Luke’s The Woodlands Hospital will have one more resource to count on as they navigate treatment. Jessica Miller, who also operates as the clinical nurse for the center, started in her new role in March. (Swinnerton, 9/30)

Becker's Hospital Review: Baptist Hospitals CEO To Retire
David Parmer is retiring as CEO of Baptist Hospitals of Southeast Texas in Beaumont, hospital officials announced on Twitter Sept. 29. Mr. Parmer will helm the organization through June 30 and then serve in an advisory role, the officials said. (Gooch, 9/29)

Las Vegas Review-Journal: Universal Health Services Confirmed A Cyberattack At Its Hospitals In Las Vegas And The U.S. 
Universal Health Services, which operates six hospitals in the Las Vegas Valley, said Tuesday that its computer networks remained shut down after what it confirmed was a cyberattack on Sunday. (Hynes, 9/29)

Becker's Hospital Review: Employees Describe Chaotic Scene At UHS Hospitals Amid IT Incident
The attack began on Sept. 27, and one nurse told CNBC the computers slowly stopped working. The health system issued a statement on Sept. 28 acknowledging an "IT security issue" and noted its facilities turned to downtime protocols. Employees are now stepping forward to describe the scene inside facilities. A Washington-based clinician working in a UHS facility said medical staff couldn't easily see lab results, imaging scans and medication lists to make treatment decisions, according to a CBS News report. The facility also reverted to hand-delivering lab orders and phone issues made it challenging for care team communication. "These things are life or death," the clinician said. (Dyrda, 9/29)

In other stories about IT issues —

Modern Healthcare: HHS To Track EHR Use Among Office-Based Physicians
HHS is launching an effort to measure health information technology adoption and use among office-based physicians, the department said Tuesday. The initiative will gather national-level data on office-based physicians' use of health IT systems, including their experiences with interoperability and administrative burden. HHS' Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology plans to use the program's findings to inform future policy decisions. (Cohen, 9/29)

Becker's Hospital Review: Piedmont Cancer Institute Email Phishing Incident Exposes 5,226 Patients' Info
Atlanta-based Piedmont Cancer Institute began notifying more than 5,000 patients in September that their personal health information may have been exposed as the result of a recent email phishing incident. The medical center reported the breach to HHS as affecting 5,226 individuals and posted a data security incident notice to its website stating that an unauthorized individual gained access to a Piedmont Cancer Institute employee's email account between April 5 and May 8. (Drees, 9/29)

In news about quality of care —

Modern Healthcare: FDA Warns Of Safety Problems At Virginia Mammography Clinic
The Food and Drug Administration on Monday alerted patients who had breast cancer screenings at a privately owned mammography clinic in Richmond, Va., that there may be problems with test quality. Patients of Allison Breast Center and their family members complained to the agency that Dr. Michael Bigg, a radiologist and the clinic's owner, incorrectly interpreted mammography screenings for years and caused delays in breast cancer diagnoses. The Virginia Board of Medicine suspended Bigg's medical license in May and the clinic is now closed, according to the website. (Castellucci, 9/29)

Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Some Georgia Hospitals Keep Pandemic Information To Themselves
In March, as Georgia roiled with skepticism about the true danger of COVID-19, a stark example of the disease’s stealthy power appeared. A 42-year-old mammogram technician at Piedmont Newnan Hospital was found dead in her home, with her young child nearby. The county coroner reported that the otherwise healthy woman had tested positive. For some, it made the pandemic’s reality sink in. “I had mammograms done at that hospital,” one Twitter user wrote. Others called for more masks and resources. (Hart, 9/29)

Kaiser Health News: Post-COVID Clinics Get Jump-Start From Patients With Lingering Illness
Clarence Troutman survived a two-month hospital stay with COVID-19, then went home in early June. But he’s far from over the disease, still suffering from limited endurance, shortness of breath and hands that can be stiff and swollen. “Before COVID, I was a 59-year-old, relatively healthy man,” said the broadband technician from Denver. “If I had to say where I’m at now, I’d say about 50% of where I was, but when I first went home, I was at 20%.” (Appleby, 9/30)

AP: COVID-19 Cases Rising Among US Children As Schools Reopen
After preying heavily on the elderly in the spring, the coronavirus is increasingly infecting American children and teens in a trend authorities say appears fueled by school reopenings and the resumption of sports, playdates and other activities. Children of all ages now make up 10% of all U.S cases, up from 2% in April, the American Academy of Pediatrics reported Tuesday. And the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Monday that the incidence of COVID-19 in school-age children began rising in early September as many youngsters returned to their classrooms. (Tanner, 9/29)

The New York Times: ‘Super Healthy’ College Student Dies Of Rare Covid-19 Complications 
Chad Dorrill was in “tremendous shape.” Tall and slender. Played basketball. Ran long distances. But the 19-year-old college student died on Monday night, apparently of neurological complications related to Covid-19. Mr. Dorrill, a sophomore at Appalachian State University in Boone, N.C., had been living off campus and taking classes online when he became ill with flulike symptoms, the school’s chancellor, Sheri Everts, wrote on Tuesday in a statement to students confirming his death. “His mother encouraged him to come home, quarantine and be tested,” Dr. Everts said. (Hubler, 9/29)

In updates on school reopenings —

Politico: NYC Infection Rate Spikes As Students Head Back To School
The city has threatened to shut down non-essential businesses and ban gatherings over ten people in those neighborhoods, but officials said Tuesday they are not yet acting on that threat. They said they will go through with it if the spread of Covid-19 does not slow. “We have to take more action at this point, and more serious action. And we will be escalating with each day depending on what we see happening on the ground,” de Blasio said. (Durkin, 9/29)

AP: Mississippi Middle School In Quarantine After Virus Outbreak
An entire middle school in Mississippi is in quarantine after more than a dozen students tested positive for coronavirus. Long Beach Middle School ordered Tuesday that all students be quarantined for two weeks beginning Wednesday, according to the school’s website. Students will return to the classroom on Oct. 14. (9/29)

Des Moines Register: Iowa Eases Quarantine Guidance For Schools, Businesses, Breaking With CDC
State officials will no longer recommend that people go into a 14-day quarantine after having close contact with a person infected with the coronavirus if both people were wearing masks during the encounter, Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds announced Tuesday. The eased guidelines, which apply to places such as businesses and schools, break with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's quarantine recommendations. The federal agency says anyone who has close contact with someone who has tested positive should stay home for 14 days, regardless of whether those involved wore facial coverings. (Coltrain, 9/29)

The Baltimore Sun: Pikesville Rabbinical College Reports More Than 50 Students Tested Positive For Coronavirus And ‘Many More Have Been Exposed' 
More than 50 students have tested positive for coronavirus at Ner Israel Rabbinical College in Pikesville, and the school expects “this number to climb,” according to a campus-wide email. “As of tonight over 50 of our Talmidim [the Hebrew word for “disciple”] have tested positive for Covid-19, and many more have been exposed,” read the email, which was sent Saturday. (Deville, 9/29)

The Washington Post: Should Kids Go Trick-Or-Treating During A Pandemic? Experts Share Their Advice. 
The question many households are asking during Halloween 2020 — Should we let kids go trick-or-treating during the pandemic? — has no easy answer, like seemingly all questions related to the novel coronavirus. Outdoor activities are generally said to be safer than indoor ones. But the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently released guidance on Halloween, saying that collecting candy door to door is high-risk. This year’s holiday had all the hallmarks of a perfect night: It’s on a Saturday, and there will be a full moon. But with pandemic numbers predicted to spike in autumn, how should parents handle eager children who crave old-fashioned fun and normalcy during Halloween? (Patel, 9/28)

NPR: 'Freedges' Offer Free Food In Neighborhoods To Those In Need 
Marina Vergara has been involved in distributing food to Los Angeles' large homeless population for years through her work with a nonprofit that supports the chronically unhoused. But this spring, she heard about something new. Free food refrigerators, or "freedges," were springing up all over New York as the deadly pandemic fueled a striking rise in wider food insecurity and hunger. Vergara reached out to the members of the collective who were setting up them up. (Westervelt, 9/29)

The Washington Post: You Might Want To Rethink Using A Stability Ball As Your Desk Chair 
If you bought a stability ball to use at your pandemic home work station, or dusted off the unused one in the basement, you might want to sit down for this reality check — on a traditional chair. Claims that stability balls will strengthen your core have little backing in research. In fact, sitting on a stability ball, also known as a balance ball, exercise ball or Swiss ball, could have detrimental effects. Manufacturers often promote stability balls as both workout equipment and furniture. Advertisements assert that although the products can be used to make exercises more challenging — by doing situps atop the balls, for example, or propping your feet on them to do pushups — simply using them as desk chairs improves posture and facilitates a core-strengthening workout. (Chang, 9/29)

In sports news —

The Washington Post: What To Know About NFL’s First Covid-19 Outbreak 
Even though most games have been played without fans in the stands, the NFL had navigated the novel coronavirus pandemic with relative smoothness through three weeks of the regular season. That changed Tuesday, when news broke that eight members of the Tennessee Titans — three players and five staff members — had tested positive for the coronavirus in the aftermath of their game Sunday against the Minnesota Vikings, injecting uncertainty into the schedule for the first time since the summer, when the pandemic forced the cancellation of preseason games and required teams to significantly alter how they went about their daily operations. (Bonesteel, 9/29)

The Washington Post: NHL Ends Its Bubble As Tampa Bay Lightning Hoist The Stanley Cup 
On Monday, the NHL released its second-to-last coronavirus testing update from the bubble, which stated it had administered 33,174 tests since teams arrived in Edmonton and Toronto on July 26. In that span, there were no positive results. (Pell, 9/29)

NPR: Parents Who've Lost Jobs Struggle To Manage Their Own Stress — And Their Kids' 
"We're seeing skyrocketing rates of job losses and food insecurity and stress," says Anna Johnson, a developmental psychologist at Georgetown University. "I think it will be very hard for these families who've lost income and jobs to get back to where they were. I think there will just be a lot of stress and turmoil in the household for the foreseeable future ... that takes a toll." That toll isn't just on the parents, who're struggling to make ends meet, but also on their children, says Johnson. With stressed-out parents at home, no school to escape to and a lack of in-person interaction with friends, children have fewer ways to cope with their circumstances, says psychologist Archana Basu of the T.H. Chan Harvard School of Public Health. Neither Basu nor Johnson were involved with the poll. (Chatterjee, 9/30)

North Carolina Health News: Pandemic Increases Hardships On Children 
Child advocates are worried that increased hardships due to the coronavirus pandemic could have long-term negative physical and mental health impacts for kids. In July, 30 percent of North Carolina adults with children reported that they were behind on their rent or mortgage payments and/or they could not afford enough food for their families, according to data collected by the U.S. Census Bureau. (Knopf, 9/30)

WBUR: Juggling Financial Stress And Caregiving, Parents Are 'Very Not OK' In The Pandemic 
Yates is among the 60% of households with children across the country that have lost jobs, or businesses, or have had wages reduced during the pandemic, according to a poll released Wednesday by NPR, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. The poll also found 74% of households with children that made less than $100,000 report facing serious financial problems. (Chatterjee, 9/30)

Fresno Bee: COVID-19 Twice As Contagious Than Thought Early In Pandemic 
During the first months of the coronavirus pandemic, the World Health Organization estimated that each sick individual was infecting an average of two others. This “basic reproductive number” — or (R0) and pronounced “R naught” — reveals how contagious a disease is. Now, new research from Duke University says the number was likely twice as big, with one infected individual bringing down an average of 4 to 5 people with them, according to a study published Sept. 24 in the journal PLOS One. (Camero, 9/28)

NPR: As Young Adults Get Infected With Coronavirus, Older Adults At Risk Of COVID-19 
Young adults are driving coronavirus infections in the U.S. and are likely spreading the virus to older, more vulnerable populations, according to a recent report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Early in the COVID-19 pandemic, older adults were more likely to get infected, but when researchers analyzed cases from June to August, they found that people in their 20s accounted for the largest share of confirmed cases compared to other age groups. And public health experts say this is a worrying trend. (Stone, 9/29)

The New York Times: Studies Begin To Untangle Obesity’s Role In Covid-19
In early April, Edna McCloud woke up to find her hands tied to her hospital bed. She had spent the past four days on a ventilator in a hospital in St. Louis County, Mo., thrashing and kicking under sedation as she battled a severe case of Covid-19.“They told me, ‘You were a real fighter down there,’” recalled Ms. McCloud, a 68-year-old African-American retiree with a history of diabetes and heart problems. She weighed close to 300 pounds when she caught the coronavirus, which ravaged her lungs and kidneys. Nearly six months later, she feels proud to have pulled through the worst. “They said people with the conditions I have, normally, this goes the other way,” she said. (Wu, 9/29)

Kaiser Health News and PolitiFact: What We Know About The Airborne Spread Of The Coronavirus
The federal government did a quick pivot on the threat of the coronavirus spreading through the air, changing a key piece of guidance over the weekend. On Sept. 18, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned that tiny airborne particles, not just the bigger water droplets from a sneeze or cough, could infect others. It cited growing “evidence.” By Sept. 21, that warning was gone from its website, with a note saying it had been posted in error and the CDC was in the process of updating its recommendations. (Greenberg, 9/30)

In other science and research news —

Fox News: Long-Term Use Of Acid Reflux Meds Linked To 24% Increase In Diabetes: Study 
Long-term, regular use of medications to treat acid reflux was linked to a 24% increased risk of type 2 diabetes, says a new study. The findings, by joint first authors Jinqiu Yuan and Qiangsheng He with The Seventh Affiliated Hospital, Sun Yat-Sen University in Shenzhen, China, were published Tuesday in the journal Gut. (Rivas, 9/29)

Kansas City Star: Pancreatic Cancer Treatment In Clinical Trial Prolongs Life 
On Sept. 10, 2019, Maria de Armas’ life changed forever. She had been dealing with digestive problems for a while, but they were getting worse. It wasn’t until her daughter noticed a pamphlet sitting on a doctors’ office waiting room table that 74-year-old de Armas asked for a more thorough examination. One CT scan later, on her 53rd wedding anniversary, de Armas was diagnosed with stage 3 pancreatic cancer. According to the statistics, she had less than a year to live. (Camero, 9/29)

Stat: New Research Shows Older Adults Are Still Often Excluded From Clinical Trials
For years, researchers have called out a glaring gap in many clinical trials: Despite having far higher rates of many diseases, older adults are largely excluded from studies testing new therapies that might help them. For how extensively experts have studied the issue of age disparities, though, it remains a significant problem — and one that has grown all the more pressing during the Covid-19 pandemic, given that the virus has hit older adults particularly hard. (Gopalakrishna, 9/30)

Fox News: Kentucky Army Reservist Dies Of Coronavirus; Military Fatalities Now At 8
A 48-year-old Army Reservist has become the eighth military service member to die of the coronavirus, the Pentagon said this week, according to reports. Sgt. 1st Class Mike A. Markins, of Kentucky, was a nearly 30-year military veteran, first having served as an active duty member of the Air Force from 1990-1997. He joined the Army Reserve in 2000. He also worked as a full-time civilian employee for the Army Reserve for nearly 20 years, according to the Courier-Journal of Louisville. (Stimson, 9/30)

In other news from the states —

St. Louis Post Dispatch: Parson's Office Doesn't Believe Governor Caught Virus At Veterans Home Facing Outbreak 
The Mt. Vernon Veterans Home in southwest Missouri confirmed its first case of COVID-19 the day after Gov. Mike Parson visited the facility earlier this month. The veterans home, as of Tuesday, was grappling with 24 active infections among veterans and 12 among staff, said Jamie Melchert, spokesman for the Missouri Veterans Commission. (Suntrup, 9/29)

St. Louis Post Dispatch: EEOC Says Maryland Heights Company Refused To Hire Pregnant Woman
The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission sued a Maryland Heights construction company Tuesday, claiming the company rescinded a woman's job offer when they found out she was pregnant. The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in St. Louis, says Hollie Beck interviewed for a receptionist position at The Harlan Company on May 31, 2019, and was offered the job three days later. Beck then resigned from her job at Subway. But after the recruiter told the company that Beck was pregnant, they revoked her job offer out of the concern that she would miss work and have to be retrained, the suit says. (Patrick, 9/29)

AP: Oklahoma Highway Patrol Captain Dies From COVID-19
An Oklahoma Highway Patrol captain has become the first state trooper in Oklahoma to die of COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus. Capt. Jeffery Sewell, 58, of Atoka died Saturday at a Denison, Texas, hospital where he had been treated for the virus for about three weeks, OHP spokesperson Sarah Stewart said Tuesday. (9/29)

Dallas Morning News: Bids Are In To Clean Up Shingle Mountain. Dallas City Council To Pick Best One
The city has received nine bids for the long-awaited task of hauling away a mountain of shingles dumped in southeastern Dallas, and it’s now up to the City Council to award the contract. After a roughly two-year stalemate between the city, the accused polluter, and the landowner who owns the Shingle Mountain site, Dallas officials issued a bid proposal earlier this month for the messy job of loading and hauling away about 175,000 yards of shingles and other debris. (Krause, 9/29)

The CT Mirror: Connecticut Has Its Worst Single-Day Bump In Coronavirus Cases In Months
Nearly 2% of Connecticut’s coronavirus test results came back positive Tuesday, the highest, single-day infection rate since the state left the worst days of the pandemic behind in late June. That number comes just nine days before Connecticut is set to enter its third phase of easing COVID-19 restrictions — one that will permit theaters and concert halls to reopen on a limited basis and increase the indoor capacity of restaurants and event venues. (Phaneuf, 9/29)

NPR: Florida's Miami-Dade Pushes Back On Loosening Of Coronavirus Restrictions
Miami-Dade County says it will not fully comply with a decision by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis to lift most restrictions aimed at controlling the spread of coronavirus, saying it's too soon to safely reverse the precautions. County Mayor Carlos Gimenez, speaking Tuesday with local medical advisors, and in a conference call with White House Coronavirus Task Force Coordinator Dr. Deborah Birx and the nation's leading infectious disease expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, said that the number of COVID-19 cases in the county has declined because it has reopened very slowly. (Allen, 9/29)

The Wall Street Journal: Covid-19 Cases Jump In Canada, Prompting New Restrictions 
Canada is seeing a sharp rise in cases of Covid-19, alarming health officials and triggering a second round of lockdowns and strict distancing recommendations. Average daily case counts have nearly reached the peak levels set in April, according to the country’s chief public-health officer. Confirmed cases for the past seven days—9,636 ended Sept. 28—rose 29% from the previous seven-day period, according to data from Johns Hopkins University, and are roughly triple the tally from the last seven days in August. (Vieira, 9/29)

The Guardian: World Bank Announces $12B Plan For Poor Countries To Buy Covid Vaccines
The World Bank has announced plans for a $12B initiative that will allow poor countries to purchase Covid-19 vaccines to treat up to 2 billion people as soon as effective drugs become available. In an attempt to ensure that low-income countries are not frozen out by wealthy nations, the organization is asking its key rich-nation shareholders to back a scheme that will disburse cash over the next 12 to 18 months. (Elliott, 9/29)

The New York Times: Vilified Early Over Lax Virus Strategy, Sweden Seems To Have Scourge Controlled 
Normalcy has never been more contentious than in Sweden. Almost alone in the Western world, the Swedes refused to impose a coronavirus lockdown last spring, as the country’s leading health officials argued that limited restrictions were sufficient and would better protect against economic collapse. ... For their part, the Swedes admit to making some mistakes, particularly in nursing homes, where the death toll was staggering. (Erdbrink, 9/29)

AP: Child Poverty Likely To Increase In EU Amid Virus Pandemic
Child poverty has reached an “unacceptable” level across the European Union, the world’s largest trading bloc, a situation likely to worsen during the coronavirus pandemic, the EU’s external auditor said Tuesday. According to EU data, almost 23 million people under 18 — approximately one in four children — are at risk of poverty or social exclusion in the 27-nation bloc. (Petrequin, 9/29)

Reuters: Trudeau Says He Will 'Take Into Account' U.S. Drug Import Plans But Will Put Canadians First 
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Friday that while he is willing to entertain demands from the United States for Canadian medications, he would put the nation’s needs first. In a bid to lower drug prices, U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration on Friday finalized a plan that includes a measure allowing states to purchase medicines from Canada. (9/25)

Politico: Europe Shrugs At Trump’s ‘America First’ Drug Pricing
It’s been a constant refrain of the Trump administration: Americans are getting the short end of the stick in their business deals. When it comes to pharmaceuticals, there’s a kernel of truth to it. Take the dramatic headlines of sky-high insulin prices and persistent fears of medical bankruptcy. Americans consistently pay more than their European counterparts for their medicines. To address this imbalance, the administration issued an executive order earlier this month to ensure that U.S. drug prices aren’t higher than those of other rich countries. But experts warn there’s a very real risk it won’t succeed in slashing the prices, while making the already secretive market for pharmaceuticals even more opaque. (Martuscelli, 9/29)

Becker's Hospital Review: Pharmacy Groups Blast US Importation Of Drugs From Canada
Pharmacy groups are speaking out against a final rule from the FDA and HHS that allows importation of prescription drugs from Canada, which the White House claims will bring Americans savings for their medications. The American Pharmacists Association said that the rule, which was published Sept. 25,  jeopardizes patient safety by creating supply chain vulnerabilities that could introduce counterfeit or unsafe drugs. "APhA is disappointed that FDA would risk the safety and security of our nation’s drug supply by creating a complex and convoluted program allowing legal importation of certain drugs from Canada. We believe FDA’s new drug importation program is not a safe way to reduce drug prices—and puts patients at risk," the group said in a news release.  (Anderson, 9/28)

In other drug-pricing news —

Stat: Trump’s Drug Coupon Pledge Highlights GOP Inconsistencies
The last time a president used an obscure law to spend billions of Medicare dollars without congressional approval, Republican lawmakers called it a political ploy, a technicality, a way to write a “blank check” to help win an election. They launched investigations and issued subpoenas. But that was when President Obama was in charge. Now, it’s President Trump who’s using the same little-known Medicare law for a maneuver that even some Republicans admit is more brazen than Obama’s attempt. And so far, Republicans are silent. (Florko and Facher, 9/25)

Stat: Drug Industry CEOs Set To Testify About Controversial Medicines
The House Oversight Committee will hold two days of hearings this week with six drug industry CEOs. The hearings are the presumptive climax of an 18-month investigation first launched by the late Rep. Elijah Cummings in 2019. The hearing could be the most perilous yet for drug makers, who have managed to avoid any major missteps at the multiple congressional drug pricing hearings that preceded this one. The committee’s probe was extensive: Staff reviewed more than a million pages of internal documents from drug companies. And while we don’t know yet what the committee plans to reveal during the hearings, which are scheduled for Wednesday and Thursday, many of the drugs at the center of the probe already have a long and sordid history when it comes to pricing. (Florko, 9/29)

Forbes: GoodRx IPO Shows Low Drug Prices Can Still Mean Big Money
Shares of drug pricing company GoodRx soared on Wednesday, up 53% from its initial IPO list price of $33 at market close. The company best known for its drug discount coupons is also cashing in on the virtual care boom set off by the Covid-19 pandemic through its telemedicine services. The company started trading at $46 per share, $13 above its expected price, and  ended at $50.50 per share. The company’s market cap was $19.4 billion. “This is my first time going through an IPO and it is definitely arduous and painful at times,” says co-CEO and cofounder Doug Hirsch. “But the net result was positive and now I can go back to my day job." (Forbes, 9/23)

Bloomberg: Trump’s Drug-Pricing Ideas Would Cost Taxpayers, Benefit Pharma
Early in President Donald Trump’s term he said pharmaceutical companies’ prices were so high, they were “getting away with murder.” He promised Americans he would help them save big on prescription drugs. And drug companies, well, they were going to pay for it. But drug prices rose anyway. In 2018, for every one drug price that fell, 96 other drug prices went up, the Associated Press reported. Patients’ out-of-pocket drug costs also increased — by more than 50% from 2016 to 2018 for people with cancer, arthritis and other serious conditions, according to the Health Care Cost Institute. (Peter B. Bach, 9/29)

The Bulwark: Trump’s Desperate, Extraconstitutional, And Probably Illegal Ploy To Lower Drug Prices
According to the New York Times, in July and August, President Trump pursued one last (and probably illegal) gambit with the pharmaceutical industry to deliver lower prices to consumers. He and his aides used the threat of pricing tied to an international benchmark to coerce the industry to agree to provide direct assistance to Medicare beneficiaries. The Times reports that major  pharmaceutical companies were prepared to pay for $150 billion worth of cost-sharing relief for senior citizens if the administration halted its price-benchmarking plan. It is not clear from the story how the drug companies could provide such assistance under current law. (James C. Capretta, 9/24)

The (Galveston, Texas) Daily News: Trump Executive Order Undermines Vaccine Innovation
As our state and country continue to grapple with COVID-19 and its devastating effects, it’s clear that to defeat this pandemic, the United States must embrace the power of the competitive market and the immense medical innovation it produces. Today, about 90 percent of all newly developed medicines are available in our country, dwarfing comparable rates in countries like France and Canada (50 percent and 46 percent, respectively). In fact, when it comes to the development of and access to innovative medicines and treatments, the United States’ success is unparalleled in the world. (Dennis Borel, 9/28)

Pamplin Media Group: 'Most Favored Nation' Pricing Harms Oregonians With Disabilities
We can all agree, prescription drug costs are simply too high for most Americans. Unfortunately, the administration's "Most Favored Nation" executive order on drug pricing misses the mark and could harm some Oregonians with disabilities in the long run. The Most Favored Nation Executive Order would model the United States after foreign countries, some of which use quality-adjusted life years (QALYs)-based assessments. This is dangerous for people with disabilities. (Jake Cornett, 9/26)

Bangor Daily News: Why Profiteering On COVID Drugs Hurts Small Businesses Like Mine
Every year, I pay $14,000 out of pocket for infusions of biopharmaceuticals to keep my Crohn’s disease, a chronic inflammatory auto-immune condition, under control. It’s by no means a panacea, but it sure beats the days before I took them. Back then I passed out nearly every month from the pain and had to have 18 inches of my intestine surgically removed. If I were not fortunate enough to have insurance, I would either have to go back to those days or pay $30,000 a year. Why are biopharmaceuticals so expensive? Yes, part of it is that they are more complex than typical medications. But it’s mostly because the pharmaceutical companies that make them have used their immense political power to create virtual monopolies. That has allowed them to price gouge patients like me who need to stomach their price-tag in order to survive. (Doug Fuss, 9/26)

The Wall Street Journal: A Depressing Debate Spectacle 
No one expected a Lincoln-Douglas debate, but did it have to be a World Wrestling Entertainment bout? Which may be unfair to the wrestlers, who are more presidential than either Donald Trump or Joe Biden sounded in their first debate Tuesday night. The event was a spectacle of insults, interruptions, endless cross-talk, exaggerations and flat-out lies even by the lying standards of current U.S. politics. Our guess is that millions of Americans turned away after 30 minutes, and we would have turned away too if we didn’t do this for a living. Mr. Trump no doubt wanted to project strength and rattle Mr. Biden, but he did so by interrupting him so much that he wouldn’t let Mr. Biden talk long enough even to make a mistake. (9/30)

Bloomberg: Trump-Biden Debate Brawl Embarrassed The U.S. 
I’ve watched a lot of presidential general election debates. This was the first time that I spent much of the time hoping that the feed to foreign nations was somehow disabled, because what we saw Tuesday night — what President Donald Trump did on Tuesday night — was so deeply embarrassing to the nation. Whether it was the constant interruptions, or the refusal to condemn right-wing violence, or the false claims about the voting process and how they undermine the democracy, or the steady stream of false statements, or the habit of casting blame on anyone and everyone except for himself, or the wild conspiracy-theory rantings, Trump spent 90 minutes demonstrating how he’s not fit for the office he holds.  (Jonathan Bernstein, 9/30)

Fox News: First Presidential Debate -- Here's Who Won On Style And Substance
President Trump was weakest on the topic of the coronavirus, which is unsurprising. The pandemic is a clear political vulnerability for the president, given that most public polls show that a majority of Americans disapprove of Trump’s handling of the virus. Likewise, Biden was strongest during the coronavirus discussion. Biden landed solid attacks on Trump for downplaying the threat of the coronavirus early on, which he argued has contributed to 200,000 Americans dead from the coronavirus pandemic and the U.S. doing dramatically worse than the rest of the world. (Doug Schoen, 9/30)

Fox News: Biden Wins First Debate, Trump Is Truth’s Worst Enemy
Trump has no health care plan, but relentlessly tries to tear down our health care even amid a global health crisis. And voters know the next Supreme Court justice will help decide whether preexisting health conditions — perhaps including lung scarring and heart damage from COVID-19 — can be used to deny them care. Now Trump says his nominee to the high court must be confirmed in time to rule in his favor when he contests election’s results — a heinous violation of the judicial independence our system requires — even though most Americans want the person elected president just weeks from now to make the pick. (Rep. Eric Swalwell, 9/30)

The Washington Post: Pundits’ Horrified Debate Reactions 
While the pundits zeroed in on Trump’s constant interrupting and talking over Biden and debate moderator Chris Wallace’s inability to gain control over the night, one moment in particular caused extreme distress for several commentators: Trump telling the far-right Proud Boys to “stand back and stand by” when asked by Wallace whether he would denounce white supremacists. “We are in an immoral swamp of misbehavior,” Van Jones said on CNN. “This was not a normal night.” (Elahe Izadi, 9/29)

Stat: Online Privacy Loss: Another Covid-19 Aftershock 
Since the coronavirus pandemic first emerged in the United States, millions of Americans have gone online to search for information related to the virus or Covid-19, the disease it causes. Most had no idea they were revealing information about themselves — not just to the government agencies, hospital systems, or media outlets whose websites they visited, but to third-party companies that surreptitiously track their activity and invade their online privacy. (Matthew S. McCoy, Timothy Libert and Ari B. Friedman, 9/30)

The Wall Street Journal: Pelosi Tries To Settle For $2.2 Trillion
The art of the deal this isn’t. Amid the talks over another coronavirus relief bill, Republicans in the Senate have supported a $500 billion “skinny” package. The White House signaled at one point it might go as high as $1.5 trillion. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s new counter offer: $2.2 trillion. Her latest plan, unveiled on Monday, would restore the full $600-a-week federal supplement to unemployment benefits, which was a disincentive to work before it expired in July. The proposal would send Americans a fresh round of checks, $1,200 per person and $500 per dependent. (9/29)

Bloomberg: Coronavirus Relief: Mnuchin And Pelosi Must End Stimulus Stalemate 
Last week, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin finally got around to talking about a new round of coronavirus aid, and yesterday the Democrats released a new plan. Not before time. The prolonged failure to extend fiscal relief poses a grave threat to the economy. Differences remain between the two sides, but these disagreements cannot justify doing nothing at all — which, even now, remains a distinct possibility. A compromise should be struck without further delay. Undoubtedly, Republicans bear most of the blame for the impasse. To replace the expiring provisions of the previous fiscal package, they proposed roughly $650 billion of additional spending. That’s far too little. (9/29)

The Wall Street Journal: Your Covid Cribsheet, Updated
Since we reviewed the key knowables and predictables about Covid-19 in April, new points have emerged. Sewage studies and patient samples seem to show the virus was circulating in Europe and South America before an outbreak was officially recognized in Wuhan. Lockdowns might or might not have been important contributors to suppressing eruptions that overwhelmed hospitals in the Chinese city, in New York, in Northern Italy. These episodes are not well understood. The hospitals themselves may have been a progenitor of local spikes. The mandatory closing of local businesses is hard to disentangle from the steps people were already taking to protect themselves. (Holman W. Jenkins, Jr., 9/29)

Bloomberg: Coronavirus: Why People Have Had Enough Of Lockdown Rules
The history of epidemics is rife with examples of society rebelling against tough public-health edicts, such as the breach of plague quarantine in 18th-century Marseille or protests against face masks during the 1918 influenza pandemic. The grim consequence is a fresh wave of deadly infections. Covid-19’s million deaths may pale in comparison to the estimated 50 million lives lost in 1918, but the cycle risks unfolding again. France, the U.K. and Spain face a triple threat: A jump in cases, a population exhausted by lockdown-induced recession, and rising resistance to tougher measures. Curfews and closures of restaurants and bars have seen business owners literally throw their keys to the ground in present-day Marseille. In Madrid, protesters have bristled at a targeted local lockdown they view as discriminatory. It’s not just conspiracy theorists on the streets in London and Berlin who are angry. (Lionel Laurent, 9/30)

Axios: Drugs Aren't The Reason The U.S. Spends So Much On Health Care
Voters care a lot about drug prices, but they’re not the main reason the U.S. spends so much on health care. The big picture: The U.S. spends twice as much per person as other wealthy nations, according to a new Peterson-Kaiser Tracker analysis — and hospitals and outpatient care are the primary culprits. By the numbers: The U.S. spent $10,637 per capita on health care in 2018. Comparable countries spent $5,527. (Drew Altman, 9/30)

Georgia Health News: It’s Vital To Boost Domestic Drug Production 
We are seeing economic loss, strain on our health care systems and an unimaginable loss of life in our country due to the coronavirus pandemic. While we have confronted many challenges in the medical arena in recent months, our health care supply chain – which ensures that lifesaving medications are available to all Americans – requires a sharper focus. (Maria Thacker-Goethe, 9/29)

The Hill: It's Now Up To Health Systems To Solve Our Food Problems 
The whole world is getting fat," declared Whole Foods founder, John Mackey, in a recent interview with the New York Times. Because, he continues, "in some sense, we are all food addicts." Mackey explains that he does not think we have a food access problem, but rather a market demand problem. "If people want different foods, the market will provide it." (Dr. Sarah Matathia, 9/29)

Bloomberg: Disney Theme Park Layoffs Show Depth Of Covid Recession
The post-Covid-19 “return to normal” that Americans long for is far enough away that not even a company built on dreams can see it. Walt Disney Co. on Tuesday said it will let go of an astonishing 28,000 employees at its U.S. theme parks, which include Walt Disney World and Disneyland, as the coronavirus continues to prevent those businesses from fully reopening. Disney’s California locations remain closed because of state restrictions, while the Florida parks have been operating with limited capacity and weaker attendance than Disney anticipated. It’s clear that for families weighing the risks of travel and crowds over the reward of getting out of the house, the virus won out. (Tara Lachapelle, 9/29)

Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Some Welcome News In Ga.’s COVID-19 Struggle
Given Georgia’s long slog to gain ground against the COVID-19 pandemic, good news is more than welcome. So it’s encouraging to see that the state has, at long last, dipped out of the COVID-19 red zone. That means that some key numbers are looking better these days. The latest report by the White House Coronavirus Task Force and obtained by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution notes that “Georgia has seen a decrease in new cases and a decrease in test positivity over the last week. Improvements were seen at university campuses.” (9/30)