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Latest KFF Health News Stories

The Making of Reluctant Activists: A Police Shooting in a Hospital Forces One Family to Rethink American Justice

KFF Health News Original

In 2015, Houston police officers stepped into Alan Pean’s hospital room, closed the door and shot him through the chest. Nearly six years later, his survival has brought the Pean family a wrenching legacy and conflicted sense of purpose.

KHN’s ‘What the Health?’: Picking Up the Pace of Undoing Trump Policies

KFF Health News Original

The Biden administration has started to speed efforts to reverse health policies forged under Donald Trump. Most recently, the administration overturned a ban on fetal tissue research and canceled a last-minute extension of a Medicaid waiver for Texas. That latter move may delay the Senate confirmation of President Joe Biden’s nominee to head the Medicare and Medicaid programs, as Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) seeks to fight back. Anna Edney of Bloomberg News, Rachel Cohrs of Stat and Alice Miranda Ollstein of Politico join KHN’s Julie Rovner to discuss these issues and more. Plus, for extra credit, the panelists recommend their favorite health policy stories of the week they think you should read, too.

California and Texas Took Different Routes to Vaccination. Who’s Ahead?

KFF Health News Original

California stresses equity for minority groups. Texas is all about personal choice and liberty. Both are struggling to vaccinate Latinos and contending with vaccine hesitancy among conservative communities.

Texas Winter Storm Exposes Gaps in Senior Living Oversight

KFF Health News Original

As the recent winter storm disaster in Texas showed, many long-term care sites aren’t required to have backup power supplies or other redundancies to keep residents safe when disaster strikes.

In Austin, Some Try to Address Vaccine Inequity, but a Broad Plan Is Elusive

KFF Health News Original

The east side of Austin has few of the chain stores key to the Texas vaccination plan. But local officials have done pop-up vaccination events in the community to get more shots to Blacks and Latinos.

Amid Covid Health Worker Shortage, Foreign-Trained Professionals Sit on Sidelines

KFF Health News Original

Hospitals dealing with staff shortages during the current covid surge are unable to tap into one valuable resource: foreign-trained doctors, nurses and other health workers, many with experience treating infectious diseases. Colorado, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York and Nevada are the only states to have eased credentialing requirements during the pandemic.

‘Last Responders’ Brace for Surge in Covid Deaths Across US

KFF Health News Original

In some parts of the country, the surge in covid cases is overwhelming coroners, morgues, funeral homes and religious leaders. It has required ingenuity and even changed the rituals of honoring the dead.

Lions and Tigers and Anteaters? US Scientists Scan the Menagerie for COVID

KFF Health News Original

Thousands of animals in the U.S. have been tested for the coronavirus, as researchers work to understand its transmission and which other species might be at risk. So far, dozens have tested positive, mostly cats and dogs exposed to sick owners.

Young Doctor Succumbs to COVID, One of the South’s Many Health Workers Lost

KFF Health News Original

A 28-year-old Texas doctor tested positive in early July and died in September — one of a dozen young health workers nationwide whose deaths from the coronavirus have been profiled by KHN and The Guardian as part of the “Lost on the Frontline” project.

In Texas, More People Are Losing Their Health Insurance as COVID Cases Climb

KFF Health News Original

During the pandemic, nearly 700,000 additional Texans have lost health insurance. The Lone Star State already had more uninsured people than any other. It has given people with COVID symptoms pause before seeking medical care.