This Week in Brief: Friday, Sept. 11, 2026
With Midterms Looming, Journalists Consider Measles, Food Recalls, and Obamacare
KFF Health News journalists made the rounds on national and local media recently to discuss topical stories. Here’s a collection of their appearances.
A NY Hospital Tried To Close Its Birthing Center. This City United To Fight Back.
By Noam N. Levey and Hannah Norman
Democrats and Republicans in Troy, New York, joined together to challenge a national Catholic health system determined to close the last birthing center in the county.
The Market Forces Quietly Adding Thousands to Patient Bills
By Elisabeth Rosenthal
The true cost of “vertical integration”: patients directed to a higher-priced location for procedures. Or forced to buy from their insurer’s wholly owned pharmacy, which may not stock the drug prescribed or provide it at the lowest price.
‘It’s Triage’: California’s Next Governor Will Face Destabilizing Surge in Uninsured
By Christine Mai-Duc
The nation’s uninsured rate hit a historical low when Xavier Becerra was health secretary. Now he wants to be California’s next governor as states stare down the biggest rise in the uninsured rate in a generation.
Indigenous Groups Are Exempt From Medicaid Work Rules, but Native Hawaiians Aren’t
By Ashley Mizuo
Native Hawaiians will have to comply with the new work requirements in President Donald Trump’s signature One Big Beautiful Bill Act, despite facing significant obstacles to employment and healthcare.
Nonprofits Are Helping Musicians Pay for Insurance in Austin, Texas, and Beyond
By Olivia Aldridge, KUT
A nonprofit and a local public health agency are subsidizing marketplace health insurance for Austin music artists, even as shifting marketplace conditions make the program a more expensive proposition. It’s becoming a model for other cities and sectors.
When a Friend Becomes a Caregiver
By Paula Span
People outside the family frequently step into helping roles when older adults need assistance.
Anger Over Health Costs Clouds Midterms
Amid a campaign already focusing on affordability, anxious voters are unlikely to be assuaged by headlines about healthcare costs rising even more next year. And a lawsuit that could cut off access nationwide to the abortion pill mifepristone gets a hearing in federal court. Joanne Kenen of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and Politico Magazine, Sandhya Raman of Bloomberg Law, and Amanda Seitz of KFF Health News join KFF Health News’ Julie Rovner to discuss these stories and more. Rovner also interviews Lauren Sausser, who wrote the latest KFF Health News “Bill of the Month.”
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Readers Wrestle With Healthcare Inequalities and Want a Word With Congress
KFF Health News gives readers a chance to comment on a recent batch of stories.