Weekly Edition: April 23, 2021

After Accident, Patient Crashes Into $700,000 Bill for Spine Surgery
By Julie Appleby Generous personal injury coverage on your car policy may not be enough to cover medical bills. Patients can get financially blindsided when auto insurance and health insurance policies differ.

Censorship or Misinformation? DeSantis and YouTube Spar Over Covid Roundtable Takedown.
By Victoria Knight The Florida governor considers the pushback he received from the online video platform to be “Orwellian.” But the scientists featured at the event made specific statements YouTube deemed as “misinformation,” at odds with current public health recommendations for controlling the spread of the covid virus.

Only One Vaccine Is OK’d for Older Teens. It’s Also the Hardest to Manage in Rural America.
By Katheryn Houghton Of the three covid vaccines the U.S. government has authorized, only one is available to 16- and 17-year-olds: the Pfizer shot. It’s also the most complicated to manage in rural settings, with their small, dispersed populations. That forces some teens and their families to travel long distances for a dose — or go without.

Virtual Care Spreads in Missouri Health System, Home to ‘Hospital Without Beds’
By Eric Berger In 2015, St. Louis-based Mercy health system opened what officials called the world’s first “hospital without beds.” Since the pandemic, Mercy has incorporated telehealth throughout its system, part of a national acceleration in virtual care that proponents laud but critics say is happening too fast.

Michigan’s Outbreak Worries Scientists. Will Conservative Outposts Keep Pandemic Rolling?
By Julie Appleby The covid outbreak in Michigan stands out on the U.S. contagion map, but odds are it will be repeated elsewhere. How vaccine hesitancy, relaxed restrictions and a coronavirus variant combined to create the worst outbreak in the country.

KHN’s ‘What the Health?’: Picking Up the Pace of Undoing Trump Policies
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?
By Anna Almendrala and Sandy West 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.

Doctors Scramble to Understand Long Covid, but Causes and Prognosis Are Elusive
By Michelle Andrews and Lydia Zuraw Medical experts are struggling to define or explain the lingering, debilitating symptoms some covid patients experience. Part of the problem is the wide range of symptoms, but doctors say getting a better understanding will mean tracking patients and their outcomes and establishing clinical trials.

Strides Against HIV/AIDS Falter, Especially in the South, as Nation Battles Covid
By Sarah Varney Public health resources have shifted from one pandemic to the other, and experts fear steep declines in testing and diagnoses mean more people will contract HIV and die of AIDS.

Listen: A Rookie Doctor Starts Her Career, Forged by the Pandemic
The latest episode of “America Dissected” features a conversation with Dr. Paloma Marin-Nevarez and KHN senior correspondent Jenny Gold. Gold documented the new physician’s first months on the job at a Fresno, California, hospital, caring for severely ill covid patients.

Another Soda Tax Bill Dies. Another Win for Big Soda.
By Samantha Young A bill that would have allowed California cities and counties to once again pursue taxes on sugary drinks was just shelved in the legislature without a hearing. Public health advocates blame the political — and financial — clout of the soft drink industry.

From Rotten Teeth to Advanced Cancer, Patients Feel the Effects of Treatment Delays
By Bruce Alpert Health providers are seeing the consequences of pandemic-delayed preventive and emergency care, from longer hospital stays to more root canals.

UVA Health Will Wipe Out Tens of Thousands of Lawsuits Against Patients
By Jay Hancock The Virginia hospital giant had already stopped suing patients with less than $107,000 in household income.

After a Deadly Year on the Roads, States Push for Safety Over Speed
By Rachel Bluth Lawmakers in California and other states are rethinking how they set and enforce speed limits, and they’re proposing to hand more power to local authorities to slow drivers in their communities.

Humana Health Plan Overcharged Medicare by Nearly $200 Million, Federal Audit Finds
By Fred Schulte Medicare Advantage company may face record penalty over alleged billing errors.

Public Health Experts Worry About Boom-Bust Cycle of Support
By Michelle R. Smith, The Associated Press and Lauren Weber and Hannah Recht Congress has poured tens of billions of dollars into public health since last year. While health officials who have juggled bare-bones budgets for years are grateful for the money, they worry it will soon dry up, just as it has after previous crises such as 9/11, SARS and Ebola. Meanwhile, they continue to cope with an exodus from the field amid political pressure and exhaustion that meant 1 in 6 Americans lost their local health department leader.

Snag a Vaccine Appointment, Then Face the Next Hurdle: How to Get There?
By Rae Ellen Bichell For some, a vaccine appointment a few hours away is no biggie. For others, it’s a major barrier to gaining protection from the coronavirus.

Journalists Unpack Patchwork Vaccine Rollout, Rapid Covid Tests and More
KHN and California Healthline staff made the rounds on national and local media this week to discuss their stories. Here’s a collection of their appearances.

The Shock and Reality of Catching Covid After Being Vaccinated
By Steven Findlay At least 5,800 people have fallen ill or tested positive for covid two weeks or more after being fully vaccinated, according to the CDC. “I now tell everyone, including my colleagues, not to let their guard down."

KHN’s ‘What the Health?’: Pause and Effect on Covid Vaccines
Podcast panelists discuss a range of health policy developments, from the latest in the covid vaccination effort to the HHS budget, among other things.