Biden’s Big Health Agenda Won’t Be Easy to Achieve
Much like President Barack Obama, a President Biden could find his health policies initially sidelined by economic issues — in his case, caused by the pandemic.
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Much like President Barack Obama, a President Biden could find his health policies initially sidelined by economic issues — in his case, caused by the pandemic.
COVID-19’s “long haulers” — patients with lingering effects of the disease — have joined the ranks of Americans with preexisting conditions. For those shopping for health coverage on the individual market, here’s help navigating an uncharted insurance landscape.
KHN and The Guardian unveil an interactive database documenting front-line health care worker deaths. The majority of them are people of color — and nurses face the highest toll.
The Trump administration rolled back protections for transgender patients just days before the Supreme Court cemented LGBTQ rights under the Civil Rights Act. So, what now? Meanwhile, coronavirus politics reaches beyond health care settings. Anna Edney of Bloomberg News, Tami Luhby of CNN and Shefali Luthra of KHN join KHN’s Julie Rovner to discuss this and more. Also, for extra credit, the panelists recommend their favorite health stories of the week they think you should read, too.
COVID-19 has upended the lives of people with dementia, limiting their interactions with others and complicating matters for their caregivers.
In a draft study, researchers correlated cellphone data showing students’ back-to-campus movements and county infection rates to quantify how the coronavirus spread as colleges and universities reopened for the fall semester.
Polio terrified Americans, and in 1955, when Jonas Salk’s vaccine became available, they snapped it up like candy. Sixty-five years later, COVID is the latest dread virus, but many undercurrents could inhibit its acceptance.
Human clinical trials are scheduled for a drug that could prevent some of the 100,000-plus deaths from snakebites worldwide each year. The same drug may also help people suffering from COVID-related acute respiratory distress.
Executions have been on hold in California since 2006, stalled by a series of legal challenges. But COVID-19 is proving a lethal presence on San Quentin’s death row.
While the Harvard Business School gently chided returnees to be on their best behavior, Stanford deployed green-vested enforcers and campus police who sometimes threatened students if they violated the rules. Both, apparently, succeeded.
Fort Peck Assiniboine and Sioux Tribes initially opposed the Wolf Point Wild Horse Stampede this year, worrying about hundreds of people coming to their reservation for the rodeo amid coronavirus concerns. But the annual event was on private land and went ahead, highlighting the reopening tensions between resuming normal economic activities and protecting the vulnerable.
Millions of people have lost their jobs and health insurance since March, and experts say many of those looking for a plan on the ACA marketplace may not be able to get the assistance they need.
Health researchers are among the voices calling for police to stop using tear gas and pepper spray on protesters, because these chemical irritants can damage the body in ways that can spread the coronavirus and increase the severity of COVID-19. One example: Tear gas and pepper spray can sow confusion and panic in a crowd, causing people to rip off their masks and touch their faces, leading to more contamination.
California’s ping-ponging approach to managing the pandemic — twice reopening large portions of the service sector economy only to shut them again — has residents and business owners on edge. But experts say the push and pull on businesses may be what success looks like in much of the U.S. for months to come, given COVID-19’s pervasive spread.
Counties say the ripple effects of the state’s COVID-19 data failures are impeding their ability to slow the spread of the coronavirus, even as they must make life-or-death decisions about business and school reopenings.
If Democrat Joe Biden is successful in his bid for the presidency but the Senate remains in GOP control, Democrats’ plans for major changes in health care may be curbed.
Some are grieving the loss of precious time in late life. Others are adjusting their ideas of what is possible and making the best of it.
The U.S. public health system has been starved for decades and lacks the resources necessary to confront the worst health crisis in a century. An investigation by The Associated Press and KHN has found that since 2010, spending for state public health departments has dropped by 16% per capita and for local health departments by 18%. At least 38,000 public health jobs have disappeared, leaving a skeletal workforce for what was once viewed as one of the world’s top public health systems. That has left the nation unprepared to deal with a virus that has sickened at least 2.6 million people and killed more than 126,000.
Some California hospitals near the Mexican border have received so many COVID-19 patients the past few weeks that they have had to divert some to other facilities. Hospital officials say most of the infected patients are U.S. citizens or legal residents who live in, or recently traveled to, Mexico and came to the U.S. for care.
We gathered tips from experts on what to look for — masks are a constant theme — when trying to decide if you will be comfortable visiting various establishments.
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