The independent source for health policy research, polling, and news.
Twelve of the largest drugstores in the U.S. sent shoppers’ sensitive health information to Facebook or other platforms, according to an investigation by The Markup and KFF Health News.
The first FDA-authorized cigarettes with 95% less nicotine than traditional smokes will go on sale in California, Florida, and Texas starting in early July. Anti-smoking groups oppose greenlighting just one plant biotech’s products and instead urge federal regulators to set a low-nicotine standard for the entire industry.
During pregnancy, workers often face hazardous circumstances, including breathing toxic chemicals. On June 27, the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act began requiring employers to provide “reasonable accommodations.” But the new law has a big hole: Not nearly enough is known about which chemical exposures are dangerous for pregnant workers.
It’s been a year since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade and, with it, the nationwide right to abortion. The decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization set off widespread uncertainty in government and the courts about the legality or illegality of the procedure. But the decision has had other consequences too, including affecting where health professionals choose to locate. In this special episode of KFF Health News’ “What the Health?” Alice Miranda Ollstein of Politico, Shefali Luthra of The 19th, and Sandhya Raman of CQ Roll Call join KFF Health News chief Washington correspondent Julie Rovner to discuss these issues and more. Also this week, Rovner interviews KFF’s Alina Salganicoff about the organization’s research and other work on women’s health policy over the past year.
As evidence supporting medication treatment for opioid addiction mounts, judges, district attorneys, and law enforcement officials in rural America are increasingly open to it after years of insisting on abstinence only.
Last month, Florida joined a growing number of states in banning sales taxes on diapers to make them more affordable for older adults and families with young children. Though diapers are essential for many, they are not covered by food stamps. Nor are incontinence products for older adults typically covered by Medicare. The cost can easily add up on a fixed income.
Many state legislatures have passed or are considering restrictions on gender-affirming care for trans minors. Yet much of the discussion is based on misconceptions about what that care entails.
The “front door” to the health system is changing, under pressure from increased demand, consolidation, and changing patient expectations.
Supporters say the proposed rules would balance the goals of increasing access to health care and helping prevent medication misuse. Opponents say the rules would make it difficult for some patients — especially those in rural areas — to get care.
Recovering from emergency gallbladder surgery, a Tennessee woman said she spent months without a permanent mailing address and never got a bill. She was sued by the health system two years later.
The $120 million International African American Museum that opened this week in Charleston, South Carolina, allows visitors to step back in history at Gadsden’s Wharf, where tens of thousands of enslaved Africans arrived in America, the genesis of generations of health disparities.
The FDA, Justice Department, and White House have failed to act as vapes with kid-friendly flavors like cotton candy or gummy bears proliferate.
Kristie Fields, a cancer patient in Virginia, was urged to go public to seek financial help. She worried about feeding hurtful stereotypes.
Though most California counties are experimenting with dispatching health professionals rather than law enforcement to respond to people experiencing mental health crises, powerful police unions fear defunding.
Physicians and attorneys say it’s a question of when — not if — a pregnant person dies from lack of care in a state with an abortion ban, potentially setting the stage for a malpractice lawsuit that could pressure providers to reconsider delaying or denying care.
Three secretaries of Health and Human Services, who served under Presidents Joe Biden, Donald Trump, and Barack Obama, gathered this week for a rare, candid conversation hosted by the Aspen Ideas Festival and KFF Health News’ “What the Health?” about the experience of being the nation’s top health official.
What does a day in the life of the nation’s top health official really look like? And how much of their agenda is set by the White House? In this special episode of KFF Health News’ “What the Health?” — taped before a live audience at Aspen Ideas: Health, part of the Aspen Ideas Festival, in Aspen, Colorado — host and chief Washington correspondent Julie Rovner leads a rare conversation with the current and two former U.S. secretaries of Health and Human Services. Secretary Xavier Becerra and former secretaries Kathleen Sebelius and Alex Azar talk candidly about what it takes to run a department with more than 80,000 employees and a budget larger than those of many countries.
A federal program meant to reduce maternal and infant mortality in rural areas isn’t reaching Black women who are most likely to die from pregnancy-related causes.
States and localities are receiving more than $54 billion over nearly two decades.
A quality-control crisis at an Indian pharmaceutical factory has left doctors and their patients with impossible choices as cheap, effective, generic cancer drugs go out of stock.
