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The law, which takes effect Jan. 1, prohibits out-of-network ground ambulance operators from billing patients more than they would pay for in-network rides. It also caps how much the uninsured must pay.
The federal government requires state Medicaid programs to pay for abortions in limited circumstances, but Iowa hasn’t done so for years. No providers seek Medicaid payments, which require the approval of the governor, an anti-abortion Republican.
Sleep deprivation in adolescents is linked to mental health struggles, worse grades, traffic accidents, and more. That’s why states such as California and Florida have mandated later high school start times. But opposition to later times is less about the science than it is about logistics and costs.
Providers and health care advocates warn a proposed rule change in Montana would jeopardize immunity levels in child care centers and communities. Efforts to change vaccination exemption rules are underway in other states, too.
The number of men in the state taking paid family leave to bond with a new child has risen nearly 20% since the start of the pandemic.
Gov. Gavin Newsom signed legislation expanding paid sick leave to five days, extending bereavement leave to miscarriages and failed adoptions, and approving an eventual $25-an-hour health care minimum wage. Still, in a possible sign of national ambitions, the Democrat vetoed free condoms in schools and refused to decriminalize psychedelic mushrooms.
The legislation bans the use of four additives that are already prohibited in many other countries but remain in popular U.S. foods. Advocates say states need to act because the FDA has done little.
Michigan is one of the few remaining abortion havens in the Midwest. But getting an abortion in that state is still more difficult than it should be, providers say.
California is the first state to ban the controversial diagnosis known as “excited delirium,” which has been used increasingly to justify excessive force by law enforcement. A human rights advocate described the law, signed this week by Gov. Gavin Newsom, as a “watershed moment” in criminal justice.
At least 30 states are reinstating coverage for children wrongly removed from the rolls under Medicaid redetermination, the federal government reported. It’s just the latest hiccup in the massive effort to review the eligibility of Medicaid beneficiaries now that the program’s pandemic-era expansion has expired. And federal oversight of the so-called unwinding would be further complicated by an impending government shutdown. Rachel Roubein of The Washington Post, Sandhya Raman of CQ Roll Call, and Sarah Karlin-Smith of Pink Sheet join KFF Health News chief Washington correspondent Julie Rovner to discuss these issues and more. Also this week, Rovner interviews KFF Health News’ Samantha Liss, who reported and wrote the latest KFF Health News-NPR “Bill of the Month” feature, about a hospital bill that followed a deceased patient’s family for more than a year.
The White House said the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau will develop new regulations that would prevent unpaid medical bills from being counted on credit reports.
A sweeping agreement approved by state lawmakers would gradually raise the minimum wage for hundreds of thousands of health workers to a nation-leading $25 an hour. The pact would also end labor’s years-long battle with dialysis clinics.
Health department officials are asking legislators to change criminal commitment laws amid a bottleneck at the Montana State Hospital.
Hollywood actors and writers who qualify for their union health plans get a very good deal compared with other Americans. But not working during the strike threatens their eligibility in the system.
Studies suggest official numbers vastly underestimate heat-related injuries and illness on the job. To institute protections, the government must calculate their cost — and the cost of inaction.
Though health policies in general got little airtime, the discussion of whether candidates support a federal abortion ban underscored how Republicans, in a post-Roe environment, face political challenges on the issue.
Brand-name drug prices in the U.S. — more than three times the price in other developed countries — are related neither to the amount of research and development required to bring them to market nor their therapeutic value, recent research shows. Have drugmakers overplayed their hand?
A Biden administration proposal would help standardize the data on prices that hospitals provide to patients, increase its usefulness to consumers, and boost enforcement. Previous rules gave hospitals too many loopholes.
After decades of unchecked mergers, health care is the land of giants, with huge medical systems monopolizing care in many cities, states, and even whole regions of the country. This decreases patient choice, impedes innovation, erodes quality of care, and raises prices. And federal regulators have been slow to act.
Opponents of the wave of state legislation say the measures place health providers’ preferences over patients’ rights.
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