Sacramento Bee: Public Health Leaders Push Back Against Gavin Newsom’s Budget Cuts: ‘We Cannot Go Back’
Public health leaders raised alarm at proposed cuts to California’s state and local health departments Monday, calling the proposal from Gov. Gavin Newsom “devastating” and “a step backwards.” Newsom on Friday unveiled his plan to fill a roughly $28 billion budget deficit, which includes more than $32 billion in cuts to one-time and ongoing spending over the next two years. (Nixon, 5/13)

CapRadio: ‘Takes Us Out At The Knees’: California Local Health Officials Warn Against Cutting Funding
County public health leaders from across California assembled Monday to call on the state Legislature to preserve an annual $300 million in funding for state and local departments that began in 2022, in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic. To reduce the state’s nearly $28 billion deficit, Governor Gavin Newsom is proposing a number of cuts to the budget, including the annual Future of Public Health funding. A third of the $300 million goes to the state, and two thirds go to the counties. (Wolffe, 5/13)

Newsweek: California Faces Critical Deadline As 300,000 Kids Lose Health Insurance
Roughly 300,000 children might permanently lose their health insurance in California Governor Gavin Newsom's revised state budget. After the federal government ended its COVID-19-era continuous coverage health insurance protections, about 1.6 million Californians were removed from Medi-Cal. Of that number, 300,000 are children. (Blake, 5/13)

San Francisco Chronicle: Apps Are Helping Disabled Members Of Congress Do Their Jobs
As House floor speeches go, the subject of recent remarks by Rep. Jennifer Wexton, D-Va., was unremarkable — she proposed renaming a small-town Virginia post office. But the speech nevertheless marked a new era for people with disabilities: Wexton’s words came from an app, not her own voice. Wexton, 55, was diagnosed with a rare neurodegenerative disease in September 2023, a condition she describes as “Parkinson’s on steroids.” (Stein, 5/14)

Los Angeles Times: California Makes $3.3 Billion Available For Mental Health Beds
Gov. Gavin Newsom is set to announce Tuesday that the state will make $3.3 billion in funding available by July to begin building inpatient and outpatient mental health treatment centers as part of a massive effort to transform California’s mental health system and address the homelessness crisis. The money is the first tranche of a $6.4-billion bond authorized by voters when they narrowly approved Proposition 1 in March. (Garrison, 5/14)

Los Angeles Times: Revelations Of Possible Radioactive Dumping Around Bay Area Trigger Testing
Beyond a chain-link fence topped with spiraled barbed wire, swaying coastal grasses conceal a cache of buried radioactive waste and toxic pesticides from a bygone chemical plant. Warning signs along the Richmond, Calif., site’s perimeter attempt to discourage trespassers from breaching the locked gates, where soil testing has detected cancer-causing gamma radiation more than 60 times higher than background levels in some places. (Briscoe, 5/14)

AP: California Moves Closer To Requiring New Pollutant-Warning Labels For Gas Stoves
California could require all new gas stoves sold in the state to carry a label warning users about pollutants they can release that have been linked to respiratory illnesses. The state Assembly approved a proposal Monday that would require the label on gas stoves or ranges made or sold online after 2024, or sold in a store after 2025. The bill now heads to the state Senate. (Austin, 5/14)

Los Angeles Times: Flu Season Is Over, But There Is A Viral Surge In California Wastewater. Is It Avian Flu?
An unusual surge in flu viruses detected at wastewater treatment plants in California and other parts of the country is raising concerns among some experts that H5N1 bird flu may be spreading farther and faster than health officers initially thought. In the last several weeks, wastewater surveillance at 59 of 190 U.S. municipal and regional sewage plants has revealed an out-of-season spike in influenza A flu viruses — a category that also includes H5N1. (Rust, 5/13)

Stat: H5N1 Bird Flu Outbreak Response Could Be Hampered By USDA, FDA Turf War
On a bright June day in 2018, one of the nation’s top regulators waved groceries in the air, quizzing the secretary of agriculture on which agency is charged with monitoring different types of food. Scott Gottlieb, the commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration at the time, grinned widely as he held liquid egg whites and a carton of eggs. The former is under the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s food safety purview. The eggs, under the FDA’s. The mood was jovial, winkingly acknowledging the complexity, and at times absurdity, in the way the government regulates food. (Zhang, Lawrence and Florko, 5/14)

Voice of San Diego: How San Diego’s Safe Sleeping Sites Are Faring On Housing
It’s now been more than 10 months since the city opened the first of two large-scale campgrounds offering homeless residents an alternative to shelters. The relatively new model, which the city has dubbed safe sleeping, is now grappling with the same challenges moving residents into housing as the city’s longstanding shelters. Yet safe sleeping providers and city officials say they are also serving a larger volume of unsheltered people reluctant to enter traditional shelters who may need more time to stabilize before they seek housing. They acknowledge they have also confronted staffing kinks and confusion as they ramp up – and are continuing to adjust as they learn more about their operations. (Halverstadt, 5/14)

Los Angeles Times: Planned Parenthood Plans To Spend Seven-Figures In California Races
Planned Parenthood of California plans to launch a multimillion-dollar campaign Tuesday to oust Republicans from several California congressional districts, the latest signal of how critical the state’s House races will be in determining which party takes control of the House of Representatives after the November election. The effort, coordinated by an independent campaign arm of the reproductive rights organization, is a reflection of the role abortion will play in the fall, particularly among suburban women voters, in the aftermath of the 2022 Supreme Court ruling overturning federal protection for abortion rights and subsequent laws passed in several states to sharply limit access to the procedure. (Mehta, 5/14)

Los Angeles Times: Younger Patients Sought Vasectomies After Roe Vs. Wade Overturned
Kori Thompson had long wrestled with the idea of having a child. The 24-year-old worried about the world a kid would face as climate change overtook the globe, fearing the environmental devastation and economic strain that could follow. He had been thinking about getting a vasectomy ever since he learned about the sterilization procedure from a television show. But “the thing that actually triggered it was the court decision,” Thompson said. (Reyes, 5/14)

The Hill: Nearly Two-Thirds Of Americans Want Abortion Access: Pew Poll
Almost two years after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, most Americans still support abortion access. About 6 in 10 Americans think abortion should be legal in all or most cases, according to a new Pew Research Center survey of 8,709 adults released Monday. The share of American adults who believe abortion should be legal in all or most cases has increased by 4 percentage points since 2021, according to Pew. (O’Connell-Domenech, 5/13)

The Hill: Mail-Order Abortion Pills Safe And Effective: Study
Medication abortion pills — mifepristone and misoprostol — are effective and run a low risk of causing serious adverse events when mailed to patients, a new study shows. The study, published Monday in the peer-reviewed publication JAMA Internal Medicine, looks at the experiences of more than 500 people who wanted to end a pregnancy between January 2020 and May 2022. (O’Connell-Domenech, 5/13)

Stateline: The Number Of Births Continues To Fall, Despite Abortion Bans
Births continued a historic slide in all but two states last year, making it clear that a brief post-pandemic uptick in the nation’s birth numbers was all about planned pregnancies that had been delayed temporarily by COVID-19. Only Tennessee and North Dakota had small increases in births from 2022 to 2023, according to a Stateline analysis of provisional federal data on births. In California, births dropped by 5%, or nearly 20,000, for the year. And as is the case in most other states, there will be repercussions now and later for schools and the workforce, said Hans Johnson, a senior fellow at the Public Policy Institute of California who follows birth trends. (Henderson, 5/14)

KVPR: He Invented A Successful Medical Device As A Student. Here's His Advice For New Grads
When he was 25 years old, Thorsten Siess, a mechanical engineering student at the University of Aachen in Germany had an idea: What if there was a way to keep the heart pumping blood during surgery or following a heart attack with a device that affixes a tiny motor to the tip of a catheter?" This would be able to be put into patients without the need for a major operation," says Siess. "Normally, of course, you would have to split the sternum." Today, Siess's idea is a reality — a medical device called the Impella — and he serves as the chief technology officer of Abiomed, which is part of Johnson & Johnson. (Lupkin, 5/14)

CNN: What The Results Of Wegovy’s Longest Clinical Trial Yet Show About Weight Loss, Side Effects And Heart Protection
New analyses of the longest clinical trial yet of the weight-loss drug Wegovy are shedding light on how quickly it helps people lose weight, how long they sustain that weight loss and how safe the medicine is over four years of use. (Tirrell, 5/13)

Bloomberg: Wegovy Cuts Heart Risk Even If People Don’t Lose Much Weight
Novo Nordisk A/S’s blockbuster obesity drug Wegovy cut the risk of heart attacks and strokes irrespective of how much patients weighed, a study found, results that doctors said could drive more prescriptions for the medicine. The heart benefit was seen across the board in the Wegovy patients, including people who were overweight but not obese, and in people who didn’t lose much weight, said John Deanfield, a professor of cardiology at University College London, who helped lead the trial. (Kresge, 5/13)

Newsweek: Scientists Reveal Hidden Indicator Of Future Weight Gain
Scientists might be able to predict whether you will gain or lose weight from the size of your fat cells.It has long been known that the size and number of our fat cells determine how much body fat we have. But exactly how they impact long-term changes in body weight has been less well understood. To explore these associations, researchers from the Karolinska Institutet in Sweden measured the size and number of fat cells in the abdominal fat of 260 volunteers with an average BMI of 32. (Dewan, 5/13)

NPR: Fake Fentanyl Pills Skyrocket In U.S. Police Seizures, Study Finds 
A new study shows a dramatic spike in the number of counterfeit fentanyl pills being seized by law enforcement, an indication of the growing illicit drug supply driving the country's historic opioid crisis.Last year, more than 115 million pills containing illicit fentanyl were seized by law enforcement, compared to over 71 million in 2022, according to the study published Monday in the International Journal of Drug Policy. (Bowman, 5/13)

Reuters: US Reclassification Could Drive Fresh Research Funding Into Pot Sector
The U.S. pot sector could see an influx of medical research funding from healthcare investors amid renewed interest from pharmaceutical firms, should a proposal to reclassify cannabis as a lower-risk substance be approved, industry experts said. The current classification as a Schedule I substance has limited research into cannabis due to restricted access to cannabis products, regulatory hurdles and funding limitations. (Roy, 5/14)

Oaklandside: Amid Hurdles, Self-Help Hunger Program Still Stands In North Oakland
Bags of rice. Bulbous summer squashes. Tangerines. Cans of hominy and coconut milk. All afternoon, people dropped by the plaza on foot and by bike. They picked up pieces of produce to inspect them and loaded canvas shopping bags with food. All items were free, donated by stores or “rescued” before heading to the landfill.The Self-Help Hunger Program has operated for close to 15 years on a small triangular park on the Oakland-Berkeley border, known as Jasper P. Driver Plaza or simply “The Island.” From Tuesday through Friday, a largely volunteer crew distributes free produce and pantry items. (Orenstein, 5/13)

Los Angeles Blade: American Academy Of Pediatrics Responds To Cass, Reject Bans
Over the past few weeks, Dr. Hillary Cass has begun giving interviews in the United States to defend her report targeting transgender care. The Cass Review has faced criticism for its alleged anti-trans political ties, biased findings, promotion of conversion therapists, and poor treatment of evidence regarding transgender care.In an interview with NPR, Dr. Cass claimed that transgender individuals’ care should be judged by their “employment,” rather than their satisfaction with the care received. Later, during an interview with The New York Times, Cass misleadingly stated that she had not been contacted by any lawmakers or U.S. health bodies, despite having met with political appointees of Gov. Ron DeSantis to discuss banning trans care before her report was published.In response, both the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Endocrine Society have categorically rejected the review as a justification for bans on care and have challenged many of its alleged findings. (Reed, 5/13)

Los Angeles Times: These Yogurt-Covered Pretzels Might Make You Sick, FDA Warns
Popular brands of yogurt-covered pretzels were recalled last week after a routine sampling of the sweet coating was found to contain salmonella. The pretzels distributed by the wholesaler, Western Mixers Produce & Nuts Inc. of Ontario, were sent across California through Smart & Final, Gelson’s Markets, Thorp Fruit and Down Home Goods stores. The pretzels are packaged in plastic containers under the names First Street Brand at Smart & Final and as Gelson’s Markets’ store brand. They are sold as bulk at Down Home Goods and Thorp Fruit, according to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. (Fry, 5/13)

Stat: Cue Health's Covid-19 Tests Lead To False Results, FDA Warns
The Food and Drug Administration warned consumers Monday to not use Cue Health’s at-home Covid-19 tests. This follows an FDA warning letter to the company last week that said Cue was not following the conditions stipulated in the emergency use authorizations for its tests. (Trang, 5/13)

Reuters: New Breast Cancer Genes Found In Women Of African Ancestry, May Improve Risk Assessment
Twelve breast cancer genes identified in women of African ancestry in a large study published on Monday may one day help better predict their risk for the disease and highlights potential risk differences from women of European descent. Studies to identify genetic mutations linked with breast cancer have previously mainly focused on women of European ancestry. (Lapid, 5/13)