San Diego Union-Tribune: Hundreds Of San Diegans Could Soon Be Homeless Without Continued Federal Aid, Officials Say 
Victims of domestic violence. Human trafficking survivors. Formerly homeless residents. More than 460 households in the city of San Diego — amounting to well over 1,000 children and adults — are set to lose the rental aid they receive from the federal government by as soon as next summer, local officials said this week at a public hearing. (Nelson, 5/8)

Times of San Diego: Nonprofits: San Diegans Struggling With High Costs Need Help
Local nonprofit leaders on Thursday called on legislators to increase funding directed at fighting San Diego’s high cost of living. Their targets: high rent and child care costs – and the food insecurity, and even homelessness, that can result from both. San Diego City Council President Pro Tem Kent Lee and Councilmember Sean Elo-Rivera gathered with representatives from five local nonprofits to highlight how increasing costs are contributing to the financial burden for tens of thousands of residents. (Caspers, 5/8)

Los Angeles Times: In Multimillion-Dollar Building, Formerly Homeless People Face ‘Dismal’ Conditions, Suit Says
At the corner of 7th and Witmer streets, not far from downtown Los Angeles, stands a gray-and-orange six-story building that was meant to serve as permanent supportive housing for formerly homeless people. But for many tenants who long dreamed of moving off the streets and into their own apartment, the property has become a horror show. (Vives, 5/9)

Los Angeles Times: L.A. County Finds High Lead Levels In Soil On Properties Already Cleaned By Army Corps
New soil testing by the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health has found high levels of lead and other toxic metals at homes destroyed by January’s catastrophic wildfires and cleared by federal cleanup crews. The county health department hired Roux Associates Inc. to conduct soil sampling at 30 homesites that had been cleaned up by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers — the federal agency leading debris-removal operations for the Eaton and Palisades wildfires. (Briscoe and Smith, 5/8)

San Francisco Chronicle: Gas Stoves Nearly Double Children’s Cancer Risk, Stanford Study Shows
A new study from Stanford University found that children living in homes with frequent gas stove use and poor ventilation face nearly twice the lifetime cancer risk from benzene exposure compared to adults. The study, published in the Journal of Hazardous Materials, is the first to evaluate cancer risks from benzene generated during gas stove combustion and to estimate leukemia cases attributable to these emissions. (Vaziri, 5/8)

Bay Area News Group: Jay Leno Pushes Bill To End Smog Checks In California For Vehicles 35 Years Or Older
Should old cars get a break from California’s smog check laws? Former Tonight Show host and avid car collector Jay Leno thinks so. (Rogers, 5/9)

CalMatters: Delays In CA Youth Mental Health Program Threaten Gains In Schools
California made a huge one-time investment in youth mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic as rates of depression, anxiety and eating disorders surged among children and teens. One piece of the state’s plan included a way to keep money flowing for schools that  wanted to expand mental health services for students. It involved allowing K-12 schools and colleges to charge Medi-Cal and private health insurance for behavioral health care provided on campus, a change that would allow them to provide more services and hire additional mental health staff. (Ibarra, 5/8)

San Diego Union-Tribune: ‘No Meaningful Treatment’: Doctor Says San Diego County Jails Are The Worst He’s Ever Seen 
“On the matter of imposing discipline for people with mental health needs and/ or intellectual disabilities, San Diego County jail is far behind other jail and prison systems in California,” Stewart wrote in the 165-page analysis, dated last August but only recently released publicly. The San Diego County jail system — where more than 240 people have died since 2006 — is an outlier among other California counties, Stewart found. (McDonald and Davis, 5/8)

Los Angeles Times: Federal Lawsuit Alleges UCLA Medical School Uses A Race-Based Admissions Process
A federal class-action lawsuit accuses UCLA’s medical school and various university officials of using race as a factor in admissions, despite a state law and Supreme Court ruling striking down affirmative action. The lawsuit, filed Thursday in California’s Central District federal court, was brought by the activist group Do No Harm, founded in 2022 to fight affirmative action in medicine; Students for Fair Admissions, the nonprofit that won its suit at the Supreme Court against Harvard’s affirmative action program; and Kelly Mahoney, a college graduate who was rejected from UCLA’s David Geffen School of Medicine. (Mejia, 5/8)

The Bay Area Reporter: Despite Past Statements, LGBTQ Catholics Express Optimism About 1st American Pope
The Roman Catholic Church got its 267th pope May 8, as the College of Cardinals chose an American for the first time. Pope Leo XIV, the former Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost, addressed the throngs of pilgrims in St. Peter’s Square with his first words, “Peace be with you.” Whether Leo will continue the late Pope Francis’ tonal shift in including LGBTQ people in the world’s largest Christian denomination with 1.4 billion members remains to be seen, as past comments surfaced that were critical of LGBTQ families. He has also been critical of the Trump administration in recent months, particularly around immigration issues, according to X posts and retweets. (Ferrannini, 5/8)

Voice Of San Diego: After Hundreds Of Prop. 36 Drug Arrests, Few Drug Treatment Referrals
Police countywide arrested hundreds of repeat drug offenders in the months after California voters approved Proposition 36, which promised to offer treatment rather than simply jail time and a felony record. But until last month, the region didn’t have a formal process to connect Proposition 36 offenders with treatment and put the felony cases against them on hold. In the initial absence of a formal process to link offenders with those services, many weren’t connected in the four months after police started making arrests. (Halverstadt, 5/8)

The Washington Post: Trump Tells Congress To Raise Taxes On The Rich In Budget Bill
President Donald Trump instructed congressional Republicans this week to raise taxes on the wealthiest earners as part of his “big, beautiful bill,” rattling his party’s brittle consensus on economic issues and muddling the GOP’s path toward enacting his campaign promises. ... House GOP leaders in recent days have ruled out certain cuts to social safety net programs that the GOP had earlier targeted to meet budget goals. Speaker Mike Johnson said the House would not cut the amount states receive to fund Medicaid, and House Agriculture Committee Chairman Glenn Thompson (R-Pennsylvania) told The Washington Post that his committee would not rescind federal anti-poverty food assistance money. Hard-liners had been eyeing both of those areas as potential sources of savings. (Bogage and Stein, 5/8)

Bloomberg: GOP Eyes Pharma Tax Hike, Nixing Drug Price Deal For Trump Bill
House Republicans are considering nixing a Medicaid drug pricing plan floated by President Donald Trump and fiercely opposed by the pharmaceutical industry as the party pushes to strike a massive tax and spending deal in the coming days. But drugmakers may not be totally off the hook. (Cohrs Zhang, 5/8)

Stat: Democrats Target Medicare Advantage, Not Medicaid Cuts, In Trump Budget
As Republicans in Congress debate ways to cut Medicaid so they can fund tax breaks, Democrats are pushing them in a different direction: cut excess spending in Medicare Advantage instead. (Herman, 5/8)

Los Angeles Times: Trump Cuts To L.A. Overdose Prevention Efforts Alarm Experts
Nearly a decade into California’s fentanyl crisis, public health experts are finding cause for both optimism and worry. Fatal opioid overdoses in the state have finally receded from record highs, with around 6,700 deaths recorded in the first half of 2024 — a roughly 16% drop from 2023’s peak. (Davies, 5/9)

AP: Transgender Troops Being Moved Out Of The Military Under New Pentagon Order
The Pentagon will immediately begin moving as many as 1,000 openly identifying transgender service members out of the military and give others 30 days to self-identify under a new directive issued Thursday. Buoyed by Tuesday’s Supreme Court decision allowing the Trump administration to enforce a ban on transgender individuals in the military, the Defense Department will begin going through medical records to identify others who haven’t come forward. (Baldor, 5/8)

Politico: The MAGA Backlash To Trump’s MAHA Surgeon General Pick
President Donald Trump’s new pick for surgeon general — wellness influencer Casey Means — is already the target of MAGA vitriol, underscoring a split inside the president’s base over the future of Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s “Make America Healthy Again” movement. Trump’s decision to select Means came just hours after news broke about his decision to withdraw Janette Nesheiwat, a former Fox News contributor, for the post. (Gardner, 5/8)

MedPage Today: Trump's HHS Deputy Secretary Pick Breezes Through Senate Hearing
James O'Neill -- President Donald Trump's pick for the No. 2 spot at HHS under Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. -- faced questions on vaccine mandates, HHS cuts, and even the hiring of David Geier to lead a new agency study on vaccines and autism, but emerged from a Senate committee hearing on his nomination relatively unscathed. O'Neill was supposed to field questions from the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee on Thursday morning alongside Janette Nesheiwat, MD, Trump's previous pick for Surgeon General. However, O'Neill faced the committee alone after Nesheiwat's nomination was pulled hours before the hearing. (Henderson, 5/8)

Los Angeles Times: New Rules Keep Migrant Children In Custody For Months; Advocates Sue
Two advocacy groups are suing the Trump administration to halt the use of new rules they say have kept migrant children in federal custody and separated from their families for months as the children’s mental health deteriorates. The National Center for Youth Law and Democracy Forward filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia on behalf of a Los Angeles-based immigrant advocacy group along with two siblings in California foster care, a teenager who gave birth while being detained and other children who crossed the Southern border without a legal custodian and have been in federal programs for prolonged periods. (Uranga, 5/9)

The New York Times: Migrants Are Skipping Medical Care, Fearing ICE, Doctors Say
A man lay on a New York City sidewalk with a gun shot wound, clutching his side. Emily Borghard, a social worker who hands out supplies to the homeless through her nonprofit, found him and pulled out her phone, preparing to dial 911. But the man begged her not to make the call, she said. “No, no, no,” he said, telling her in Spanish that he would be deported. Ms. Borghard tried to explain that federal law required hospitals to treat him, regardless of his immigration status, but he was terrified. (Baumgaertner Nunn, Agrawal and Silver-Greenberg, 5/8)

San Diego Union-Tribune: Kaiser Mental Health Workers Ratify New Contract 
After 196 days on strike, Kaiser mental health care workers ratified a new four-year contract Thursday, approving a deal that delivers gains in pay and retirement benefits and delivers a little breathing room for administrative duties. (Sisson, 5/8)

Becker's Hospital Review: Cedars-Sinai To Launch Internal Startup Incubator
Los Angeles-based Cedars-Sinai is partnering with venture-builder Redesign Health to launch a new platform aimed at building and scaling companies that solve critical healthcare challenges. The Digital Innovation Platform will leverage Cedars-Sinai’s clinical expertise, research capabilities and data resources to develop companies focused on addressing issues such as workforce shortages, rising costs, inefficiencies and the complexity of patient care. (Diaz, 5/8)

Los Angeles Times: Another Big Lie: RFK Jr. Wants To Make America Healthy Again
If you consider addiction a disease, as most medical experts do, then you would certainly be in favor of anything that helps preserve lives, and helps avoid the grief of those whose loved ones have died accidentally from a drug overdose. And if you had spent, say, 14 years as a heroin addict, you would surely push as hard as you could to make Narcan, the trade name of naloxone, as widely available as possible, especially at a moment when fentanyl continues to kill Americans in depressingly high numbers. (Robin Abcarian, 5/4)

Orange County Register: Here’s How To Find A Doctor Who Prescribes Medical-Aid-In-Dying Drugs
When my last day finally comes — hopefully, not until I’m 105 or so — I want to be in full control of my own death. I do not want my last minutes on this agonizingly beautiful planet to be lost in a paralyzing morphine haze, devoid of food and water, diapered and gasping, until some final crescendo where every system shuts down. Ouch. Eek. No, no, no. I’ve heard from so many readers who feel the same way — but, even though death with dignity has been the law of the land in California for nearly a decade, we remain mystified about how, exactly, to access this kind of care. Hospitals can, and do, refuse to provide it on moral and religious grounds. (Teri Sforza, 5/4)

San Francisco Chronicle: This ‘Toxic Stress’ Costs Californians $1.5 Trillion Annually
An alarming 62% of Californians have experienced at least one traumatic experience during their youth, such as abuse, neglect or household challenges like mental illness or violence, and 16% have experienced four or more. Experts call these early traumas “adverse childhood experiences” or ACEs for short. ... Many people who experience these issues face health challenges later in life. (Nicole Eberhart and Joshua Breslau, 5/7)

San Diego Union-Tribune: Psychedelic Research Saved My Life. Help It Save Others. 
As a California veteran, I’ve witnessed firsthand how traditional treatments often fail to address the invisible wounds of war. That’s why I strongly support Assembly Bill 1103, legislation that could accelerate life-changing treatments for veterans and others suffering from traumatic brain injury (TBI), post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and other conditions driving our nation’s suicide crisis. (Joe Hudak, 5/8)