Latest California Healthline Stories
HHS Finds Drug Firms Violated Best-Price Rules
A “handful” of pharmaceutical companies “skirted” Medicaid drug pricing rules by selling brand-name drugs to HMOs “without reporting the lower prices as required under federal law,” according to a new report from the HHS Office of Inspector General.
PacifiCare Expects Earnings Under ‘Shared-Risk’ Payments
PacifiCare Health Systems, which operates the nation’s largest Medicare HMO, announced yesterday it expects its earnings for the first quarter and the full year to “reach the high end” of “a wide range of analysts’ predictions,” the Los Angeles Times reports.
Davis Announces Health Grant Awards, Appointments
Gov. Gray Davis (D) made several announcements this week regarding grants for mental health and substance abuse programs and appointments to health care positions.
Jury Rules Against Flight Attendant in Tobacco Case
A Miami, Fla., jury decided yesterday that a former flight attendant who contended that she developed several illnesses from secondhand smoke in planes should not be awarded money damages from the tobacco industry, the Miami Herald reports.
Campbell Offers Bill to Ban Human Cloning
Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell (R-Colo.) yesterday introduced a bill to bar human cloning and “urged” the House to follow suit, Agence France-Presse reports.
Report Counters ‘Anecdotes’ about State’s Physician Exodus
No evidence exists to support anecdotes about “large numbers of doctors” leaving California, according to a report released this week by the University of California-San Francisco Center for Health Professions’ California Workforce Initiative.
HUD Secretary Considers Shifting Homeless Services to HHS
Housing and Urban Development Secretary Mel Martinez said yesterday that he is considering shifting responsibility for programs addressing homeless individuals with mental illness and substance abuse problems to HHS, the Washington Post reports.
Lockyer Announces Civil Suit Against Nursing Home Owner
Attorney General Bill Lockyer (D) yesterday announced that the state has filed a civil complaint against the owner and operator of four nursing homes, alleging “serious patient neglect,” the Los Angeles Times reports.
Senate Votes Down Planned Medicare Home Care Funding Cut
The Senate yesterday voted 99-1 in favor of an amendment to the FY02 budget resolution that would use “surplus funds” to eliminate a planned 15% cut for Medicare home health care providers, CongressDaily reports.
Inmates File Class-Action Suit Over Medical Care
In “the largest class-action [suit] ever filed over prison conditions,” nine inmates and their lawyers are suing the state over its “woefully inadequate” prison health care system, the San Francisco Chronicle reports.