- California Healthline Original Stories 2
- The Next Obamacare Battleground: Subsidies For Out-Of-Pocket Costs
- Also Made In Mexico: Lifesaving Devices
- Covered California & The Health Law 1
- San Francisco May Provide Blueprint For Statewide Universal Health Care Plan
Latest From California Healthline:
California Healthline Original Stories
The Next Obamacare Battleground: Subsidies For Out-Of-Pocket Costs
Exchange enrollees and insurers fret over a lawsuit that could end federal help with copays and deductibles. (Ana B. Ibarra, )
Also Made In Mexico: Lifesaving Devices
The medical supply industry makes a particularly revelatory case study of the difficulties of untangling global trade. (Sarah Varney, )
More News From Across The State
California's New Cigarette Tax Causing Some Smokers To Snuff Out Habit
The $2-per-pack increase kicked in on Saturday. The tax is expected to generate $1.4 billion in its first year.
The Sacramento Bee:
Will California's New Cigarette Tax Make More Smokers Quit?
Plunk down a pack of cigarettes at the cash register and be prepared to pay up, way up. As of April 1, Californians are forking over an extra $2 per pack. Some smokers this past week said they were stocking up on cartons, ahead of Saturday’s price hike. Others said it’s jolting them into finally snuffing out cigarettes for good. (Buck, 4/1)
The Mercury News:
Tobacco Tax: $2 Price Hike Hits Smokers On Saturday
Expected to generate $1.4 billion in its first year, most of the additional tax will go toward Medi-Cal, which provides health coverage for California’s poor and which backers say shoulders $3.5 billion a year for treating tobacco-related illnesses. The rest of the new tax will go to support cancer research and smoking-prevention programs. (Seipel, 4/1)
Politico Pro:
California's New Tobacco Tax Sparks Provider Rate Dispute
California’s $2-per-pack cigarette tax increase, which goes into effect Saturday, is causing tension between the state’s Medicaid providers and Gov. Jerry Brown. ... The latest budget proposal, which Brown released in January, directs $1.2 billion to a Department of Health Care Services fund to support new growth in Medi-Cal expenses as compared to the last fiscal year. But groups representing the doctors and dentists who treat the state’s neediest residents want Brown to commit funds to boosting provider reimbursement rates, which are among the lowest in the country. (Colliver, 3/31)
Covered California & The Health Law
San Francisco May Provide Blueprint For Statewide Universal Health Care Plan
Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom, a gubernatorial candidate, helped implement the plan for the city and now wants to see it grow to cover all of California.
The Mercury News:
San Francisco’s Universal Health Care Plan Eyed As Model For California
Ironically, all of the universal health care buzz is coming after the GOP’s plan to replace the Affordable Care Act with a bare-bones substitute plan collapsed. The Congressional Budget Office had estimated that the Republican plan would have decreased the federal deficit by more than $300 billion, but increased the ranks of uninsured Americans by 24 million by 2026. (Seipel, 4/2)
Drugmaker Recalls Some Epi-Pens In U.S. And Overseas
The recall covers devices made between December 2015 and July 2016.
The Orange County Register:
Small Number Of EpiPens Being Recalled Due To Dangerous Risk Of Failure
Meredian Medical Technologies is voluntarily recalling a small number of its EpiPen and EpiPen Jr. auto-injectors over concern they may have a defective part that could cause the potentially life-saving devices not to activate. (Smith, 3/31)
Whooping Cough Vaccination Very Effective During Pregnancy, Study Confirms
The mothers pass pertussis antibodies on to their newborns, protecting them until they were old enough to get vaccinated.
KPCC:
Vaccinating For Pertussis During Pregnancy Protects Baby, Study Says
A large-scale study of tens of thousands of births appears to validate the federal government's recommendation that pregnant women get vaccinated to protect their unborn babies from pertussis, also known as whooping cough. (Plevin, 4/3)
In other public health news —
KPCC:
A Call For A Federal Push To Eliminate Hepatitis B, C
The federal government should spearhead an aggressive effort to eliminate hepatitis B and C by 2030, argues a new report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine. (Plevin, 3/31)
The Santa Rosa Press Democrat:
Santa Rosa Dad Hates To Ask, But He Really Needs A Kidney
There are waiting lists for people like [Richard] Lazovick, who would gratefully accept a kidney from someone who died and whose family agrees to donate some or all of his or her organs. But Lazovick knows that many potential transplant recipients die or become too ill for the surgery before they rise to the top of the list.The National Kidney Foundation says 13 people die each day while waiting for a kidney from a deceased donor. The best Lazovick can figure, he may be in line for such a kidney for as long as about eight years.Rather than quietly wait, he’s asking for something superior: a kidney donated by a living person. (Smith, 4/2)
Burbank School's Mental Health Plan Gets A Check-Up: 'We’re On The Right Path'
John Burroughs High School is training teachers and implementing actions to help students cope with anxiety and stress.
Los Angeles Times:
One Year Into Mental Health Plan, Burbank School Officials Gauge Progress
Students’ mental health, anxiety — and the drugs they take to cope — were up for discussion during a Burbank school board study session Thursday, nearly one year after the board established a mental health and wellness plan. Since the plan was approved last April, Burbank officials have opened a mental health and wellness office at John Burroughs High School, trained teachers in suicide prevention and hired John Costanzo to serve as a mental health and wellness coordinator to oversee districtwide efforts. (Corrigan, 3/31)
In other news from across the state —
Santa Rosa Press Democrat:
Santa Rosa March For Health Hails Trump Failure To Repeal Obamacare
The GOP-led attempt to roll back the Affordable Care Act became fodder for fiery speeches and chants by political demonstrators Saturday in Santa Rosa, where a downtown rally and march drew up to 250 people. Speakers on the steps of Santa Rosa City Hall called for protection of undocumented residents and support for the mentally ill, in-home care workers, community health centers and a single-payer health care system, sprinkled with appreciation for President Donald Trump’s failure two weeks ago to repeal former President Barack Obama’s signature health care law. (Kovner, 4/1)
Ventura County Star:
Ventura County Health Agency Announces New Hire
Matthew Sandoval will serve as second-in-command for the 2,700-employee Ventura County Health Care Agency. Johnson K. Gill, director of the agency that leads departments ranging from animal services to a hospital and clinic system, said Sandoval was hired as chief deputy director. He starts his duties Monday with the agency, the county's largest division. (Kisken, 4/1)
Santa Rosa Press Democrat:
Sonoma County’s 7th Grade CPR Education Program Saves 3 Lives
In the six years since Save Lives Sonoma started bringing hands-only CPR education to Sonoma County seventh-graders, three students have used that knowledge to keep people alive. The latest instance came a month ago when Petaluma Junior High School eighth-grader Lucy Decker was in Oakland for a Bay Area crew regatta and a spectator collapsed. A crowd formed around the man, and one of the bystanders attempted CPR. Decker, 13, stepped in to assist. (Warren, 3/31)
Trump: Anyone Who Thinks Repeal Is Dead 'Does Not Know The Love And Strength' Of Republican Party
President Donald Trump took to Twitter over the weekend to vow that efforts to dismantle the Affordable Care Act are still on-going. Meanwhile, now that Republicans control the White House and both chambers of Congress, they also own the political ramifications of health care, and Medicare-For-All may serve as a gut-check for some Democrats in the Trump era.
USA Today:
Trump Claims He Will Rally On Health Care
President Trump expressed confidence Sunday — both on social media and the golf course — that he and aides can somehow resurrect their attempt to repeal President Barack Obama's health care law. Hours before hitting the links with one of his critics on health care — Republican Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky — Trump tweeted: "Anybody (especially Fake News media) who thinks that Repeal & Replace of ObamaCare is dead does not know the love and strength in R Party!" (Jackson, 4/2)
The Associated Press:
Health Care Defeat Means GOP Risks Blame In '18 Elections
The crash of the House Republican health care bill may well have transformed an issue the party has long used to bash Democrats into the GOP's own political nightmare. Since former President Barack Obama's health care overhaul was enacted in 2010, Republicans have blamed Democrats for rising premiums and diminished choices of insurers and doctors in many markets. Repealing Obama's law has been a paramount GOP campaign promise that helped them grab control of the House that year, the Senate in 2014 and elected Donald Trump to the White House last November. (Fram, 4/1)
CNN:
Democrats' Medicare-For-All Litmus Test
Democrats eying the 2020 presidential contest could soon face a "Medicare-for-all" litmus test from the party's progressive base. After last month's failure of President Donald Trump and congressional Republicans to repeal Obamacare, progressives are going on offense, mounting a new push for single-payer health insurance. (Bradner, 4/3)
In other national health care news —
The New York Times:
The Next Battle In The War Over Planned Parenthood
Cecile Richards, the president of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, was poring over a spiral notebook in her bare-bones office here when she was asked about President Trump’s latest attempt to cut a deal on abortion. Days earlier, the Trump White House had floated a trial balloon: If Planned Parenthood would quit performing abortions, it could keep roughly $550 million in annual federal funding. (Stolberg, 3/31)
Reuters:
U.S. Zika Vaccine Begins Second Phase Of Testing
Researchers have begun the second phase of testing of a Zika vaccine developed by U.S. government scientists in a trial that could yield preliminary results as early as the end of 2017. Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said on Friday the $100 million trial has already been funded and will proceed, irrespective of the $7 billion in cuts to the National Institutes of Health budget proposed by the Trump Administration over the next 18 months. (Steenhuysen, 3/31)
Stat:
Hospitals Rush To Get Accelerated Visas For Foreign Medical Residents
[For] some of the 3,814 non-US citizens who graduated from foreign schools and who won coveted residencies in the United States, it’s unclear whether they’ll be able to start work on time in the summer. That’s because a program that allows employers to fast-track H-1B visa applications for their employees has been suspended as of Monday. US immigration officials announced the change just a month ago — and Match Day, when new residents learn where they will be placed was March 17 — leaving some hospitals rushing to figure out who needed this kind of visa and to apply before “premium processing” would no longer be an option. (Boodman, 4/3)
The Associated Press:
A 'Sci-Fi' Cancer Therapy Fights Brain Tumors, Study Finds
It sounds like science fiction, but a cap-like device that makes electric fields to fight cancer improved survival for the first time in more than a decade for people with deadly brain tumors, final results of a large study suggest. Many doctors are skeptical of the therapy, called tumor treating fields, and it's not a cure. It's also ultra-expensive — $21,000 a month. (4/2)
The Washington Post:
The Scary Reason Doctors Say Kids Need HPV Vaccinations
When actor Michael Douglas told a reporter that his throat cancer was caused by HPV contracted through oral sex, two themes emerged that had nothing to do with celebrity gossip. The first was incredulity — since when was oral sex related to throat cancer? Even the reporter thought he had misheard. The second was embarrassment. This was too much information, not only about sexual behavior but also about one’s partners. Douglas apologized, and maybe the world was not ready to hear the greater truth behind what he was suggesting. That was four years ago. (Schaaff, 4/2)