San Francisco Chronicle: Obamacare’s Murky State Forces Bay Area Clinics To Scale Back 
For most of last year, Sherry Hirota, chief executive of Asian Health Services, was planning to convert two floors of offices in its Oakland Chinatown facility to clinic space to accommodate more patients. But that changed on Nov. 8. Soon after the election — as Republicans in Congress began taking steps to repeal the Affordable Care Act — uncertainty over the future of the health care law forced Hirota’s group to scale back those plans. They are now going to build out just one floor of new clinic space instead. That’s because Asian Health Services stands to lose $8 million, about 15 percent of its annual revenue, if the Affordable Care Act is repealed without a comparable replacement. (Ho, 1/21)

Los Angeles Times: Obamacare Repeal Would Also Affect Your Employer Health Insurance
Stephanie Blythe isn’t due to give birth until April, but she already ordered a breast pump through her insurance company because she’s worried about the future of the Affordable Care Act. “Once I have it, they can’t take it away from me,” said Blythe, 31. (Karlamangla, 1/22)

Past California Healthline Coverage: Large Employer Health Plans Could Also See Some Impacts From Obamacare Overhaul | Health Law Sleepers: Six Surprising Health Items That Could Disappear With ACA Repeal

Los Angeles Times: First Child Death From Flu Reported This Season In California As Cases Rise Sharply
Thousands of Californians have been showing up at doctors’ offices and hospitals sick with the flu this month, in what officials say could be a much more severe flu season than the last. “If you compare this time last year we’re seeing twice as many flu cases,” said Dr. Michael Neely, interim chief of infectious diseases at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles. “If it keeps going up at this rate and stays up then we will see a lot more cases this year.” (Karlamangla, 1/20)

San Jose Mercury News: Santa Clara County Reports First Flu-Related Death Of Season
As California public health officials on Friday announced that flu activity around the state is now more severe than last year, Santa Clara County reported its first flu death in a person under 65 — and Riverside County reported the state’s first flu death in a child under 18. (Seipel, 1/20)

Modesto Bee: Flu Season Claims Two More Lives In Stanislaus County And An Infant Is Seriously Ill
The county Health Services Agency said the seasonal flu claimed the life of a 41-year-old man who had no underlying medical conditions. The man, who’s name was not released, died on Wednesday. The other death was a 57-year-old man who succumbed to the illness Sunday. It was the third flu-related death reported in the county since the flu season began. The 57-year-old man had a history of health problems, the county health agency said. Health officials also were concerned about a local infant with flu-like symptoms that was transferred to a hospital intensive care unit outside of the area. (Carlson, 1/20)

San Francisco Chronicle: State’s Flu Season Taking Toll; Twice As Many Outbreaks As Normal
This flu season is shaping up to be among the worst in a decade, with more people infected far earlier than usual and more of them ending up hospitalized, state public health workers said Friday. California has recorded 14 flu-related deaths in people under age 65 — a marker for the severity of a flu season — including the death of a Santa Clara County resident announced Friday. That’s about normal for this date, officials said. But other markers of severity are much higher than usual, the state said. Hospitalization rates for flu-related causes are at their highest level in more than a decade, excluding the H1N1 pandemic in 2009 that caused extremely widespread illness. (Allday, 1/20)

KPBS: Flu-Related Hospitalizations At 10-Year High In California 
It's looking like this year's flu season could be much more severe than last year's, according to state health officials. Flu activity typically picks up in January and early February in California. Dr. James Watt, chief of the division of communicable disease control for the California Department of Public Health, said the number of people who are seeing their doctor because of a cough and fever is about normal for this time of year. (Goldberg, 1/20)

Los Angeles Times: Measles Outbreak Grows In L.A.'s Orthodox Jewish Community Despite California's Strict New Vaccination Law
Six months after California’s strict vaccine law took effect, a measles outbreak has infected 20 people, most of them in Los Angeles County, prompting a search for others who may have been exposed to the highly contagious virus.Most of the patients live in western areas of the county, including L.A.’s Westside, the Santa Monica Mountains and the San Fernando Valley. Santa Barbara and Ventura counties each reported one case. (Karlamangla, 1/21)

In other public health news —

The Bakersfield Californian: 'A Hidden Health Crisis': Toxic Stress Driving Up Kern Death Rates
An invisible disease has been killing middle-aged white people throughout the southern San Joaquin Valley at higher rates than ever before. The disease can’t be detected by a blood test or remedied with a prescription. It’s been referred to as one of the country’s greatest unaddressed public health crises and a rising “epidemic of white death.” The disease is toxic stress, a result of childhood trauma and other environmental stressors like poverty, food insecurity and basic living needs not being met. (Pierce, 1/20)

Modesto Bee: With Group Homes Coming To An End, Stanislaus County Seeks Families To Care For Troubled Foster Kids 
State-mandated reforms to foster care will eliminate group homes in Stanislaus and other counties, and bring other changes expected to challenge the child welfare system. About 3,000 of the 60,000 foster children in California – who are removed from their parents due to abuse or neglect – are placed in group homes for special therapy and care. But long-term residential care has not met the needs of the state’s most troubled foster youths, lawmakers believe. The state wants to reduce reliance on group homes and place those young people in safe, comfortable homes with relatives, foster parents or adoptive families who are trained and given professional support to meet their needs. (Carlson, 1/20)

Santa Rosa Press Democrat: Fundraiser In Santa Rosa Held For Planned Parenthood 
The day after The Women’s March drew millions of protesters across the country and internationally to rally against President Trump’s stated agenda, a low-key gathering of about 50 people took place Sunday in Santa Rosa to help protect women’s access to abortion and health services. ... “Its important to celebrate the rights we have and tell the whole world we will be keeping them and won’t go back,” said Sierra Faulkner, the Santa Rosa woman who organized the event at Brew, a downtown coffee and beer house. (Mason, 1/22)

Los Angeles Times: The Latest Battlefront In The Abortion Wars: Regulations To Bury Or Cremate Fetuses
Over the last two years, at least five states have introduced requirements that healthcare facilities bury or cremate the remains from abortions, and in some cases also from miscarriages and stillbirths. The rules in Arkansas and North Carolina have already taken effect. Texas, Louisiana and Indiana are embroiled in lawsuits challenging their regulations, with a decision in the Texas case expected as soon as this week. (Zavis, 1/23)

The New York Times: Trump Issues Executive Order Scaling Back Parts Of Obamacare
In his first executive order, President Trump on Friday directed government agencies to scale back as many aspects of the Affordable Care Act as possible, moving within hours of being sworn in to fulfill his pledge to eviscerate Barack Obama’s signature health care law. (Davis and Pear, 1/20)

The Washington Post: With Executive Order, Trump Tosses A ‘Bomb’ Into Fragile Health Insurance Markets
The practical implications of Trump’s action on Friday are harder to decipher. Its language instructs all federal agencies to “waive, defer, grant ­exemptions from or delay” any part of the law that imposes a financial or regulatory burden on those affected by it. That would cover consumers, doctors, hospitals and other providers, as well as insurers and drug companies. The prospect of what could flow from pulling back or eliminating administrative rules — including no longer enforcing the individual mandate, which requires Americans to get coverage or pay an annual penalty, and ending health plans’ “essential benefits” — could affect how many people sign up on the Affordable Care Act marketplaces before open enrollment ends Jan. 31 for 2017 coverage, as well as how many companies decide to participate next year. (Eilperin and Sullivan, 1/22)

The Wall Street Journal: Donald Trump’s Health-Law Directive Spurs A Dash To Decode It
The executive order suggests the new administration intends to take swift action on its own if necessary, with a particular eye to the health law’s centerpiece requirement that most individuals buy insurance or pay a penalty. Removing that penalty would be popular in some quarters. It could also set in motion a chain of events that would hasten the collapse of the individual insurance market, and with it the health law, if no other steps were taken. Insurers losing a guaranteed customer base, while still being forced to insure sick people, could move to pull out of some markets or signal plans to dramatically increase premiums, with uncertain political consequences. (Radnofsky and Armour, 1/22)

Los Angeles Times: Here's What Trump's Executive Order Really Means For Obamacare
Has Obamacare been repealed? In a word, no. The healthcare law was a huge piece of legislation that included scores of legal requirements and provided hundreds of billions of dollars in assistance to help extend health coverage to millions of Americans. All that can only be repealed by another law, which would require an act of Congress, not just an executive order from the president. (Levey, 1/21)

The New York Times: Trump’s Health Plan Would Convert Medicaid To Block Grants, Aide Says
President Trump’s plan to replace the Affordable Care Act will propose giving each state a fixed amount of federal money in the form of a block grant to provide health care to low-income people on Medicaid, a top adviser to Mr. Trump said in an interview broadcast on Sunday. The adviser, Kellyanne Conway, who is Mr. Trump’s White House counselor, said that converting Medicaid to a block grant would ensure that “those who are closest to the people in need will be administering” the program. (Pear, 1/22)

Reuters: Trump May Not Enforce Individual Health Insurance Mandate: Aide 
The Trump administration may no longer enforce a rule requiring individual Americans to carry health insurance or pay a penalty if they do not, a senior White House official said on Sunday. Speaking on ABC's "This Week" program, Kellyanne Conway, counselor to the president, said President Donald Trump "may stop enforcing the individual mandate." (Lange and Clarke, 1/22)

And talk of high-risk pools evoke memories of terrible coverage and patients dying on wait lists —

The New York Times: Trump’s Vow To Repeal Health Law Revives Talk Of High-Risk Pools
Joanne Fitzgerald was getting divorced and was stressed out. When stomach pain kicked in, she saw a doctor to have it checked out.That was her mistake. The doctor diagnosed a mild form of gastritis, an inflammation of the stomach lining, and recommended some over-the-counter medicine. But when the divorce became final, in 2008, she lost health coverage from her husband’s employer, and insurer after insurer refused to cover her because of the condition. She was finally offered a policy that excluded coverage for anything related to her gastrointestinal tract. (Abelson, 1/22)