San Francisco Chronicle: California Has 10 Days To Ban Transgender Athletes, Trump Admin Says
A Trump administration investigation into two California agencies has determined both are violating Title IX by allowing transgender girls to play on girls sports teams, the U.S. Department of Education announced Wednesday. Soon after Trump took office, he issued an executive order banning transgender athletes from girls sports, arguing that allowing them to compete violated Title IX, the landmark federal law that prevents sex discrimination in public and private schools that receive federal funding. The Department of Education announced soon after that it would investigate California and other states that allow athletes to compete in accordance with their gender identity. (Libby and Bollag, 6/25)

The Bay Area Reporter: SF, Oakland LGBTQ Centers Reckon With Budget Cuts
When queer people first come out or have fallen on hard times, LGBTQ community centers large and small may be some of the first places they look to for support and community. T. McCarthy, who is queer, struggled to find work in the city and felt stereotyped as a neurodivergent person in the workplace. Starting in 2007, she went to the San Francisco LGBT Community Center for help and utilized its employment services. Approximately 50,000 people visit the center’s building on Market Street annually, some seeking services, others to get information or attend events there. (Ferrannini, 6/25)

Los Angeles Times: A Decade On From Obergefell, Setbacks Prompt A Reckoning Among LGBTQ+ Groups
When the Supreme Court ruled in the landmark Obergefell vs. Hodges case 10 years ago that same-sex couples have a right to marry nationwide, the sense of triumph was palpable. Celebrations broke out in the streets, and courthouses were flooded with newlyweds. But that wasn’t the only response. Opponents of LGBTQ+ rights immediately began implementing new strategies to limit the decision’s reach and reverse the broader momentum toward LGBTQ+ acceptance, including by casting a small, less understood subset of the queer community — transgender people — as a growing threat to American families and values. (Rector and Wilner, 6/26)

Becker's Hospital Review: Prospect To Lay Off 125 In California
Los Angeles-based Prospect Medical Holdings has shared plans to lay off 125 employees at its Orange, Calif.-based Prospect Medical Group location, according to a June 20 WARN notice obtained by Becker’s. The layoffs are due to ” the sale of Prospect’s assets” at the facility, the notice said. Prospect has been working since November to offload 10 of its 16 hospitals amid financial challenges. (Ashley, 6/25)

San Francisco Chronicle: This 117-Year-Old San Francisco Neighborhood Pharmacy Is Closing
It seemed like a belated reunion was unfolding Wednesday at 4494 Mission St. Outside, the old men and women visiting were greeted by the familiar red neon words in cursive as they entered the dimly-lit drug store many of them had frequented for decades. It wasn’t long before laughter rang through the building while the sounds of clinking bottles and package rustling aired in the backdrop. In less than a month, against many of the community’s wishes, the Central Drug Store will permanently shutter. (Wu, 6/25)

The Guardian: Hundreds Of Weight Loss And Diabetes Jab Users Report Pancreas Problems
Hundreds of people have reported problems with their pancreas linked to taking weight loss and diabetes injections, prompting health officials to launch a study into side-effects. Some cases of pancreatitis reported to be linked to GLP-1 medicines (glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonists) have been fatal. (Bawden, 6/25)

TBIJ: Generic Cancer Drugs Fail Quality Tests At Alarming Rate, Investigation Shows 
Vital chemotherapy drugs used around the world have failed quality tests, putting cancer patients in more than 100 countries at risk of ineffective treatments and potentially fatal side effects, an investigation by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism (TBIJ) reveals. (Eccles, Milivojevic and Sapkota, 6/25)

Bay Area News Group: Senior Population Rises In The Bay Area
The Bay Area isn’t getting any younger. In fact, new data released by the U.S. Census Bureau on Wednesday shows that the region’s population of seniors is growing fast. Meanwhile, the Bay Area’s youth and middle-aged population is stagnant and even declining in some counties. (Stringer and Rowan, 6/26)

San Diego Union-Tribune: Judge Who Oversees Court For Mentally Ill Defendants Must Grant Request To Step Aside, Ruling Says
An appellate court on Wednesday ruled that the San Diego Superior Court judge who leads a specialized court for mentally ill criminal defendants must heed challenges raised by prosecutors and step aside as judge in hearings to consider whether to admit two potential new participants. (Figueroa, 6/25)

Berkeleyside: Berkeley Approves Budget That Trims Affordable Housing Program
The Berkeley City Council approved an $829 million budget early Wednesday morning that avoids widespread layoffs and service cuts. But the steps the council took to balance the $26.8 million deficit it faced earlier this year came with warnings from city finance staff, because many are one-time maneuvers that don’t address a substantial structural deficit Berkeley faces in the years to come. And the budget drew criticism for using funding from a 2016 tax that was sold to voters as a revenue source for affordable housing to patch a hole in the city’s general fund. (Savidge, 6/25)

San Francisco Chronicle: S.F. Staves Off Nearly 100 Layoffs In Last-Minute Budget Talks
After nearly 15 hours of negotiations that stretched well into the early morning, San Francisco officials approved Mayor Daniel Lurie’s two-year budget, restoring funding for 100 threatened jobs and critical city programs after an extended standoff over spending for homeless services. ... At the marathon hearing, the board finalized budgets for all departments and found enough savings on its own to stave off layoffs for about 100 filled positions, Supervisor Connie Chan said. The board also identified millions of dollars in "add backs" to restore those jobs as well as services for transitional-age youth, housing subsidies for families living in RVs and homelessness prevention. (Toledo, 6/25)

The Washington Post: Wind Phone In California Desert Helps People Ease Their Grief 
The ‘wind phone’ was installed by Colin Campbell and Gail Lerner, whose children, Ruby and Hart Campbell, were killed by a drunk driver in 2019. (Page, 6/26)

Los Angeles Times: California Veterans Urge Study Of 'Lifesaving' Psychedelic Therapy
For years after his service in Afghanistan and Iraq, U.S. Army Special Forces veteran Joe Hudak fought a daily battle against a voice inside his head screaming anxious, dark and dangerous thoughts. He lost multiple team members in combat during his two-decade career in the Green Berets and tried everything he could to treat his post-traumatic stress disorder — talk therapy, group therapy, medication and even swimming with dolphins. (Harter, 6/26)

Voice of San Diego: Voice's Hepatitis A Coverage Spurred Dramatic Action
It was late summer 2017 and San Diego’s homelessness crisis had entered a deadly new chapter. Months earlier, the county had declared a hepatitis A outbreak, warning that homeless people and illicit drug users were most at risk. The number of cases and deaths rose in the months that followed, and the city and county didn’t seem to be aggressively fighting back. Unsheltered residents with limited options to protect themselves were scared – and I was scared for them. (Halverstadt, 6/25)

San Francisco Chronicle: UC Davis Study: Disposable Vapes May Be More Toxic Than Cigarettes
Some popular disposable e-cigarettes emit toxic metals at levels that surpass those found in traditional cigarettes and earlier generations of vapes, according to a new study by researchers at UC Davis. The study, published Wednesday in ACS Central Science, found that a single day’s use of one disposable device released more lead than nearly 20 packs of conventional cigarettes. (Vaziri, 6/25)

The Hill: Nitrate In Water Tied To Low Birth Weight, Preterm Birth
Exposure to a common agricultural contaminant in drinking water, even in small doses, may be linked to increased risks of preterm birth, a new study has found. The pollutant, called nitrate, is also associated with low birth weight in infants whose mothers consumed affected water during pregnancy, according to the study, published on Wednesday in PLOS Water. (Udasin, 6/25)

KQED: The New 'Razor Blade Throat' Nimbus COVID Variant: Symptoms, Incubation Period And When To Test
If it feels like several people you know are complaining of feeling sick with a what they assume is an “awful summer cold” — perhaps with a painful sore throat — there’s a good chance it could be COVID-19. Again. COVID levels in Bay Area wastewater may be lower than they were this time last year, but they’re slowly increasing, according to Stanford’s WastewaterSCAN team, which monitors coronavirus presence in human sewage. And this is fueled in part by a new subvariant called NB.1.8.1, dubbed “Nimbus.” (Severn, 6/26)

Becker's Hospital Review: The States Most Vulnerable To Healthcare Job Losses Due To Medicaid Cuts
California, New York and Texas are projected to lose the most healthcare jobs stemming from federal Medicaid spending reductions included in Republicans’ One Big Beautiful Bill Act, according to a June 23 brief from the Commonwealth Fund. The budget reconciliation bill, passed by the House of Representatives on May 22, reduces federal funding for Medicaid by $863 billion over the next decade. (Emerson, 6/25)

The Hill: Senate Republicans Battle Over Rural Hospital Relief Fund To Offset Medicaid Cuts
Senate Republicans including Sen. Susan Collins (Maine) say a new proposal to create a $15 billion relief fund for rural hospitals is not adequate to make up for tens of billions of dollars in federal Medicaid funding cuts included in the Senate megabill to enact President Trump’s agenda. Collins told reporters Wednesday that the $15 billion relief fund floated by the Senate Finance Committee is likely not the final offer from Senate Republican leaders to address the concerns of several senators who worry the bill’s cap on health care provider taxes could put scores of rural hospitals out of business around the country. (Bolton, 6/25)

The Washington Post: Gym Memberships May Become HSA-Eligible Under GOP Tax Bill 
A provision of Republicans’ massive tax and spending bill could help Americans meet their workout goals, by treating gym memberships as a medical expense. Fitness companies are lobbying lawmakers for a larger piece of the nearly $150 billion that Americans have stashed in their Health Savings Accounts. HSAs — which allow people with high-deductible health plans to set aside pretax money to cover certain medical, dental and vision expenses — have skyrocketed in popularity since they came into being in 2004 as the definition of “qualified medical expense” has expanded well beyond co-pays and prescription refills to include meal delivery services, sunblock, lip balm, electrolyte drinks, baby monitors and wearable health trackers. (Weil, 6/25)

Scripps News: People In Wheelchairs Zip-Tied And Escorted Out Of Capitol Hill Office Building During Medicaid Cuts Protest
U.S. Capitol Police detained a group of peaceful protesters on Wednesday, including several people in wheelchairs, during a protest over proposed cuts to Medicaid spending. Scripps News footage shows a crowd of people, some of them in wheelchairs, being zip-tied and escorted out of the Russell Senate Rotunda. The room is part of a Senate office building on Capitol Hill. (Reed and Koraganie, 6/25)

Fierce Healthcare: Congress' Digital Health Hearing Obscured By Reconciliation
Digital health companies testified to the House Ways and Means health subcommittee Wednesday morning about the benefits of using wearables and remote monitoring devices to track personal health data. The discussion about healthcare technology was dwarfed by conversation about healthcare cuts in the reconciliation bill, which is moving through the Senate this week. (Beavins, 6/25)

CNN: RFK Jr.’s New CDC Advisers To Study Childhood Vaccination Schedule, Guidelines For Hepatitis B, Measles Shots
At the first meeting of a controversial new group of vaccine advisers to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the committee announced new plans to study established vaccine guidelines. The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices will create new work groups to study the cumulative effects of the childhood and adolescent vaccine schedules, the hepatitis B vaccine dose given at birth and the combination measles, mumps, rubella and chickenpox vaccine, new chair Dr. Martin Kulldorff announced at Wednesday’s meeting in Atlanta. (Tirrell, Goodman and Christensen, 6/25)

CIDRAP: 4 In 5 Americans Support Childhood Vaccine Requirements, Poll Finds
A poll released today shows that 79% of US adults support requiring children to be vaccinated against preventable infectious diseases like measles, mumps, and rubella to attend school, with even two thirds of Republicans and those who support the "Make America Great Again" (MAGA) movement agreeing with such measures. The poll of 2,509 adults, conducted by the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and the de Beaumont Foundation, also found that, among the 21% who don't support school vaccine mandates, their reasoning focused more on parental choice than on safety concerns. (Wappes, 6/25)

The New York Times: C.D.C. Vaccine Panel Loses A Member Ahead Of First Meeting 
Dr. Michael Ross, a physician licensed in Virginia who is a former professor of obstetrics and gynecology, withdrew from the committee. He was not included in the list of voting members posted on the website of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Tuesday. (Mandavilli, 6/24)

CBS News: CDC To Hire Former Head Of Anti-Vaccine Group Founded By RFK Jr.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is hiring Lyn Redwood, a nurse and the former head of a group critics have denounced as anti-vaccine, to work in its vaccine safety office, multiple CDC officials tell CBS News. Redwood was the president of the group now called Children's Health Defense, which lists as its founder Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who now oversees the CDC as secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services. Children's Health Defense has sued to curb vaccine requirements, petitioned federal agencies to revoke vaccine authorizations and spread misinformation about vaccines. (Tin, 6/25)

Politico: RFK Jr. Says US Won’t Donate To Global Vaccine Effort
The United States won’t contribute anymore to Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, until the global health organization has “re-earned the public trust,” U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said Wednesday. In an inflammatory video speech delivered to the Gavi pledging summit, seen by POLITICO, Kennedy accused Gavi of neglecting vaccine safety, making questionable recommendations around Covid-19 vaccines and silencing dissenting views. (Chiappa, 6/25)

AP: FDA Requires Update Warning About Rare Myocarditis Risk With COVID Shots
The Food and Drug Administration said Wednesday it has expanded existing warnings on the two leading COVID-19 vaccines about a rare heart side effect mainly seen in young men. Myocarditis, a type of heart inflammation that is usually mild, emerged as a complication after the first shots became widely available in 2021. Prescribing information from both Pfizer and Moderna already advises doctors about the issue. (Perrone, 6/25)