Los Angeles Times: Two Measures To Boost Obamacare In California Signed Into Law By Gov. Jerry Brown
Gov. Jerry Brown signed two measures Wednesday to help Californians who buy health insurance under Covered California, the state's Obamacare marketplace. The measures ensure a longer enrollment period and continued treatment for some patients even if their insurer leaves Covered California. The first measure, AB 156 by Assemblyman Jim Wood (D-Healdsburg), was spurred by a Trump administration policy that established a 45-day window for shoppers on Obamacare marketplaces to buy new insurance policies for the coming year. (Mason, 10/4)

NPR: Gov. Brown To Sign Or Veto Controversial Drug Price Law
Insurers, hospitals and health advocates are waiting for Gov. Jerry Brown to deal the drug lobby a rare defeat, by signing legislation that would force pharmaceutical companies to justify big price hikes on drugs in California. "If it gets signed by this governor, it's going to send shock waves throughout the country," said state Sen. Ed Hernandez, a Democrat from West Covina, the bill's author and an optometrist. "A lot of other states have the same concerns we have, and you're going to see other states try to emulate what we did." (Dembosky, 10/4)

The Bakersfield Californian: Community Health Centers Planning For Worst, Even As Congress Attempts To Bridge Lapsed Funding Deadline
Even as Congress works to bring money to Community Health Centers after missing a critical funding deadline Saturday, those facilities are grappling with tough decisions to make up for a 70 percent reduction in federal funds that lapsed this weekend, health care leaders say. Funding for Community Health Centers expired Saturday, along with funding for the Children’s Health Insurance Program and the National Health Service Corps. Congress has began introducing legislation since late last week to bridge funding, and passed a three-month funding extension for Teaching Health Centers, which provide residency programs for new doctors, particularly in rural regions. Just six exist in California, including one in Bakersfield. (Pierce, 10/4)

Lawmakers also let the CHIP renewal deadline pass without action —

KPBS: Community Clinics Falling Off Financial Cliff After Congress Fails To Approve Funds 
Something important happened while Congress was busy trying to repeal the Affordable Care Act last week — it missed the deadline to fund community clinics. ...For many clinics in California, federal funds represent about 30 percent of their operating budget. (Goldberg, 10/4)

KQED: California Frets Over Funding After Congress Misses Health Care Deadlines
More than a million California children get their health insurance from the Children’s Health Insurance Program, also know as “CHIP.” But Congress missed an Oct. 1 deadline to renew CHIP funding — a lapse that many blame on the drawn-out effort to repeal the Affordable Care Act. (Feibel, 10/4)

USA Today: Is Your Area Prepared In The Event Of Mass Casualties, Disaster?
While the entire state of Nevada has only one Level 1 trauma center, determining whether it or other cities can cope with a disaster like Sunday's Las Vegas shooting rampage there depends on more than mere numbers. Health care systems' ability to treat mass injuries and casualties depend upon the number and type of hospitals, their capacity and preparedness and system wide plans to coordinate the response, emergency care experts say. (O'Donnell, 10/4)

California Healthline: Las Vegas Faced A Massacre. Did It Have Enough Trauma Centers?
Las Vegas is not only a glittering strip of casinos and hotels but a fast-growing region with more than 2 million residents — and one hospital designated as a highest-level trauma center. The deadly shooting Sunday that killed at least 59 and sent more than 500 people to area hospitals raised questions about whether that’s enough. (Appleby and Galewitz, 10/4)

The Washington Post: Why Blood Donations Spiked After Las Vegas Mass Shooting
It happens after every disaster, whether natural or human-made. Before the floods recede or the crime tape is removed, hundreds will line up to donate their blood. Less than 24 hours after the mass shooting in Las Vegas, a line of people twisted from a blood center around several city blocks. According to one woman's tweet, it took seven hours or more to get to the front of the line. Time and time again it's the same story. When two bombs shredded scores of runners and fans at the 2103 Boston Marathon, media outlets reported that some participants who had crossed the finish line kept running — right to Massachusetts General, around the corner, to donate blood. (Nutt, 10/4)

NPR: Why Counting Gunshot Victims In Las Vegas Is Challenging
Dr. Christopher Fisher was working at Sunrise Hospital and Medical Center just off the Las Vegas strip on Sunday evening when the patients starting arriving. "It did look a bit like a war zone, can't say that it didn't," he remembers. "Frantic families, blood in the hallways." People came in so grievously injured and so many at a time that Fisher, who is the medical head of trauma services for the hospital, and his colleagues used markers, writing directly on patients, to do triage. (Hersher, 10/4)

Stat: Nevada's Mental Health System Was In Dire Straits. Then Came Las Vegas
Nevada’s mental health system was already overstretched before the carnage on Sunday night at a country music festival here. Now, thousands of victims, survivors, and their loved ones — as well as first responders and local workers who witnessed the horror — are expected to need mental health services in the coming weeks and months. ... Nevada ranked last in the U.S. by measures of access to mental health care in a report released last year by the nonprofit group Mental Health America. Mental health professionals in the state said they’re routinely forced to turn patients away or add them to the end of long waiting lists. (Robbins, 10/4)

The San Diego Union-Tribune: San Diego Paramedics To Join Hepatitis A Fight 
Paramedics are the newest troops in the fight against San Diego’s ever-growing hepatitis A outbreak. A letter signed this week by the director of the state Emergency Medical Services Authority temporarily expands state laws that govern paramedics, granting them emergency powers to “vaccinate at-risk populations in response to the outbreak.” Dr. Kristi Koenig, director of the San Diego County Emergency Medical Service, requested the temporary scope of practice expansion on Sept. 20 and said Wednesday night that she received approval in the mail Tuesday. (Sisson, 10/4)

Los Angeles Times: San Diego Hepatitis Outbreak Continues To Grow: 481 Cases
Add 20 more cases and 22 more hospitalizations to San Diego County’s ever-growing hepatitis A outbreak.Tuesday afternoon the county Health and Human Services Agency raised the number of the outbreak’s confirmed cases to 481 from 461 and hospitalizations to 337 from 315. The death count associated with the outbreak, which started in November 2016, remained at 17 for a second straight week. (Sisson, 10/4)

KPBS: 'Scanxiety': The Fear And Anxiety Of Cancer Screenings
"Scanxiety" is not an official medical term. Even so, doctors and other providers who treat cancer patients are well acquainted with it. Dr. Haydee Ojeda-Fournier, medical director of breast imaging at UC San Diego Moores Cancer Center, said anxiety is one of the risk factors of breast cancer screening. (Goldberg, 10/5)

In other public health news —

The Mercury News: San Jose Sobering Center Opens With High Hopes
Santa Clara County’s newest stab at reducing public drunkenness — a state-of-the-art “sobering station’’ — opened its doors in a room in county’s Reentry Center for former inmates, across from a police parking lot. Beginning with Sunnyvale, Campbell and the sheriff’s office, officers can drop off severely intoxicated but otherwise mellow people to dry out — at what officials hope will be a cheaper cost to taxpayers than an emergency room or jail. (Kaplan, 10/4)

KPCC: Life Expectancy Varies By 15 Years Between LA County Neighborhoods 
Children born in Los Angeles County today can expect to live more than 82 years, which is more than the average American. However, that longevity is not shared equally across the county—depending on where you live, your life expectancy can vary by up to 15 years. (Beggin, 10/4)

Los Angeles Times: Hundreds Applied To Be On California's Pot Advisory Committee. Here's Who Got Picked 
With just three months left to draft new rules for marijuana sales in California, the state on Wednesday appointed a panel of industry members, health experts, law enforcement officials and union leaders to provide advice during the effort. (McGreevy, 10/4)

In other news from across the state —

Capital Public Radio: Imagine Dragons Singer Brings Smiles At Sutter Children's Center 
Patients at Sutter Children’s Center in Sacramento got a surprise musical visit Wednesday from Dan Reynolds, lead singer of the popular rock band Imagine Dragons. Reynolds made a pit stop at the hospital while in town for a show at the Golden 1 Center. (Caiola, 10/4)

The New York Times: Bill To Rescue Children’s Health Program Hits Snag In House
Legislation to rescue the Children’s Health Insurance Program sailed through a Senate committee on Wednesday, but touched off a partisan conflict in the House, diminishing hopes that the popular program would be quickly refinanced. Funding for the program expired on Sunday, and state officials said they would soon start notifying families that children could lose coverage if Congress did not provide additional money. It was impossible to say when Congress might pass a bill and send it to President Trump. (Pear, 10/4)

The Associated Press: Parties Fight Over Funding Children's Health Insurance
The House Energy and Commerce Committee approved the measure on a party-line 28-23 vote. The program covers 8.9 million low-income children, and a renewal of funds for it seems virtually inevitable. But four days after the program's federal funding expired, the bill's problems were underscored as Democrats opposed GOP plans for financing the extension and a related community health center bill. The GOP cuts include trimming a public health fund established under former President Barack Obama's health care law and making it harder for people buying individual health coverage to avoid paying premiums. (Fram, 10/4)

Modern Healthcare: House, Senate Committees Pass CHIP Bill Proposals 
During the House panel's markup hearing Wednesday, Democrat members slammed a Republican proposal to partially pay for CHIP by charging higher Medicare premiums to seniors earning more than $500,000. The Senate version of the bill does not suggest an offset to fund the program. "Here we are with a partisan bill that asks for coverage of children on the backs of seniors," said Rep. Diana DeGette (D-Colo.). The suggestion could derail CHIP altogether, warned Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-Calif.), who noted that other bills circling in Congress, including proposed tax cuts, don't suggest how they will be funded. But some Republicans maintained that higher Medicare premiums for wealthy beneficiaries likely wouldn't be a hardship. (Dickson, 10/4)

Reuters: Obamacare Sign-Up Challenge: Proving The Law Is Not Dead
More than two thousand miles away from the healthcare debate in Washington, President Donald Trump's threats to let Obamacare collapse are sowing confusion about its fate and dampening 2018 enrollment expectations. The uncertainty here in Arizona, echoed in interviews across the country, shows that even though they have not been able to repeal former President Barack Obama's signature healthcare law, the Republican effort to undermine it is gaining traction. (Gershberg and Tobin, 10/4)

In other national health care news —

Politico: Angry GOP Donors Close Their Wallets
Republicans are confronting a growing revolt from their top donors, who are cutting off the party in protest over its inability to get anything done. Tensions reached a boiling point at a recent dinner at the home of Los Angeles billionaire Robert Day. In full view of around two dozen guests, Thomas Wachtell, a retired oil and gas investor and party contributor, delivered an urgent message to the night’s headliner, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell: Just do something. (Isenstadt and Debenedetti, 10/5)

Politico: How We Found Tom Price’s Private Jets
The first tip came from a casual conversation with a source back in May: Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price was using private jets for routine travel, possibly in violation of federal travel rules that allowed such flights only when commercial options weren’t available. But it was a tip and little else – no times, no names of charter services and not even a schedule from a notoriously secretive cabinet secretary. (Diamond and Pradhan, 10/4)

Politico: Abortion Fight May Draw Trump’s Filibuster Wrath
Senate Republicans want to follow the House and vote to ban abortions after 20 weeks. But doing so would likely reopen an internecine fight over the filibuster with the lower chamber — and the president. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) on Thursday will reintroduce his bill to ban abortions nationwide after 20 weeks of pregnancy, which failed on the Senate floor two years ago, 54-42. It’s sure to fail again if Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell brings it up. (Everett, 10/5)

Stat: Cigna Says It Won't Cover OxyContin Prescriptions Through Employer Plans
The health insurer Cigna on Wednesday announced it will no longer cover OxyContin prescriptions for customers on its employer-based health plans, the second major announcement in two weeks from an industry group billed as an effort to slow the opioid epidemic. Cigna also announced its intent to reduce opioid use among its consumers by 25 percent by 2019. Insurance consumers who have started OxyContin use for cancer or hospice care are exempt from the policy change. (Facher, 10/4)