San Francisco Chronicle: Signups For Health Insurance Through Covered California Up 7 Percent
About 342,000 Californians have signed up for health insurance through Covered California since open enrollment began in November — up roughly 7 percent compared to this time last year, according to figures released by the agency Monday. Covered California is the state agency created under the Affordable Care Act to sell health plans to Californians who do not get insurance through their employers or Medi-Cal, the insurance program for the poor. (Ho, 1/22)

The Mercury News: Think You've Got The Flu? A Doctor Consultation App Might Help
The growing market of on-demand and telemedicine appointments is booming this winter as the flu season continues its rampage across California. Doctor’s offices and hospital emergency rooms are overflowing with flu patients as the death toll from one of the worst flu seasons in more than decade has risen to 74, including 25 in the Bay Area. (Seipel, 1/23)

In other news —

KBAK: Kern Hospital Employees Least Vaccinated In California
Last year Kern County had the lowest immunization rate in the state with only 70% of all hospital employees getting the flu shot. We hear it every year, medical professionals telling us to get the flu shot. However, the data shows their own co-workers aren't getting the flu shot. According to the California Department of Public Health last year at Bakersfield Memorial Hospital only 62% of employees got vaccinated, 65% at Kern Medical, 54% at Mercy Hospital, 52% at Mercy Southwest, and 78% at Adventist Health. (Platt, 1/23)

The Mercury News: Golden Gate Bridge Reports Spike In Suicide Deterrence
The Golden Gate Bridge is reporting it intervened with a record number of people who came to the span in 2017 to potentially end their lives. Last year the bridge patrol team assisted 245 people on the bridge because they presented a risk of suicide, according to figures provided by the bridge district. There were 33 confirmed suicides. In 2016 there were 184 successful interventions and 39 suicides. (Prado, 1/22)

In other public health news —

KPCC: California Falls Short In Passing Protections Against Drunk Driving, Group Says 
California ranks just middle of the road in adopting strong traffic safety laws, according to a new report from Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit. The state has strict regulations protecting consumers and the environment, but the group concluded California falls short in areas that could keep residents safe on the streets. (McCarty Carino, 1/22)

KQED: Ag Industry Fights Pesticide Penalties And State Efforts To Increase Future Fines
Several produce and farm labor contractors are contesting fines they face in connection with two separate pesticide drifts in the Central Valley that sickened close to 130 agricultural workers last year. In August the Kern County agricultural commissioner issued more than $50,000 in fines against two firms, including Sun Pacific, the produce company behind the popular Cuties oranges, for violating pesticide rules in an incident that sickened 37 farmworkers near the town of Maricopa in May. (Goldberg, 1/22)

Los Angeles Times: Healthcare Deals Fire Up As Drug Giants Face Price Pressure
The new year's healthcare deals began to snowball as Sanofi and Celgene Corp. scooped up assets that promise to offset pricing pressure for some of their top-selling drugs. ...The Monday activity sent the deals volume in U.S. biotechnology to its highest level since the third quarter of 2010, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. (Lauerman, 1/22)

KPBS Public Media: Four San Diego County Hospitals Make C-Section Honor Roll
Four local hospitals have met or surpassed a federal goal for reducing unnecessary Caesarean births. That accomplishment has placed them on Smart Care California's C-section honor roll. The hospitals are Scripps Memorial, Scripps Encinitas, Tri-City Medical Center and Sharp Grossmont. The c-section rate in the U.S. has increased dramatically over the last decade. Nationwide, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 32 percent of babies are born by C-section. The federal government has set a goal of reducing C-section rates for low-risk, first-births to 23.9 percent. (Goldberg, 1/23)

The Mercury News: How Do Authorities, Medical Staff React To California Torture Case? Probably Like Everyone Else
Riverside County sheriff’s deputies who rescued the Turpin siblings after one escaped from their Perris home on Sunday, Jan. 14, as well as hospital staff who are now taking care of them, are likely responding to the siblings’ plight like everyone else — with a wide range of complex emotions. ...Deputies and hospital staff can get support through their workplaces, chaplains and The Counseling Team International, a San Bernardino-based group of counselors who provide critical-incident intervention and one-on-one counseling through contracts or on a case-by-case basis. (Hurt, 1/22)

In other news from across the state —

Los Angeles Times: Agreement Between Unions And L.A. Unified Preserves Health Benefits, But It Won't Fix Financial Woes
A tentative three-year agreement between the Los Angeles Unified School District and eight unions is good for the district's 60,000 employees, at least in the short term. They hold onto the healthcare choices they have now without having to contribute to their costs. (Blume, 1/23)

The New York Times: Government Shutdown Ends After 3 Days Of Recriminations
Congress brought an end to a three-day government shutdown on Monday as Senate Democrats buckled under pressure to adopt a short-term spending bill to fund government operations without first addressing the fate of young undocumented immigrants. The House quickly approved the measure — which will fund the government through Feb. 8 and extend funding for the popular Children’s Health Insurance Program for six years — and President Trump signed it on Monday night. (Stolberg and Kaplan, 1/22)

The Washington Post: Short-Term Spending Agreement Provides Longer-Term Relief For CHIP
The spending bill that the Senate and House adopted Monday, and that President Trump signed, provides six years of federal money for the Children’s Health Insurance Program, a bipartisan creation that furnishes coverage to nearly 9 million children and 375,000 pregnant women. The budget for CHIP, as it is known, ended on Sept. 30 without lawmakers having reauthorized it as they had done several times over its two decades — usually months in advance of the deadline. States, which share responsibility for CHIP, had been running short of federal funds for their programs at different paces. Connecticut became the first to freeze enrollment just before Christmas, and at least five states notified families that they would need to do so soon. Eleven other states were expecting to run out by the end of next month. (Goldstein, 1/22)

The Hill: Congress Funds Children's Health Program After Four-Month Delay
"This action ends months of anxiety and worry for the hard-working families who rely on CHIP for life-saving health care," said Frederick Isasi, executive director of Families USA, a health care advocacy group in D.C. "States — some of which had already sent notices to families warning of looming CHIP enrollment freezes—can now set about restoring trust that CHIP will be there for kids and their families." (Hellmann, 1/22)

Capital Public Radio: Deal To End Shutdown Funds Health Care For 2 Million Californians 
About two million California children will continue to receive health care through the federal-state Children’s Health Insurance Program. The federal budget deal that ended the government shutdown reauthorizes the CHIP program for six years. (Bradford, 1/22)

Stat: Congress Delays Medical Device Tax For Two Years
Almost no one got everything they wanted out of the Monday deal to reopen the government — except perhaps medical device companies, who managed to fend off an industry-wide excise tax before the first payments were due. The stopgap spending deal that was signed by President Trump on Monday included a two-year delay of the 2.3 percent tax, which was originally included in the Affordable Care Act to help pay for the law’s health insurance subsidies. (Mershon, 1/22)

CQ: Many Health Care Provisions Wait In Limbo For An Omnibus Deal
Lawmakers' focus over the next three weeks will be a long-term spending bill and immigration issues but, as usual in this session, health care issues could creep into the debate. The Senate on Monday was poised to pass a three-week continuing resolution (HR 195) that the House is expected to vote on later Monday. It includes a six-year renewal of the Children's Health Insurance Program and the suspension of certain health care taxes. But Congress still needs to address a slate of health care issues left over from last year that lawmakers and aides have said could move as part of an omnibus spending bill. (McIntire, 1/22)

The Associated Press: Deal That Broke Senate Impasse: Kids' Health But No DACA
The agreement [also includes] delays to three taxes under the Obama-era health care law: the medical device tax through 2019, the so-called Cadillac tax on generous employer-paid health care plans through 2021 and a tax on health insurance companies through 2019. (1/22)

The Washington Post: Shutdown Ends After Democrats Agree To Trust That McConnell Will Allow ‘Dreamer’ Vote
The impact of the shutdown, which began at midnight Friday, was minimal, leaving hundreds of thousands of federal workers unsure of what the week would bring — but stretching into just one workday. Lawmakers agreed to fund the government through Feb. 8 after McConnell (R-Ky.) said he would address the status of young immigrants called “dreamers” who were brought to this country illegally as children. (Sullivan, O'Keefe and Viebeck, 1/22)

The Wall Street Journal: Congress Passes Three-Week Spending Bill To End Shutdown
The agreement will keep the federal government running through Feb. 8, but did little to resolve the underlying policy fights over immigration and government-spending levels and doesn’t preclude a similar shutdown next month. The deal also opened a rift in the Democratic Party between a left flank that wanted to hold out now for an agreement on the young immigrants known as Dreamers and a more centrist group eager to reopen the government and work out a bipartisan compromise. (Peterson, Hook and Andrews, 1/22)

Politico: Congress Votes To End Shutdown
Coons and King were part of a group of at least two dozen senators who began meeting late last week in the office of Sen. Susan Collins to broker a deal to stave off a shutdown — much like the effort that the Maine Republican led in 2013. To try and keep the peace, Collins wouldn't let any senator in the room talk unless they were holding a "talking stick" — which one aide later said was a Maasai leadership stick that Sen. Heidi Heitkamp (D-N.D.) gave Collins a few years ago. At one point, Sen. Lamar Alexander of Tennessee forcefully tossed the stick toward Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia after Warner interrupted him, nearly shattering a glass elephant belonging to Collins, according to two people briefed on the throw. After that incident, Collins suggested using a small rubber ball, and Alexander also brought his own basketball "because it’d be safer than a stick," an aide said. (Kim, Everett and Schor, 1/22)