Capital Public Radio: Assembly Speaker Says Single-Payer Remains Shelved 
“Absolutely nothing has happened with the bill,” Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon, a Los Angeles-area Democrat, says of the high-profile Senate measure to establish single-payer health care. Rendon shelved the bill last year, after it passed the Senate, calling it “woefully incomplete,” because it does not specify how the state would would seek federal approval, bypass constitutional spending limits and cover as much as a $400 billion cost. (Bradford, 1/8)

The Mercury News: Tamiflu Shortage Reported In Some Bay Area Walgreens Stores
The recent spike in flu cases around the Bay Area and California is not only crowding hospital emergency rooms with flu patients, it’s also leading to more demand for flu shots and antiviral medications to treat the virus. That means some drug stores around the region, such as Walgreens, are reporting a limited supply of Tamiflu, said company spokesman Scott Goldberg. (Seipel, 1/8)

Orange County Register: Tamiflu In Short Supply At Some Orange County Pharmacies As Local Flu Season Tally Climbs To Nearly 1,800 Confirmed Cases 
In Orange County, as of Monday, Jan. 8, four people under 65 had died from flu-related illnesses, and an estimated 1,773 positive cases had been reported since Oct. 1, according to the Orange County Health Care Agency. That’s up threefold, compared to the 502 reported cases at this time last flu season. (Connelly, 1/8)

Modesto Bee: Flu Season Spreads Misery In Stanislaus County. Death Toll Increases Statewide
One of the worst flu seasons in years is sending droves of patients to medical clinics and emergency rooms and filling hospital beds in the region. The seasonal flu struck the Northern San Joaquin Valley earlier than usual with a virulent strain, causing fever, headache, body aches, congestion and serious complications in some patients. (Carlson, 1/8)

KPBS: County Supervisors To Review Flu Severity 
San Diego County Supervisors will decide Tuesday whether to declare a state of emergency because of the severity of this year’s flu season. Last week saw a surge of reported cases in the final week of 2017 and now all eyes are on whether those numbers will continue to rise. (St John, 1/8)

The New York Times: Already ‘Moderately Severe,’ Flu Season In U.S. Could Get Worse
This winter’s flu season is turning into a “moderately severe” one that might get worse because of an imperfect vaccine and steady cold weather, flu experts and public health officials said this week. The flu is now widespread across the country and the peak of transmission probably occurred during the Christmas-New Year’s holiday week, just as many people were crowded into planes, buses and cars or in large family gatherings, said Dr. Daniel B. Jernigan, director of the influenza division of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (McNeil, 1/8)

The Mercury News: California Hospitals Fined For Serious, Sometimes Tragic Mistakes 
Investigators found that the hospital had failed to provide a safe environment for the elderly suicidal patient and prevent him from carrying out his plan. Among other issues, the hospital staff did not tell a security guard, who was monitoring the patient from a video camera behind the nurses’ station, that he was suicidal. The hospital issued a statement saying that the suicide “deeply saddened our patient care team and everyone involved. When a patient is in our hospital, our priority is to provide care with integrity and compassion.” (Seipel, 1/8)

In other hospital news —

Ventura County Star: Groundbreaking For Oxnard Hospital Expansion Set
A ground-breaking celebration will be held Thursday at St. John's Regional Medical Center in Oxnard for the hospital's emergency department expansion, a new neuroscience center and several other projects. The ground-breaking is open to the public and will be held from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. at the hospital, 1600 N. Rose Ave., Oxnard. The hospital's modernization and expansion project is set for completion by April 2019. It includes nine additional exam rooms in the emergency department, expansion of the neonatal intensive care unit, upgraded labor and delivery rooms and other changes. (Kisken, 1/8)

The Wall Street Journal: Apple Defends Its Smartphone Practices For Children After Investor Critique
Apple Inc. defended its record of providing parental controls and other protections for children who use its iPhones and other devices, after a pair of prominent investors called on the tech giant to take more steps to curb the ill effects of smartphones. In a statement late Monday, Apple said that its mobile software includes extensive parental controls governing different types of content and applications, noting that it started offering some of them as early as 2008. (Mickle, 1/8)

Capital Public Radio: The Healthiest Water Ever? Maybe Not 
A growing number of people are seeking out “raw water,” described by some companies as unfiltered, untreated and unsterilized water from natural sources. Proponents say it contains natural minerals and probiotics that are eliminated during the public water filtering process. (Caiola, 1/8)

In other public health news —

Sacramento Bee: Study: Extended Ibuprofen Use Can Impair Fertility In Men
Ibuprofen is a common over-the-counter drug that helps with pain and inflammation. However, for men, it could compromise their ability to procreate, a new study suggests. (Harris, 1/8)

Los Angeles Times: Romaine Lettuce Is A Bad Choice Right Now, Health Agencies Warn
If you've somehow missed the huge warnings so far, we beg of you: Do not eat romaine lettuce. There's no official government recall in the United States - yet. But with two dead and many more sickened in the United States and Canada, major health organizations are advising you avoid the stuff. This all began in December, when the Canadian Government warned consumers to avoid romaine due to potential contamination with E. coli. (Van Hare, 1/8)

KQED: Health Experts Worry Brewer Tax Cuts May Increase Costs To Nondrinkers 
In this new year, beer brewers are enjoying a temporary excise tax break that was signed into federal law as 2017 was winding down. But now public health experts are saying the temporary cut could come with a big cost over the next two years. (Sullivan, 1/9)

KQED: L.A. County Mobilizes To Bring Homeless In From The Cold
L.A. County has opened more than a dozen temporary winter shelters, with about 1,500 beds. Hinderliter says the shelters give LAHSA outreach workers a chance to offer services to people who can otherwise be hard to reach and track at a time when there isn’t enough supportive housing to shelter the county’s surging homeless population. (Cuevas, 1/8)

The Washington Post: Senate Finance Committee To Evaluate Alex Azar To Be The Next HHS Secretary
Alex Azar, the White House’s choice to become the second health and human services secretary in less than a year, will appear for his Senate confirmation hearing Tuesday, giving Democrats a chance to probe his drug industry ties but not halt his path toward joining the president’s Cabinet. The 10 a.m. hearing before the Senate Finance Committee will give Azar’s Democratic critics a forum to contend that his role in helping to approve rising pharmaceutical prices while a top executive of Eli Lilly means he is ill-suited to carry out President Trump’s stated goal of making medicines more affordable. (Goldstein and Eilperin, 1/8)

The Hill: House Dems Sound Alarm About Trump Health Nominee 
A group of House Democrats want the Senate Finance Committee to question President Trump’s nominee for Health and Human Services secretary about high drug prices at his former employer, Eli Lilly. In a letter to Finance Committee leaders, led by Texas Reps. Beto O'Rourke and Lloyd Doggett, the Democrats said Alex Azar should also be pressed on his commitment to uphold the Affordable Care Act, otherwise known as ObamaCare. (Weixel, 1/8)

Politico: HHS Nominee's Mission Is To Finish The Job On Obamacare
President Donald Trump’s pick for Health and Human Services secretary is on the verge of taking control of the department with a clear mandate: Take down Obamacare from the inside. With Republicans stalled on repeal, the GOP is looking to Alex Azar to put a conservative stamp on the health care system through shrewd rulemaking and the use of expansive regulatory powers — and all without the help of a Congress that’s failed to scrap the 2010 health care law. (Cancryn, 1/9)

The Wall Street Journal: Republicans Scale Down Agenda For Safety-Net Programs, Health Law
Republicans are scaling back their ambitions to overhaul safety-net programs and dismantle the Affordable Care Act following President Donald Trump’s weekend retreat with GOP leaders, due to concerns they can’t muster enough support ahead of the 2018 midterm elections. Instead, Republican lawmakers are likely to embrace a slimmed-down agenda focused on the basics, including funding the government, raising the government debt limit and striking a deal on immigration, according to GOP lawmakers and aides. (Peterson and Armour, 1/9)

In other national health care news —

The Hill: Profit Outlook Brightens For ObamaCare Insurers
The ObamaCare doomsday scenario that many Republicans and Democrats predicted for 2018 is unlikely to come to pass, with insurers having adapted to the uncertainty that marked President Trump’s first year in office.  Insurers who decided to stick with ObamaCare after a tumultuous 2017 are likely to have a relatively profitable year, analysts and experts predict, for reasons including higher-than-expected enrollment.  (Hellmann, 1/9)

Stat: In States That Didn't Expand Medicaid, Hospital Closures Have Spiked
In recent years Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion has created a financial fault line in American health care. Hospitals in states that enacted the expansion got a wave of newly insured patients, while those in states that rejected it were left with large numbers of uninsured individuals. A new study released Monday reports a crucial consequence of that divide: Nonexpansion states have suffered a significant increase in hospital closures. States that expanded benefits, on the other hand, saw their rate of closures decline. (Ross,1/8)

Los Angeles Times: Why The United States Is 'The Most Dangerous Of Wealthy Nations For A Child To Be Born Into'
It's no surprise that the United States ranks absolutely last in child mortality among the world's wealthiest countries — that's been true for years. A new study examines how this sad situation came to be. According to data from the World Health Organization and the global Human Mortality Database, the problems go all the way back to the 1960s. It was during that decade that the U.S. infant mortality rate (for babies less than a year old) and the U.S. childhood mortality rate (for those between the ages of 1 and 19) began to exceed the combined rates for the other 19 richest nations. (Kaplan, 1/8)

Los Angeles Times: Banning Seven Words At The CDC Would Have At Least Seven Serious Consequences For Public Health
"It's a beautiful thing, the destruction of words," George Orwell writes in the fifth chapter of his dystopian novel, "1984." Four public health experts from Emory University in Atlanta, just a stone's throw from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, beg to differ. In an editorial published Monday in the Annals of Internal Medicine, they said it would be "damning, immoral and unacceptable" for CDC officials to act on reported admonitions from the Trump administration to avoid the use of seven words and phrases in the agency's official budget documents. (Healy, 1/8)

Kaiser Health News: Her Sister’s Keeper: Caring For A Sibling With Mental Illness
When sisters Jean and Ruby were growing up in Harlem, they invented a game of make-believe called “Eartha.” The little girls would put on their prettiest dresses and shiniest shoes and sit down to tea as grown-up ladies. They discussed details of their hoped-for husbands and children, and all the exciting things they would do together. But 45 years later, the sisters’ lives are nothing like they imagined. Ruby Wilson, 54, has paranoid schizophrenia and lives in an assisted living facility in North Carolina. Her sister Jean Moore, 57, is her legal guardian. (Gold, 1/9)

USA Today: Dry January: What Are The Benefits? And Is It Worth It?
With the booze-filled December behind us, many Americans will try to make up for their eggnogs, wines and other holiday spirits with Dry January, a 31-day break from all alcohol. The practice gained popularity after a British nonprofit promoted it in 2013, becoming a government-backed public health campaign the next year aimed at improving health, trimming waistlines and fattening wallets. But will putting down the bottles for a month make up for the recent weeks' revelry? Yes and no, according to a smattering of data and experts on the subject. It might depend on your goal. (Hafner, 1/8)

Stat: How To Determine Trump's Mental Fitness? Reliable Cognitive Tests Exist
When President Trump has his physical exam on Friday, there is little chance he will repeat the same story within a span of 10 minutes or fail to recognize old friends, as the explosive new book “Fire and Fury” by Michael Wolff asserts he has done in the past. But the mental deterioration that causes such memory lapses would be detectable on standard cognitive tests. The White House told reporters on Monday that psychiatric tests would not be conducted as part of the president’s physical, but did not explicitly rule out cognitive assessments. (Begley, 1/9)

The Washington Post: The White House Struggles To Silence Talk Of Trump’s Mental Fitness
The White House is struggling to contain the national discussion about President Trump’s mental acuity and fitness for the job, which has overshadowed the administration’s agenda for the past week. Trump publicly waded into the debate spawned by a new book, “Fire and Fury” — Michael Wolff’s inside account of the presidency — over the weekend by claiming on Twitter that he is “like, really smart” and “a very stable genius.” In doing so, the president underscored his administration’s response strategy — by being forceful and combative — while also undermining it by gleefully entering a debate his aides have tried to avoid. (Rucker and Parker, 1/8)