The New York Times: California Drug Price Plan Is Criticized By Patient Advocates
A state ballot initiative meant to lower prescription drug prices for California faces an expected opponent: the pharmaceutical industry, which has spent almost $70 million to defeat it. But concerns are also coming from a more curious source: some patient advocacy groups. Called the Drug Price Relief Act, or Proposition 61, the proposal would prohibit state programs, such as California’s Medicaid, from paying more for a drug than the lowest price paid by the federal Department of Veterans Affairs, which typically receives big discounts. (Pollack, 7/4)

Los Angeles Times: What You Need To Know About The 17 Propositions On November's Statewide Ballot
California voters will be asked on Nov. 8 to sort through the longest list of statewide propositions since the PlayStation 2 was on the market and the St. Louis Rams won the Super Bowl. The list of 17 ballot measures certified by Secretary of State Alex Padilla on Thursday offers a dizzying array of public policy choices for Californians to sort out this fall. ... Voters will face three very different proposals on healthcare issues, with one of the measures likely to spark a multimillion-dollar opposition campaign. (Myers, 7/3)

KPCC: Parents, Advocacy Groups Sue To Overturn California’s New Vaccination Law
As California’s new law requiring almost all children entering day care, kindergarten or 7th grade to be vaccinated against various diseases took effect Friday, opponents filed a federal lawsuit seeking to have the law overturned. The suit, filed by six parents and four advocacy groups in U.S. District Court in San Diego, argues that the law violates the California Constitution’s guarantee of a public education for all children. It also claims the law violates the rights to, among other things, equal protection and due process guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution. (Glickman, 7/1)

Sacramento Business Journal: Marshall Hospital Pays $5.5 Million Settlement In Billing Fraud Case
Marshall Medical Center has agreed to pay $5.5 million to settle allegations that the Placerville-based hospital and other defendants defrauded Medicare, Medicaid and Tricare in billing improprieties. The settlement, announced by the U.S. Attorney’s office Thursday, stems from a 2012 federal lawsuit filed by whistleblower Colleen Herren. Her suit alleged that that Marshall and four other defendents defrauded the insurance systems through a variety of bill improprieties, according to the settlement announcement. (Anderson, 7/1)

In other hospital news —

The Fresno Bee: $55 Million Hospital Bond Campaign Divides Tulare
Voters in Tulare and outlying areas are being courted to vote yes on Measure I, the proposed $55 million bond that supporters say is needed to finish the stalled Tulare Regional Medical Center expansion project. But some residents who normally would be bond cheerleaders are opposing it, saying they don’t trust the company under contract with Tulare Local Health Care District to run the hospital. (Griswold, 7/2)

The Fresno Bee: Saint Agnes Bid To Modify Minimum Charity-Care Level Draws Ire
Saint Agnes Medical Center is coming under fire from community members for its request to reduce the amount it is required to allocate to charity care under an agreement with the state attorney general. The nonprofit Catholic-based hospital in Fresno wants a $7 million annual charity-care minimum, established three years ago, to be lowered because it provided less than $5 million in care to patients who had no insurance or means to pay for their care in 2015. (Anderson, 7/2)

KPCC: Effort To Fight Opioid Abuse Spreads To 80 LA County Urgent Care Clinics
Amidst a national epidemic of prescription opioid abuse, 80 public and private urgent care clinics across Los Angeles County will now follow guidelines designed to combat overuse of the powerful pain medications, the county public health department announced Friday. The move will help address a surge in patients asking for opioids at urgent care clinics, says Dr. Gary Tsai, medical director for the Substance Abuse Prevention and Control division of the L.A. County Department of Public Health. The increase in drug seekers came after all 76 emergency departments in L.A. County adopted the same prescription guidelines last year, he says. (Plevin, 7/1)

In other public health news —

The Sacramento Bee: LGBT Community Aims To Trim Its Higher Tobacco Use
When Bill Gruenloh moved to Sacramento from St. Louis 10 years ago, he headed to the easiest place to meet people and make friends – the local gay bar. Then 24 and a smoker since his teens, he hoped that a healthy West Coast lifestyle, and the state ban on smoking in many public areas, would help him shake his addiction once and for all. But when he walked into the Mercantile Saloon and other midtown haunts sporting the rainbow flag, he was quickly offered a light. (Caiola, 7/4)

The Fresno Bee: Northeast Fresno Water Issues Confound City, State Investigators
Hundreds of homes in northeast Fresno have discolored water – and, in some cases, excessive levels of toxic lead – coming from their faucets. And while homeowners clamor for answers about why and what to do about it, those answers are in painfully short supply. There are a couple of common denominators to the cases: Homes that are plumbed with galvanized iron pipe and which also receive drinking water from the city’s northeast surface water treatment plant. (Sheehan, 7/4)

KPCC: USC Plays A Role In National Cancer Moonshot Program
USC is involved in two of the new initiatives unveiled at last week's White House Cancer Moonshot summit. One is a crowd sourcing platform created by Peter Kuhn, a USC professor of biological science, medicine and biomedical engineering. CancerBase, as it's called, is a collaboration of patients, USC and Stanford University scientists and social media companies. It aims to create a real-time, global "cancer map" from patient data submitted anonymously through Facebook, according to USC spokeswoman Emily Gersema. (O'Neill, 7/5)

KQED: DNA Offers A Clue Into Why Some People Are More Sociable And Trusting
A new study has found a genetic difference that might explain at least part of this spectrum of sociability. It might even help us understand how someone can go from being shy as a child to outgoing as an adult or vice versa. The gene involved, the oxytocin gene, makes perfect sense as it is intimately involved in sociability. It has the instructions for making the hormone oxytocin and this hormone forges bonds when falling in love, plays a critical role in mother-child bonding and improves people’s ability to read emotions accurately in the face of another person. Oxytocin isn’t the whole story, but it is almost certainly a piece in these puzzles. (Starr, 7/1)

The Washington Post: Democrats Release Draft Of Platform, With Shifts To Left On Death Penalty, Abortion, Taxes
The Democratic National Committee released the latest draft of its 2016 platform late Friday afternoon, a week after Sen. Bernie Sanders (Vt.) promised to fight "on the floor of the convention" if more progressive planks did not make it in. ... For the first time, the 2016 Democratic platform says that the party will attempt to repeal the Hyde Amendment (which bars the use of federal funds for most kinds of abortion) and the Helms Amendment (which prevents foreign aid from being spent on abortion). (Weigel, 7/1)

The New York Times: Brand-Name Drug Makers Wary Of Letting Generic Rival Join Their Club
For decades, brand-name and generic drug companies have fought each other in Congress, at international trade negotiations and in court. So when the world’s largest generic drug company moved this year to join the powerful trade association for producers of brand-name medicines, pharmaceutical lobbyists were in a swivet. The trade group, the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, known as PhRMA, is plunging into battles over drug prices here and in many state capitols. And the request from the generic company, Teva Pharmaceutical Industries, is raising eyebrows in PhRMA’s secretive councils. (Pear, 7/1)

In other national health care news —

The New York Times: UnitedHealthcare Sues Dialysis Chain Over Billing
Private health insurers can pay more than $4,000 for each dialysis treatment. Government health plans like Medicaid pay around $200. That gaping price difference was the motivation for a scheme, orchestrated by a for-profit dialysis chain, that illegally pushed poor people in Florida and Ohio out of inexpensive government programs and into expensive private plans sold by UnitedHealthcare, according to a lawsuit the giant insurer filed in federal court on Friday. UnitedHealthcare says the arrangement needlessly exposed the patients to medical bills. (Abelson and Thomas, 7/1)

Modern Healthcare: Supreme Court Term Mixed Bag For Healthcare Industry
Last year, healthcare leaders had their eyes trained on one big case – King v. Burwell – and they celebrated when the justices voted to uphold a key provision of the Affordable Care Act. This year wasn't nearly so straightforward for healthcare leaders watching the Supreme Court, which wrapped up its latest term this week. (Schenker, 7/3)

The New York Times: Sex May Spread Zika Virus More Often Than Researchers Suspected
An outbreak of the Zika virus in the continental United States could begin any day now. But while there is plenty of discussion about mosquito bites, some researchers are beginning to worry more about the other known transmission route: sex. Intimate contact may account for more Zika infections than previously suspected, these experts say. The evidence is still emerging, and recent findings are hotly disputed. All experts agree that mosquitoes are the epidemic’s main driver. (McNeil, 7/2)

The Wall Street Journal: New Weight-Loss Tactics For The Moderately Obese
The Food and Drug Administration has recently approved a host of new weight-loss interventions that make millions more people eligible for obesity treatments. Among the devices are balloons that inflate inside the stomach and leave less room for food, electrical impulses that trick the brain into thinking the stomach is full and a tube that lets people drain out some of their stomach contents after meals. The new interventions don’t require major surgery and are reversible; several are aimed at the estimated 60 million Americans who are only moderately obese, with a body-mass index of 30 to 40. (Beck, 7/4)