San Francisco Chronicle: GOP Health Plan To Cost Older, Poorer Californians Far More 
The health care bill proposed by House Republicans would disproportionately affect older and poorer Californians by shrinking federal assistance to hundreds of thousands of older people who buy plans on Covered California and by reducing federal funding to Medi-Cal, the insurance program for the poor, experts say. The American Health Care Act, the GOP proposal to replace the Affordable Care Act, includes two provisions that health care experts calculate would lead to lower-income Californians in their 50s and 60s paying more for health care. (Ho, 3/13)

In other news —

Sacramento Bee: Gig Economy Workers Could Lose Coverage In Obamacare Repeal 
More than 3 million people in the U.S. are classified as independent workers, according to estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau. From 2004 to 2014, self-employed people working in repair and maintenance, personal and laundry services, pet sitting and other jobs belonging to the census bureau’s “other category” grew by nearly 1 million people, or 31 percent, according to bureau data. A Republican proposal to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act now puts in danger the health insurance of independent workers who received Medi-Cal through the federal expansion. (Caiola, 3/14)

Sacramento Bee: Gavin Newsom To Propose Universal Health Care Plan For California 
Democratic Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom is drafting a health care plan for California that he plans to unveil as a core component of his gubernatorial run, based in part on the universal health care program he signed into law when he was mayor of San Francisco. Newsom, seen as a strong contender in the increasingly crowded field of candidates vying to succeed Gov. Jerry Brown in 2018, is staking out an ambitious plan to rein in rising health care costs, expand universal access to people across the state regardless of income or immigration status, and preserve coverage for the estimated 5 million Californians who risk losing their insurance under President Donald Trump’s changes. (Hart, 3/13)

Orange County Register: Tustin's Only Hospital Reopens Under New Ownership After Scandal 
Prospect Medical Holdings of Los Angeles bought the 108,000-square-foot Newport Avenue facility in May 2014 from Pacific Health Corp. for an undisclosed amount. At the time, the facility was called Newport Specialty Hospital and housed 18 critically ill children in a pediatric subacute unit. The sale marked the end of a turbulent period for the 177-bed community hospital once known as Tustin Hospital and Medical Center. (Perkes, 3/13)

In other hospital news —

Santa Rosa Press Democrat: Petaluma Valley Hospital Vote Delayed 
Petalumans will no longer be voting to approve an operator for Petaluma Valley Hospital on June 6, as had long been the Petaluma Health Care District’s plan. The announcement came Friday at the PHCD board meeting, also the last day to submit a ballot measure for the June vote. In a news release, Elece Hempel, board president, cited the “complex” process of transitioning from St. Joseph Health as the hospital’s operator to the board’s choice of Paladin Healthcare as its new operator. The board has entered into a non-binding letter of intent with Paladin, but St. Joseph Health will continue to operate the hospital until Paladin is approved by voters. (Warren, 3/13)

Los Angeles Times: Dying Patients Want Easier Access To Experimental Drugs. Here's Why Experts Say That's Bad Medicine
Former firefighter Mike DeBartoli is a man desperate to rescue himself. He suffers from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, the degenerative nerve disorder better known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, which usually kills within five years. He has already spent one year in a clinical trial, taking four pills a day that may have been a placebo. It didn’t help. (Healy, 3/13)

Sacramento Bee: Germ-Zapping Xenex Robot Another Tool In Fight Against Hospital Infections 
Last week, Sutter Medical Center in Sacramento showed off its first-ever “germ-zapping” robot, a wheeled machine that emits pulsating ultraviolet light that’s been shown to kill off infection-causing bacteria. It’s even got a name, chosen by hospital staffers: Xhaiden, an American baby name said to mean “beam of cleansing light.” (Buck, 3/13)

In other public health news —

Capital Public Radio: Costs For Alzheimer's Patients Continue To Rise 
Health care costs for treating Californians with Alzheimer's disease continue to grow significantly. It will cost Medi-Cal an estimated $3.5 billion to care for people with Alzheimer's disease this year, according to the Alzheimer's Association. And it's expected to rise 47 percent over the next eight years...The report shows the average out-of-pocket costs for seniors with Alzheimer’s and other dementias are almost five times higher than for people without the disease. (Johnson, 3/13)

Los Angeles Times: Your Kids Aren't Killing You; One Day They May Actually Help You Live Longer 
Sometimes — a lot of times — it feels as if being a parent is shaving years off your life, but a new study suggests that’s not the case. In fact, just the opposite may be true. (Netburn, 3/13)

KPCC: Our Wet Winter Could Be Bad News For Pollen Allergies
While the winter rains may have eased California's drought, "some people are going to have to appreciate it inside their cars or inside their homes," because the increased plant growth also means more pollen in the air, said Tam, Medical Director at the Gores Family Allergy Center at Children's Hospital Los Angeles. Pollen allergies can cause stuffy nose, itchy eyes, and tiredness. They can be particularly harmful for people who are also asthmatic. Rain isn’t the only weather condition that affects allergies; winds can blow pollen from one area to another. Even if an individual isn't allergic to the tree pollen in his immediate area, "you get those Santa Ana winds and you get those pollens coming down into the city so you will be affected," said Dr. Richard Barbers, Professor of Clinical Medicine at the Keck School of Medicine of USC. (Lavender, 3/13)

Ventura County Star: Funding Grows To Treat Mentally Ill Defendants
Ventura County has added almost $600,000 to a $1 million contract for the treatment of mentally ill residents in a locked facility in Sylmar, driven by the late opening of a county facility and increased demand. Early last week the Ventura County Board of Supervisors authorized the 55 percent increase in the contract with the Sylmar Health & Rehabilitation Center, effective through the end of the fiscal year. The infusion was needed partly because billing revenues were lost when the new county facility, the Horizon View Mental Health Rehabilitation Center, opened five months late because of construction delays. (Wilson, 3/13)

In other news from across the state —

Capital Public Radio: Sacramento Opens Three New Warming Shelters
Three new warming centers in Sacramento have been full every night they've been open, according to the City of Sacramento. The city says 700 homeless people and families have stayed at the centers a total of 2,000 times. Emily Halcon is the Homeless Services coordinator for the city and says two centers provide a place to sleep and eat. (Moffitt, 3/13)

Orange County Register: CSUF Public Relations Students Team Up With Local Nonprofit Organization To Raise Funds For Pediatric Cancer 
Cal State Fullerton students Claire Imada and Elizabeth Gallardo are seniors in the university’s College of Communications and while they’ve been exposed to numerous public relations courses and projects throughout their time at the university, the duo agree that nothing has compared to being completely immersed in the public relations field. Imada, 22, a public relations student with a minor in Asian American studies and Gallardo, 23, a public relations student with a minor in business administration, recently became interns at the Irvine-based Pediatric Cancer Research Foundation (PCRF). (Marcos, 3/13)

East Bay Times: Mercury Spill Forces Neighborhood Street Closure
Contra Costa County hazardous materials workers were working with federal and state staff to decontaminate a stretch of roadway closed to traffic after a mercury spill Monday... Clean-up crews with the county’s hazardous materials response team will join contractors hired by the federal Environmental Protection Agency and state Department of Toxic Substances Control to assess and decontaminate coned-off areas of the street and a sidewalk splotched with tell-tale traces of liquid mercury. (Kelly, 3/13)

The New York Times: Health Bill Would Add 24 Million Uninsured But Save $337 Billion, Report Says
The House Republican plan to replace the Affordable Care Act would increase the number of people without health insurance by 24 million by 2026, while slicing $337 billion off federal budget deficits over that time, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said Monday. (Kaplan and Pear, 3/13)

In other national health care news —

Politico: GOP Scrambles After Scorching Health Bill Appraisal
House Republican leaders plunged into damage control mode Monday after a brutal budgetary assessment of their Obamacare replacement threatened to upend Senate GOP support and armed their critics on the left. Speaker Paul Ryan’s team quickly pinpointed rosier elements of the report by the Congressional Budget Office, from cost savings to lower premiums. (Cheney, Everett and Pradhan, 3/13)

The Associated Press: Critics Of GOP Health Bill Get Ammunition From Budget Score
Critics of GOP health care legislation got fresh ammunition from a report that estimates the bill would increase the ranks of the uninsured by 14 million people next year alone, and 24 million over a decade. (Werner, 3/14)

Politico: White House Analysis Of Obamacare Repeal Sees Even Deeper Insurance Losses Than CBO
The House bill was already under attack from both very conservative members who wanted it to go further, as well as moderates worried about coverage erosion particularly in Medicaid. The CBO number made the task of passing it even more challenging. (Demko, 3/13)

The Associated Press: Trump: GOP Bill Will Push Insurance Costs 'Down, Down, Down'
President Donald Trump sought to highlight complaints about the Obama health care law Monday, including a gripe of his own, that the law is "a disaster" but that the media makes it look "wonderful." (3/13)

The Washington Post: The GOP’s Dramatic Change In Strategy To Pass Its Health-Care Law
To get the Affordable Care Act passed, Democrats used a big-tent approach, convening health-care groups that did not normally talk to one another while cutting deals and strong-arming key industry players to build broad support for the plan. First, the drug companies got on board. Then came the hospitals and the doctors. (Johnson, 3/13)

The New York Times: Health Policy Expert Is Confirmed As Medicare And Medicaid Administrator
The Senate on Monday confirmed Seema Verma, a health policy expert from Indiana, to lead efforts by the Trump administration to transform Medicaid and upend the Affordable Care Act. (Pear, 3/13)