Modesto Bee: Covered California Extends Enrollment Period After ‘Ridiculous’ Court Decision
Covered California gave consumers another week for enrollment after a federal judge’s ruling on the Affordable Care Act last week. Judge Reed O’Connor of the U.S. District Court in Texas declared the entire health reform law is unconstitutional because of the original mandate requiring individuals to have insurance. (Carlson, 12/18)

The Associated Press: California Doctor Accused Of Prescribing Drugs In 5 Deaths
A Southern California doctor was arrested Tuesday on charges of doling out drugs to patients he didn’t examine and is alleged to have prescribed drugs to five people who died of overdoses as well as an impaired driver who struck and killed a bicyclist, federal prosecutors said. Dr. Dzung Ahn Pham, 57, faces charges of illegally distributing powerful opioids and prosecutors said he prescribed drugs to addicts or people selling them on the street. He prescribed some drugs after receiving text messages requesting specific quantities and doses, prosecutors said. (Melley, 12/18)

Orange County Register: Thousand Oaks Mass Shooting Gunman Had Drugs Illegally Prescribed By Tustin Doctor, Feds Say 
Federal prosecutors also alleged that medications prescribed by Dzung Ahn Pham, of Tustin, were found in the possession of a man believed to have carried out the mass shooting at the Borderline Bar and Grill in Thousand Oaks that claimed the lives of 13 people. Pham, the owner of the Irvine Village Urgent Care, faces two federal counts of illegally distributing oxycodone. While he has not been criminally charged in connection to the Borderline shooting, the death of the Costa Mesa fire captain or the overdose deaths, authorities in a court filing alleged that he routinely gave out large quantities of powerful narcotics to dozens of patients. (Emery, 12/18)

In other news on the opioid crisis —

San Francisco Chronicle: SF Sues Drug Companies Over Marketing Of Addictive Painkillers
San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera filed a federal lawsuit Tuesday accusing Purdue Pharma and other pharmaceutical companies of fueling the nation’s epidemic of opioid addiction by deliberately misleading doctors and the public about the dangers of powerful painkillers. In a complaint running more than 160 pages, Herrera’s office alleges that Purdue, which makes OxyContin, and the drugmakers Janssen Pharmaceuticals, Endo Pharmaceuticals, Cephalon, Insys Therapeutics, Mallinckrodt Pharmaceuticals and Actavis, aggressively marketed addictive opioid painkillers to treat chronic pain knowing they had a high potential for abuse. (Fracassa, 12/18)

KQED: Camp Fire Caused Nearly 2 Straight Weeks Of Bay Area's Worst Air Quality On Record 
From Nov. 8 to Nov. 20, the region was choked by dangerously high levels of fine particulate matter, ranking among the worst periods of hazardous smoke since the Bay Area Air Quality Management District began keeping such records in 1999. All of the district's 17 monitoring stations — spread through eight Bay Area counties — detected high concentrations of the pollutant. (Goldberg, 12/19)

San Jose Mercury News: Shampoo, Soap May Play A Role In Early Puberty
Many parents already worry about the chemicals in the personal care products that their kids use but now a new study takes that fear to the next level: the exposure starts even before a child is born. Girls exposed to chemicals commonly found in shampoo, toothpaste and soap may hit puberty earlier, even if their only exposure is through the products their moms used while were pregnant, according to a new longitudinal study led by researchers at UC Berkeley. (D'Souza, 12/18)

In other public health news —

Capital Public Radio: FDA E. Coli Investigation Leads To Recall By Santa Barbara Grower
The Food and Drug Administration says its investigation into the source of an outbreak of E. coli illnesses linked to California romaine has led to a farm in Santa Barbara county. Adam Brothers farm in Santa Barbara county says it has voluntarily recalled cauliflower and red and green leaf lettuce harvested on Nov. 27-30. (Mitric, 12/18)

East Bay Times: Benioffs' $15 Million Gift To Address Mental Health Services
UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital Oakland has received a $15 million gift from Lynne and Marc Benioff to address a shortage of mental health services for children and adolescents in Oakland and the East Bay. The $15 million gift, announced Tuesday by UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospitals, is intended to enable the Oakland hospital to increase its mental health services, heighten awareness and encourage philanthropy. (Kawamoto, 12/18)

KQED: In Effort To Keep Alta Bates Open, Officials Point To New Report About Potential Impacts Of Closure
Politicians and unions in the East Bay are stepping up the pressure on Sutter Health to keep Alta Bates Medical Center operational as a full-service hospital. On Tuesday, a task force unveiled a long-awaited report by UC Berkeley heath planning researchers on the impact of the hospital closure on health in the East Bay. (Dillon, 12/18)

In other news from across the state —

LAist: LA Leads The Nation In Chronic Homelessness 
Homelessness in the U.S. rose slightly — about a third of a percentage point — between 2017 and 2018, according to a new report from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. While much of the data in the report isn't new, it does provide new context for the homelessness crisis. (Tinoco and Fonseca, 12/18)

Sacramento Bee: Large Cannabis Cultivation Facility OK’d For North Sacramento 
The 21,596-square-foot facility, which now houses an auto repair shop, will mostly be used for cultivation, but it will also include areas for manufacturing, packaging, distribution and six suites for delivery-only medical and recreational cannabis, according to a city staff report. The council approved the plan with an 8-0 vote, with Mayor Darrell Steinberg absent. (Clift, 12/18)

Politico: Obamacare’s Secret Base: America’s Middle Class
Millions of middle-class Americans who get health coverage through work have been getting Obamacare benefits for years — whether they know it or not. And millions of older Americans who rack up big drug costs under Medicare get more financial help through Obamacare — whether they know it or not. Now a Texas federal judge who just invalidated the entire health care law has put them at risk — whether they know it or not. (Kenen and Ollstein, 12/19)

Boston Globe: Here’s Why Experts Say The Judge In The ACA Case Went Too Far
Yet a federal judge in Texas has ruled that the Republican elimination of the tax penalty for the uninsured also invalidated the legal mandate that every adult American have health insurance. Based on just those two issues, Judge Reed O’Connor ruled the entire law is unconstitutional. But Boston-area law professors who specialize in health care law and the intersection between health care and the US Constitution contend O’Connor’s vaporizing of the Affordable Care Act as a whole is the judicial equivalent of a doctor performing surgery on the wrong body part — it’s just not right. (Ellement, 12/18)

Bloomberg: Obamacare Battle Now Before A Baltimore Judge Picked By Obama 
Five days after a Texas judge declared the Affordable Care Act unconstitutional, Obamacare supporters are back in court in a bid to save it. A lawsuit filed in September as a hedge against just the sort of ruling U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor in Fort Worth issued Dec. 14 is the new front in the nearly nine-year war over President Barack Obama’s signature achievement and could force the issue back before the U.S. Supreme Court. (Harris, 12/19)

Modern Healthcare: Texas ACA Ruling Complicates Politics Of Medicaid Expansion
A Texas federal judge's ruling Friday invalidating the Affordable Care Act could create political headaches for Medicaid expansion supporters in states that are moving to implement or maintain expansion. If it's upheld on appeal, which is highly uncertain, U.S. District Judge Reed O'Connor's decision declaring the entire ACA unconstitutional would eliminate federal authorization and funding for the expansion of Medicaid to low-income adults. That would force states to shoulder the full price of covering people who would not qualify for coverage under pre-ACA criteria, rather than having the federal government pick up 90% of the cost. (Meyer, 12/18)

The Wall Street Journal: Pfizer, Glaxo To Combine Consumer-Health Businesses
Pfizer Inc. and GlaxoSmithKline PLC plan to combine their consumer-health units, and eventually spin off the joint venture—creating a global giant selling drugstore staples like Advil and Sensodyne toothpaste. The deal announced Wednesday is an unexpected ending to a yearlong process by Pfizer to shed its consumer business, as it and other pharmaceutical companies focus more on higher-margin prescription-drugs. Glaxo has been pursuing the same focus, though has until now stayed committed to its consumer business, which its chief executive led before her promotion to the top job. (Martuscelli and Roland, 12/19)

The New York Times: GlaxoSmithKline And Pfizer To Merge Consumer Health Units
The companies said they expected the deal to close in the second half of next year, and that plans call for the new business to be spun off within five years via a listing on the British stock markets. The divisions being merged had combined global sales of $12.7 billion in 2017. (Condliffe, 12/19)

Bloomberg: Glaxo Plans Breakup After Pfizer Deal Combines Panadol, Advil 
The non-cash transaction creates the world’s biggest supplier of over-the-counter medicines with brands of painkillers such as Advil and Panadol and marks a shift from Glaxo Chief Executive Officer Emma Walmsley’s previously stated strategy of keeping the steadily performing consumer and vaccine businesses under the same roof as the more volatile pharma operations. (Paton, 12/19)

Reuters: Drugmaker GSK To Split After Striking Pfizer Consumer Health Deal
For Pfizer, the deal resolves the issue of what to do with its consumer health division, which includes Advil painkillers and Centrum vitamins, after an abortive attempt to sell it outright earlier this year. GSK, whose consumer products include Sensodyne toothpaste and Panadol painkillers, had withdrawn from that earlier Pfizer auction process but Walmsley said the opportunity to strike an all-equity deal cleared the way for the new agreement. (12/19)

The New York Times: Suicide Among Veterans Is Rising. But Millions For Outreach Went Unspent By V.A.
Suicide prevention efforts by the Department of Veterans Affairs fell off sharply in the last two years, even though reducing the high suicide rate among veterans is the agency’s top clinical priority, according to a new report. With the department’s top management in turmoil, the suicide prevention effort lacked leadership, planning meetings were repeatedly canceled, millions of dollars budgeted for outreach went unspent, and the television and radio ads that had been broadcast thousands of times across the country in previous years went all but silent. (Philipps, 12/18)

In other national health care news —

The New York Times: Trump Administration Report On School Safety Plays Down Role Of Guns
Unveiling a report commissioned by President Trump in the aftermath of a mass shooting last winter at a Florida high school, administration officials on Tuesday played down the role of guns in school violence while focusing instead on rescinding Obama-era disciplinary policies, improving mental health services and training school personnel in the use of firearms. The report — by the Federal Commission on School Safety, which consists of four cabinet officials and is led by Education Secretary Betsy DeVos — drew on months of research marked by political conflict and mixed messaging from the administration on how to handle violent events like the Feb. 14 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla. Seventeen students and staff members were killed and 17 others were injured in the shooting. (Rogers and Green, 12/18)

The New York Times: Nearly 40,000 People Died From Guns In U.S. Last Year, Highest In 50 Years
More people died from firearm injuries in the United States last year than in any other year since at least 1968, according to new data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. There were 39,773 gun deaths in 2017, up by more than 1,000 from the year before. Nearly two-thirds were suicides. It was the largest yearly total on record in the C.D.C.’s electronic database, which goes back 50 years, and reflects the sheer number of lives lost. (Mervosh, 12/18)

The New York Times: Thousands Of Migrant Children Could Be Released After Policy Change
The Trump administration announced on Tuesday that it planned to ease onerous security requirements for sponsors of migrant children, meaning that thousands who have been parked in shelters for months could soon be released and reunited with family members. In a major policy reversal, the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees the care of migrant children through its Office of Refugee Resettlement, said that it would no longer require that all members of a household where a child is to live be fingerprinted. Instead, fingerprints will be required only of the adult who is sponsoring the minor, typically a parent or another relative. (Jordan, 12/18)

Politico: Anti-Abortion Groups Demand Ouster Of NIH Chief Over Fetal Tissue
Two influential anti-abortion groups called Tuesday for the ouster of NIH Director Francis Collins over his support for fetal tissue research for medical science. Live Action, March for Life and other conservative groups have been frustrated that the Trump administration has not banned research using fetal tissue donated by women who have had abortions. (Ollstein, 12/18)

Reuters: Judge Mulls Using Monitor To Oversee CVS During Court Process
A federal judge said on Tuesday that he was considering using a court-appointed monitor to make sure CVS Health Corp refrains from fully integrating with insurer Aetna while he examines the companies' settlement with the government. Judge Richard Leon of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia held the hearing as part of his review of the antitrust settlement reached with the Justice Department to win approval for the companies' $69 billion merger. (12/18)

Reuters: U.S. Surgeon General Wants Tougher Action To Tackle Teen Vaping Epidemic
U.S. Surgeon General Jerome Adams on Tuesday issued a rare advisory calling for aggressive steps against e-cigarette use among teens, which he said has become an "epidemic". The detailed advisory listed various strategies that states, communities, health professionals and parents can apply to restrict the use of e-cigarettes. (12/18)

The New York Times: Addicted To Vaped Nicotine, Teenagers Have No Clear Path To Quitting
A Harvard addiction medicine specialist is getting calls from distraught parents around the country. A Stanford psychologist is getting calls from rattled school officials around the world. A federal agency has ordered a public hearing on the issue. Alarmed by the addictive nature of nicotine in e-cigarettes and its impact on the developing brain, public health experts are struggling to address a surging new problem: how to help teenagers quit vaping. (Hoffman, 12/18)

The Washington Post: Congressional Report: Drug Companies, DEA, Failed To Stop Flow Of Millions Of Opioid Pills
The distributors of powerful prescription opioids and the Drug Enforcement Administration failed to stop the flow of millions of pills into rural West Virginia despite rampant warning signs that the pills were being diverted for abuse, inertia that contributed to the nation’s opioid epidemic, a congressional report has found. A report from the majority staff of the House Energy and Commerce Committee found that distributors, which fulfill orders for prescription drugs to pharmacies, failed to conduct proper oversight of their customers by not questioning suspicious activity and not properly monitoring the quantity of painkillers that were being shipped to individual pharmacies. (Zezima, 12/19)