Latest From California Healthline:
California Healthline Original Stories
Detention Centers In California Lack Oversight And Proper Care, Reports Find
Health and safety problems at immigration detention facilities throughout California pose a serious risk to detainees, according to two reports released Tuesday. State Attorney General Xavier Becerra and California State Auditor Elaine Howle concluded that federal and local governments are failing to adequately oversee the facilities, allowing the problems to persist. (Anna Gorman and Ana B. Ibarra, )
Good morning! The decision to invite only female speakers to the microbiome conference at the University of California, San Diego, is creating some backlash among critics who are calling it a violation of anti-discrimination policy. More on that below, but first here are your top California health stories for the day.
Audit Of Immigration Facilities In California Finds Detainees Lack Access To Health Care, Face Long Periods Of Confinement: Attorney General Xavier Becerra released a 147-page report that found immigrants who were being detained in California lack sufficient access to health care and legal aid, among other problems. Becerra blamed a lack of federal oversight for many of the problems. The report showed that the quality of care varied by facility, but that most of the detainees spent as much as 22 hours a day in cells, without breaks. Other health and safety issues detailed in the report included: staff members at the centers delaying medical appointments for patients complaining of shortness of breath; inadequate supervision of suicidal youths; and in one case, failing to refer a patient with dangerously low blood pressure to a physician. Becerra says that he is prepared to take legal action against those that fail to comply with his office’s recommendations. “We hope that other states are watching because everyone in this country has constitutional rights and everyone at the end of the day — child and adult — deserves to be treated in a humane way,” Becerra said, emphasizing that the detainees were civilians awaiting determinations on their deportation status, not criminals. Read more from the Los Angeles Times, the San Francisco Chronicle, the Associated Press, Capital Public Radio and California Healthline.
Key Deadlines Passes Without A Single-Payer Bill Introduced In Calif. Legislature: Although previous versions of single-payer bills have been shelved before in the California Legislature, some advocates were still surprised that lawmakers couldn’t get enough political consensus to put forward another bill before a key deadline passed. “To not have a comprehensive solution on the table in the first year of a two-year session in the most progressive legislature in the country is baffling,” said Stephanie Roberson, a lobbyist for the California Nurses Association. But Assemblyman Jim Wood, who leads the Assembly Health Committee, says he thinks a new single-payer bill would be “pre-mature” at the moment, citing the financial uncertainty of paying for it. Read more from the Sacramento Bee.
Proposed Bill Would Tackle Issue Of Surprise Medical Bills For ER Patients: “Balance billing” has been gaining national attention because it can leave patients who have insurance with eye-popping medical costs that they didn’t know were coming. The Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital, in particular, has been thrust into the spotlight because it is out-of-network for all private insurers. It's designed mostly to treat low-income people who have Medicaid, so anyone who is taken to the facility to be treated is at risk of getting hit with a massive bill at the end. But S.F. hospital is just an extreme example of a widespread problem that lawmakers are trying to tackle. “If you’re incapacitated or undergoing a life-threatening condition, you don’t have the ability or time to decide what hospital to go to,” said Assemblyman David Chiu. Read more from KQED.
Below, check out the full round-up of California Healthline original stories, state coverage and the best of the rest of the national news for the day.
More News From Across The State
Sacramento Bee:
10,000 UC Hospital, Campus Workers Weigh Strike Over Impasse
Union leaders for roughly 10,000 research and technical workers are contemplating whether to strike against the University of California after their union bargaining team rejected the last, best and final offer presented last week by the administration. ...The UC has been negotiating with UPTE-CWA 9119 since May 2017, and its last contract offer expired Friday. (Anderson, 2/27)
Ventura County Star:
Battle Over Medi-Cal Plan's Flares At Public Meeting In Ventura County
The CEO of the Medi-Cal managed care system in Ventura County called an effort to replace the system self-serving, triggering an angry response at a public meeting Monday. Dale Villani, leader of the Gold Coast Health Plan, focused on efforts by leaders of the private nonprofit Clinicas del Camino Real health system to find sponsors for a proposed state bill to replace Gold Coast with a two-plan system. In the current county-organized health system, Gold Coast administers Medi-Cal health insurance for about 196,000 low-income recipients in Ventura County. (Kisken, 2/26)
Stat:
A Science Conference Invited Only Women On Stage. Then Came A Backlash
The decision to invite only female speakers to the microbiome conference at the University of California, San Diego, this week was meant to make a statement about how scientific meetings ought to be organized. Instead, the move has ignited a minor controversy, thrusting a gathering about a technical scientific subject into the culture wars. The inaugural International Microbiome Meeting, put on by UCSD’s Center for Microbiome Innovation, is expected to have 27 microbiome experts — all women — take the stage as presenters over two days this week. (Robbins, 2/27)
The Bakersfield Californian:
County Debuts New Mobile Clinic Designed To Take Health Services Directly To Communities
After years of low turnout at its satellite offices, Kern Public Health has embarked on a new strategy to bring health care to underserved areas. It started its new plan on Jan. 1 with a soft launch, and sees promise that the program will grow as it becomes better known throughout the county. ...Discussions for the new project began when the county analyzed attendance data and realized the public did not use many of its satellite offices, leaving nurses and staff without much to do when they staffed the clinics. Small offices in places like Mojave, Taft, Ridgecrest and even Arvin had sometimes gone without customers, or only saw one customer a day, so the county set out to bring a more accessible clinic to the public. (Morgan, 2/26)
Capital Public Radio:
Sacramento Will Not Increase The Number Of Cannabis Dispensaries In The City This Year
Sacramento is not quite ready to increase the number of storefront cannabis dispensaries within city limits, despite efforts to expand opportunities in the marijuana industry for people of color. At a committee meeting on Tuesday, City Council members agreed to shelve discussion of expanding the number of dispensaries for a year. (Miller, 2/26)
Sacramento Bee:
East Sacramento Gem Of A Medical History Museum Thriving, Expanding
A medical history museum tucked away in East Sacramento has doubled in size and expanded the number of exhibits. The remodeled Museum of Medical History is now better organized and more spacious. The collection leaves virtually no aspect of medicine over the past 150 years untouched. “Due to a generous donation, we were able to not only revise the whole old part of the museum and open up more, so it looks more like a museum than a curio shop, but also double the size of the museum,” said the museum’s curator, Dr. Bob LaPerriere. (Caraccio, 2/26)
The Wall Street Journal:
Bayer Faces Mounting Weedkiller Lawsuits Amid Sweeping Restructuring
Bayer AG on Wednesday said the number of plaintiffs suing the German company over its weedkillers had risen by another 1,900 over the last three months. The legal battle has cast a cloud over the chemicals and pharmaceuticals group’s prospects that analysts say could take months, if not years to dissipate. Bayer said as of late January it faced a total of 11,200 plaintiffs claiming weedkillers containing the chemical glyphosate cause cancer, compared with 9,300 at the end of October. (Bender, 2/27)
KQED:
Stanford Researchers Using MRI Scans To Predict Meth And Cocaine Relapse
A team of researchers at Stanford University are scanning the brains of stimulant users like Dee Dee to better understand one of the most intractable and frustrating questions in addiction treatment: Who is most likely to relapse and why? Current studies show that 60 percent of people in rehab for meth addiction relapse within a year of discharge, a stat that has health officials on edge as meth use in San Francisco is again surging. (Dembosky, 2/26)
San Francisco Chronicle:
SF Gets $3 State Million Grant For Mental Health, Drug Abuse Services For Homeless
San Francisco is receiving a $3 million state grant to expand badly needed mental health and substance abuse services for homeless people over the coming 18 months. The grant from the California Department of Health Care Services will fund a range of outreach, social work and case management expansions aimed at shepherding intensively troubled homeless people into programs that will help them get off the streets and into healthy, housed lives. (Fagan, 2/26)
LAist:
A Groundbreaking Report Goes Deep On Black Homelessness In Los Angeles
Homelessness disproportionately affects black people in Los Angeles. Though about nine percent of Los Angeles County's total population is black-identifying, black people make up about 36 percent of the county's homeless population, according to the 2018 homeless count. (Tinoco, 2/26)
Sacramento Bee:
Homeless Can No Longer Sleep At Sacramento City Hall During Day
Homeless people will soon be able to sit or sleep outside Sacramento City Hall overnight but not during the day. The City Council on Tuesday voted unanimously and without discussion to amend a city ordinance that prohibited people from being on City Hall property from 11 p.m. to 7 a.m. unless attending a city hearing or meeting. (Clift, 2/27)
Modesto Bee:
Stanislaus County Supervisors Approve A Low Barrier Homeless Shelter In Modesto
In giving approval Tuesday to an ambitious effort to assist the homeless, Stanislaus County supervisors fought perceptions they will simply be warehousing people in a new shelter in Modesto. A proposed 180-bed shelter at the Salvation Army site at Ninth and D streets will be coupled with an adjacent access center with services to help the homeless get their lives back on track. (Carlson, 2/26)
Los Angeles Times:
Selma Blair Opens Up About Multiple Sclerosis In Poignant New Interview
Multiple sclerosis is a disease of the central nervous system that sparks the immune system to attack the protective myelin sheath covering the nerves. The resultant damage disrupts the body’s ability to communicate with itself. Throughout the interview, Blair’s voice shook due to spasmodic dysphonia, a symptom of the chronic disease caused by involuntary muscle movements of the voice box. "It is interesting to put it out there, to be here, to say, 'This is what my particular case looks like right now,'" she said. (Lee, 2/26)
Sacramento Bee:
Purple District Democrat Testing Medicare For All Support
Rep. Josh Harder is the only Democrat from a moderate district who will be front and center as House progressives roll out their plan on Medicare for all Wednesday. He’ll also be the only California Democrat and freshman Democrat to speak at the announcement, putting his face on a plan fraught with pitfalls for moderates. The move will put an even larger target on his back as Republicans move to unseat him. It will be a test of whether districts outside of the solidly Democratic will support the bold effort at health care overhaul as it takes steps towards becoming law — which Republican groups have painted as a socialist dream. (Irby, 2/27)
Reuters:
U.S. House Democrats Introduce Sweeping 'Medicare For All' Bill
Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives unveiled an ambitious proposal on Tuesday to move all Americans into the government's Medicare health insurance program, tapping into public frustration over the rising cost of healthcare that has become a key issue for the party as it seeks to gain control of Congress and the White House in 2020. The bill, unveiled by Democratic Representative Pramila Jayapal from Washington state, would transition the U.S. healthcare system to a single-payer "Medicare for All" program funded by the government in two years. (2/26)
The Washington Post:
More Than 100 House Democrats To Unveil ‘Battle-Ready’ Medicare-For-All Plan As 2020 Election Looms
Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, is expected to release legislation Wednesday that incorporates key policy demands of single-payer activists, aiming to overhaul the U.S. health-care system even faster and more dramatically than legislation proposed in 2017 by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.). Jayapal’s Medicare-for-all would move every American onto one government insurer in two years, while providing everyone with medical, vision, dental and long-term care at no cost. Similar proposals have been projected to increase federal expenditures by at least $30 trillion but virtually eradicate individuals’ health spending by eliminating payments such as premiums and deductibles. (Stein, 2/26)
The New York Times:
What Would ‘Medicare For All’ Do To Medicare?
The basic idea of “Medicare for all” is that all Americans should get access to the popular, government-run program. But a new bill toward this goal, the first introduced in the current Congress, would also drastically reshape Medicare itself. The bill, from Representative Pramila Jayapal of Washington and more than 100 Democratic House co-sponsors, would greatly expand Medicare and eliminate the current structure of premiums, co-payments and deductibles. (Sanger-Katz, 2/26)
The Hill:
Push For ‘Medicare For All’ Worries Centrist Dems
Centrist Democrats who helped their party win back the House majority with victories in key swing districts last fall are sounding the alarm that the liberal push for “Medicare for all” could haunt them as they try to defend their seats and keep control of the House. Instead, these moderates — many of whom will face tough reelection bids in 2020 — are pressing their party leaders to work with President Trump and Republicans to deliver to voters back home a bipartisan victory on lowering prescription drug prices and other health efforts rather than focus on an aspirational Medicare for all messaging bill. (Wong, 2/27)
The Associated Press:
Senators Draw On Own Experiences To Chastise Drug Companies
Channeling the ire of constituents and drawing from personal experience, senators chastised drug company executives Tuesday over the high cost of prescription medications, while the CEOs warned that government price controls could stifle breakthroughs on diseases like Alzheimer's. The Senate Finance Committee hearing marked the first time lawmakers have called the industry's top executives to account for rising prices, which are a drain on Medicare and Medicaid and a burden to millions of Americans. The extraordinary public accounting was a sign that Congress and the White House are moving toward legislation this year to curb costs. (2/26)
Reuters:
U.S. Senators Tell Drug Company Executives Pricing Is 'Morally Repugnant'
Senators took aim in particular at Abbvie Inc Chief Executive Richard Gonzalez and his company's rheumatoid arthritis drug Humira - the world's top-selling prescription medicine. Executives from AstraZeneca PLC, Sanofi SA, Pfizer Inc, Merck & Co, Johnson & Johnson and Bristol-Myers Squibb Co also answered questions from members of the U.S. Senate Finance Committee. The executives pointed to their companies' records of developing lifesaving medications, saying profits generated in the lucrative U.S. market help them fund expensive research and development of future treatments. (2/26)
The New York Times:
Drug Makers Try To Justify Prescription Prices To Senators At Hearing
Senator Robert Menendez, Democrat of New Jersey, the home to many drug and biotechnology companies, offered what he described as “a friendly warning” to the witnesses. “If you don’t take meaningful action to reduce prescription drug prices,” he said, “policymakers are going to do it for you.” (Pear, 2/26)
The Washington Post:
Drug Prices: Pharma CEOs Testify Before Congress
The CEOs from Pfizer, Merck, Sanofi and others were subjected to a ritualistic grilling. But the executives survived the three hours of questioning largely unscathed by deflecting blame for their list prices to insurance companies, despite an admonishment from Senate Finance Committee Chairman Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa) that he would not stand for finger-pointing. The industry leaders they are forced to set prices higher so they can pay big rebates to insurance companies and pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs). They acknowledged that practice especially hurts consumers without insurance, who pay full list price at the pharmacy, as well as those with coverage whose co-payment is a percentage of the list price. They insisted they are not to blame for the pain. (Rowland, 2/26)
Politico:
Friction Between Drugmakers, GOP Intensifies At Hearing On Pharma Pricing
The roughly four-hour Senate Finance Committee hearing didn't yield many fiery confrontations, and Finance Chairman Chuck Grassleyindicated he will go slow pursuing pricing legislation. But the companies took hits from Republican lawmakers like Texas Sen. John Cornyn, who accused AbbVie of abusing the patent system by obtaining 247 patents to protect its multibillion-dollar arthritis drug Humira from competition for more than 30 years. (Karlin-Smith, 2/26)
The Hill:
Senators Grill Drug Execs Over High Prices
“If you bring a drug to the market with a low list price in this system, you get punished financially and you get no uptake because everyone in the supply chain makes money as a result of a higher list price,” Merck CEO Kenneth Frazier told senators. “The system itself is complex and interdependent and no one company can unilaterally lower list prices without running into financial and operating disadvantages that make it impossible to do that.” (Hellmann, 2/26)
Stat:
Who Shined And Who Sank: How 7 Executives Fared In Defending Pharma
Pharmaceutical executives walked into a Senate hearing on Tuesday expecting a public flogging. When it was over, they were dubbed by one Republican senator “the magnificent seven.” In other words, for phama executives, it turned out to be a pretty good day. Merck’s Ken Frazier shined, as many expected. AstraZeneca’s Pascal Soriot and Bristol-Myers Squibb’s Giovanni Caforio both showed how much they’ve grown into their roles as CEOs. Sanofi’s Olivier Brandicourt managed to avoid being savaged over questions about high insulin prices. (Herper and Florko, 2/26)
The Washington Post:
Democrats Grill Trump Officials Over Family Separations And Threaten Wider Legal Probe
At separate hearings on Capitol Hill, Democratic lawmakers hammered the Trump administration Tuesday over the “zero tolerance” prosecution policy that split thousands of migrant children from their parents last year and devolved into a political fiasco for the White House. Several Trump officials acknowledged to the House Judiciary Committee that they did not speak up to supervisors or attempt to stop the implementation of the family separations at the border, despite warnings it probably would traumatize children. Facing aggressive and sometimes angry questions from Democrats, the officials who formulated and carried out the separation system recognized communication failures among their agencies, but defended their actions as an attempt to uphold immigration laws. (Miroff, Sacchetti and Sonmez, 2/26)
The Associated Press:
Nearly 6,000 Abuse Complaints At Migrant Children Shelters
Thousands of accusations of sexual abuse and harassment of migrant children in government-funded shelters were made over the past four years, including scores directed against adult staff members, according to federal data released Tuesday. The cases include allegations of inappropriate touching, staff members allegedly watching minors while they bathed and showing pornographic videos to minors. Some of the allegations included inappropriate conduct by minors in shelters against other minors, as well as by staff members. (2/26)
The Washington Post:
House Targets Family Separations In First Trump Subpoena
A House committee voted Tuesday to subpoena Trump administration officials over family separations at the southern border, the first issued in the new Congress as Democrats have promised to hold the administration aggressively to count. The decision by the Oversight Committee will compel the heads of Justice, Homeland Security and Health and Human Services to deliver documents to lawmakers. The committee’s chairman, Democratic Rep. Elijah Cummings of Maryland, has pledged to press the administration for documents and testimony on a wide swath of issues, but family separation was among his first priorities. (Long, 2/26)
The New York Times:
A Guide To The House’s First Major Gun Control Vote In Years
The House this week is set to pass the first major gun control legislation in over two decades, with Democratic lawmakers expected to approve two measures strengthening background checks for all firearms sales. The last time the House put high-profile legislation expanding gun control laws to a vote was in 1994, when it passed the Federal Assault Weapons Ban and made it illegal to manufacture a number of semiautomatic weapons for civilian use. That legislation expired after a decade and was not renewed by a Republican-controlled Congress. (Edmondson, 2/27)
The Wall Street Journal:
FDA Plans Multifaceted Response To Opioid-Abuse Epidemic
The Food and Drug Administration plans new steps to combat the abuse of opioid painkillers, ranging from new dosage forms to small-quantity packaging and new research requirements on drugmakers. The new FDA measures are a further effort to stem the opioid-addiction crisis that has led to an estimated 47,000 opioid-painkiller overdose deaths in 2017 alone. The agency plans for the first time to require makers of opioid pain pills to conduct long-term studies of their drugs’ long-term effectiveness. The FDA has long mandated studies about safety, but the testing for possible long-term loss of effectiveness is a new authority for the agency in a law passed by Congress last fall. (Burton, 2/26)
The New York Times:
‘Executing Babies’: Here Are The Facts Behind Trump’s Misleading Abortion Tweet
The latest battle in the nation’s continuing war over abortion involves a federal bill called the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act. Senate Democrats this week blocked the bill from reaching a vote, and President Trump responded with an angry tweet. (Grady, 2/26)
Reuters:
U.S. EPA Denies Being Soft On Polluters As Democrats Question Enforcement
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's enforcement chief on Tuesday pushed back on "the myth" that the regulator is soft on polluters as Democratic lawmakers pressed her on the big decline in civil penalties and site inspections last year. (2/26)
The New York Times:
When The Bully Is The Boss
Senator Amy Klobuchar’s nascent campaign is fending off a stream of stories from former staffers that she was a volatile, highhanded boss who often demeaned and humiliated people who worked for her. She has one of the highest rates of turnover in the Senate. “Am I a tough boss sometimes? Yes,” she said in a recent CNN forum. “Have I pushed people too hard? Yes.” The presumption that tough bosses get results — and fast — compared with gentler leaders is widespread, and rooted partly in the published life stories of successful C.E.O.s. Bobby Knight, the Indiana University basketball coach and author of “The Power of Negative Thinking,” was notoriously harsh, and enormously successful. So was Steve Jobs, the co-founder of Apple. (Carey, 2/26)