Becker's Hospital Review: Hundreds Strike UC Hospitals Over 'Unnecessary' Job Cuts
Hundreds of unionized employees at UC San Diego Health and UCSF Health are staging one-day strikes this week, protesting recent layoffs that labor groups allege threaten patient care and exacerbate staffing shortages across the University of California health system. On July 22, about 230 workers at UC San Diego Health participated in a one-day strike. ... At UCSF Health, a similar one-day strike is scheduled for July 25, following the elimination of about 200 positions. (Condon, 7/22)

San Francisco Chronicle: Genentech Announces Mass Layoff At South San Francisco Headquarters
Biotech giant Genentech is planning another wave of job cuts at its South San Francisco headquarters, the company told local officials in a letter last week. According to a WARN notice filed with the state of California, 87 employees are slated to be permanently laid off starting in the fall. (Vaziri, 7/22)

The Intersection: Northern San Joaquin Valley Organization Addressing Region’s Healthcare Workforce Shortage Announces Nonprofit Status
Population growth. Aging Baby Boomers. More people with health coverage. Together they add up to a healthcare workforce shortage that’s been building in California for decades. For five years, Stockton-based HealthForce Partners California has worked to close the workforce gap under the fiscal sponsorship of United Way of San Joaquin County. Last week, the group announced it will begin operating as an independent nonprofit. (Aguilar, 7/22)

San Francisco Chronicle: UCSF, Stanford Launch $200M Cancer Hub For Breakthrough Research
UCSF and Stanford are launching a $200 million cancer hub that will be the largest collaborative project of its kind on the West Coast, with the goal to dramatically improve cancer care, especially for the most stubborn diseases, over the next decade. The Weill Family Foundation is funding the center with a $100 million matching donation, for which Stanford and UCSF together have raised about $25 million in institutional funds; each university will raise $50 million over the next decade. (Allday, 7/23)

Becker's Hospital Review: Enloe Health Signs Medline As Med-Surg Supplier
Chico, Calif.-based Enloe Health has signed a multi-year agreement naming Medline its primary vendor for medical-surgical supplies. (Murphy, 7/22)

Becker's Hospital Review: 8 Systems Net Big Results Moving From 'Healthcare To Health'
Hospitals and health systems are in the midst of a movement to keep patients out of hospitals by investing in more socially responsible programs. ... To achieve this, many hospitals [including Riverside University Health System-Medical Center] are launching and expanding socially responsible programs, often in the form of community initiatives and improving access to outpatient care. (Taylor, 7/22)

Voice of OC: Orange County’s Medi-Cal Program Stockpiles $1.8 Billion Despite CA Auditor Concerns
While the state government and cities throughout the county are grappling with tight budgets, Orange County’s Medi-Cal program has the opposite problem – over $1.8 billion sitting in the bank two years after state auditors said to spend more on the community. OC’s health program for the poor and needy, CalOptima, is responsible for the healthcare of around one third of Orange County’s residents and maintains a yearly budget of over $4 billion. (Biesiada, 7/23)

The Imprint: CA Stops Subsidizing Out-Of-State Treatment For Adoptees
Five years ago, California reversed course on its longstanding practice of sending foster children and teens to far-flung residential centers in other states. Amid mounting scrutiny of abusive conditions at programs professing to provide mental health treatment, the state declared the facilities “lacking.” But until this month, California continued to pay for hundreds of children adopted from foster care to live in many of these same facilities — a use of public funds one child welfare expert called “state-sponsored abandonment.” (Tiano, 7/22)

Voice of San Diego: State Unlocks New Territory For San Diego’s Encampment Crackdown
The city of San Diego has entered a one-year agreement with the state to clean up encampments along a 5-mile stretch of state freeways. San Diego is the first in California to enter into the agreement, which also allows the city to receive up to $400,000 in reimbursement. The agreement includes portions of freeways in the neighborhoods of Little Italy, Sherman Heights, East Village, Barrio Logan and downtown San Diego. (Martinez Barba, 7/22)

Los Angeles Times: Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority Names A New Chief Executive
An attorney who handles homelessness policy in the Los Angeles city attorney’s office has been selected as the interim chief executive for the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority to guide the troubled agency through a year of downsizing. An agenda item posted Tuesday would authorize Wendy Greuel, chair of the 10-member LAHSA commission, to negotiate a 12-month contract with Gita O’Neill, a career city attorney. (Smith, 7/22)

Times of San Diego: Researchers Launch Tool To Forecast South Bay Sewage Levels
Researchers from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography have unveiled a new forecast model that predicts the amount of sewage in the South Bay up to five days ahead of time, helping beachgoers judge their risk of getting sick. ... The lead oceanographer on the project, Falk Feddersen, said the pathogen forecast model works like a weather forecast for ocean sewage levels. (Miller, 7/22)

The New York Times: Malcolm-Jamal Warner Drowned In Area Known For Rip Currents 
The beach in Costa Rica where actor Malcolm-Jamal Warner drowned was known for its strong surf and dangerous rip currents, and was not protected by lifeguards when he died on Sunday. A second man who was rescued from the sea that day was in critical condition, the authorities said. (Taylor and Bolanos, 7/22)

Courthouse News Service: Texas Man Sues California Doctor Over Medication Abortion 
Texas man filed a federal wrongful death lawsuit against a California doctor, claiming the doctor mailed abortion medication to his girlfriend. In the lawsuit, filed in the Southern District of Texas on Sunday, plaintiff Jerry Rodriguez seeks civil damages from a California doctor named Remy Coeytaux over what he says are violations of state and federal laws regarding the mailing of abortion medications. (Thompson, 7/22)

The Hill: Toxic PFAS Found In Reusable Menstrual Products
Many reusable menstrual products that have gained increasing popularity among teens are packed with toxic “forever chemicals,” a new study has found. Among the biggest repeat offenders are washable pads and underwear, according to the study, published on Tuesday in Environmental Science & Technology Letters. And as more consumers opt for multi-use products over their disposable counterparts, the study authors expressed cause for concern. (Udasin, 7/22)

Los Angeles Times: FDA Panel On SSRI Antidepressants In Pregnancy Raises Alarms
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is turning its attention to selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, a class of antidepressant drugs long criticized by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. On Monday morning, the FDA hosted a 10-person expert panel on the use during pregnancy of SSRIs. ... Nine of the panel’s 10 members were researchers, doctors or psychologists who have previously questioned the safety of SSRIs publicly or spoken out against antidepressant use in general. (Purtill, 7/23)

Los Angeles Times: Is Baby Getting Enough Breastmilk? New Device Helps Moms Learn
A group of university researchers at Northwestern — including a nursing mother — have come up with a way to ease one of the most anxiety-producing dilemmas of early breastfeeding: How much milk is the baby consuming? The new device — the result of a collaboration between pediatricians and engineers — is a small wireless set of electrodes worn on the mother’s breast that measures the amount of milk expressed during a feeding. (Gold, 7/22)

Los Angeles Times: End Of Transgender Care At Children’s Hospital L.A. Signals Nationwide Shift Under Trump
When Children’s Hospital Los Angeles first told thousands of patients it was shuttering its pediatric gender clinic last month, Jesse Thorn was distraught but confident he could quickly find a new local care team for his kids. But by the time the Center for Transyouth Health and Development officially closed its doors on Tuesday, the father of three was making plans to flee the country. (Sharp, 7/23)

EdSource: Fear And Resilience: Transgender Students Express Concerns Over Trump’s Anti-Trans Policies 
During the spring semester, the EdSource California Student Journalism Corps spent time with students who identify as transgender to find out how they feel about Trump’s actions, how they navigate an unsafe environment and how they carry on with their education. (Herrera, McGill, Rojas and Castillo, 7/23)

The New York Times: U.S. Olympic Officials Bar Transgender Women From Women’s Competitions 
The United States Olympic & Paralympic Committee quietly changed its eligibility rules on Monday to bar transgender women from competing in Olympic women’s sports, and now will comply with President Trump’s executive order on the issue, according to a post on the organization’s website. The new policy, expressed in a short, vaguely worded paragraph, is tucked under the category of “USOPC Athlete Safety Policy” on the site, and does not include details of how the ban will work. Nor does the new policy include the word “transgender” or the title of Mr. Trump’s executive order, “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports,” referring to it instead as “Executive Order 14201.” (Macur, 7/22)

USA Today: Attorneys General From 28 States Urge NCAA To Erase Transgender Athlete Records
Attorneys general from 28 states sent a letter to the NCAA, urging the organization to wipe out records, awards, titles and any other recognitions transgender athletes received in women's sports. The letter, spearheaded by Mississippi attorney general Lynn Fitch, was sent on Tuesday, July 22, co-signed by other Republican attorneys general. Fitch said in a statement the letter urges the NCAA to "restore to female athletes the records, titles, awards, and recognitions they earned but were denied because of policies that allowed biological males to compete in female categories." (Mendoza, 7/22)

Los Angeles Times: Deaf, Mute, Terrified: ICE Arrests DACA Recipient, Sends Him To Texas
[Javier Diaz Santana's] experience raises serious questions, beyond whether people who are in this country with legal protection should be seized and detained by immigration agents. If ICE is going to apprehend people with disabilities, shouldn’t agents follow federal law and make the required accommodations available? (Mejia, 7/22)

AP: Hegseth Tightens Rules On Getting Medical Waivers To Join The US Military
People with congestive heart failure, undergoing treatment for schizophrenia or who have a history of paraphilic disorders will no longer be eligible for a medical waiver to serve in the military, according to new rules issued by the Pentagon on Tuesday. The guidance signed by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth updates a list of conditions that disqualify potential recruits from serving in the armed forces. The decision comes after the Pentagon announced earlier this year that it would ban transgender troops and review other medical conditions that are currently eligible for a waiver. (Klepper, 7/22)

AP: US Labor Department Picks More Than 60 Rules For Trump's Deregulation Mandate
The U.S. Department of Labor is aiming to rewrite or repeal more than 60 “obsolete” workplace regulations, ranging from minimum wage requirements for home health care workers and people with disabilities to standards governing exposure to harmful substances. If approved, the wide-ranging changes unveiled this month also would affect working conditions at constructions sites and in mines, and limit the government’s ability to penalize employers if workers are injured or killed while engaging in inherently risky activities such as movie stunts or animal training. (Bussewitz, 7/22)

The New York Times: E.P.A. Is Said To Draft A Plan To End Its Ability To Fight Climate Change
The Trump administration has drafted a plan to repeal a fundamental scientific finding that gives the United States government its authority to regulate greenhouse-gas emissions and fight climate change, according to two people familiar with the plan. The proposed Environmental Protection Agency rule rescinds a 2009 declaration known as the “endangerment finding,” which scientifically established that greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide and methane endanger human lives. (Friedman, 7/22)

The New York Times: Amid Fear Of Retaliation, N.S.F. Workers Sign Letter Of Dissent 
More than 140 employees of the National Science Foundation have signed a letter denouncing what they described as efforts to undermine one of the country’s main science funding agencies. They accused the Trump administration of abruptly firing workers, withholding funds and decimating the agency’s budget. Out of fear of retaliation, all but one of the employees’ signatures are redacted. The letter, addressed on Monday to Representative Zoe Lofgren, the senior Democrat on the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, petitioned it to defend the mission of the N.S.F. and its employees. (Robles-Gil, 7/22)

Bloomberg: RFK Jr. Turns To Fringe Medical Journal To Find New Hires
George Tidmarsh is a millionaire co-founder of a biotech firm, serial entrepreneur, neonatologist and adjunct professor at Stanford University. But his part in creating a fringe medical journal is the role that stands out as he takes a top post at the US Food and Drug Administration. Tidmarsh, who will lead the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, is at least the fifth person appointed to a federal health agency under the helm of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. this year connected to the Journal of the Academy of Public Health. (Nix, 7/22)

CNN: Anti-Vaccine Group That Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Founded Files Lawsuit Against Him Over Vaccine Safety Task Force 
A nonprofit anti-vaccine group founded by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is suing him, in his capacity as secretary of the US Department of Health and Human Services, for failing to establish a task force to promote the development of safer childhood vaccines. (Tirrell and Owermohle, 7/22)