Los Angeles Times: California Regulators Want To Weaken Hazardous Waste Disposal Rules
California environmental regulators are considering rolling back the state’s hazardous waste disposal rules, potentially permitting some municipal landfills to accept more contaminated soil from heavily polluted areas. From lead-acid battery smelters to rocket testing facilities, heavy industry over the past century in California has left large swathes of land imbued with dangerous chemicals. As a result, contaminated soil that has been removed during major environmental cleanups or new construction has typically comprised the largest bloc of hazardous waste in California each year. More than 560,000 tons of toxic dirt are excavated every year on average, according to a 2023 DTSC report. (Briscoe, 3/12)

Southern California News Group: California Lawmakers Discuss Faulty Emergency Alert Systems After Southern California Wildfires 
Two months after multiple emergency evacuation messages were erroneously sent to millions of Los Angeles County residents during the January wildfires – leading to confusion and, in some cases, “information fatigue” and skepticism about such notices – lawmakers in Sacramento convened a hearing to discuss how to improve communications moving forward. (Tat, 3/12)

Becker's Hospital Review: Physician Staffing Firm Files For Bankruptcy
NES Health, a physician-led staffing firm, has filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy, marking the official collapse of the company after months of financial turmoil that left emergency department physicians at numerous hospitals across the nation unpaid. NES Health filed for bankruptcy Feb. 21 in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Illinois, with estimated assets between $1 million and $10 million and liabilities ranging from $10 million to $50 million, according to court documents obtained by Becker's. The company, founded by Allan Rappaport, MD, a California-based radiation oncologist, listed hundreds of creditors, including hospitals and contract physicians. (Carbajal, 3/11)

Becker's Hospital Review: How Stanford Is Doing Home Care Differently
Palo Alto, Calif.-based Stanford Health Care is taking a unique approach to home care to maneuver around state regulations. The health system plans to launch advanced care at home May 1, serving up to 12 patients at a time. CMS has granted Stanford a hospital-at-home waiver but the state of California doesn't allow for that care model. (Bruce, 3/11)

Becker's Hospital Review: Keck Medicine Of USC Shares 'The Way To Grow' For Academic Systems
As we continue to see academic health systems acquiring hospitals, Los Angeles-based Keck Medicine of University of Southern California is also focused on accelerating growth through partnerships and collaborations beyond its main campus. Keck Medicine's CFO Chris Allen told Becker's during a CFO+Revenue Cycle Podcast episode that the system recently launched a new ventures corporation aimed at focusing on joint ventures and off-campus partnerships. (Ashley, 3/11)

Becker's Hospital Review: 'Make Me A Better Doctor': Kaiser Permanente's AI Playbook
In August, Kaiser Permanente embarked on the largest rollout of generative AI in healthcare to date. The Oakland, Calif.-based health system offered Abridge, an ambient AI listening tool that drafts clinical notes for the EHR, to tens of thousands of providers. Becker's caught up with Brian Hoberman, MD, executive vice president of IT and CIO at the Permanente Federation, at the HIMSS conference in Las Vegas to find out how the implementation is going. (Bruce, 3/11)

Becker's Hospital Review: The Hidden Cost Of AI For Hospitals
Hospitals and health systems across the U.S. are bombarded with new artificial intelligence-driven applications promising to solve big challenges for a better tomorrow. While many provide a clearly needed service, they aren't a magic wand. "AI cannot solve for broken systems or broken workflows," said Deepti Pandita, vice president of informatics and CMIO of UCI Health in Orange County. (Dyrda, 3/11)

Los Angeles Times: Getting A Filling — At The Mall. Why Dentists And Other Wellness Tenants Are In Big Demand.
Not long ago, dentists were about as welcome as a toothache at shopping centers. Landlords preferred more conventional retailers in their malls, relegating dentists to out-of-the-way locations if they would lease space to them at all. Now they are prominent tenants in many shopping centers as part of a growing trend of medical-retail or “medtail” businesses joining boutiques and restaurants at neighborhood malls. (Vincent, 3/12)

NBC News: Hospitals Keep Dodging Price Transparency Rules, Leading Trump To Take Action — Again
For 17 years, Michelle Arroyo did everything she could to keep her son alive after he’d been diagnosed with brain cancer at 6 years old. The single mom from California moved from Orange County to Los Angeles to be closer to the best doctors and medical facilities, quit her job in real estate to care for her son around-the-clock and liquidated all her financial assets, including her retirement account. But despite her best efforts, Arroyo’s son, Grayson Arroyo-Smiley, died in 2023 at 22 years old, leaving Arroyo distraught and saddled with mounting medical bills that soared, she said, into the millions. (Francis, 3/12)

Becker's Hospital Review: House Passes Bill With Short-Term Wins For Hospitals
House Republicans on March 11 passed legislation to keep the government running through Sept. 30 and extend several critical healthcare provisions that were due to expire March 31. The continuing resolution, which passed the House in a 217-213 vote, would: Eliminate the Medicaid disproportionate share hospital cuts through Sept. 30; Extend certain telehealth waivers and the hospital-at-home program through Sept. 30; Expand the enhanced low-volume adjustment program through Sept. 30 and the Medicare-dependent hospital program through Oct. 1; Extend add-on payments for rural ambulance services through Oct. 1. (Condon, 3/11)

San Diego Union-Tribune: San Diego County Moves Closer To A Crackdown On Camp Fires And Homeless Encampments
In a unanimous and bipartisan vote Tuesday, the Board of Supervisors told staffers to update the county’s existing anti-camping law with provisions that crack down on fires. On days when the risk of wildfire is low, however, officials may only be able to clear encampments when shelter beds are available. (Nelson, 3/11)

Voice of San Diego: Most San Diego Housing Agencies Aren’t Giving Out New Section 8 Vouchers
Housing authorities across San Diego County are bracing for possible cuts to federal rental assistance programs that advocates warn could impact tenants with Section 8 vouchers. Even before the latest funding threats, all but one of the region’s six housing agencies stopped doling out tenant-based vouchers to families on their already years-long waiting lists to focus on keeping existing voucher-holders housed. (Halverstadt, 3/12)

KQED: United Way Bay Area Raises Alarm Over Federal Funding Pause For Hunger, Homelessness
United Way Bay Area is warning that a federal funding pause could worsen hunger and homelessness across the region. Under a budget approved last April, California was set to receive $18.3 million in federal aid, with $2.5 million allocated for the Bay Area. That funding is now indefinitely paused. (Dominguez, 3/11)

Capital & Main: More People In ICE Custody Means Smaller Meals And Delayed Medical Care, Detainees Say
Immigration detention facilities are facing shortages in food, clothing, hygiene products and staff as the Trump administration chooses to hold more people in custody, according to detainees in multiple states. People in the custody of Immigration and Customs Enforcement in California, New Mexico, Texas and Washington told “Beyond the Border” that since President Donald Trump took office, they’ve noticed a deterioration of already difficult conditions in facilities run by various entities including private prison companies CoreCivic and GEO Group as well as ICE itself. (Morrissey, 3/11)

The New York Times: E.P.A. Plans To Close All Environmental Justice Offices
The Trump administration intends to eliminate Environmental Protection Agency offices responsible for addressing the disproportionately high levels of pollution facing poor communities, according to a memo from Lee Zeldin, the agency administrator. Mr. Zeldin’s move effectively ends three decades of work at the E.P.A. to try to ease the pollution that burdens poor and minority communities, which are frequently located near highways, power plants, industrial plants and other polluting facilities. Studies have shown that people who live in those communities have higher rates of asthma, heart disease and other health problems, compared with the national average. (Friedman, 3/11)

Stacker: Older Black People Die At Higher Rates Than Their White Peers. Here’s Why Aging Is A Greater Risk For Black Americans
For older Black people in America, the golden years often come with a harsh reality: They are more likely to suffer from chronic illnesses, be sicker in old age, and die younger than their white counterparts. (Goodwin, 3/11)

ABC News: RFK Jr. Tells Food Leaders He Wants Artificial Dyes Removed From Food Products Before He Leaves Office 
Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. told food industry leaders in a closed-door meeting on Monday that he wants them to remove artificial color additives from their products by the end of his time in office, according to a memo describing the meeting, which was obtained by ABC News. At the Washington gathering, which included the CEOs of Kellogg's, Smucker's and General Mills, Kennedy said it is a top priority of the Trump administration to rid America's food of the artificial dyes, wrote Melissa Hockstad, president and CEO of the Consumer Brands Association, a trade group, who penned the memo. (McDuffie and Flaherty, 3/11)

The Washington Post: Education Department, With Mass Layoff, Cuts Nearly Half Of Its Staff
The Education Department said Tuesday that it is cutting its staff by about half, a major step toward President Donald Trump’s goal of shrinking the federal role in education and one that critics denounced as damaging to American children. Trump has said he wants to eliminate the department altogether, but that is unlikely because it would require an act of Congress and 60 yes votes in the Senate, where Republicans hold only 53 seats. Absent that, the administration has been working to gut the agency by cutting grants and contracts and reducing staff. (Meckler and Douglas-Gabriel, 3/11)

Stat: After Cuts, SAMSHA Employees Describe An Agency In Shambles
The new administration’s decision to fire a tenth of the workers at the federal government agency that oversees mental and behavioral health will imperil efforts to curb suicides and drug overdose deaths, according to current and former employees. (Broderick, 3/12)

The (Santa Rosa) Press Democrat: 17 Years After Cancer Diagnosis, Veterans Affairs Grants Santa Rosa Man Service-Related Benefits
For years, Paul Critchett has demanded in vain the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs acknowledge the connection between that day in the nuclear reactor compartment and the terminal cancer diagnosis that followed. (Benefield, 3/11)

Military Times: Military Medical System Unprepared For Future Conflict, Experts Say
When it comes to combat casualty care, “without urgent intervention, the Military Health System will continue to slide into medical obsolescence,” a retired Air Force trauma surgeon told senators Tuesday. The consequence of a military medical system that’s unprepared to handle a high volume of casualties in any future major conflict is that “many will have survivable injuries, yet one in four will die at the hands of an unprepared system,” said Dr. Jeremy W. Cannon, a professor of surgery at the University of Pennsylvania’s Perelman School of Medicine and a surgeon in the Philadelphia Veterans Affairs Medical Center. (Jowers, 3/11)

NPR: Mental Health Care From Veterans Affairs Is Shaken By Trump's Policies, Sources Say
In the wake of federal firings and executive orders, providers and patients at the Department of Veterans Affairs say mental health and mental health care are suffering. They fear this struggle will get worse as the VA carries through with 80,000 promised job cuts. The agency is one of the largest providers of mental health care in the country. (Riddle, 3/12)

San Francisco Chronicle: S.F. Halts Plan For A New Mental Health And Addiction Center In SoMa
San Francisco is withdrawing plans to open a new mental health service center on the border of the city’s Mid-Market and SoMa neighborhoods following backlash from the community and Board Supervisor Matt Dorsey, who lives on the same block as the proposed site. The city’s Department of Public Health was recently pursuing plans to move its behavioral health service center from a leased property at 1380 Howard St. to 1125 Mission St., a more modern building that the city was looking to purchase. The purchase plan, according to Dorsey, was sold as a way to allow the city to exit an “unfavorable lease agreement” and potentially serve more clients. (Angst, 3/11)

San Diego Union-Tribune: Grossmont Union Schools Superintendent Will Step Down To Fight Brain Tumor 
Grossmont Union High School District Superintendent Mike Fowler is stepping down, citing his ongoing intensive treatment for a brain tumor. (Stephenson, 3/11)

Capitol Weekly: Can Cell Phone Bans In CA Schools Be Enforced?
In these divided times, limiting cell phone use in schools has emerged as an issue both Republicans and Democrats can get behind. But while these policies enjoy bipartisan support, enacting them may prove challenging. Last year, California joined at least seven other states (Idaho, Indiana, Louisiana, Minnesota, Ohio, South Carolina and Virginia) in adopting or expanding rules to reduce the use of cell phones by students in schools when Gov. Gavin Newsom signed AB 3216 by Assemblymember Josh Hoover (D-Folsom) into law. (Joseph, 3/11)

San Francisco Chronicle: California Distributor Recalls Frozen Oysters Due To Norovirus Risk
A California seafood distributor issued a recall for 650 cases of frozen half-shell oysters imported from South Korea due to potential norovirus contamination. The affected oysters, labeled with the code KR 7 SP, were distributed by Sea Win to wholesalers across California and may have been shipped to other states. (Vaziri, 3/11)

Stat: Gilead Data Suggests Yearly Shot Of PrEP Drug Blocks HIV Infection 
Last year, Gilead released data showing that an HIV drug, called lenacapavir, could provide virtually complete protection against infection with just a single injection every six months. The drug, now under regulatory review, was greeted as a breakthrough, the closest thing the field has ever had to a vaccine. On Tuesday, Gilead published early data suggesting a new formulation of the drug  could be used to prevent infection with just a single shot every year. (Mast, 3/11)