Latest From California Healthline:
California Healthline Original Stories
Stopping the Churn: California and Other States Want to Guarantee Medicaid for Kids
California is looking to stop the churn of children who go off and on Medicaid and is weighing new continuous-enrollment policies for youngsters up to age 5, no matter if their household income changes. (Phil Galewitz, )
Newsom Wins Reelection, Stresses Need For Abortion Freedoms: Democrat Gavin Newsom easily won a second term as California’s governor on Tuesday. Speaking to supporters in Sacramento, Newsom said, “We have governors that won their reelections tonight in other states that are banning books, that are banning speech, that are banning abortion, and here we are in California moving in a completely different direction,” Newsom said. “That’s a deep point of pride.” Read more from AP, the Los Angeles Times, and Politico.
What Passed, And What Didn't? California will enshrine abortion rights in the state Constitution and uphold a ban on flavored tobacco, but it won’t tighten kidney dialysis regulations or allow betting on sports games. Read more from the San Francisco Chronicle. Keep scrolling for full election results.
Below, check out the roundup of California Healthline’s coverage. For today's national health news, read KHN's Morning Briefing.
More News From Across The State
The Hill:
Voters Support Abortion Rights In All Five States With Ballot Measures
Voters in California, Vermont and Michigan on Tuesday approved ballot measures enshrining abortion rights into their state constitutions, while those in traditional red states Montana and Kentucky rejected measures that would have restricted access to reproductive care. The votes signal strength to effort to support abortion rights after the Supreme Court in June ruled to overturn the landmark 1973 case Roe v. Wade and the constitutional right to the procedure. (Dress, 11/9)
Los Angeles Times:
Californians Vote To Protect Abortion Rights With Prop. 1
With its passage Tuesday, the state’s constitution will expressly guarantee a person’s “fundamental right to choose to have an abortion and their fundamental right to choose or refuse contraceptives.” California’s Democratic-controlled Legislature placed Proposition 1 before voters, saying it was needed to ensure that state courts or politicians could not undermine reproductive rights in the future without voter approval. (Gutierrez, 11/8)
Los Angeles Daily News:
Proposition 1: Abortion Protections Measure Approved By Voters
Californians have approved Proposition 1, which will amend the state constitution to enshrine access to abortion and contraception throughout the state. (Nickerson, 11/8)
KQED:
Californians Vote To Protect Abortion Rights In State Constitution
California voters overwhelmingly approved Proposition 1 on Tuesday, enshrining the right to reproductive freedom in the state Constitution, less than five months after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned federal abortion protections. While the new constitutional amendment (PDF) does not expand abortion access into the final months of pregnancy, as some of its opponents had warned, it does bolster reproductive rights by explicitly prohibiting the state from denying anyone access to the procedure or to contraceptives. (McClurg, 11/8)
Politico:
California Voters Guarantee Abortion Rights In State Constitution
“Tonight we celebrate reproductive freedom, and that loud clear message that abortion is and forever will be protected in California,” Senate President Pro Tem Toni Atkins (D-San Diego) said at an event in Sacramento celebrating the passage. “History has shown us that human rights must be enshrined in our constitution so that no extremist wielding power can infringe upon them.” (Colliver, 11/9)
Election Results: Dialysis Clinics
AP:
Californians Reject Measure To Alter Dialysis Clinic Rules
For the third time in three straight elections, California voters rejected a ballot measure that would have mandated major changes to the operations of dialysis clinics that provide life-saving care to 80,000 people with kidney failure. Proposition 29 failed after nearly 70% of Californians voted “no” in returns late Tuesday. The measure would have required a doctor, nurse practitioner or physicians’ assistant to be present during treatment at the state’s 600 outpatient dialysis facilities. (Weber, 11/9)
Bay Area News Group:
Dialysis Industry Defeats Challenge At Ballot Box, For The Third Time
Proposition 29 has been defeated. As election results roll in Tuesday evening the “Yes” vote was trailing by 40 points. If the results hold, the dialysis industry will have successfully defeated new regulations at the ballot box for the third election in a row. (Rowan, 11/8)
Los Angeles Times:
California Votes No On Prop. 29 For Dialysis Clinics Changes
Proposition 29 would have required dialysis clinics to have a doctor, nurse practitioner or physician assistant present while patients are receiving care at any of the state’s 600 dialysis centers. Clinics also would have been required to disclose if a physician had ownership interest in a facility and to report patient infection data. (Evans, 11/8)
Election Results: Flavored Tobacco
Los Angeles Times:
Flavored Tobacco Banned In California As Prop. 31 Passes
California voters on Tuesday passed a ballot measure to uphold a 2020 law that banned the sale of most flavored tobacco products, giving anti-tobacco advocates an expected victory in a multiyear fight against the industry to mitigate a youth vaping crisis. (Wiley, 11/8)
Stat:
California Bans Flavored Tobacco Products, Including Vapes
On Tuesday, Californians overwhelmingly voted to ban all flavored tobacco products in the state. The move makes California by far the largest state to ban such products, which are already illegal in a smattering of smaller states, including Rhode Island, New Jersey, and Massachusetts. (Florko, 11/9)
Election Results: Gambling and Homelessness
Los Angeles Times:
Propositions 26 And 27, Which Would Have Legalized Sports Gaming, Lose Big
Propositions 26 and 27 were resoundingly rejected by voters in Tuesday’s election, despite a half-billion dollars in spending to convince Californians to legalizing sports gaming. Campaigns for the two competing measures flooded the airwaves with a constant barrage of attack ads, which some California political poll directors criticized for driving up opposition and confusing voters. (Willon, 11/8)
San Francisco Chronicle:
S.F. Voters Choose Oversight Of Homelessness Department In Wake Of Chronicle Investigation
Months after a Chronicle investigation exposed squalid and chaotic conditions inside city-funded housing for San Francisco’s most vulnerable residents, voters on Tuesday chose to create an oversight commission for the Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing — a $672 million agency that has operated without formal accountability. (Thadani and Palomino, 11/8)
Sacramento Bee:
Update: Sacramento Measure Calling For More Homeless Sweeps Leads In Early Returns
A Sacramento ballot measure that would make it easier for the city to clear homeless camps from public property is leading in early election returns, with 56.3% of the votes counted so far supporting Measure O. The measure grew out of frustration in Sacramento’s business community with the city’s homelessness crisis. (Clift, 11/8)
Los Angeles Times:
COVID-19 Still A Leading Cause Of Death In L.A. County
The coronavirus continues to play an outsized role in the mortality rate in Los Angeles County, new data from the Department of Public Health show. According to an analysis from the county health department, COVID-19 was the second-leading cause of death in the first six months of 2022, illustrating the outsized impact the pandemic has had on mortality rates despite widespread availability of vaccines and the arguably less-severe Omicron strain. (Lin II, Money and Reyes, 11/8)
CIDRAP:
Risk Of Rare Heart Inflammation May Be Higher After Moderna Than Pfizer COVID Vaccine
Myocarditis and pericarditis are rare after mRNA COVID-19 vaccination, but rates of the inflammatory heart conditions were twofold to threefold higher after receipt of the second dose of the Moderna vaccine than after the Pfizer/BioNTech formulation, suggests a head-to-head comparison in Canadian adults. (Van Beusekom, 11/8)
Capitol Weekly:
Stem Cell: $137 Million Buys More Clinical Trials, Shared Labs, Research
It was a $137 million day for the Golden State’s stem cell agency — no small event even for an enterprise that is backed by billions. The scientific scope covered by the $137 million was impressive. It ranged from bolstering the vaunted Alpha Clinic Network initiated around the state by the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM), as the agency is legally known, to raising the number of CIRM’s clinical trials to 83. Plus, CIRM directors gave the go-ahead to a $50 million program to finance shared labs around the state. (Jensen, 11/8)
Sacramento Bee:
New Sacramento Cannabis Dispensary Is First Of Its Kind
A new cannabis dispensary that opened Monday is the first in a city program designed to give Sacramento residents affected by the war on drugs an opportunity to legally sell marijuana to customers. (Diamond, 11/8)