Calls Mount for Biden to Track US Health Care Worker Deaths from Covid
By Ed Pilkington, The Guardian
As The Guardian and KHN end Lost on the Frontline, a yearlong project to count health care worker deaths in the pandemic, the White House is under pressure to take up the task.
Prominent Scientists Call on CDC to Better Protect Workers From Covid
By Christina Jewett
The academics insist that more workers should get top-rated N95 masks, the best defense against airborne coronavirus particles.
Health Workers and Hospitals Grapple With Millions of Counterfeit N95 Masks
By Christina Jewett
Masks imitating the real thing are flooding U.S. ports, and authorities can hardly keep pace.
Congress Cites KHN Investigation in Probe of National Academies
By Christina Jewett and JoNel Aleccia
The House oversight committee is requesting conflict-of-interest disclosure forms from a National Academies committee studying organ transplants. KHN previously reported on apparent conflicts among members of a committee studying drug waste.
Government Oversight of Covid Air Cleaners Leaves Gaping Holes
By Lauren Weber and Christina Jewett
Thousands of schools have spent millions of federal covid relief dollars snapping up air cleaning technology that claims to inactivate covid-19. But the devices fall into a regulatory gap.
New Covid Cases Plunge 25% or More as Behavior Changes
By Christina Jewett
End of holiday gatherings or fear of the virus may be at play – or hope for the vaccine
Nuevos casos de Covid caen un 25% o más a medida que cambian conductas
By Christina Jewett
Expertos dicen que la caída puede estar relacionada con el creciente temor al virus después que alcanzara niveles récord, así como con la esperanza de vacunarse pronto.
KFF Health News' 'What the Health?': Judging the Abortion Pill
Any day now a conservative federal judge in Texas could upend the national abortion debate by requiring the FDA to rescind its approval of mifepristone, a drug approved in the U.S. more than 20 years ago that is now used in more than half of abortions nationwide. Meanwhile, a controversial study on masks gets a clarification, although it may be too late to change the public impression of what it found. Alice Miranda Ollstein of Politico, Jessie Hellmann of CQ Roll Call, and Sarah Karlin-Smith of the Pink Sheet join KHN chief Washington correspondent Julie Rovner to discuss these issues and more. Plus, for “extra credit,” the panelists suggest health policy stories they read this week they think you should read, too.
Unused Johnson & Johnson Covid Doses Are Piling Up as FDA Waits to See if Shelf Life Can Be Extended
By Rachana Pradhan and Christina Jewett
As vaccine expiration dates loom, states with hundreds of thousands of doses on hand say demand is tanking and there’s no easy way to donate to other states or countries that might want them
Boeing Tested Air Purifiers Like Those Widely Used in Schools. It Decided Not to Use Them in Planes.
By Christina Jewett and Lauren Weber
The technology that schools have been snapping up in the fight against covid “has not shown significant disinfection effectiveness” to install on its planes, Boeing found. Now the company’s study is being debated in a proposed class-action suit.