Latest California Healthline Stories
KFF Health News' 'What the Health?': American Health Under Trump — Past, Present, and Future
Dreaming of a Trump victory, Republicans have a wish list of health policy changes — including loosening Affordable Care Act regulations to make cheaper coverage available and ending Medicare drug price negotiations. Meanwhile, after a publicly reported death stemming from a state abortion ban, Vice President Kamala Harris is emphasizing the consequences of Trump’s work to overturn Roe v. Wade. Tami Luhby of CNN, Shefali Luthra of The 19th, and Joanne Kenen of Politico and Johns Hopkins University join KFF Health News senior editor Emmarie Huetteman to discuss these stories and more.
Abortion Clinics — And Patients — Are on the Move, as State Laws Keep Shifting
Clinics in states where most abortions are legal, such as Kansas and Illinois, are reporting an influx of inquiries from patients hundreds of miles away — and are expanding in response. Despite the Supreme Court’s overturning of federal protections in 2022, abortions are now at their highest numbers in a decade.
Cyberattacks Plague the Health Industry. Critics Call Feds’ Response Feeble and Fractured.
Health care weathered more ransomware attacks last year than any other sector, and that was before a debilitating February hack of payments manager Change Healthcare. Executives, lawyers, and policymakers are worried the federal government’s response is underpowered, underfunded, and too focused on hospital security.
These Alabama Workers Were Swamped by Medical Debt. Then Their Employer Stepped In.
A decades-old manufacturing company opened a clinic and made primary care and prescriptions free for employees and their families.
Las clínicas de abortos, y sus pacientes, se movilizan a medida que cambian las leyes estatales
El fallo de la Corte dejó en manos de los estados las políticas sobre el aborto. Desde entonces, 14 estados promulgaron prohibiciones a la práctica que contemplan unas pocas excepciones, mientras que otros han restringido el acceso.
Ballot Measure on New Medi-Cal Spending Has Broad Support, But Opponents Flag Pitfalls
Proposition 35, which would use revenue from a tax on managed-care plans to raise the pay of health care providers who serve Medi-Cal patients, has united a broad swath of California’s health care, business, and political establishments. But a newly formed, smaller group of opponents says it will do more harm than good.
Tennessee Tries To Rein In Ballad’s Hospital Monopoly After Years of Problems
Ballad Health, a 20-hospital system with the nation’s largest state-sanctioned hospital monopoly, serves patients in Tennessee, Virginia, Kentucky, and North Carolina.
Fighting Staff Shortages With Scholarships, California Bill Aims To Boost Mental Health Courts
A new bill would create a scholarship program for students who agree to work with specialized courts in California to get patients into treatment, but some people argue the state shouldn’t restrict scholarship aid to a new, untested program given broader behavioral health workforce shortages.
Historic Numbers of Americans Live by Themselves as They Age
Longer life spans, rising rates of divorce, widowhood, and childlessness, and smaller, far-flung families are fueling a “gray revolution” in older adults’ living arrangements. It can have profound consequences for their health.
Watch: New Documentary Film Explores a Lynching and a Police Killing 78 Years Apart
The “Silence in Sikeston” documentary film explores how the nation’s first federally investigated lynching and a police killing 78 years apart haunt the same rural Missouri community. The film from KFF Health News and Retro Report explores the lasting impact of such trauma — and what it means to speak out about it.