States

Latest California Healthline Stories

Trump Won’t Force Medicaid To Cover GLP-1s for Obesity. A Few States Are Doing It Anyway.

Late last year, South Carolina Medicaid approved a class of medications known as GLP-1s to treat obesity, placing it among the few state programs covering these effective but expensive drugs. But access remains limited, even for patients covered by Medicaid, because of stringent prerequisites that must be satisfied before starting the drug.

Housing, Nutrition in Peril as Trump Pulls Back Medicaid Social Services

About half of states have broadened Medicaid, the state-federal low-income health care program, to pay for social services such as housing and nutritional support. The Trump administration, however, views these experiments as distractions from the core mission to provide health care.

Rural Patients Face Tough Choices When Their Hospitals Stop Delivering Babies

More than 100 rural hospitals have stopped delivering babies since 2021, including a South Dakota hospital that serves small towns, farming communities, and a Native American reservation. Patients there now travel at least an hour to give birth.

Trump’s DOJ Accuses Medicare Advantage Insurers of Paying ‘Kickbacks’ for Primo Customers

The Department of Justice alleges that several major health insurers paid brokerages “hundreds of millions of dollars in kickbacks” to get agents to steer consumers into their Medicare Advantage plans, allegations the insurers strongly dispute.

Los hospitales que atienden partos en zonas rurales están cada vez más lejos de las embarazadas

Más de un centenar de hospitales rurales han dejado de atender partos desde 2021, según el Center for Healthcare Quality and Payment Reform. El cierre de los servicios de obstetricia se suele achacar a la falta de personal y la falta de presupuesto.

Even Where Abortion Is Still Legal, Many Brick-and-Mortar Clinics Are Closing

Some clinics that provide abortions are closing, even in states where voters have passed some of the nation’s broadest abortion protections. It’s happening in places like New York, Illinois, and Michigan, as reproductive health care faces new financial pressures.

KFF Health News' 'What the Health?': GOP Tries To Cut Billions in Health Benefits

GOP-controlled House committees approved parts of President Donald Trump’s “one big, beautiful bill” this week, including more than $700 billion in cuts to health programs over the next decade — mostly from Medicaid, which covers people with low incomes or disabilities. Meanwhile, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. testified before Congress for the first time since taking office and told lawmakers that Americans shouldn’t take medical advice from him. Julie Appleby of KFF Health News, Alice Miranda Ollstein of Politico, and Joanne Kenen of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and Politico Magazine join KFF Health News’ Julie Rovner to discuss these stories and more.

Newsom’s Pitch as He Seeks To Pare Down Immigrant Health Care: ‘We Have To Adjust’

Gov. Gavin Newsom said that he’s proud his state expanded health care to all low-income residents regardless of immigration status but that tough budget times call for some adjustments. The Democrat’s new budget proposes scaling back benefits to adults living in the country illegally, as well as charging them a $100 monthly premium.