First Edition: June 8, 2015
Today's early morning highlights from the major news organizations.
Kaiser Health News:
What’s At Stake When The Supreme Court Rules On Health Plan Subsidies
Later this month, the Supreme Court is expected to rule on King v. Burwell, a case challenging the validity of federal tax subsidies helping millions of Americans buy health insurance if they don’t get it through an employer. If the court rules against the Obama administration, those subsidies could be cut off for people in the approximately three dozen states using healthcare.gov, the federal exchange website. Here are answers to some frequently asked questions about the case. (Rovner and Carey, 6/8)
Kaiser Health News:
Bill To Speed FDA Approvals Includes Rewards For Drugs Designed For Kids
Advocates for children with rare diseases are watching closely a congressional effort to streamline the nation’s drug approval process because the bill includes a provision extending a federal program that rewards companies making remedies for these young patients. (Gillespie, 6/8)
The New York Times:
Health Care Expansion Is Rejected In Florida
The vote in the House was 72 to 41 against the measure, with all 37 Democrats and four Republicans voting yes. It was a far different outcome from the one in the Senate, which solidly backed the plan in a 33-to-3 vote on Wednesday. The Florida Health Insurance Affordability Exchange would have used more than $18 billion over 10 years in federal funds to expand the pool of low-income Floridians eligible for health insurance and help them buy it from private providers. Instead, House Republicans, using their 81-to-39 majority and an almost uniform opposition to using federal dollars to broaden the pool of patients covered under Medicaid, criticized the new plan, calling it nothing more than Medicaid expansion under another name. (Madigan, 6/5)
The Associated Press:
House Votes Down Medicaid Expansion Compromise 72 - 41
The vote came on the fifth day of a special session that was required after the House and Senate failed to pass a budget during their regular 60-day session. The two chambers were divided over health care, including whether to expand health care coverage. During the regular session, the House never voted on the Senate proposal. That changed after an emotionally charged debate that fell along party lines as legislators either called it disastrous or life-saving. The final vote was divided, although four Republicans voted with the Democrats. (Fineout and Kennedy, 6/6)
The New York Times:
States Confront Wide Budget Gaps Even After Years of Recovery
Many of the legislatures that are struggling with budgets can point to external forces, including slow economic recoveries and rising health care costs, for their woes. “This is very different from past recovery periods, where you had fairly robust revenue growth at the state level,” said Scott D. Pattison, executive director of the National Association of State Budget Officers. “We’re not seeing enough revenue growth to solve some of the problems that we’re seeing.” (Bosman, 6/7)
The Washington Post:
How Did Arizona And Nevada, Neighbors Under GOP Control, End Up On Such Wildly Different Paths This Year?
On Monday, Nevada passed its largest tax increase ever — $1.1 billion — in order to raise money for the state’s struggling schools. Local papers heaped praise on Gov. Brian Sandoval (R ) for pulling off this unlikely feat, which took months of coaxing his recalcitrant Republican colleagues. Arizona made history of a different kind last month. Propelled by his campaign-trail pledge to reduce taxes every year he is in office, Gov. Doug Ducey (R ) led his legislature into passing one of the state’s stingiest budgets in the past 30 years. The hundreds of millions in cuts come at the expense of Arizona’s colleges, Medicaid and the poor. (Guo, 6/5)
The New York Times:
Painkillers Resist Abuse, But Experts Still Worry
The pill was OxyContin, a painkiller that its manufacturer, Purdue Pharma, says deters abuse by being difficult to chew or liquefy into forms that give addicts stronger highs, orally or through injection. Since adding these features to its original and widely abused OxyContin in 2010, the company has likened the pill to a virtual seatbelt to restrain the nation’s epidemic of prescription drug abuse. But as thousands of addicts still find ways to abuse OxyContin and similar painkillers, called abuse-deterrent formulations, some experts caution that the protections are misunderstood and could mislead both users and prescribers into thinking that the underlying medications are less addictive. (Schwarz, 6/6)
The Wall Street Journal:
FDA Queues Up Review Of Anti-Cholesterol Drugs
A Food and Drug Administration advisory panel this week considers experimental cholesterol-lowering drugs whose approval could pave the way for blockbuster medicines with potentially billions of dollars in sales. The panel is evaluating evolocumab from Amgen Inc. and alirocumab from Sanofi SA and partner Regeneron Pharmaceuticals Inc., new LDL-lowering agents that would be the first major additions to the coronary heart-disease medicine chest since statin pills were first prescribed in the late 1980s. (Rockoff, 6/6)
The Wall Street Journal:
Bernie Sanders Draws Crowds With Matter-Of-Fact Message
[Sen.] Sanders’s path to the White House is as tough as they come. He has taken positions that are on the far left of the spectrum. In his speech, he called for a “Medicare-for-all” health-care system, free tuition at public colleges and universities, and a breakup of the big financial institutions. (Nicholas, 6/6)
Los Angeles Times:
Blue Shield Faces More Heat Over Nonprofit Status, $1.2-Billion Deal
Health insurance giant Blue Shield of California is facing more questions over its loss of tax-exempt status as it tries to win state approval of a $1.2-billion acquisition. A former Blue Shield executive is accusing the San Francisco insurer of giving contradictory answers to state officials about its corporate structure. And consumer advocates are calling on Blue Shield to disclose details of a state audit that examined the company's taxpayer subsidy. (Terhune, 6/5)
The Associated Press:
AP Exclusive: Abortions Declining In Nearly All States
Abortions have declined in states where new laws make it harder to have them — but they've also waned in states where abortion rights are protected, an Associated Press survey finds. Nearly everywhere, in red states and blue, abortions are down since 2010. Explanations vary. Abortion-rights advocates attribute it to expanded access to effective contraceptives and a drop in unintended pregnancies. Some foes of abortion say there has been a shift in societal attitudes, with more women choosing to carry their pregnancies to term. ... Nationwide, the AP survey showed a decrease in abortions of about 12 percent since 2010. One major factor has been a decline in the teen pregnancy rate, which in 2010 reached its lowest level in decades. There's been no official update since then, but the teen birth rate has continued to drop, which experts say signals a similar trend for teen pregnancies. (Crary, 6/7)
The Associated Press:
State-By-State Trends In Annual Number Of Abortions
The Associated Press has collected the latest annual numbers of abortions from health departments in all 45 states that compile such data on a comprehensive basis. This table shows the results, comparing the most recent numbers — mostly from 2013 or 2014 — to 2010, the year before legislative efforts intensified of efforts in many states to enact new restrictions affecting access to abortion. (6/7)
Los Angeles Times:
Bill Would Limit Efforts To Recoup Medi-Cal Costs From Patients' Estates
The state's Medi-Cal program has long looked to the estates and heirs of deceased Californians to recoup public money spent on their healthcare in the last years of life. But the practice — including suing survivors and filing liens against the homes of poor families — is coming under attack in Sacramento. (Pfeifer, 6/5)
The New York Times:
Hospitals Back Providers Applying For New York State Marijuana Licenses
New York’s new medical marijuana program has drawn the interest of several major hospitals, which have formed alliances with aspiring growers to try to make the drug accessible to their patients. Friday was the deadline for companies to apply to become one of up to five licensed medical marijuana producers and distributors in the state. The State Health Department said on Friday that it was not yet able to release the number or names of the companies that had applied. But one hospital group, North Shore-Long Island Jewish Health System, with a heavy presence in and east of New York City, announced that it had applied for a license in partnership with Silverpeak Apothecary, a medical marijuana company based in Colorado, where marijuana has been legalized for medical and recreational use. (Hartocollis,6/5)
The Wall Street Journal:
Companies Rush To Meet Deadline For Pot Licenses
North Shore-LIJ Health System, a Long Island operator of 19 hospitals in the state, said on Friday that it is one of the applicants for New York’s new medical-marijuana licenses, lending institutional credibility to a business that has previously had more interest from smaller entrepreneurs. “There’s a lot of perceptual baggage for marijuana,” said Kevin Tracey, president and chief executive of the Feinstein Institute for Medical Research, the research arm of North Shore-LIJ. “But I think when you put on your health-care-delivery hat, and it’s effective and not dangerous, why wouldn’t a good health-care system want to understand it?” (Ramey, 6/5)
The New York Times:
Meth Finds A New Market In New York
They are gay and bisexual black men who flocked to the city in search of sexual freedom and found darker things with it — H.I.V., homelessness, social isolation. And many carry a deeper shame. “When people started to talk about their sexual lives,” said Chris Johnson, a therapist at GMAD since 2006, “they would introduce that crystal meth became a part of that sexual experience.” Beginning five or six years ago, Mr. Johnson started hearing in therapy sessions about 24-, 36- and 48-hour sex binges fueled by meth, which can intensify sexual desire while delaying orgasm for hours. (Secret, 6/5)
USA Today:
Fla. Hospital Probed Over Babies' Deaths After Heart Surgery
Federal regulators announced Friday that they are investigating a Florida hospital over the deaths of several infants who had heart surgery in the past four years. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services began the probe after a CNN report about the deaths at St. Mary's Medical Center in West Palm Beach, which is owned by Tenet Healthcare. Most of the babies were Medicaid patients. (Winter, 6/7)