La medicación para prevenir el VIH debe ser gratis, pero las aseguradoras siguen cobrándola
By Sarah Varney
March 3, 2022
KFF Health News Original
Una norma federal estableció que los pacientes no debían pagar por la medicación para prevenir el VIH. Pero las aseguradoras siguen enviando facturas por los fármacos y servicios médicos asociados.
HIV Preventive Care Is Supposed to Be Free in the US. So, Why Are Some Patients Still Paying?
By Sarah Varney
March 3, 2022
KFF Health News Original
The Department of Labor issued rules in July clarifying that health plans need to cover the costs of prescription drugs proven to prevent HIV infection, along with related lab tests and medical appointments, at no cost to patients. More than half a year later, the erroneous billing continues.
In Super-Vaxxed Vermont, Covid Strikes — But Packs Far Less Punch
By Sarah Varney
January 28, 2022
KFF Health News Original
With its highest-in-the-nation vaccination rates, Vermont offers a glimpse of what’s possible as the U.S. learns to live with coronavirus.
Nursing Homes Bleed Staff as Amazon Lures Low-Wage Workers With Prime Packages
By Sarah Varney
December 23, 2021
KFF Health News Original
Add nursing homes to the list of industries jolted by Amazon’s handsome hourly wages. Enticed by an average starting pay rate of $18 an hour and the potential for benefits and signing bonuses, low-wage workers are fleeing entry-level elder care for jobs packing boxes.
KHN’s ‘What the Health?’: The ACA Turns 12
March 24, 2022
KFF Health News Original
Although its fate was in doubt more than a few times, the Affordable Care Act turned 12 this week. Year 13 could be pivotal in determining how many Americans receive ACA health insurance, and at what price. Meanwhile, three leading credit bureaus agreed to stop using most medical debt to measure U.S. consumers’ creditworthiness. Anna Edney of Bloomberg News, Rachel Cohrs of Stat, and KHN’s Mary Agnes Carey join KHN’s Julie Rovner to discuss these issues and more.
Children and Covid: Journalists Explore Grief and Vaccine Side Effects
June 26, 2021
KFF Health News Original
KHN and California Healthline staff made the rounds on national and local media this week to discuss their stories. Here’s a collection of their appearances.
KHN’s ‘What the Health?’: Roe v. Wade on the Rocks
December 2, 2021
KFF Health News Original
A Supreme Court majority appears ready to overturn nearly 50 years of abortion rights, at least judging by the latest round of oral arguments before the justices. And a new covid variant, omicron, gains attention as it spreads around the world. Alice Miranda Ollstein of Politico, Sarah Karlin-Smith of the Pink Sheet and Shefali Luthra of The 19th join KHN’s Julie Rovner to discuss these issues and more. Also this week, Rovner interviews Blake Farmer of Nashville Public Radio about the latest KHN-NPR “Bill of the Month” episode.
What Will It Take to Boost Vaccinations? The Scene From Kentucky’s Back Roads
By Sarah Varney
October 18, 2021
KFF Health News Original
With Kentucky in the grip of a covid surge, public health workers are taking their vaccination campaign house to house and church to church, trying to outmaneuver the fantastical tales spread on social media and everyday hurdles of hardship and isolation.
The Pandemic Almost Killed Allie. Her Community’s Vaccination Rate Is 45%.
By Sarah Varney
September 7, 2021
KFF Health News Original
As the delta variant overtakes Mississippi and other undervaccinated parts of the country, one 13-year-old girl’s experience with covid and MIS-C shows a community’s reluctance to embrace public health precautions and continued vulnerability to the pandemic.
Why is the South the Epicenter of Anti-Abortion Fervor?
By Sarah Varney
August 3, 2021
KFF Health News Original
The Supreme Court, come autumn, will consider a Mississippi law that bans nearly all abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy. That’s hardly the most restrictive abortion law passed in the South. How did anti-abortion views become concentrated in the South?
Long Drives, Air Travel, Exhausting Waits: What Abortion Requires in the South
By Sarah Varney
August 3, 2021
KFF Health News Original
Restrictive abortion regulations enacted across the South require women to drive across state lines to find safe services. With the U.S. Supreme Court set to hear a challenge to Roe v. Wade, abortion rights defenders say long drives and wait times could become the norm across much of America.
They Lost Medicaid When Paperwork Was Sent to an Empty Field, Signaling the Mess to Come
By Brett Kelman
August 3, 2022
KFF Health News Original
Tennessee expects to soon disenroll about 300,000 people from its Medicaid program. But families like the Lesters have suffered when bureaucracy and clerical mistakes caused them to unfairly lose coverage under the same program.
KFF Health News' 'What the Health?': On Abortion Rights, Ohio Is the New Kansas
August 10, 2023
Podcast
Nearly a year to the day after Kansas voters surprised the nation by defeating an anti-abortion ballot question, Ohio voters defeated a similar, if cagier, effort to limit access in that state. This week, they rejected an effort to raise the threshold for approval of future ballot measures from a simple majority, which would have made it harder to protect abortion access with yet another ballot question come November. Meanwhile, the number of Americans without health insurance has dropped to an all-time low, though few noticed. Joanne Kenen of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and Politico, Rachel Roubein of The Washington Post, and Emmarie Huetteman of KFF Health News join KFF Health News’ chief Washington correspondent, Julie Rovner, to discuss these issues and more. Also this week, Rovner interviews Kate McEvoy, executive director of the National Association of Medicaid Directors, about how the “Medicaid unwinding” is going, as millions have their eligibility for coverage rechecked.
KFF Health News' 'What the Health?': Health Programs Are at Risk as Debt Ceiling Cave-In Looms
May 4, 2023
Podcast
A warning from the Treasury Department that the U.S. could default on its debt as soon as June 1 has galvanized lawmakers to intervene. But there is still no obvious way to reconcile Republican demands to slash federal spending with President Joe Biden’s demand to raise the debt ceiling and save the spending fight for a later date. Meanwhile, efforts to pass abortion bans in conservative states are starting to stall as some Republicans rebel against the most severe bans. Joanne Kenen of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and Politico, Rachel Cohrs of Stat, and Alice Miranda Ollstein of Politico join KFF Health News chief Washington correspondent Julie Rovner to discuss these issues and more.
KHN’s ‘What the Health?’: Drug Price Effort Hits a Snag
May 13, 2021
KFF Health News Original
Democratic leaders in Congress have vowed to pass legislation to address high prescription drug prices this year, but some moderates in their own party appear to be balking. Meanwhile, younger teens are now eligible for a covid-19 vaccine and the Biden administration reinstated anti-discrimination policy for LGBTQ people in health care. Joanne Kenen of Politico, Sarah Karlin-Smith of the Pink Sheet and Rachel Cohrs of Stat join KHN’s Julie Rovner to discuss these issues and more.
De reacios a activistas: el tiroteo en un hospital obliga a una familia de inmigrantes a repensar la justicia estadounidense
By Sarah Varney
May 10, 2021
KFF Health News Original
Un matrimonio de inmigrantes de Haití y México, y sus tres hijos, narran lo que es sentir el racismo en carne propia.
The Making of Reluctant Activists: A Police Shooting in a Hospital Forces One Family to Rethink American Justice
By Sarah Varney
May 10, 2021
KFF Health News Original
In 2015, Houston police officers stepped into Alan Pean’s hospital room, closed the door and shot him through the chest. Nearly six years later, his survival has brought the Pean family a wrenching legacy and conflicted sense of purpose.
Peligran avances contra el VIH por la lucha contra covid, en especial en el sur del país
By Sarah Varney
April 21, 2021
KFF Health News Original
El impacto exacto de una pandemia sobre la otra todavía está por evaluarse, pero los datos preliminares inquietan a expertos que hasta hace poco celebraban los enormes avances en el tratamiento del VIH.
Strides Against HIV/AIDS Falter, Especially in the South, as Nation Battles Covid
By Sarah Varney
April 21, 2021
KFF Health News Original
Public health resources have shifted from one pandemic to the other, and experts fear steep declines in testing and diagnoses mean more people will contract HIV and die of AIDS.
High Obesity Rates in Southern States Magnify Covid Threat
By Sarah Varney
March 11, 2021
KFF Health News Original
In the American South — home to nine of the nation’s 12 heaviest states — obesity is playing a role not only in covid outcomes, but in the calculus of the vaccination rollout.