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It’s now a crime in Alabama to administer or prescribe gender-affirming puberty blockers and hormones to transgender people under age 19, as a new law took effect Sunday without intervention from the courts. Alabama is the first state to enact such a ban on these treatments for transgender youth. A similar measure in Arkansas to halt the treatments was blocked by a federal judge before it took effect. A federal judge has not yet ruled on a preliminary injunction request to block Alabama from enforcing the law while a court challenge goes forward. (Chandler, 5/8)

KHN: The Families Of Trans Kids In Texas Consider Their Options Amid Crackdown On Care 

Cameron Wright, 16, has always seen himself as a “dude.” As a young child, Cameron didn’t have the words to explain the disconnect between how he saw himself and how the world saw him. But he knew that despite being born in a girl’s body, he was meant to be a boy. After taking reversible puberty blockers that pause a teenager’s body changes, Cameron considered whether he wanted to begin hormone therapy to physically transition more permanently. He did not take the decision lightly. Cameron said his doctor made him spend almost a year mulling over the question, working with his therapist, and thinking through the life-altering implications before the doctor believed he was ready to start taking the medications in 2020. (West, 5/9)

Missouri lawmakers are poised to require schools test and, potentially, filter drinking water to prevent lead poisoning, making the state one of just a handful that require administrators to meet standards stricter than federal regulations. The state offers grants for schools to pay for water testing, but there is no requirement to test, and only a handful have opted to do so. And while scientists agree there is no safe level of lead — a dangerous neurotoxin that is especially harmful to children — federal drinking water regulations allow far higher concentrations of lead before requiring water systems to take action. (Kite, 5/6)

The Mount Blue Regional School District canceled school on Friday after test results showed elevated levels of lead in nearly half of the drinking fountains and faucets. The tests at the eight schools were completed at the end of March following Maine’s new law that requires fixtures in the state’s schools used for drinking water and food preparation to be tested. (5/7)

A bill to make the Oklahoma Medical Marijuana Authority a freestanding state agency awaits action from Gov. Kevin Stitt. The Oklahoma Senate on Thursday gave final passage to legislation that is the result of years of discussions about moving the OMMA out of the Oklahoma Health Department. The House has supported in recent years similar legislation, but it wasn't until Oklahoma City Republicans Senate Pro Tem Greg Treat and House Majority Floor Leader Jon Echols authored Senate Bill 1543 this year that the idea really took off in the Senate. (Forman, 5/8)

The police said two Ohio State University students died in apparent drug overdoses this week as health officials warned that fake Adderall pills could contain fentanyl, a powerful synthetic opioid. The police received a 911 call at 10:46 p.m. on Wednesday from a woman who reported that her roommate and her roommate’s friends had overdosed at an off-campus apartment, said Officer Doran Carrier of the Columbus Division of Police. Three university students were taken to hospitals, he said. (Sundaram, 5/7)

The Kearney School District has been keeping a supply of Narcan on hand, the opioid overdose medication. Just in case. Last fall, when that stock was set to expire, district nurse Karen Hughes found a national program that gives it to high schools for free. So she signed up. Just days after receiving the fresh Narcan, school staff members had to use it. On a student. Citing privacy issues, school officials won’t give many details about what Hughes calls “the incident.” But what unfolded at a Northland school was a “best-case scenario,” assistant superintendent Jeff Morrison told The Star. “The student is still alive.” (Gutierrez and Ritter, 5/9)

KHN: National Addiction Treatment Locator Has Outdated Data And Other Critical Flaws

At a psychiatric hospital in Michigan, Dr. Cara Poland’s patients were handed a sheet of paper to find follow-up care. The hospital had entered local ZIP codes on a website — run by the nation’s top substance use and mental health agency — and printed the resulting list of providers for patients to call. But her patients who tried to use it often hit a wall, Poland said. They’d call a number only to find it disconnected, or they’d learn that a facility wasn’t accepting new patients, or that the clinician had retired or moved. (Pattani, 5/9)

he Yukon-Kuskokwim Health Corp. is dispatching health teams to multiple villages in the Y-K Delta this month to test school age kids for tuberculosis. Case counts are trending above average this year. The situation has been further complicated by the coronavirus pandemic and the repeal of a state law that required in-school testing. St. Mary’s school principal Teresa Paukan said that the community opted for school-wide testing last month after a student tested positive. The testing trend found second case of tuberculosis. “We would have never found out about that positive case if we didn’t get (testing) into the school,” said Paukan. (Schwing, 5/8)

One by one the nymphs climbed up the researcher’s bright blue boot, looking like little more than specks of dirt as they searched out another meal of blood. Those nymphs, young lone star ticks skittering toward flesh, are just one species of potential disease vectors in Illinois. And their unsettling climb in Grundy County, captured on video last year, was just one of many tick encounters for Holly Tuten, whose work requires collecting thousands of the bloodsuckers. While most people spend their lives trying to avoid ticks, Tuten, a vector ecologist who leads the state’s tick surveillance program with the Illinois Natural History Survey, seeks them out, hoping to understand where and what they’re spreading in an effort to reduce future damage. (Greene, 5/9)

A 25-year-old homeless man is believed to have committed suicide at the Rikers Island jail complex in New York City on Saturday evening, according to people familiar with the case. The man, Dashawn Carter, was found hanging from a window in his cell at the Anna M. Kross Center just two days after being transferred back to Rikers from a state psychiatric hospital, according to a person with knowledge of the circumstances surrounding his death. (Hu and Ransom, 5/8)

Have your seasonal allergies been hitting you harder than ever in recent years? It’s not your imagination: Studies show that pollen counts are increasing and that spring is arriving earlier in Kansas City. Researchers have linked more intense allergy seasons to the climate crisis, since warmer temperatures can lead to more pollen in the air and cause the weather to warm up earlier. Here’s what we know about how allergies impact the Kansas City area. Longer and more prolific pollen seasons are just one symptom of a rapidly warming climate. Air pollution can also contribute to respiratory conditions like asthma and exacerbate humans’ reactions to allergens. (Wallington, 5/9)

Even as a child, Sarah Nauser seldom could be slowed by the concept of “no.” To the contrary, said her mother, Jamie Sanders: “It was almost like if you said ‘no’ she’d try harder.” “I always found a way,” said Sarah, beaming, as ever, befitting her “Smiley” nickname. So the girl who was as radiant as adamant played baseball with the boys from about the time she could run, leading to a softball career at Blue Springs High. When she became consumed with another uniform, she began volunteering for the Blue Springs Police Department by the time she was 15 or 16; she started at the Kansas City Police Academy the first date possible: the day after her 21st birthday. (Gregorian, 5/8)