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There is no slack in Anchorage’s homelessness response system. Shelters and housing programs are largely full, many with long waitlists. For the first time in decades, there is no walk-in, low-barrier homeless shelter in Anchorage. (Goodykoontz and Hughes, 7/30)

Genetic analysis of the virus responsible for the first case of polio in the United States in nearly a decade shows it is linked to vaccine-derived viruses recently detected in Jerusalem and London, the Global Polio Eradication Initiative announced on Friday. (Branswell, 7/29)

New Hampshire health officials have identified the first batch of mosquitoes to test positive for West Nile Virus this year. (7/29)

New laws overhaul regulation of medical marijuana, including changing the chief regulator of medical marijuana from the state Department of Agriculture and Forestry to the Louisiana Department of Health; and expanding the number of medical marijuana pharmacies allowed to operate in the state. (7/31)

After a decade of vigorous opposition, most North Carolina Republicans have now embraced the idea of expanding the state’s Medicaid program to cover hundreds of thousands of additional low-income adults. Legislative approval finally appears within reach. (Robertson, 7/31)

KHN: Citing A Mental Health Crisis Among Young People, California Lawmakers Target Social Media 

Karla Garcia said her son’s social media addiction started in fourth grade, when he got his own computer for virtual learning and logged on to YouTube. Now, two years later, the video-sharing site has replaced both schoolwork and the activities he used to love — like composing music or serenading his friends on the piano, she said. “He just has to have his YouTube,” said Garcia, 56, of West Los Angeles. (Finn, 8/1)

By 2013, Steve Harbin’s alcohol problem was plain to nearly everyone. Once a prosperous salesman in the construction industry, he’d lost his job and health insurance. Gone were the dream house he’d designed in Albuquerque’s foothills and many of the motorcycles he’d owned. The last one, a Kawasaki W650 with a peashooter exhaust, sat in his garage in disrepair. (Alcorn, 7/24)

Alcohol costs New Mexico dearly. It killed 1,878 residents in 2020, three times the nation’s rate. But getting hammered here is cheap. At the Shop-N-Save on Gallup’s west side, a thirty-rack of Natural Ice beer sells for $24.95 after tax, a little over two hours’ earnings at minimum wage. Total Wine in Santa Fe offers a five-liter box of Franzia Crisp White wine for $15.15, or 45 cents per drink. And you can’t do better than Wal-Mart in Rio Rancho, where a 1.75-liter handle of Aristocrat vodka sells for $11.84, just 30 cents a drink. (Alcorn, 7/24)

At a 12-steps meeting in Albuquerque’s foothills, one of hundreds held each week statewide, there were cowboys, Anglo women in golf shirts, and Hispanic day laborers. A woman without housing asked around for a place to stay the night. A downcast man in nurse’s scrubs said he had relapsed but hoped to go home that night, if his wife would have him. New Mexicans can’t neglect the state’s enormous alcohol problem even if they want to. (Alcorn, 7/24)