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An aide to New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo who is heading up the state’s vaccine rollout has called local officials to gauge their loyalty to the beleaguered governor, according to multiple reports on Sunday. Larry Schwartz, who has filled several supportive roles for the Cuomo administration over the years, has rattled local leaders across the state with his outreach, according to The Washington Post and The New York Times. (Gronewold, 3/14)

A winter storm has revealed issues in Jackson, Miss.' aging water supply system, leaving thousands of residents without water service since mid-February, NBC News reports. While water supply has been a recurring challenge for Jackson residents, "this year’s outage is one of the worst in recent history," NBC writes. It would take hundreds of millions of dollars to restructure the system to make it resilient enough to withstand harsh climate, mayor Chokwe Lumumba told the outlet. (Arias, 3/14)

New Mexico lawmakers on Sunday moved closer than ever to passage of a bill that would allow terminally ill patients to seek medical aid to end their lives. The legislation, House Bill 47, cleared the Senate Judiciary Committee on a 5-3 vote and heads next to the Senate floor. It won House approval last month, the first time medical aid-in-dying legislation has ever passed a chamber of the state Legislature. In Sunday’s hearing, Rep. Deborah Armstrong, an Albuquerque Democrat and co-sponsor of the bill, highlighted her daughter Erin’s own story as she urged lawmakers to pass the bill. Erin has an inoperable brain tumor, she said, and has faced excruciating pain at times while undergoing treatment. (McKay, 3/14)

Crisis centers and emergency departments at hospitals in the Philadelphia area are feeling the crunch as they are often the first stop for people in a mental health crisis. The next step is an inpatient mental health program for additional treatment or discharge if the patients are judged not to pose a danger to themselves or others. The wait for a bed often took days even before the pandemic, particularly for children and adolescents. COVID-19 requirements and precautions, such as testing and quarantining, have made placements even harder. Plus, having to spend a lot of time in an emergency room can be especially overwhelming for someone in crisis, experts said, making it more difficult to treat the mental health symptoms. (Ao, 3/15)

While New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy has pledged to be transparent throughout the coronavirus pandemic, his administration has denied or slowly responded to requests for records related to spending, communications and decision-making. Sunshine Week, an annual focus on press freedoms and the fight for government transparency, comes a year after the state marked its first positive case and, soon after that, the first death from the virus. (Catalini, 3/15)

The leaders of three Massachusetts teachers unions are backing emergency legislation filed by state lawmakers that would require the education commissioner to give districts more time to prepare for the full-time return of elementary school students to classrooms. Officials with the Massachusetts Teachers Association, the American Federation of Teachers Massachusetts, and the Boston Teachers Union also said the legislation would allow more school workers — who became eligible for vaccines last Thursday — to be able to receive doses if they choose. “Rushing this without proper planning would be unsafe and unwise — both for safety and instruction,” said Jessica Tang, president of the Boston Teachers Union. (Hilliard and Tziperman Lotan, 3/14)

Appalled when he saw blood mixed with the waste in his mother’s nursing home toilet, Tim Wall called 911 emergency workers as well as quizzing staff at her Kernersville facility to try to get answers. The information he got from EMTs and care providers during the Jan. 5, 2021 incident shocked Wall even more, he said in a phone interview. He quoted a care worker who said, “See, your mom’s incontinent and we’ve been changing her all day and we haven’t seen any blood. That must have been from yesterday. ”Wall said, “You mean she was bleeding like that yesterday?” (Goldsmith, 3/15)

The sheer prevalence of obesity in the nation was a public health concern long before the coronavirus pandemic — 2 in 3 Americans exceed what is considered a healthy weight, with 42% falling into the obesity range, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But COVID-19 dramatically fast-tracked the discussion from warnings about the long-term damage that excess fat tissue can pose to heart, lung and metabolic functions to far more immediate threats. (3/13)