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Gov. Jared Polis kicked off this year’s session with a laudable promise: “saving Coloradans money and keeping our state affordable is my top priority this session.” Health insurers support the sentiment, but key features of this year’s legislative agenda undermine the Polis pledge. (Amanda Massey, 4/19)

If you’ve seen Hulu’s “Dopesick” — or the nonfiction book that inspired the miniseries about the origin and subsequent unraveling of the opioid crisis — you might remember that Virginia served as the central focus of the plotlines. Virginia was not randomly chosen as the setting for “Dopesick,” nor was it just one of many random states affected by the Sackler family’s lies and deceit. The Sacklers embodied a presence just as big as the coal mining companies did in the region and exploited low-income Black and Indigenous communities and communities of color that make up a significant portion of the population in the Appalachians and the southern U.S. The family owns Purdue Pharma, the group responsible for creating Oxycontin, one of the most commonly abused prescription drugs in the country, according to the Addiction Center. (Quynh Anh Nguyen, 4/19)

After aging off his parent’s health insurance, 26-year-old Alec Smith decided to use the money he’d need to spend for his own coverage to pay for the insulin keeping him alive. But it proved too expensive, and he left the pharmacy without his prescription. Back at his apartment, he tried to ration what he had. Four day later, he was found dead by his girlfriend. He was three days from his next paycheck. (4/15)