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The Trump administration released new regulations Monday that will force health insurance companies to publish cleaned-up spreadsheets of the prices that they pay hospitals and doctors, while stripping out meaningless data that clogged up the files. (Herman, 10/5)

The Federal Trade Commission admonished two dozen large healthcare companies to review their price transparency data on Monday. FTC Chair Andrew Ferguson’s round of warning letters is another attempt by the federal government to compel hospitals to comply with a regulation that went into effect in 2021 requiring providers to post accurate pricing data on their websites. (Kacik, 10/5)

UnitedHealth Group is under investigation for allegedly illegally denying access to medically necessary care, the state of Texas disclosed Monday. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton issued administrative subpoenas, or civil investigative demands, to the UnitedHealthcare parent company. The office is collecting evidence on whether the insurer has delayed or denied care by superseding a physician’s medical judgment. For example, the insurer has been accused of bribing nursing homes to delay hospitalizations for patients, the state said. (Tong, 10/5)

A cybersecurity breach last year of Oracle Corp.’s healthcare unit compromised personal information belonging to nearly 20 million people, according to information released by the Texas attorney general. In a report issued Friday, the Texas AG said the company disclosed that Social Security numbers, addresses and medical information of almost 20 million people, including about 3 million Texans, were taken in the hack. Oracle in March 2025 alerted some customers to the cyberattack, saying it occurred sometime after Jan. 22, although the Texas-based company didn’t release the number of patients’ electronic health records that were affected. (Fozi, 10/6)

Kim Blumenthal, a Yale-trained immunologist, had no idea that U.S. airlines were required to carry emergency medical kits on most flights. But when she needed to treat a young child suffering a severe allergic reaction on a plane, a flight attendant brought out a kit filled with a strict list of drugs and diagnostic tools. Blumenthal then responded to a medical emergency on another flight. And it happened again. (Frankel, 10/4)

�������ýҕ�l Health News: Before Saying Yes To The Medical Test, Know The Risks And Benefits

When Lori Baute first learned about precautionary full-body MRI scans, she dismissed the idea. “ I heard Kim Kardashian got one, and some other wealthy people,” Baute said. But at 59, she was worried about her long-term health. She has a family history of cancer, and she’s a critical caregiver for her aging mom and her adult brother with special needs. After a close friend was diagnosed with bladder cancer, Baute decided to make an appointment with a clinic that offers full-body scans near where she lives in Ocala, Florida. Her results came back a week later. One major finding: She has lesions on her pancreas. “When I got that, I was really petrified,” she said. (Farmer, Anthony and Ruppelt, 10/6)

GE HealthCare announced a definitive agreement Monday to acquire Sofie Biosciences, which makes the radioactive drugs used in PET scans, for $945 million. The company is purchasing the manufacturer from private equity firm Trilantic North America. The deal is expected to close in the first half of 2027. This acquisition would expand GE HealthCare’s presence in the U.S. radiopharmaceutical market, according to the company. It also expands GE HealthCare’s capabilities in theranostics, an emerging targeted treatment approach for conditions such as cancer. (Dubinsky, 10/5)

UChicago Medicine plans to spend nearly $328 million to construct a four-story laboratory facility about a mile from its flagship hospital — a building that will be part of a larger partnership with the University of Chicago and City Colleges of Chicago to expand job training on the South Side. (Schencker, 10/5)

It is probably impossible to overstate how complex a brain is: A network of billions of intertwined neurons forming an intricate anatomy, capable of working on the millisecond scale to perceive reality, detect sensations, create plans, and take actions. (Merelli and Molteni, 10/5)

President Trump has approved the execution of Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, the U.S. Army officer who killed 13 people and wounded 32 others in the 2009 shooting at Fort Hood in Texas, the deadliest mass shooting at an American military base. Sean Parnell, a Pentagon spokesman, said on Monday that Major Hasan would be executed by firing squad, adding that the secretary of the Army would set the time and place of the execution. If the order is carried out, Major Hasan, 56, will be the first person to be executed through the military justice system since 1961. (Cameron, 10/5)

The Trump administration says none of this is happening. “DHS is NOT arresting U.S. citizens by mistake.” “There are no ‘indiscriminate’ stops.” Allegations of “racial profiling are disgusting, reckless and categorically FALSE.” “The pattern is NOT of law enforcement using force.” “ICE does not zip tie or restrain children.” But that is precisely what is happening, and at a far larger scale than previously reported. (Foy, Talbot, Yar, Michelena, Fortis, Elba and Wray, 10/6)

Medical staff at the Adelanto ICE Processing Center repeatedly failed 39-year-old Ismael Ayala-Uribe before he died in custody, according to a mortality review by investigators with ICE’s Health Services Corp. The former DACA recipient died from complications related to a pelvic abscess while in ICE custody on September 22, 2025, a coroner’s report states, after being detained for nearly a month inside the Adelanto detention center, federal authorities said. (Mena, 10/3)

Last summer’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations left many foreign-born residents of Los Angeles afraid to venture outdoors, even when their health depended on it. A new study from USC finds that emergency room visits from patients born outside of the U.S. fell by more than 20% in the first four weeks after arrests escalated in June 2025. Those who did come in were significantly more likely to require hospitalization than U.S.-born patients, suggesting that they were postponing treatment until they were seriously ill. (Purtill, 10/5)

Five Democratic governors want more time from the federal government to implement Medicaid work requirements correctly. In a Thursday letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the governors of California, Maine, New Mexico, Oregon and Virginia, all Democrats, urged HHS to delay the start date for the work requirements, citing shifting policies that have thrown their preparations off course. (Early, 10/5)

Gov. Ned Lamont and other state officials gathered in Stamford on Monday afternoon to spotlight Connecticut’s efforts to protect residents’ Medicaid coverage in the face of pending federal changes to the program taking effect on Jan. 1. (Golvala, 10/5)

A new video from Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders was standard issue Republican messaging for promoting her state’s stricter rules for people on Medicaid. No more could able-bodied people lounge around while receiving taxpayer-funded healthcare, she said — they needed to work. But the decision to portray an unemployed moocher as a young, white, cheeseball-chomping gamer named Brad upset some conservative commentators last week. (Turbay and Tang, 10/6)

President Donald Trump enacted the largest Medicaid cuts in history last year. Since then, his administration has stretched those cuts even further than scorekeepers expected. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services’ state-directed payments regulation, its provider tax proposal, its rule codifying Medicaid work requirements and a guidance document revising certain Medicaid budget policies would result in deeper impacts than what the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office projected last year, according to CMS’ own calculations. (Early, 10/5)

Federal appeals court judges didn’t take kindly to the Trump administration’s arguments Monday in a hearing on Humana’s lawsuit against the government over its rules for auditing Medicare Advantage plans. (Bannow, 10/5)

So far, Ken Paxton is the only attorney general to investigate pediatricians for vaccinating children. (Jewett, 10/5)

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced a new research initiative at the National Institutes of Health to study vaccine injuries on Monday, according to people familiar with the matter. Kennedy visited the NIH campus in Bethesda, Maryland, to unveil the initiative, said the people, who weren’t authorized to discuss the event publicly. (Cohrs Zhang and Raman, 10/5)

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled Monday that it will not hear the case of a group of former city of Bellingham, Washington, employees who were fired for refusing to comply with a COVID-19 vaccine mandate. No reason was given, as is often the case for denied petitions. The employees – which include EMTs, police officers, firefighters, a senior inspector and a wastewater collections supervisor – filed a federal lawsuit against the city of Bellingham and former Mayor Seth Fleetwood in June 2024 over Fleetwood’s 2021 executive order requiring city employees to get the COVID-19 vaccine. (Edelman, 10/5)

Vaxcyte said Monday that its experimental pneumococcal vaccine hit the primary endpoints in a Phase 3 clinical trial, setting up the California-based biotech to compete with Pfizer and Merck. (Mast, 10/5)

University of South Florida researchers are developing a new malaria vaccine that would prevent the return of the disease once a person has already been infected. Unlike viral mosquito-borne illnesses such as dengue, malaria is caused by parasites in the genus Plasmodium, which are transmitted by infected female Anopheles mosquitoes. (Liguori, 10/6)

Gov. Kathy Hochul declared a statewide health emergency in New York State on Monday as measles cases increased dangerously across rural counties where vaccination rates have lagged. As of Saturday, 108 measles cases had been reported across the state this year, the most since 2019, when New York was the epicenter of a national outbreak. Most of the cases are in rural areas, concentrated in the Finger Lakes region. (Goldstein, 10/5)

Measles cases in Pennsylvania have surpassed 1,000 so far this year as the state continues to battle its largest outbreak in decades. Monday's update from the Pennsylvania Department of Health (DOH) brings the total number of 2026 measles cases in the state to 1,004 across 39 counties. At least 198 people have been hospitalized, and five measles-associated deaths have been reported, DOH data shows. (Kekatos, 10/5)

President Trump said Monday he is concerned about the suspected plague case in Russia, saying the U.S. is “looking at it very strongly.” The State Department said Monday it was monitoring the suspected case of pneumonic plague in Irkutsk Oblast, Russia. “I hate to see them having it,” Trump told reporters before departing the White House for Nebraska. “It’s a rough disease. We used to be able to control, but somehow those microbes have gotten stronger and smarter.” (Wilson, 10/5)

Plague is one of history’s most feared diseases, responsible for pandemics that killed tens of millions of people. Today, human cases are rare and can usually be treated with antibiotics. A suspected case of pneumonic plague in Siberia has renewed attention on the disease after a young worker at a Russian institute that studies plague and other dangerous infections died of severe pneumonia. (Gale, 10/6)

Kenya’s Health Ministry on Tuesday confirmed the country’s first imported Ebola case from Congo. ... Health authorities have placed the county on high alert and are monitoring for possible additional cases. (10/6)

The State Department’s new approach to foreign aid is changing the way the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention works abroad. (Paun, 10/5)

Detected cases of a rare but deadly fungal infection increased about fourfold from 2023 to 2025 at a U.S. laboratory that tests samples nationwide, and the reasons why aren't clear, researchers said. The clinical reference laboratory at the University of Washington identified 48 confirmed cases and one probable case of Cladophialophora bantiana infection from January 2009 to July 2026. While the annual case count ranged from one to five in 2009-2023, it jumped to eight in 2024 and 14 in 2025. (Rudd, 10/5)

The Trump administration released a report showing career officials had objected to the 2021 memo as evidence that the policy was biased against conservatives. But in an ironic twist, the administration has forced out many of the objectors. (Barrett. 10/5)

An AI-based healthcare startup on Monday started offering prescriptions to Utah patients without direct human oversight, the first time a state has allowed such technology to replace the role of a doctor. The move, limited to acne medications, sets the stage for a new era in healthcare in which AI takes on a larger role in routine medical care. It also comes months after the state’s efforts to expand the role of AI in healthcare via its pilot program drew scrutiny and anger among doctors. (Inampudi, 10/5)

If you receive food assistance through the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program, or SNAP, your monthly benefit could increase slightly this month, as part of an annual adjustment for inflation. The maximum benefit for an individual went up $8, while the maximum for a household of four went up $29. But Oct. 1 also marks the beginning of new Trump administration policies that reduce the federal government’s investment in food assistance. (Dario, 10/5)

Baltimore has created a new grant program to bring healthy food to neighborhoods with limited grocery options, but questions remain about how much impact the city can achieve with the budgeted money and where additional funding will come from. (Baugh, 10/6)

True Food Kitchen, a health-food focused restaurant chain that counts Oprah Winfrey among its investors, has filed bankruptcy after struggling with management turnover and lingering effects of the Covid-19 pandemic. The company said in court papers that it closed a dozen locations after filing Chapter 11 protection on Sunday and will seek to either recapitalize or sell the business. The chain said it grappled with “significant management turnover, which resulted in frequent changes to expansion strategy, brand direction, and menu offering.” (Randles, 10/5)

Michael Jensen’s social media post struck a chord and led to an outpouring of donations to the nonprofit in Washington state. (Penman, 10/6)

DataOne, the Microsoft-linked New Jersey datacenter recently hit with a $1 million fine for running unpermitted generators, emitted large amounts of health-harming air pollution for nearly a year before state regulators stepped in, according to public records obtained by Floodlight. The Vineland facility’s 62 gas-fired generators became public in August after a Floodlight/Guardian visual investigation found them operating without permits. The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection last week fined the company over the fleet but didn’t disclose how long the generators had been operating nor how much air pollution they had released into the surrounding community over the past year.  (Simon, 10/1)

In the coming weeks, the Navy plans to reopen a well closed since an estimated 20,000 gallons of jet fuel from the Red Hill Bulk Fuel Storage Facility spilled, seeped into the aquifer and contaminated drinking water for thousands of homes. Following a March report by the Environmental Protection Agency that declared the drinking water in the Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam water system “free of fuel contamination since 2022,” the state Department of Health notified the U.S. Navy earlier this month it would grant conditional approval to reopen the ʻAiea-Hālawa Shaft. (Greenaway, 10/5)

In their annual report, heart failure experts pointed to worsening survival and disease trends unless the field is able to change course. (Lou, 10/5)

Heart doctors insist there’s no debate: High levels of LDL, or “bad” cholesterol, in the blood can lead to serious heart attack, stroke or death. (Sudhakar, 10/5)

Pulse oximeters gained prominence during the Covid-19 pandemic, offering anyone a handheld tool to take stock of their blood oxygen level. But their newfound popularity also brought new attention to their limitations — several studies have shown that pulse oximeters overestimate blood oxygen levels when used on darker skin tones. (Oza, 10/6)

Researchers have long puzzled over why people who diet or take weight-loss drugs are quick to regain weight after they stop. A new study has proposed a potential clue: a chemical mechanism that may encourage fat cells to continue making a hormone that makes us hungry and create a “memory” of obesity even after weight loss. Scientists caution that the study’s evidence involves mice and is not proof of the mechanisms that explains weight regain. But it’s a step forward in a growing understanding of the cellular functions and changes underlying obesity, experts said. (Wu, 10/5)

Starbucks is facing a consumer lawsuit over claims that the protein drinks labeled “sugar-free” on its cafe menus may actually contain more sugar than a Reese’s peanut butter cup. The federal lawsuit filed late Friday in Seattle alleges that eight protein beverages Starbucks sells in the U.S. contain varying amounts of sugar even though the company lists them as sugarless. (Durbin, 10/5)

Disabled women can struggle to find medical care, which means they often miss important health screenings such as those for breast or cervical cancer. A paper published today in JAMA Network Open today shows that women with physical disabilities are less likely to undergo routine cervical cancer screening than women without disabilities. (Holohan, 10/5)

A Public Health Alerts report today reveals that, based on 2025 data, 13.4% of US middle school and high school students had ever used e-cigarettes and 4.1% had ever used nicotine pouches, while 5.2% currently used e-cigarettes and 1.7% currently used nicotine pouches. (Wappes, 10/5)

Maternal health conditions during pregnancy were consistently associated with autism spectrum disorder but several factors varied across race and ethnic groups, a large retrospective study of U.S. children showed. Autism prevalence differed by race and ethnicity, but most maternal health conditions during the perinatal period had similar relationships with autism, reported Magdalena Janecka, PhD, of NYU Grossman School of Medicine in New York City, and co-authors. (George, 10/5)

Having theoretical access to healthcare doesn't mean you can take advantage of it, as underscored by a report examining mothers' experiences for themselves and their children. Released Thursday, Pulse Check 2026: Mothers on Mental Health, Care, and the Systems Around Their Families reports that nearly 48% of Florida mothers surveyed said they had struggled to take care of their own mental health needs during the past month. (Sexton, 10/4)

More frozen organic berries sold at Walmart and Trader Joe's are being recalled because they could be contaminated with a dangerous strain of E. coli bacteria. The Chilean supplier behind the products, Frutas y Hortalizas del Sur S.A., widened its recall Friday, according to a company announcement posted by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). (Vohnoutka, 10/5)

More than 122,000 cases of Gatorade have been recalled for failing to declare the presence of synthetic food dyes. The recall affects 28-ounce bottles of Gatorade Lemon Lime, Gatorade Lemon Lime Zero, Gatorade Orange and Gatorade Orange Zero that were distributed to more than three dozen states, according to the Food and Drug Administration. (Jira, 10/5)

When Blue Cross Blue Shield recently published research suggesting that hospitals use artificial intelligence tools to extract more money from insurers without providing additional care, people were mad. Amid growing concerns about AI, one glimmer of hope has been its potential to improve health — and yet, here it was: inflating health care costs without yielding any benefits. (Leah Pierson, 10/6)

As Washington and Beijing tussle for dominance in frontier technologies, there’s one area in which competition shouldn’t preclude collaboration: innovative medicines. Beijing’s latest five-year plan for the biotechnology sector details how the country wants to lead the field globally. Unusually for an industrial blueprint, it comes with numeric targets. (Juliana Liu, 10/5)

Assisted dying accounts for more than 5 percent of deaths in Canada. (Gary Rodin and Madeline Li, 10/5)

What doctors on the front lines are seeing should serve as a warning to other states. (Leana S. Wen, 10/6)

�������ýҕ�l Health News: Witnessing The Failed Execution Of Christa Pike: 'We Could All Hear Her Breathing' 

On Sept. 30, I was one of the seven media witnesses who observed Tennessee fail to execute convicted murderer Christa Pike, the first woman to face the death penalty in the state in almost 200 years. From our previous reporting, each of us had an inkling that the lethal injection process might not go according to plan. Pike’s attorneys had asked the Tennessee Supreme Court to allow her to be hanged instead, citing concerns that a platelet disorder and small veins would make the actual injection not only painful but ineffective. (Catherine Sweeney, 10/6)