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For the first time, retail pharmacies, from corner drugstores to major chains like CVS and Walgreens, will be allowed to offer abortion pills in the United States under a regulatory change made Tuesday by the Food and Drug Administration. The action could significantly expand access to abortion through medication. (Belluck, 1/3)

Medication abortion accounts for over half of abortions in the country. Abortion pills are frequently prescribed online and mailed to patients, effectively providing a way to circumvent state restrictions that took effect after the high court decision — even as 18 states require that a patient take the pills in person. (Gonzalez, 1/4)

CEO Evan Masingill of GenBioPro, the generic maker of the medication, called the FDA’s move “a step in the right direction that is especially needed to increase access to abortion care.” ... He added, however, that the policy “will not provide equal access to all people” because many states have laws in place either banning abortion in most circumstances or mandating that patients only get the pills directly from their prescribing doctors. (Miranda Ollstein and Gardner, 1/3)

The U.S. Postal Service (USPS) can continue to deliver prescription abortion medication despite a June 2022 Supreme Court ruling that overturned a landmark abortion rights decision, the Justice Department said on Tuesday. The department's Office of Legal Counsel said in an opinion sought by USPS that the mailing of mifepristone and misoprostol, commonly used to terminate pregnancies, did not violate an 1873 law known as the Comstock Act. (Shepardson, 1/4)

A legal opinion, from Justice’s Office of Legal Counsel, concludes that a nearly 150-year-old statute aimed at fighting “vice” through the mail is not enforceable against mailings of abortion drugs as long as the sender does not know that the drugs will be used illegally. (Gerstein and Ollstein, 1/3)

Dozens of influential conservative, religious and anti-abortion advocacy groups are pressuring the new GOP House majority to pass bills implementing national restrictions on abortion — even though the legislation would go nowhere with Democrats in control of the Senate and White House. (Miranda Ollstein, 1/3)

Indiana’s medical licensing board next month will hear a case regarding the Indianapolis doctor who this past summer provided an abortion to a 10-year-old rape victim from Ohio. (Rodgers, 1/3)

Tony Evers pledged to push for abortion access, the expansion of Medicaid, and more public school funding when he was sworn in Tuesday for a second term as Wisconsin's 46th governor. (Hess and Beck, 1/3)

Texas teens will now need their parents’ permission to get birth control at federally funded clinics, following a court ruling late last month. These clinics, funded through a program called Title X, provide free, confidential contraception to anyone regardless of age, income or immigration status; before this ruling, Title X was one of the only ways teens in Texas could obtain birth control without parental consent. (Klibanoff and Dey, 1/3)

When condoms were distributed at a career fair five years ago, West Sabine High School’s seventh and eighth graders took handfuls and tucked them inside their jackets and pants pockets. It set field trip chaperone Carnelius Gilder into a panic. Gilder had driven the students to a church in the area to attend the career fair. Students had attended it in previous years with no problems; Gilder was taken aback to see a vendor giving away contraception for the first time. (Salhotra and Dey, 1/4)

Much of the U.S. is in the throes of a winter COVID-19 surge with cases poised to eclipse last year’s summer peak, driven by new variants, waning immunity and holiday gatherings.  ... But public health experts are expressing frustration that instead of focusing on mitigation measures including masking and improved ventilation, U.S. officials have turned their attention towards China. (Weixel, 1/4)

New York City is warning of the rising threat of the “tridemic” — a mix of an increase in Covid-19 cases, the flu and respiratory syncytial virus. In recent weeks, flu cases in New York City already surpassed the rate during the peak of the last four flu seasons. Meanwhile, Covid and RSV cases have increased during the same period as the holidays end and people go back to work and school, city officials said. (Spector, 1/3)

National hospitalization rates now rival those from the peak over this past summer driven by bygone omicron subvariants, federal data shows. Some of the areas seeing the large upticks in hospitalizations are those where the new subvariant, XBB.1.5 is most prevalent. For instance, in the Northeast (federal health region 1), XBB.1.5 has the highest regional proportion, accounting for 75 percent of cases, and hospitalizations have risen 16 percent over the prior seven days, the largest region-specific rise, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (Mole, 1/3)

The start of the year is bringing with it a mild reprieve in the so-called tripledemic, but some Southern California hospitals remain stressed by the still-high circulation of flu, COVID-19 and RSV. Children’s Hospital Los Angeles is still so busy that it cannot always accommodate transfers of patients from other hospitals, according to Dr. James Stein, the facility’s chief medical officer, in a statement. (Money, Lin II and Martinez, 1/3)

This fall and winter have upended life for working parents of little children, who thought the worst of the pandemic was behind them. The arrival of vaccines for younger children and the end of quarantines for COVID exposure were supposed to bring relief. Instead, families were treated to what some called a “tripledemic.” (Hollingsworth and Savage, 1/3)

As 2022 came to a close, the World Health Organization (WHO) met with Chinese officials to get more details about the country's COVID-19 outbreak as several more nations announced testing requirements for people arriving from China. (Schnirring, 1/3)

For the first two years of the Covid-19 pandemic, people working in the infectious diseases and global health spheres were largely focused on the new disease. In 2022, however, gears shifted. Covid didn’t go away, but diseases like flu that had been held in abeyance by the new virus and the measures we used to slow its spread — well, they’re baaack. (Branswell, 1/4)

The baseless tweets began to circulate within minutes of Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin’s stunning collapse on the field during “Monday Night Football.” Anti-vaxxers and right-wing provocateurs sought to link the injury that left Hamlin in critical condition and the coronavirus vaccine, without any evidence. Their claims built on years of coronavirus vaccine misinformation that has been seeded across social media. (Zakrzewski and Weber, 1/3)

While the Bills released an official statement Tuesday morning confirming that Hamlin, who is 24 years old, suffered cardiac arrest and is in critical condition, some people on social media have been pointing blame at the COVID-19 vaccine in the latest attempt to undermine the vaccine’s efficacy. Although Hamlin’s personal vaccine status remains unknown, the NFL reported earlier this year that 95% of players had been vaccinated. (Thompson Payton, 1/3)

For some experts, the episode called to mind a rare, often lethal condition called commotio cordis that can occur when a person is struck sharply in the chest, as Hamlin was. Such a blow, when it occurs at a specific point in the heart’s pumping cycle, can send the organ into an abormal rhythm that disrupts the flow of blood to vital organs. (John Milton, 1/3)

While Hamlin's team and family have yet to confirm exactly what happened, many of the doctors following his case online have narrowed it down to one likely cause: commotio cordis (kuh-MOH-dee-oh KOR-dis). (Treisman, 1/3)

The fact that Hamlin was alive at all, though, was the product of teamwork between Bengals and Bills medical personnel, and the NFL’s “emergency action plan,” which prepared them for a situation that hadn’t occurred in the league since 1971, when the Lions’ Chuck Hughes suffered a cardiac incident on the field and was later pronounced dead. (Volin, 1/3)

Te’Jaan Ali was playing basketball in a school gym on the South Side of Chicago when he started feeling hot. The heat in the gym — which didn’t have air conditioning — was likely just as bad as the sweltering temperatures outside, which reached 90 degrees on July 18, 2020. Ali, 19, stood in front of a fan and collapsed. Less than two hours later, he died in a hospital emergency room of a heart condition. (Perez and Anderson, 1/3)

Credit cards offered by banks including Wells Fargo & Co. and Synchrony Financial intended to cover expensive health-care services may be causing unnecessary financial pain for consumers, said a group of US senators, who cited potentially deceptive promotions. (Smith, 1/3)

A congressional advisory panel is exploring whether Medicare’s popular managed care plans should be required to offer a standard set of core benefits. But an industry trade group opposes that prospect and instead wants to “standardize” and improve the way the federal government presents plan offerings to consumers. (Pugh, 1/4)

In 2018, responding to a wave of overdose deaths, Congress passed legislation requiring Medicare to pay for services at opioid treatment programs for the first time. But two years after Medicare began covering those programs, which use methadone and other medications to help reduce opioid use and overdose deaths, providers say their efforts are being hindered by Medicare Advantage — private insurance companies that administer benefits to about half of the Medicare population. (Hellmann, 1/4)

What kind of healthcare reforms can we expect from the 118th Congress? The outlook is a bit cloudy. (Pipes, 1/3)

With high stakes for both public health and industry, EPA is set to reveal at least the broad contours of its plans for tightening air quality standards for a particularly pernicious pollutant. Following a review that took much longer than first expected, the White House regulations office last week sent the proposed soot standards rule back to EPA, clearing the way for its public release. (Reilly, 1/3)

EPA is investigating whether Colorado's regulation of air pollution from industrial facilities discriminates against Hispanic residents and other racial minorities, according to a letter released last week. (1/3)

3M Co. ’s decision to quit making “forever chemicals” represents a tactical retreat aimed at containing its potential liability over its products in legal fights expected to last for years, analysts say. 3M is defending itself against allegations that chemicals and products it has made for decades have contaminated drinking water and pose health risks. (Tita, 1/3)

Lillian Bernier, 31, has worked as a machinist since 2019 at Turbocam, a Barrington, N.H.-based company that makes parts for the HVAC, automotive, aviation, and space exploration industries. She claims that the company’s refusal to provide gender-transition health care coverage amounts to discrimination against her based on her sex, transgender status, gender identity, and disability. (Alanez, 1/2)

KHN: Watch: Patient Sent To Collections For Surgery She Never Had

Grace Elizabeth Elliott got a mysterious hospital bill for medical care she had never received. Even after the hospital acknowledged its error, a collection agency pursued Elliott for the debt. (1/4)

About 600 people alive today can’t have children because California’s government sterilized them either against their will or without their knowledge, and now the state is trying to find them so it can pay them at least $15,000 each in reparations. (Beam, 1/4)

The researchers found that children who habitually checked their social media feeds at around age 12 showed a distinct trajectory, with their sensitivity to social rewards from peers heightening over time. Teenagers with less engagement in social media followed the opposite path, with a declining interest in social rewards. (Barry, 1/3)

An analysis of electronic health record and antimicrobial susceptibility data at US hospitals found that resistance patterns for some bug-drug combinations vary by care setting and patient ages, researchers reported yesterday in JAC-Antimicrobial Resistance. (Dall, 1/3)

Melanie Senn’s father, long dead, appeared to her as she lay back in the dimly lit room at the Santa Monica clinic, a mask over her closed eyes, and the psychedelic trip began. More precisely, it was his thumb. It was disembodied and huge, materializing in her mind to wipe away her own image. Just as a parent might lick a thumb, she said, and use it to clean the dirtied cheek of a child. (Reyes, 1/2)

Last week in The American Journal of Health-System Pharmacy, a team led by University of Southern California researchers reported disruptions in the demand for anticoagulant and antiplatelet medications at US hospitals during the COVID-19 pandemic. (Van Beusekom, 1/3)

People who have COVID-19–related loss of smell may benefit from visual-olfactory training using patient-preferred essential oils, according to a clinical trial published late last week in JAMA Otolaryngology-Head & Neck Surgery. (Van Beusekom, 1/3)

Startup health insurers spent 2022 scaling back their businesses as investors are no longer willing to contribute the billions of dollars necessary for subsidizing them. Insurtechs Oscar Health, Clover Health and Bright Health Group’s failure to thrive at a time when most health insurers are making more money than ever has left some wondering what their future holds. (Tepper, 1/4)

Cybercriminals seeking to seize sensitive health information are increasingly targeting vulnerable vendors to get around the safeguards healthcare providers, insurers and other entities have erected to protect patient data. (Berryman, 1/3)

The Oregon Health Authority cleared the Amazon-One Medical transaction Dec. 28. The regulator concluded the acquisition would be unlikely to affect access and cost for Oregonians and ruled out a more comprehensive review because One Medical operates only five primary care clinics and treats few patients in the Beaver State. (Perna, 1/3)

LCMC Health has acquired three HCA Healthcare-owned hospitals in southeast Louisiana for $150 million, following approval by state regulators, the nonprofit system announced Tuesday. (Hudson, 1/3)

After years of churning out profits, many Colorado hospitals are now facing a downturn, according to recently filed financial disclosures. UCHealth, for instance, reported a $157.5 million loss in the quarter ending Sept. 30, 2022. The loss was driven largely by investment losses — reported at more than $200 million. But the sagging stock market was not the only economic stressor for the hospital system. (Ingold, 1/3)

Jackie DeSouza-Van Blaricum began on Tuesday as president of HCA Healthcare Far West Division, with oversight of eight hospitals and multiple health care facilities throughout Las Vegas and California. Headquartered in the Las Vegas Valley, the division encompasses the Sunrise Health System, including Sunrise, Sunrise Children’s, Southern Hills and MountainView hospitals. (Hynes, 1/3)

By 2019 life expectancy in Indiana was 77 years, almost two years below the national average. So Gov. Eric Holcomb convened a special commission in 2021 to look at steps Indiana could take to improve health overall. The answer, when the commission delivered its final report in August: Restructure the state’s public health system, a proposal that came with a suggested price tag of about $242 million a year. (Rudavsky, 1/4)

KHN: Public Health Agencies Try To Restore Trust As They Fight Misinformation

By the summer of 2021, Phil Maytubby, deputy CEO of the health department here, was concerned to see the numbers of people getting vaccinated against covid-19 slipping after an initially robust response. With doubt, fear, and misinformation running rampant nationwide — both online and offline — he knew the agency needed to rethink its messaging strategy. (Sausser, 1/4)

A survey of nearly 45,000 college students in France reveals a high prevalence of stress, anxiety, depression, suicidal thoughts, and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) 15 months after the COVID-19 pandemic began. (Van Beusekom, 1/3)

Sesame has joined the list of major food allergens defined by law, according to the US Food and Drug Administration. The change, which went into effect on January 1, comes as a result of the Food Allergy Safety, Treatment, Education and Research Act, or FASTER Act, which was signed into law in April 2021. (Rogers, 1/2)

Michael Mendez said that when learned he had hepatitis C, “I didn’t even know what it was.” Mendez, 47, had been homeless for years in Los Angeles, and said he hadn’t gone to a doctor the entire time he was living on the streets. When Mendez got a roof over his head, at the Arroyo Seco Tiny Home Village, he decided to stop at the UCLA Health mobile clinic that rolled weekly to the Highland Park site — and soon learned about the infection that could jeopardize his life. (Reyes, 1/1)

By the time she completed her residency in emergency medicine, Dr. Andreia Alexander had seen all manner of injuries and complications — everything from kidney stones and broken bones to stab wounds and seizures. She was prepared, as an ER saying goes, for "anyone, anything, anytime." (Adams, 1/4)

KHN: Many Families With Unaffordable Employer Coverage Now Eligible For Covered California Subsidies

If having the family on your employer-sponsored health plan has been a financial hardship, or outright impossible to afford, help may be on the way. The federal government recently fixed a controversial Treasury Department rule tied to the Affordable Care Act that denied assistance to many families whose workplace coverage busted their budgets. (Wolfson, 1/4)

California is expected to receive about $470 million from a multistate settlement with CVS over allegations that the pharmacy chain contributed to the country’s opioid crisis, the state attorney general’s office said Tuesday. (Martinez, 1/3)

Hoping to avoid a post-holiday spike of new COVID-19 cases, Los Angeles County health officials are asking residents to wear a high-quality mask  indoors through the end of the week. “Ten days of mask-wearing as many return to work, in school, can slow transmission, minimize disruptions to work and learning,” Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer said at a briefing last week. (Vaziri and Beamish, 1/3)

California’s COVID-19 supplemental paid sick leave law expired Saturday, the end of 2022. But state officials say that people who got sick before the end of the year, with illness or recommended isolation that extended into this year, still are entitled to stay on leave and be paid for it this year under the law’s provisions. (Vaziri and Beamish, 1/3)

Atlanta City Council approved legislation Monday to authorize Mayor Andre Dickens to contract with Grady Health System as the lead operator of the Center for Diversion and Services that is set to open this year. (Nobles III, 1/3)

In Mississippi, where elected officials have a long history of praising self-sufficiency and condemning federal antipoverty programs, a welfare scandal has exposed how millions of dollars were diverted to the rich and powerful — including pro athletes — instead of helping some of the neediest people in the nation. (Wagster Pettus, 1/3)

A former Colorado funeral home owner was sentenced to 20 years in federal prison on Tuesday for defrauding relatives of the dead by dissecting 560 corpses and selling body parts without permission. (Shiffman, 1/4)

A new study has found nearly half of Iowa drivers involved in a traffic crash tested positive for at least one drug. The study by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration screened people involved in crashes for drugs at seven Level 1 trauma centers nationally, ranging from Massachusetts to California. The University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics was one of the centers included. (Krebs, 12/29)

Iowa's medical marijuana program saw another year of growth in patient and provider participation, resulting in more than $10 million in sales by the end of 2022. New data on the program was released in a report by the Iowa Cannabidiol Board in late December that offers recommendations to state lawmakers for proposed changes to the state program in the upcoming Legislative session. (Ramm, 1/2)

A controversial jail doctor’s company filed for bankruptcy last month, leaving more than a dozen Minnesota counties scrambling to find a different health provider for people in their jails. (Marohn, 1/4)

Small business owners struggling to afford health coverage for their employees, staffing problems in hospitals and nursing homes, and Medicaid for residents without permanent legal status. These are among the top health care issues that advocates are calling on lawmakers to address in the legislative session that begins Wednesday. One of the most common priorities among advocates is affordable, accessible health insurance for individuals and businesses. (Carlesso, 1/3)

An Eli Lilly drug if approved for weight loss could become the best-selling drug of all time, but concerns are mounting about who will actually be able to afford it. (Lovelace, Jr. 1/1)

Metformin, a common medication to control diabetes, has become the controversial darling of tech’s health-conscious digerati who are enticed by preliminary research suggesting it might help promote longevity, reduce dementia and prevent a whole host of other conditions – including, most recently, long COVID. (Krieger, 1/3)

Unicycive Therapeutics has laid the groundwork for entering a market targeted by Sanofi and Takeda, posting pivotal bioequivalence data on a candidate designed to improve compliance with kidney disease treatment regimens. (Taylor, 1/3)

It was not that long ago that the medical community had a small arsenal of new drugs to prevent and treat COVID-19 in people most susceptible to severe disease. But the arrival of new variants, as well as the loss of two treatments for immunocompromised people, has amped up the urgency to develop a stronger generation of medicines. (Cross, 12/28)

Between the mid-1990s and the early 2010s, the number of opioid prescriptions written for Americans roughly doubled, driven by dishonest pharmaceutical marketing campaigns and unscrupulous entrepreneurs who opened so-called pill mills to sell drugs. (Maia Szalavitz, 1/3)

A pair of recent developments could substantially boost the nation’s capacity to deal with the opioid crisis. CVS and Walgreens will pay over $10 billion to settle charges against them for over dispensing opioids; this will add to the $3 billion agreed to by Walmart and would bring the current sum of expected settlements to over $54 billion. (Jerry Avorn, 1/3)

Every 5.5 minutes, someone in the United States dies from fentanyl-related overdose death. But you've probably heard about it — in this publication and on the news. With over 100,000 deaths in 2021, overdose deaths are a leading cause of injury-related death in this country — and coverage of the opioid epidemic is everywhere. (Emi Gacaj, 1/2)

The Congressional report on the FDA’s approval of Aduhelm makes some good points. As regulatory science advances, so too must the FDA’s administrative procedures. (Peter J. Pitts, 1/1)

Potentially unsafe drugs arrive in the U.S. each day. It's happening because overseas drugmakers simply face far less scrutiny than domestic U.S. drug manufacturers. The FDA frequently issues "warning letters" to these overseas factories for these safety violations. But nothing gets fixed. (Michael Stumo, 12/27)

Employers seem to rarely consider fat people when putting together their Diversity, Equity and Inclusion goals. But creating a space for plus-size employees to feel welcome has just as much to do with diversity and inclusion as any other group. (Kate Bernyk, 1/3)

Profit-driven management has eroded pediatric health care in America. Health care providers make more money treating adults than they do children. As a result, the number of hospitals offering pediatric care has decreased dramatically over the past two decades. (Alexander Stockton and Lucy King, 1/4)

When ‌‌doctors talk about patients in the hospital, we so often begin with age. A 75-year-old man with shortness of breath. A 30-year-old woman with joint swelling. Knowing our patient’s age allows us to focus on the most likely diagnoses and to develop a mental image of the patient before we enter the room. (Daniela J. Lamas, 1/4)

In 2012, Bay State voters rejected a “death with dignity” ballot measure that would have authorized doctors to supply lethal drugs for the terminally ill. In the decade since, bills to reverse the voters’ decision have been introduced in the Legislature without success. Last month, the Supreme Judicial Court upheld the state’s ban. (Jeff Jacoby, 1/3)

Fentanyl can be pressed into oxycodone tablets, Valium or other legal drugs. As the Drug Enforcement Administration has warned, those who overdose may have assumed they were taking counterfeit prescription pills that are “easily accessible and often sold on social media and e-commerce platforms.” (1/4)

In late November, I bit the bullet and took a flight from Hong Kong, where I work, back to my hometown of Shanghai. For months, there were rumors of China easing its Covid Zero policy. But I could no longer wait. It’s been three years since I last saw my aging parents. (Shuli Ren, 1/3)

On Monday night, Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin tragically became one of an estimated 356,000 Americans who suffer an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest each year. That's about 975 people a day. (1/3)

The emergency department is often called a hospital’s front door. For many people desperate for reproductive care, it is being seen as their last chance. But these days, getting treatment for pregnancy-related medical emergencies in the emergency department is complicated. (Jennifer W. Tsai and Hazar Khidir, 1/4)

A diverse and inclusive workforce benefits science and research. But unless it includes people living with a disability — the largest minority group in the U.S. and around the world — research will never be fully representative and science will not reach its full potential. (Bonnielin Swenor, Lisa I. lezzoni and Steven Barnett, 1/3)