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An experiment to provide meals to some Medicaid recipients shows food can be cost-effective medicine. But even as federal officials tout the power of nutrition, Medicaid budget cuts could lead states to think twice about covering healthy food for sick residents. One has already reconsidered.
Democrats and Republicans in Troy, New York, joined together to challenge a national Catholic health system determined to close the last birthing center in the county.
Hundreds of hospitals nationwide are bracing for Medicaid cuts as a result of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. Some state lawmakers are eyeing loans and other forms of financial aid to distressed hospitals in rural and urban areas, as healthcare providers warn of cuts to critical services and scramble for funding.
With shortages of medical professionals and an aging population, thousands of community healthcare workers prevent older adults from falling through the cracks.
Community health workers are increasingly common in rural areas, where they help patients overcome barriers to accessing care and staying healthy.
Community health workers, who often help patients get to their appointments and pick up prescriptions for them, have increasingly been recognized as an integral part of treating chronic illnesses. But state-run Medicaid programs don鈥檛 always reimburse them equally, usually excluding those who work on tribal lands.
Community paramedicine is expanding nationwide, including in rural areas, as health care providers, insurers, and state governments recognize its potential to improve health and save money.
Responding to covid has taken so much attention and energy that some public health workers believe it pushed tuberculosis off people鈥檚 radar.
Some community health groups are training Latino teens to conduct outreach and education, particularly in places where covid vaccine fears linger.
Nonprofit federally funded health centers are a linchpin in the nation鈥檚 health care safety net because they treat the medically underserved. The average profit margin is 5%, but some have recorded margins of 20% or more in three of the past four years.
A 124-year-old hospital in a midsize Rust Belt city in Indiana will soon be torn down, despite protests from residents and city officials decrying the loss of local health services. The Catholic hospital system said it is downsizing the 226-bed hospital because of a lack of demand for inpatient care, as the organization has been building new hospitals in wealthier suburbs.
Illinois used federal pandemic money to hire community health workers who connect people with food banks and rental assistance programs, just like public health officials have long hoped to do. What will happen to the community trust that has been built up when the federal money runs out and the workers disappear?
Membership-based villages help arrange services for seniors 鈥 such as handyman help or transportation to appointments 鈥 and provide social connections through classes, leisure opportunities, or community events. Despite great promise, they have been slow to expand because of difficulties raising funding and keeping people interested.
In poor neighborhoods and desert towns, community activists 鈥 some unpaid 鈥 are signing up hard-to-reach people for vaccination appointments. Experts say these campaigns are key to building the country鈥檚 immunological armor against new outbreaks.
As the pandemic brings long-standing health disparities into sharper view, community health workers are being asked to help the public health response. This fast-growing workforce helps fill the gaps between health care providers and low-income communities by offering education, advocacy and outreach.
Mutual aid groups, in which volunteers give their time and resources to help others in the community, are seeing a resurgence in New York with the coronavirus pandemic.
Health clinics in isolated African American communities in the San Francisco Bay Area provide crucial services to neglected populations. But like thousands of other community clinics around the nation, their finances have been wrecked by the pandemic shutdown.
Many of the nation鈥檚 safety-net clinics for low-income patients are having to turn their model of care upside down overnight to deal with the realities of the pandemic 鈥 a challenge both financially and logistically. Federal funding is on the way.
Since two cases of the mysterious new coronavirus were reported in Southern California, Chinese immigrants have begun donning face masks. The practice is common in China but goes against official guidance in the U.S., and that鈥檚 causing conflict in local schools.
Jane Garcia is CEO of La Cl铆nica de La Raza, which operates more than 30 clinics in the San Francisco Bay Area serving a high percentage of immigrant patients. She has challenged state and federal immigration policies in court, including the Trump administration鈥檚 recent attempt to expand the 鈥減ublic charge鈥 rule.
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