June 25, 2024
(Wall Street Journal) – One employer was paying about $100 for a prescription for a generic antidepressant, though it could be bought elsewhere for about $12. At the urging of firms that manage their drug benefits, employers turned to mail-order … Read More
June 24, 2024
(Axios) – Rising health care prices have measurably increased unemployment in the United States, according to a new study in the National Bureau of Economic Research. Why it matters: Surging health care costs don’t just hit Americans in their pocketbooks — they could be … Read More
June 21, 2024
(New York Times) – Americans are paying too much for prescription drugs. It is a common, longstanding complaint. And the culprits seem obvious: Drug companies. Insurers. A dysfunctional federal government. But there is another collection of powerful forces that often … Read More
June 18, 2024
(NPR) – For hundreds of thousands of U.S. troops and their families, when the Pentagon orders them to find health care off base there is none. An NPR analysis found that 50% of active duty military installations stand within federally designated health professional shortage … Read More
June 13, 2024
(Wired) – When Change Healthcare paid $22 million in March to a ransomware gang that had crippled the company along with hundreds of hospitals, medical practices, and pharmacies across the US, the cybersecurity industry warned that Change’s extortion payment would … Read More
June 12, 2024
(Reuters) – The U.S. Senate health panel said on Tuesday it would vote this month on whether to subpoena Novo Nordisk to answer questions about U.S. prices for weight loss drugs Ozempic and Wegovy, which are far higher than those … Read More
June 12, 2024
(NBC News) – Eleven other cancer patients and seven current and former Memorial clinicians described a facility in which both insured and uninsured patients requiring an array of treatments were regularly met with denials of care or demands for up-front … Read More
June 11, 2024
(Reuters) – The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to hear a lawsuit by more than 200 hospitals that serve low-income populations accusing the federal government of shortchanging them on Medicare funding by about $1.5 billion per year. The hospitals, located … Read More
June 7, 2024
(Axios) – Demoralized doctors and nurses are leaving the field, hospitals are sounding the alarm about workforce shortages and employees are increasingly unionizing and even going on strike in high-profile disputes with their employers. Why it matters: Dire forecasts of … Read More
June 6, 2024
(ABC News) – The Supreme Court sided with Native American tribes Thursday in a dispute with the federal government over the cost of health care when tribes run programs in their own communities. The 5-4 decision means the government will … Read More
June 5, 2024
(Army Times) – A new rapid test that checks for traumatic brain injuries using a single drop of blood is expected to make its debut in the military in the coming months. The product marks one of the most significant steps … Read More
June 5, 2024
(Wall Street Journal) – Senate Republicans blocked a Democratic measure that would protect access to contraception nationwide, in a vote designed to show the contrast between the two parties on women’s reproductive choices headed into the fall election. The bill, which … Read More
June 5, 2024
(Associated Press) — When faced with infertility, Amanda and Jeff Walker had a baby through in vitro fertilization but were left with extra embryos — and questions. Tori and Sam Earle “adopted” an embryo frozen 20 years earlier by another couple. … Read More
June 5, 2024
May 30, 2024
May 29, 2024
May 28, 2024
(Wall Street Journal) – Last summer, a rural hospital on the Kansas plains began filing dozens of lawsuits against patients who hadn’t paid their medical bills. In July and August 2023, four of every five sheriff-delivered court summonses in Pratt … Read More
May 28, 2024
(Wall Street Journal) – The economic burden of a cancer diagnosis is getting strikingly worse in the U.S., as drug and medical costs soar and more patients live longer with the disease. About 55% of cancer drugs introduced between 2019 … Read More
May 27, 2024
May 23, 2024
(Associated Press) – The Supreme Court’s pending Idaho abortion ruling may hinge on how federal spending power might protect doctors against a state’s criminal code. For guidance, the justices can look to the very beginning of Medicare in the 1960s, … Read More
May 22, 2024
(MedPage Today) – For more than 3 years — 1,193 days to be exact — the patient had been confined to an acute care bed despite the fact that for 948 days, or 80% of that time, he had no … Read More
May 22, 2024
May 21, 2024
Two Senate Republicans on Monday introduced legislation to protect access to in vitro fertilization, known as IVF, after a Democratic-led effort to do so failed earlier this year in the upper chamber. The bill, titled the IVF Protection Act, was … Read More
May 20, 2024
(Wall Street Journal) – With hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars flowing to insurers in a fast-growing market buoyed by aging baby boomers, there was little not to like as far as Wall Street was concerned. Companies like UnitedHealth Group … Read More
May 16, 2024
(KFF Health News) – At Rochester Regional Health, that won’t happen. The nonprofit system in upstate New York is one of only a few nationally that bar all aggressive collection activities. Patients who don’t pay won’t be taken to court. … Read More
