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KFF Health News: Vaccine Panel's Hepatitis B Vote Signals Further Turbulence For Immunization Policy, Public Trust When Su Wang was in medical school, she donated blood. That's when she learned she was infected with hepatitis B, a virus that attacks the liver and can lead to cancer and death decades later. "I was 18, healthy, in college," she said. "And suddenly I had a chronic illness I didn't even know about." (Gounder, 12/12)

KFF Health News: Sticker Shock: Obamacare Customers Confront Premium Spikes As Congress Dithers We've been here before: congressional Democrats and Republicans sparring over the future of the Affordable Care Act. But this time there's an extra complication. Though it's the middle of open enrollment, lawmakers are still debating whether to extend the subsidies that have given consumers extra help paying their health insurance premiums in recent years. (Appleby, 12/12)

KFF Health News: KFF Health News' 'What The Health?': Crunch Time For ACA Tax Credits Congress is running out of time to avert a huge increase in health care premium payments for millions of Americans who buy insurance through the Affordable Care Act marketplaces. Dec. 15 is the deadline to sign up for coverage that begins Jan. 1, and some consumers are waiting to see whether the credits will be extended, enabling them to afford coverage next year. (Rovner, 12/11)

AFFORDABLE CARE ACT

Reuters: Obamacare Health Subsidy To End As US Senate Rejects Dueling Remedies The U.S. Senate on Thursday rejected competing proposals by Republicans and Democrats to address a looming healthcare crisis, leaving some 24 million Americans vulnerable to significantly higher insurance premiums beginning on January 1 when a federal subsidy expires. Barring any late breakthroughs, Congress will begin an end-of-year holiday recess sometime next week and not return until January 5, after new premiums are locked in for those who had relied on the Affordable Care Act enhanced subsidy. (McCaskill and Cowan, 12/12)

The Hill: 4 GOP Senators Break Ranks To Vote For Democratic Extension Of ObamaCare Subsidies Four Republican senators, including two vulnerable incumbents who are up for reelection next year, broke ranks Thursday and voted for a three-year extension of enhanced health insurance premium subsidies under the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine), Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska) and Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) all voted for the Democratic proposal, which was introduced by Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (N.Y.). (Bolton, 12/11)

Time: What The End Of Obamacare Subsidies Could Mean For Your Health Coverage The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) also estimates that, with ACA expirations, about 4 million more people would become uninsured than would otherwise be the case. This increased uninsured rate could have various consequences, including higher Medicare costs and strains on hospitals nationwide. (Schneid, 12/11)

NBC News: With ACA Premium Hikes, Many Are Opting For No Coverage Or Cheaper Plans More people appear to be walking away from Affordable Care Act coverage or switching to cheaper plans for 2026 compared to this time last year, according to early enrollment data from several states. State health officials in New York, Pennsylvania, Idaho, Colorado and California shared numbers from the first month of ACA open enrollment, which began Nov. 1 and runs through Jan. 15 in most states. Idaho opened two weeks earlier. (Lovelace Jr., 12/11)

VACCINES

CNN: FDA Intends To Put Its Most Serious Warning On Covid Vaccines, Sources Say The US Food and Drug Administration intends to put a "black box" warning on Covid-19 vaccines, according to two people familiar with the agency's plans. (Tinker, Goodman and Tirrell, 12/12)

The Hill: New Chair Of CDC Vaccine Panel Fired From Pediatric Practice, Wife Says The wife of the newly appointed chair of the vaccine advisory panel that recently voted to roll back infant hepatitis B vaccination guidelines said Thursday that he had been fired from his pediatric cardiology practice because of his position on the committee. Kimberly Milhoan, the wife of the recently appointed chair of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Kirk Milhoan, wrote on her Substack post titled "Irony" that she and her husband were in Hong Kong this week for the World Congress of Pediatric Cardiology and Cardiac Surgery. (Choi, 12/11)

The New York Times: Covid Vaccines Reduced Children's Likelihood Of E.R. And Urgent Care Visits, The C.D.C. Reported Covid vaccines administered last fall sharply decreased the risk of emergency department and urgent care visits in children, according to new data released on Thursday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The data, published in the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, the agency's premier publication provided a striking counterpoint to the Trump administration's recent rhetoric about the vaccines. (Mandavilli, 12/11)

CIDRAP: In Call With Clinicians, CDC Recommends Flu Vaccines Widely Today the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) hosted its first Clinician Outreach and Communication Activity (COCA) call since September, focusing on seasonal influenza activity and vaccination, especially the importance of vaccinating children. "The time to get vaccinated is right now for those 6 months and older. [Flu] rates are increasing," said Tim Uyeki, MD, MPH, MPP, the chief medical officer of the Influenza Division at CDC. (Soucheray, 12/11)

CIDRAP: WHO Expert Panel Reaffirms No Link Between Vaccines And Autism A new analysis released today by the World Health Organization's (WHO's) Global Advisory Committee on Vaccine Safety (GACVS) suggests that, based on the available evidence, there is no causal association between vaccines and autism spectrum disorders (ASD), reaffirming decades of evidence supporting the safety of childhood immunizations. ... The committee examined two claims: that thiomersal-containing vaccines are associated with an increased risk of ASD and that vaccines in general contribute to autism diagnoses. (Bergeson, 12/11)

ProPublica: Sen. Ron Johnson Endorses Book Touting Chlorine Dioxide's Unproven Health Benefits For years, Sen. Ron Johnson has been spreading conspiracy theories and misinformation about COVID-19 and the safety of vaccines. He's promoted disproven treatments for COVID-19 and claimed, without evidence, that athletes are "dropping dead on the field" after getting the COVID-19 vaccination. Now the Wisconsin politician is endorsing a book by a discredited doctor promoting an unproven and dangerous treatment for autism and a host of ailments: chlorine dioxide, a chemical used for disinfecting and bleaching. (O'Matz, 12/11)

Florida Trident: Workshop On Repealing Florida Vaccine Mandates Draws National Attention Amid a post-Thanksgiving outbreak of measles in South Carolina — reporting 111 infections through Thursday morning — Florida pediatricians this week said vaccine hesitancy is growing among parents of their young patients. They say confusion is fueled by Florida's top public health officer, Dr. Joseph Ladapo, and the nation's highest-ranking vaccine skeptic, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., secretary of U.S. Health and Human Services. (Cassels, 12/11)

MORE ON THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION

Stat: SAMSHA Acting Chief, Art Kleinschmidt, To Leave His Post Friday Art Kleinschmidt, the official serving as the de facto head of the federal agency overseeing mental health and addiction treatment, is leaving his post on Friday, according to an email reviewed by STAT. (Facher, 12/11)

The Hill: Donald Trump Awards $208M Mental Health Grants To Schools The Education Department announced Thursday it is handing out $208 million in grants to the Mental Health Service Professional Demonstration and School-Based Mental Health programs. The announcement comes after the department canceled more than 200 grants for mental health funding in schools from the Biden administration era. (Lonas Cochran, 12/11)

CNN: FDA Proposes Adding Sunscreen Ingredient Commonly Used In Europe, Asia To List Of Permitted Products A new proposal from the US Food and Drug administration would allow sunscreens in the United States to include an active ingredient already commonly used in Europe, Australia and parts of Asia. (McPhillips, 12/11)

Roll Call: With Executive Order, Trump Moves To Undo State AI Laws President Donald Trump signed an executive order Thursday evening that seeks to challenge state laws on artificial intelligence and withhold certain grant funds for states with AI laws the administration dislikes. The effort could be a significant victory for major technology companies but is almost certain to be challenged in court. (Mollenkamp, 12/11)

FEDERAL FUNDING

Bloomberg: US Health Deal Halted By Kenyan Court On Privacy Concerns A new US health deal with Kenya was temporarily frozen by a court in the East African nation after a lobby group raised data-privacy concerns, even as President Donald Trump approaches more African countries with similar pacts. The High Court restrained Kenya's government from sharing any medical, epidemiological or sensitive personal health data, stopping the authorities from implementing the $1.6 billion health cooperation framework signed last week. (Herbling, 12/11)

Politico: Bill Gates Won't Sugarcoat It: Slashing Global Aid Fueled A Surge Of Death o this day, Bill Gates remains a relatively mild-mannered, non-political guy. But he's also not going to ignore reality. For the first time in 25 years, the number of child deaths is on track to rise from the previous year, to the tune of an additional 200,000 deaths, according to the Gates Foundation. And it's not a coincidence, he says, that it's coming after the Trump administration and other wealthy countries slashed foreign aid at the beginning of the year. (Burns, 12/12)

PHARMACEUTICALS

Stat: Lancet Study Shows New Antibiotic Effective Against Gonorrhea A single-dose oral antibiotic from a new class of drugs was as effective as the previous standard of care at treating uncomplicated urogenital gonorrhea, a study published Thursday in The Lancet reported. If approved for use, zoliflodacin would be a welcome addition to an armamentarium that contains precious few tools to treat Neisseria gonorrhoeae, the wily bacterium that causes the infection. (Branswell, 12/11)

The New York Times: Major Weight Loss And Knee-Pain Relief Seen With New Eli Lilly Drug People with obesity and arthritis taking an experimental obesity drug made by Eli Lilly lost more weight than with any drug now on the market, and they reported relief from their arthritis symptoms, the company announced on Thursday. The drug, retatrutide, is a next-generation obesity and diabetes medication from Eli Lilly, which already sells Mounjaro for diabetes and Zepbound for weight loss. These drugs catapulted Lilly in November into becoming the first medical company to hit a trillion-dollar valuation. (Kolata, 12/11)

NBC News: Triple-Negative Breast Cancer Vaccine Shows Promise In Early Clinical Trial When Chase Johnson was 31, her dog began acting strange. He was anxious, wouldn't leave her side and, one day, pushed his nose into the side of her breast. Johnson felt a hard lump. "I wasn't someone who was good at doing self-exams, I don't think I would have found it otherwise," Johnson, now 36, of Cary, North Carolina, said. "I had no family history of breast cancer." Johnson was diagnosed in February 2021 with triple-negative breast cancer, an aggressive type of the disease that tends to grow quickly and spread to other parts of the body. (Sullivan, 12/11)

Bloomberg: Abbott Presses Congress For Legal Shield Over Preemie Baby Formula Lawsuits The company that makes one of the two most widely used brands of formula for premature babies is threatening to stop. That is, unless US health officials and Congress help protect it from lawsuits related to infant deaths allegedly tied to its product. It's a warning that holds particular power over policy makers and legislators who've become acutely aware of the fragility of a baby formula market that's been mired in recent scandals. The biggest players in the market have struggled with shortages in recent years, and a popular upstart is under scrutiny for a botulism outbreak. (Edney, 12/11)

CIDRAP: Study Links Baloxavir To Lower Hospitalization Risk In Flu Outpatients A large retrospective cohort analysis of real-world electronic health record data suggests that baloxavir (Xofluza) may reduce hospitalizations and emergency department (ED) visits more effectively than oseltamivir (Tamiflu) in patients treated for influenza. The study, published in the International Journal of Infectious Diseases, compared outcomes among more than 75,000 US patients, offering new insights on the effectiveness of these two antiviral drugs. (Bergeson, 12/11)

HEALTH CARE INDUSTRY

Modern Healthcare: New CMS Payment Model Funds Nonconventional Health Interventions The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services will devote about $100 million to support chronic disease initiatives for fee-for-service Medicare beneficiaries, the agency announced Thursday. The Make America Healthy Again: Enhancing Lifestyle and Evaluating Value-based Approaches Through Evidence, or MAHA ELEVATE. MAHA ELEVATE is the latest in a slew of new payment models from CMS, joining others focused on digital health, chronic conditions and prior authorizations. (Early, 12/11)

Axios: Big Insurers Provide Incomplete Transparency Data: Study Three of the nation's biggest health insurers have provided an incomplete picture of their negotiated prices in transparency data that's required by federal rules, according to a new analysis. The partial disclosures by UnitedHealthcare, Aetna and Cigna could leave employers in the dark when shopping for workplace coverage, per the analysis in the American Journal of Managed Care. (Goldman, 12/11)

The CT Mirror: CT Officials Approve HHC Purchase Of 2 Prospect Hospitals The Connecticut Office of Health Strategy on Wednesday evening approved an $86.1 million deal for Hartford HealthCare to purchase Manchester Memorial and Rockville General, two struggling hospitals owned by bankrupt hospital operator, Prospect Medical Holdings. (Golvala, 12/11)

Modern Healthcare: Highmark Health, BCBS Kansas City Propose Affiliation Plan Highmark Health has proposed an affiliation with Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Kansas City that would give it a foothold outside the East Coast for the first time. Operationally, the proposed deal resembles an acquisition, except that no cash will change hands. Together, the nonprofit Blue Cross Blue Shield insurers would cover 8.1 million commercial, Medicaid and Medicare members across six states. (Tepper, 12/11)

Iowa Public Radio: UnityPoint Nurses Await Results Of Union Vote As Ballots Are Challenged This week, UnityPoint nurses in Des Moines voted on whether to form a union, but the results are still undetermined after hundreds of ballots were challenged for their validity. Following the vote on Sunday, Monday and Tuesday, 871 UnityPoint nurses voted for the union, while 666 voted against it. However, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, which is leading the unionization effort, said they are challenging the validity of another 251 ballots. This means the results of the election will be undetermined until the National Labor Relations Board can review the challenged ballots to see if they should be counted. (Krebs, 12/11)

Modern Healthcare: How This Adventist Hospital Improved Its Leapfrog Safety Grades Adventist Health Specialty Bakersfield earned an "A" in The Leapfrog Group's Hospital Safety Grade report in the fall of 2023, several months after the system bought the California facility. ... Identifying and correcting the issues that caused the slumping performance demonstrates the challenges executives face at a time of industry consolidation and what can fall by the wayside as a new facility is brought into the fold. (DeSilva, 12/11)

STATE WATCH

WUSF: DeSantis' 2026-27 Budget Proposal Includes $4.1 Billion For Health Care Gov. Ron DeSantis' $117 billion state budget proposal for 2026-27 includes $4.1 billion for health care, with major investments in cancer research, emergency medical innovation and public health infrastructure. The largest slice is a $277.5 million package for cancer research. (Mayer, 12/11)

The CT Mirror: Lamont Pledges $70M For Health Care After US Senate Deadlocks Connecticut will spend $70 million to partly offset the looming loss of $295 million in enhanced federal tax credits that subsidize health insurance premiums for tens of thousands of residents under the Affordable Care Act, Gov. Ned Lamont said Thursday. (Pazniokas and Hagen, 12/11)

The (Cleveland) Plain Dealer: Northeast Ohio Hospitals Spent $1.2 Billion On Community Benefits In 2024 Three Northeast Ohio hospitals — University Hospitals, MetroHealth System and Summa Health —collectively spent $1.23 billion to benefit their communities in Northeast Ohio in 2024, according to reports recently released by the health systems. (Washington, 12/12)

San Francisco Chronicle: Santa Clara Sales Tax Hike To Fund Hospitals Certified Santa Clara County has certified a voter-approved increase in sales tax to help fund local hospitals — one of the first counties to adopt such an approach to offset major cuts in federal health care spending. The county Registrar of Voters certified Measure A, which passed with 57% of the vote in the Nov. 4 election and will raise local sales tax by five-eights of a cent (0.625%) for five years. The Board of Supervisors approved the results of the election on Tuesday. (Ho, 12/11)

Bloomberg: Texas Files Antitrust Suit Against Epic Systems Over Health Data Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton sued Epic Systems Corp. for antitrust violations, accusing the healthcare software company of leveraging its control over patient medical records to maintain dominance in the market. The lawsuit, filed Wednesday in state court in Texas, claims that the software giant is the dominant provider of electronic health records, or EHS, in the US and uses that position to run an "anticompetitive playbook" that harms competitors and prevents hospitals and patients from accessing key data. (Mekelburg, 12/11)

Mississippi Today: Senate Group Vets Ideas For How Mississippi Should Act On Health Of Women, Children And Families Advocates and state agency directors pitched recommendations to lawmakers Tuesday on how to prioritize legislative funds for the health and well-being of women, children and families during the upcoming legislative session. The nine-member Senate Study Group on Women, Children and Families, chaired by Sen. Nicole Boyd, a Republican from Oxford, was formed in 2022 after the overturning of Roe v. Wade. The group's mission was designed to make the state safer for moms and babies. (Paffenroth, 12/11)

San Francisco Chronicle: S.F. Firefighters Get New Gear Free Of Cancer-Causing Chemicals The San Francisco Fire Department will soon be fully equipped with new gear made free from chemicals known to cause cancer, making the city the largest in the country to reach such a milestone. Standing in front of dozens of SFFD recruits sporting the new yellow-striped uniforms, Mayor Daniel Lurie and Fire Chief Dean Crispen celebrated the achievement as the result of a collaborative, years-long push for safer equipment and better health outcomes for firefighters. (Bauman, 12/11)

Newsweek: Oregon Sets Unwanted Whooping Cough Record Oregon has seen a record-high number of cases of whooping cough, also known as pertussis, this year, prompting concern about the risks posed to vulnerable populations. On December 10, the Oregon Health Authority (OHA) recorded 1,475 reported annual cases of whooping cough, breaking the state's record of 1,420 that was set in 1950. (Laws, 12/11)

GLOBAL WATCH

CIDRAP: Spain Reports First Known Human-To-Human Mpox Clade 1b Transmission Outside Africa Health officials in Spain have documented what appears to be the first case of human-to-human transmission of mpox clade 1b outside of endemic regions in Africa without any known travel link. (Bergeson, 12/11)

The New York Times: Reddit Sues Australian Government To Block Social Media Ban Reddit, the internet message board site, said Friday that it had filed a lawsuit in Australia's highest court seeking to block the country's new law banning social media accounts for children under 16, contending it infringes on children's rights to political communication. The case, along with an earlier lawsuit filed by two teenagers, sets the stage for the High Court of Australia to weigh in on some of the questions that have shrouded the legislation ever since it was first passed a year ago. Those include whether it impinges on children's rights, whether it will be able to protect children as intended and what even should be classified as a social media service. (Kim, 12/11)

The New York Times: King Charles To Speak About His Cancer In Televised Message A prerecorded video message from King Charles III will air on British television on Friday, sharing a rare update on his health since his diagnosis with an unspecified type of cancer last year. The king, 77, will address his "recovery journey" in the video and will emphasize the importance of screenings to detect cancer early, Buckingham Palace said in a statement. (Regalado, 12/12)

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