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First Edition

Today's early morning highlights from the major news organizations.

KFF HEALTH NEWS ORIGINAL STORIES

KFF Health News: When Natural Disasters Strike, Another Crisis Hits Those Recovering From Opioid Addiction A day after Hurricane Helene ripped through western North Carolina in late September 2024, Toni Brewer had no power or water. The storm had strewn fallen trees across most roads, wiped out phone and internet communications, and put some neighborhoods near her Asheville home underwater. Brewer cleared out the food in her refrigerator, grabbed some clothes, and drove more than an hour southwest with her partner to Franklin, to stay with relatives. (Jones, 4/30)

KFF Health News: States Rush To Figure Out How To Enforce Trump’s Medicaid Work Requirements State officials remain uncertain on how to enforce a requirement that many adult Medicaid enrollees show they’re working — even as one state launches its program this week — and they’re taking a variety of approaches to the job, including, in a handful of states, using artificial intelligence. A KFF survey of Medicaid officials from 42 states and the District of Columbia offers insights into key policy decisions state officials face as the Jan. 1, 2027, deadline for implementing the work requirement nears. Lingering questions include which diseases and illnesses will qualify Medicaid beneficiaries for exemptions and how to automate compliance verification. (Spears, 4/30)

RACE AND FEDERAL POLICY

The Washington Post: Voting Rights Ruling Could Deliver GOP A Host Of House Seats In 2028 The Supreme Court’s decision limiting the Voting Rights Act inflames an already raging partisan war over congressional districts and is expected to lead to a House with far fewer Black members. Republicans could use Wednesday’s ruling to capture a few more seats in this fall’s midterm elections but do not have enough time to immediately take full advantage of it. For the 2028 elections, they could capitalize on the decision to give themselves a dozen or so seats. (Marley, Cox and Meyer, 4/30)

The New York Times: Some Black Southerners Say Voting Rights Ruling ‘Missed The Mark’ Veterans of the civil rights movement and others said the Supreme Court decision felt like a bleak end to decades of gains in Black representation in the region. (Burch and Cochrane, 4/30)

The Washington Post: Louisiana Governor Plans To Postpone House Primaries After Supreme Court Ruling Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry (R) told Republican House candidates Wednesday that he plans to suspend next month’s primary elections so state lawmakers can pass a new congressional map first, according to two people with knowledge of the calls.... Landry’s announcement to suspend the May 16 primary could come as early as Friday — one day before early voting is to begin, according to people familiar with his plans who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations. Election officials sent ballots to overseas voters weeks ago. It’s unclear whether the governor’s suspension would apply only to primaries for the six House seats, or include other elections, including the heated Senate primary that pits incumbent Sen. Bill Cassidy (R) against Rep. Julia Letlow (R). Louisiana has six House seats, two of which are held by Democrats. (Merica and Marley, 4/29)

GUN VIOLENCE EPIDEMIC

CNN: Justice Department Seeks To Roll Back Gun Control Measures Days After Trump Assassination Attempt Days after a gunman charged security at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner in what investigators say was an attempt to kill President Donald Trump with legally owned firearms, his Justice Department is seeking to further roll back gun control measures. The administration is proposing 34 new rules. (Lybrand and Rabinowitz, 4/29)

CNN: No Gun Debate After White House Correspondents’ Dinner Shooting Unlike after President Reagan was shot in 1981, there’s been no sign of a fresh gun debate after an armed man attempted to storm a dinner featuring President Trump. (Bradner, 4/30)

ABORTION

AP: Supreme Court Backs Anti-Abortion Center Raising First Amendment Fears The Supreme Court on Wednesday sided with a faith-based pregnancy center that raised First Amendment concerns about an investigation into whether it misled people to discourage abortions. The high court’s unanimous ruling is a procedural victory for First Choice Women’s Resource Centers, which is challenging a New Jersey investigation of its practices. (Whitehurst, 4/29)

THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION

Stat: FDA Tests 16 Brands Of Baby Formula, Affirms Their Safety The FDA tested 312 samples from 16 infant formula brands for contaminants like heavy metals, pesticides, and the “forever chemicals” known as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS. The vast majority had undetectable or very low levels of contaminants, the agency said, with levels of lead, mercury, cadmium, and arsenic coming in below federal requirements for drinking water across all samples. (Todd, 4/29)

Stat: NIH Grants Are More Competitive And Complicated The likelihood of snagging National Institutes of Health grants has plunged to historic lows, forcing frustrated academic researchers to resort to a variety of tactics to try to obtain funding and, in some cases, keep their jobs, according to a nationwide STAT survey and follow-up interviews with respondents. (Oza, 4/30)

Capital & Main: Family Seeks Answers On Afghan Man’s Death In ICE Custody When Naseer Paktiawal found out that his older brother was not feeling well after being taken into Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody in mid-March, he called an ambulance. Paktiawal said he watched the ambulance drive up to the Dallas facility where ICE processes people its officers have arrested. Later, he said he received another call from his brother, who told him that his condition was worsening and that the medics never checked on him. (Morrissey, 4/29)

VACCINES AND OUTBREAKS

NBC News: Trump Administration Appeals Ruling That Blocked RKF Jr.'s Vaccine Overhaul The Trump administration has appealed a Massachusetts federal judge’s ruling that blocked Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s recent overhaul of the nation’s childhood vaccine schedule. A filing Wednesday evening in the District of Massachusetts indicates the administration is appealing Judge Brian Murphy’s order March 16. Murphy put any decisions made by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s vaccine advisory committee on hold, ruling that Kennedy replaced the committee “unlawfully.” (Edwards and Grumbach, 4/30)

CIDRAP: RFK Jr Holding Up Distribution Of $600 Million In Vaccines To Foreign Nations: Report New reporting from Politico says the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) under Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is holding up $600 million in funds that Congress has appropriated for the use of vaccines in low-income countries. The move is intended to put pressure on Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, the report said. Gavi said it has not received any funding for this year or last year, and the missing funds make up 15% of its operating budget. (Soucheray, 4/29)

ABC News: CDC Warns Additional Measles Cases In US Are Expected Amid Upcoming Travel Season With a busy travel season approaching, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is warning that additional measles cases in the U.S. can be expected over the next few months. The agency sent the alert to state and local health departments, reminding them to report measles cases to the CDC within 24 hours and to have measles cases reported in hospitals and to public health authorities.The CDC has encouraged public health departments to conduct contact tracing for exposed individuals as well as perform outreach to under-vaccinated communities. (Benadjaoud and Kekatos, 4/29)

CBS News: Cases Of Highly Contagious Rotavirus Increasing Among Children, Pittsburgh Doctor Says Allegheny Health Network Chair of Pediatrics Dr. Joseph Aracri said cases of the highly contagious rotavirus among local children are increasing. The uptick usually happens every year, but the increase is usually in February and March. "It's been coming through the emergency room and urgent cares, and we're getting a lot of phone calls about it," Dr. Aracri said. "I don't think we're seeing much more than we usually do; we're just seeing it later in the season." (Linder, 4/29)

CBS News: Pasadena Confirms Whooping Cough Outbreak At Don Benito Fundamental School Pasadena public health officials confirmed a whooping cough outbreak at Don Benito Fundamental School, which is near Eaton Canyon. Scientists detected four confirmed cases of pertussis, better known as whooping cough, according to the Pasadena Public Health Department. Officials said they are working closely with the Pasadena Unified School District to monitor for additional cases. (Rodriguez, 4/29)

HEALTHCARE INDUSTRY

The (Cleveland) Plain Dealer: MetroHealth Staff Push For Immediate Unionization Amid Burnout Seeking relief from what they describe as unsustainable workloads, MetroHealth System union organizers asked hospital leadership Tuesday to immediately recognize a proposed union for primary caregivers. If MetroHealth recognizes the union, bargaining could begin without the need for a vote, said organizers who announced their request during a Tuesday evening rally. (Washington, 4/29)

Modern Healthcare: Humana Shifts Stance On Medicare Advantage Benefit Cuts Humana had been a holdout when it came to cutting back on supplemental Medicare Advantage benefits. Not anymore. Humana President and CEO Jim Rechtin told investor analysts Tuesday that the second-leading Medicare Advantage insurer by membership will streamline its offerings next year to shrink the gap between its expenses and federal payments. “The priority is not growth. The priority is, number one, being on track for 2028,” Rechtin said during a call to announce the company’s first-quarter financial results. (Tepper, 4/29)

Modern Healthcare: HRSA 340B Rebate Pilot Query Splits Hospitals, Drugmakers As federal regulators consider whether to implement a hotly contested 340B Drug Pricing Program rebate experiment, providers and drugmakers are speaking out on opposite sides of the debate. The 340B program requires drugmakers to sell outpatient medications to hospitals, community health centers and other safety-net providers for 25%-50% below list price as a condition of Medicaid covering their medicines. (Early, 4/29)

Modern Healthcare: PBMs Lean On Private Label Biosimilars To Cut Drug Costs Healthcare conglomerates that dominate the pharmacy benefit manager market have gotten into the biosimilars business. Companies such as CVS Caremark owner CVS Health, Optum Rx owner UnitedHealth Group and Express Scripts owner Cigna seek to harness demand for lower-cost versions of biologic drugs and bolster their profits by establishing or repurposing overseas subsidiaries to produce private label biosimilars. (Tong, 4/29)

Undark: A 2022 Law May Be Quietly Helping People Stay On Their Meds When it comes to prescription drugs, the Inflation Reduction Act may be best known for giving the federal government the authority to directly negotiate prices on behalf of people with Medicare. But a less-publicized measure written into the 2022 law could turn out to be more impactful. It’s the annual cap on out-of-pocket spending for medication, which went into effect in 2024. This change offers a much greater degree of protection to high-cost patients because it caps their annual spending at $2,100. At the same time, it has led to a substantial increase in spending by Medicare on prescription drugs. (Cohen, 4/29)

Newsweek: Medical Misdiagnosis Costs Billions—Women Often Pay More Medical misdiagnosis costs hundreds of billions of dollars each year in the U.S., a financial burden that quietly drains household finances—especially for women, who are more likely to face years of repeat appointments, tests, and prescriptions before getting the right answer. For many, this means hundreds or thousands of dollars in extra bills each year, often for care that doesn’t resolve their symptoms. The average American family spends around 11 percent of their household income on healthcare premiums and out-of-pocket costs, according to the law firm High Rise Financial. (Laws, 4/30)

PHARMA AND TECH

Stat: Supreme Court Justices Debate 'Skinny Labeling' After months of anticipation, Supreme Court justices heard arguments about a long-standing tactic used by generic companies to carve out a distinct market for a medicine, and did not appear inclined to alter legal standards for the maneuver. (Silverman, 4/29)

MedPage Today: Find Alternative To Glucometers Linked With 114 Injuries, FDA Says Patients using recalled True Metrix blood glucose monitoring systems linked to one death and over 100 serious injuries should switch to an alternative testing method when possible, the FDA said on Tuesday. (Monaco, 4/29)

NPR: A Fast And Accurate TB Test That Doesn't Need Phlegm TB or not TB? That has been the question for nearly 150 years, when Dr. Robert Koch first identified the rod-shaped bacterium that causes tuberculosis. This serious respiratory illness is currently the world's deadliest infectious disease, killing more than a million people a year. The most common test to determine if someone has tuberculosis hasn't really changed since the late 1800s. The process relies on phlegm. (Daniel, 4/29)

Medical Xpress: One Of The World's Most Common Knee Surgeries Does Not Help And May Even Be Harmful A 10-year follow-up study has revealed that, compared to sham surgery, partial meniscectomy did not improve patients' symptoms or function. On the contrary, the 10-year follow-up of patients who had undergone partial meniscectomy found them to have more symptoms, more reduced function, increased progression of osteoarthritis and a higher probability of subsequent knee surgery when compared to sham surgery. (4/29)

Bloomberg: US Brain Implant Company Axoft Tests On Patient In China, Raises More Money A US company has tested a brain implant in a Chinese patient in Shanghai, a rare sign of cooperation as the two countries compete to develop the most advanced neurotechnology. The company, Axoft, also said on Wednesday it raised $55 million. It’s tested its device temporarily in 11 patients, including the one in Shanghai, Chief Executive Officer Paul Le Floch said. The company plans to study its device in more patients in China this year and is planning multiple clinical trials in the country, he said. (Swetlitz and Tong, 4/29)

Modern Healthcare: Aidoc Raises $150 Million Aidoc, an artificial intelligence-enabled imaging company, announced it has secured $150 million in a Series E funding round. The company has raised more than $500 million in funding with the latest round. Aidoc’s AI-powered model is designed to examine images from CT scans, MRIs and X-rays in order to detect diseases. (Famakinwa, 4/29)

The New York Times: J. Craig Venter, Scientist Who Decoded The Human Genome, Dies At 79 J. Craig Venter, a scientist and entrepreneur who raced to decode the human genome, died on Wednesday in San Diego. He was 79. His death was announced by the J. Craig Venter Institute, a nonprofit research organization founded by Dr. Venter and based in San Diego and Rockville, Md. The institute said in a statement that Dr. Venter had been hospitalized recently for side effects from cancer treatment. (Wade, 4/30)

STATE WATCH

CBS News: Minnesota Senate Approves Funding To Rescue Hennepin Healthcare From Closure The Minnesota Senate on Wednesday cleared $150 million for HCMC hospital in Minneapolis which leaders warn could close in just months if it isn't given a lifeline and fast. The measure to support Hennepin Healthcare—the state's busiest trauma hospital—was part of a health and human services package that the DFL-led Senate approved on a party-line vote. The broader spending bill also includes $115 in stabilization for other hospitals that are facing financial struggles, especially with some looming federal changes coming to Medicaid. (Cummings, 4/29)

The CT Mirror: 2 Babies Relinquished Under CT Safe Haven Law In April In April, two babies were relinquished at Connecticut hospitals under the state’s Safe Havens Act, according to the state Department of Children and Families. The babies were surrendered to Yale New Haven Hospital and Connecticut Children’s at the University of Connecticut Health Center, DCF said. (Bunnell, 4/29)

The Colorado Sun: Colorado Parents Can Turn Over Newborn Babies Up To 30 Days Old Colorado is expanding a law that lets parents leave unharmed newborns at fire stations or hospitals without facing child abandonment charges. Under the new version of the “Safe Haven” law signed this week by Gov. Jared Polis, parents will have 30 days to drop off babies they don’t want to keep. That’s up from just 72 hours. (Brown, 4/29)

CBS News: Colorado To Crack Down On "Highly Problematic," Contaminated Marijuana Products State regulators are putting Colorado's marijuana industry on notice. They're warning bad actors who are bringing hemp‑derived, often chemically-altered products into the state's legal marijuana system that there will be consequences. Regulators say they're seeing the practice more frequently, putting public health at risk while also costing the state tax revenue. Exactly how much money is being lost, however, remains unclear. (Morfitt, 4/29)

San Francisco Chronicle: SF Mayor Lurie Targeted Free Pipes, Foil Last Year. Has It Helped? One year after San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie moved to restrict the distribution of free drug supplies such as foil and pipes, there’s little evidence that the shift has helped meaningfully ease the city’s drug crisis. For decades, San Francisco has embraced a harm reduction strategy, providing free supplies intended to reduce the risks associated with illicit drug use. But last April, Lurie declared that the city had lost its way and needed to pivot as part of a new, tougher crackdown on open air drug use. (Angst, 4/29)

WyoFile: EPA, Conservation Groups: Wyoming’s ‘Impaired’ Water Protocols Run Afoul Of The Clean Water Act Federal environmental regulators and water quality advocates want the Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality to rectify a policy restricting who can submit water samples used to decide whether waters are too polluted and below Clean Water Act standards. Currently, Wyoming only accepts water samples collected by the state and federal government and their subdivisions when it’s directly making “impaired” water determinations — that’s been the case since 2020, according to state officials who in March proposed to continue that policy. (Koshmrl, 4/29)

CBS News: Chemical Leak Prompts Safety Alert At UI Health Campus A leak from a tank at the University of Illinois Chicago's Biologic Resources Laboratory prompted a safety alert Wednesday morning. UIC said there was a chemical spill and leak from a tank at the laboratory building at 1840 W. Taylor St. (Harrington and Kelly, 4/29)

LIFESTYLE AND HEALTH

The Hill: NHTSA Bans Chinese Airbag Inflators Linked To Deaths The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration on Wednesday banned Chinese airbag inflators tied to at least 10 car crash deaths and injured two other people. NHTSA said an investigation revealed that frontal driver airbags exploded, sending large metal fragments into drivers’ chests, necks, eyes and faces. All recorded accidents took place in a GM or Hyundai vehicle, but the NHTSA said it “cannot confirm the risk is limited to these makes and models.” (Fields, 4/29)

CIDRAP: Air Pollution Linked To Recurrent Respiratory Infections In Infants Exposure to common urban air pollutants in the first year of life is associated with a higher burden of respiratory infections and wheezing, according to a longitudinal study led by the Precision Vaccines Program at Boston Children’s Hospital. The findings were presented late last week at the Pediatric Academic Societies 2026 Meeting in Boston. (Bergeson, 4/29)

The Washington Post: Carbon Pollution Is Making Food Less Nutritious And Risking Health Of Billions Surging concentrations of carbon in the atmosphere have produced potent changes in the way plants grow, draining the nutrients from food. (Ahmed and Kaplan, 4/30)

CNN: Even Small Amounts Of Ultraprocessed Foods Increase Risk For Dementia, Study Says Increasing your daily consumption of ultraprocessed foods by 10% — basically the equivalent of a small bag of potato chips — may raise your risk of dementia even if you normally eat a healthy plant-rich diet, according to a new study. (LaMotte, 4/29)

Stat: New Tool Goes Beyond BMI To Identify 18 Obesity Health Risks Body mass index has its limitations, but for now it’s the metric medicine often defaults to when predicting weight-related health problems. A new tool promises to better define who’s at risk for obesity complications, based on measures that include BMI but also family history, diet, current illness, and socioeconomic factors culled from medical records. (Cooney, 4/30)

MedPage Today: CDC Study Reveals A Sleep-Deprived Nation Nearly half of U.S. adults may not be getting enough sleep, CDC survey data suggested. In 2024, 30.5% of adults slept less than 7 hours per night on average, falling short of recommended guidelines, said Amanda Ng, PhD, MPH, of the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) in Hyattsville, Maryland, and co-authors. Only 54.8% of Americans woke feeling well-rested most days or every day, Ng and colleagues reported in NCHS Data Brief. Overall, 15.4% had trouble falling sleep, and 18.1% had trouble staying asleep. Women were more likely than men to have trouble falling and staying asleep, and were less likely than men to wake up well-rested. (George, 4/29)

San Francisco Chronicle: Ghirardelli Recalls More Than A Dozen Products San Francisco-based chocolatier Ghirardelli has issued a voluntary recall of certain powdered beverage mixes after a supplier flagged potential Salmonella contamination in an ingredient, the company said Wednesday. The recall affects more than a dozen bulk products — including chocolate and white frappe mixes, hot cocoa powders and flavored drink bases — that were primarily distributed to restaurants and other food service customers. (Vaziri, 4/29)

GLOBAL WATCH

CBS News: OpenAI Sued By Families Of School Shooting Victims In Canada's Tumbler Ridge Several families of victims of a mass shooting in Canada earlier this year are suing OpenAI and its CEO, Sam Altman, alleging the company's generative AI chatbot, ChatGPT, played a role in the February shooting and that the company should have taken steps to prevent it. "The Tumbler Ridge attack was an entirely foreseeable result of deliberate design choices OpenAI made with full knowledge of where those choices led," the seven suits filed in federal court in San Francisco on Wednesday claim. (Fichten, 4/29)

NPR: Trump's Team Cuts Aid To Family Planning Programs Abroad "I'm on your veranda." That's the text Prossy Muyingo would get each night for years, sent by a 28-year-old standing outside her home in central Uganda. Immediately, Muyingo would pour a glass of water and, from the sideboard in her living room, fetch a birth control pill and bring it outside. "She was swallowing [the pill] from my house," explains Muyingo, who served as a community health worker in Mityana District for 12 years. The woman had told Muyingo that she feared her husband would beat her if he knew about the birth control. (Emanuel, 4/29)

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