Gregg's Top Three Health Policy Articles

Health policy impacts everyone, but it can be hard to know what is important.  If you can only read three things about health policy this week, I suggest...

The Top Three...

Reuters: Factbox: What's In Republican McCarthy's Debt-Limit Spending Cut Package? Childless adults up to 56 who get health insurance through Medicaid, which covers low-income people, would have to work at least 80 hours a month or participate in job training or community service. Likewise, childless adults up to 56 years old who receive food assistance through the SNAP program would lose benefits after three months if they could not prove they were working at least 20 hours a week or participating in a job training program. Those work requirements currently apply to those up to 50 years old. (4/20

AP: Supreme Court Set To Decide On Access To Abortion Pill The Supreme Court is facing a self-imposed Friday night deadline to decide whether women’s access to a widely used abortion pill will stay unchanged or be restricted while a legal challenge to its Food and Drug Administration approval goes on. The justices are weighing arguments that allowing restrictions contained in lower-court rulings to take effect would severely disrupt the availability of the drug, mifepristone, which is used in the most common abortion method in the United States. (Sherman, 4/21)

The Wall Street Journal: White House Close To Nominating Monica Bertagnolli For Top NIH Job The White House could change its plans. If it goes ahead with the nomination and the Senate confirms Dr. Bertagnolli, she would take the helm of a federal research agency whose cadre of scientists and $47 billion budget give it a powerful role in investigating diseases and exploring new treatments. ... The Biden administration previously had eyed external candidates for the job, but at least two backed out, The Wall Street Journal has reported. Among the factors deterring interest, people familiar with the matter said, were relatively low pay compared with what the private sector offers and the chance a new president could get elected and want to pick a different leader. (Whyte, 4/19)

For a Deeper Dive...

Modern Healthcare: ACA Insurers Must Include Mental Health Providers In Plans: CMS The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services will require insurers on the Affordable Care Act exchanges to include substance abuse and mental health providers in their plans, among other things. The final rule, announced Monday, softens CMS' proposed limits to the number of plan options exchange insurers can offer, and abandons agency proposals to standardize how carriers promote their drug formularies and differentiate between similar plans in a given market. It also decreases the fees insurers must pay to market their products on federal and state-based exchanges. (Tepper and Turner, 4/17

Politico: Lost On Abortion Politics, Republicans Struggle For A Solution The GOP is so divided over abortion politics that even top Mitch McConnell allies — who could succeed him as Senate leader — have opposing ideas on how to approach it. Minority Whip John Thune sees a 15-week national abortion ban as something Republicans can defend amidst Democratic attacks. Another possible GOP leader, John Cornyn of Texas, doesn’t see a need for Congress to weigh in on abortion policy in a post-Roe world. And GOP No. 3 John Barrasso said simply that “states ought to make the decision.” (Everett, 4/20)

USA Today: As States Cut Medicaid, Some Fear They'll Mistakenly End Coverage For Millions Of Eligible People Advocates warn states that accelerating this unwinding will make mistakes in what promises to be the largest bureaucratic lift in government health insurance coverage since the Affordable Care Act launched state Medicaid expansions a decade ago. The federal government estimates 8.2 million are no longer eligible, but 6.8 million could lose coverage even though they still qualify. (Alltucker, 4/19)

The Washington Post: House GOP Unveils Bill To Cut Spending, Lift Debt Ceiling. Here’s How. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) on Wednesday unveiled a bill to raise the debt ceiling into next year, slash federal spending by roughly $130 billion and unwind some of President Biden’s priorities and recent legislative accomplishments, including his program to cancel college student debt. ... The spending reductions probably would target federal health care, science, education, climate, energy, labor and research programs, while leaving untouched the Pentagon and services for veterans. But the bill does not specify the exact agencies or programs on the chopping block. (Romm, 4/19)

Reuters: People Lost Faith In Childhood Vaccines During COVID Pandemic, UNICEF Says People all over the world lost confidence in the importance of routine childhood vaccines against killer diseases like measles and polio during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a new report from UNICEF. In 52 of the 55 countries surveyed, the public perception of vaccines for children declined between 2019 and 2021, the UN agency said. (Rigby and Farge, 4/19)

Modern Healthcare: HIMSS 2023: Epic, Microsoft Bring OpenAI's GPT-4 To EHRs Epic Systems is working with Microsoft to integrate generative AI technology into its electronic health record software for the first time, the companies said Monday. The announcement was made in conjunction with the first day of the HIMSS conference, which is being held in Chicago this week. (Turner, 4/17)

Fierce Healthcare: 800,000 Nurses Say They Plan To Leave The Profession By 2027 Nearly 100,000 registered nurses were estimated to have left the field during the COVID-19 pandemic and almost 800,000 intend to follow them out by 2027, according to a survey analysis released Thursday by the National Council of State Boards of Nursing (NCSBN). (Muoio, 4/14)

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For the Visual Among Us...

A few years ago I started a weekly e-mail for friends and colleagues who want to keep up on major federal health policy developments but did not have time to plod through all the minutiae--they were busy doing important things like running organizations and taking care of patients!  Much to my surprise, it became pretty popular.  I have now converted to a weekly newsletter format so you can manage your own subscription preferences and forward to others that might be interested.  

These summaries represent my judgement on health policy issues that may not on the front pages, but are relevant to clinicians, administrators, and educators.  I monitor many news sources and clipping services to identify content for this newsletter and I try hard to be as factual, balanced, and non-partisan as possible.  While the articles are written by others (with credit attributed), the choice of what to include is entirely mine.  If you are interested in receiving a daily summary of health policy news, you might consider signing up for the KHN Morning Briefing.  If you enjoy podcasts, I suggest What the Health?

-Gregg S. Margolis, PhD