The Host
With Medicare and Social Security apparently off the desk for federal price range cuts, the main focus has turned to Medicaid, the federal-state well being program for these with low incomes. President Joe Biden has made it clear he desires to guard this system, together with the Affordable Care Act, however Republicans will seemingly suggest cuts to each once they current a proposed price range within the subsequent a number of weeks.
Meanwhile, confusion over abortion restrictions continues, significantly on the FDA. One lawsuit in Texas requires a federal choose to briefly halt distribution of the abortion tablet mifepristone. A separate swimsuit, although, asks a unique federal choose to briefly make the drug simpler to get, by eradicating a few of the FDA’s security restrictions.
This week’s panelists are Julie Rovner of Kaiser Health News, Alice Miranda Ollstein of Politico, Rachel Cohrs of STAT News, and Lauren Weber of The Washington Post.
Among the takeaways from this week’s episode:
- States are working to evaluate Medicaid eligibility for tens of millions of individuals as pandemic-era protection guidelines lapse on the finish of March, amid fears that many Americans kicked off Medicaid who’re eligible without cost or near-free protection beneath the ACA received’t know their choices and can go uninsured.
- Biden promised this week to cease Republicans from “gutting” Medicaid and the ACA. But not all Republicans are on board with cuts to Medicaid. Between the occasion’s slender majority within the House and the truth that Medicaid pays for nursing houses for a lot of seniors, slicing this system is a politically dicey transfer.
- A nationwide group that pushed the usage of ivermectin to deal with covid-19 is now hyping the drug as a remedy for flu and RSV — regardless of an absence of medical proof to assist their claims that it’s efficient in opposition to any of these diseases. Nonetheless, there’s a motion of individuals, a lot of them docs, who consider ivermectin works.
- In reproductive well being information, a federal choose just lately dominated {that a} Texas regulation can’t be used to prosecute teams that assist ladies journey out of state to acquire abortions. And the abortion challenge has highlighted the function of attorneys common across the nation — politicizing a previously nonpartisan state put up. –And Eli Lilly introduced plans to chop the value of some insulin merchandise and cap out-of-pocket prices, although their causes is probably not utterly altruistic: An professional identified {that a} change to Medicaid rebates subsequent yr means drugmakers quickly must pay the federal government each time a affected person fills a prescription for insulin, that means Eli Lilly’s plan might save the corporate cash.
Plus, for “extra credit,” the panelists counsel well being coverage tales they learn this week that they suppose you need to learn, too:
Julie Rovner: The New York Times’ “A Drug Company Exploited a Safety Requirement to Make Money,” by Rebecca Robbins.
Alice Miranda Ollstein: The New York Times’ “Alone and Exploited, Migrant Children Work Brutal Jobs Across the U.S.,” by Hannah Dreier.
Rachel Cohrs: STAT News’ “Nonprofit Hospitals Are Failing Americans. Their Boards May Be a Reason Why,” by Sanjay Kishore and Suhas Gondi.
Lauren Weber: KHN and CBS News’ “This Dental Device Was Sold to Fix Patients’ Jaws. Lawsuits Claim It Wrecked Their Teeth,” by Brett Kelman and Anna Werner.
Also talked about on this week’s podcast:
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