WITHIN 10 years, all of the nation’s 74 million baby boomers will be 65 or older. The most senior among them will be on the cusp of 85. Even sooner, by 2025, the number of seniors (65 million) is expected to surpass that of children age 13 and under (58 million) for the first time,…
By Anna Almendrala President Donald Trump, a self-described germophobe, has made no secret of his disgust with California’s growing homeless problem, which he has called a “disgrace” and “inappropriate” and equated to “living in hell.” “We should all work together to clean up these hazardous waste and homeless sites before the whole city rots away,”…
by Christina Jewett The Food and Drug Administration continues to file thousands of reports of patients’ deaths related to medical devices through a reporting system that keeps the safety data out of the public eye. The system is similar to a vast program exposed earlier this year by KHN that kept device-injury reports effectively hidden…
by Julie Rovner A FEDERAL appeals court panel in New Orleans dealt another blow to the Affordable Care Act on Wednesday, December 18, agreeing with a lower-court judge that the portion of the health law requiring most people to have coverage is unconstitutional now that Congress has eliminated the tax penalty that was intended to…
by Phil Galewitz More than $12 billion is at stake for the nation’s health insurers Tuesday, December 10, when the Supreme Court hears another Affordable Care Act case. For the federal government, the potential damages could be far greater, as its reputation as a reliable partner to private businesses is on the line. Unlike earlier…
MORE than two years after California’s surprise-billing law took effect, there’s one thing on which consumer advocates, doctors and insurers all agree: The law has been effective at protecting many people from bills they might have been saddled with from doctors who aren’t in their insurance network. But the consensus stops there. “In general, the…
by Mark Kreidler WE all know that when the power goes out, refrigerators, heaters and air conditioners stop running. Homes go dark, and desktop computers shut down. But those are mere inconveniences. If you need regular dialysis or chemotherapy at a clinic, or you have an infant in a neonatal intensive care unit or a…
by Ana B. Ibarra Starting in January, young adults can sign up for California’s Medicaid program regardless of immigration status. But a fundamental question looms: Will they? Some young people already say they won’t enroll in public coverage because they fear federal immigration policies could later penalize them for participating — though that fear might…
by Phil Galewitz IN the Byzantine world of health care pricing, most people wouldn’t expect that the ubiquitous flu shot could be a prime example of how the system’s lack of transparency can lead to disparate costs. The Affordable Care Act requires health insurers to cover all federally recommended vaccines at no charge to patients,…
by Barbara Feder Ostrov AS huge swaths of California burned last fall, federal health officials descended on 20 California nursing homes to determine whether they were prepared to protect their vulnerable residents from fires, earthquakes and other disasters. The results of their surprise inspections, which took place from September to December of 2018, were disturbing:…
by Ana B. Ibarra AS states and communities rush to ban the sale of flavored tobacco products linked to vaping, Carol McGruder races from town to town, urging officials to include what she calls “the mother lode of all flavors”: menthol. McGruder, co-chair of the African American Tobacco Control Leadership Council, has tried for years…
by Anna Maria Barry-Jester SANTA ROSA, Calif. — Dorothy Hammack had planned to wash her thick, dark hair in the kitchen sink Friday morning. She couldn’t yet shower, due to the incision on her breast from a biopsy a few days before. Her doctor had already called to let her know the results: She had…
by Jocelyn Wiener SOME of California’s most vulnerable nursing home residents, many of whom have nowhere else to go, are receiving letters from their health care plans saying they are no longer eligible for long-term care. In one notable example, three dozen nursing home residents in San Luis Obispo County were informed on the same…
by Bernard Wolfson IF you are among the Californians who buy your own health insurance, a surprise may await you as the enrollment period for 2020 coverage opens this week. Starting Jan. 1, California will become the first state to offer subsidies to middle-income people who make too much money to qualify for the federal…
by Anna Almendrala “I stopped for a few days and then I ended up buying new pods. The withdrawals got to me.” “My friends are the ones who got me into vaping. And they think I shouldn’t stop, but I want to because I don’t want to hurt my family if I get sick.” “I…
by Julie Appleby Vowing to protect Medicare with “every ounce of strength,” President Donald Trump last week spoke to a cheering crowd in Florida. But his executive order released shortly afterward includes provisions that could significantly alter key pillars of the program by making it easier for beneficiaries and doctors to opt out. The bottom…
by Anna Almendrala SHE had been buying face cream through a friend of a friend for 12 years. This time, it was Pond’s “Rejuveness,” a version of the company’s anti-wrinkle cream that is made and sold in Mexico. But someone in the Mexican state of Jalisco laced the cream with a toxic skin-lightening compound, and…
by Michelle Andrews HEALTH insurance premiums and deductibles for job-based coverage edged upward in 2019, surpassing increases in both wages and inflation, according to an annual employer survey of more than 2,000 employers released Wednesday. But the results were uneven, and many workers least able to afford it were confronted with higher-than-average costs. People at…
by Ana B. Ibarra In California, the action is local STATES are piling on. Michigan took the first statewide shot at vaping early this month when it announced a ban on the sale of flavored e-cigarette products. It was soon joined by New York, and Rhode Island jumped in Wednesday. Massachusetts went further, announcing Tuesday…
by Phil Galewitz FOR the first time in a decade, the number of Americans without health insurance has risen — by about 2 million people in 2018 — according to the annual U.S. Census Bureau report released on Tuesday, September 10. The Census found that 8.5% of the U.S. population went without medical insurance for…
by Ana B. Ibarra CALIFORNIA lawmakers dropped this year’s most controversial public health bill into Gov. Gavin Newsom’s lap on Wednesday, but it’s not clear whether he will sign the measure, which would tighten the rules for exempting children from routine vaccinations. The state Senate voted 28-11 to approve SB-276 by state Sen. Richard Pan…
by Laura Ungar and Trudy Lieberman SAN JOSE, Calif. — In the neighborhoods around San Jose, more than 1 in 9 seniors struggle to get enough to eat. They are among the millions of seniors across the country who quietly go hungry as the safety net designed to catch them frays. Nearly 8% of Americans…
by Mark Kreidler Denise Herrmann was only a few months into her new job as principal of a Palo Alto, Calif., high school in fall 2014 when a student took his own life. By the next day, Herrmann said, she and some of her colleagues at Henry M. Gunn High School were in conversations with…
by Phil Galewitz Five years after Congress passed a law to reduce unnecessary MRIs, CT scans and other expensive diagnostic imaging tests that could harm patients and waste money, federal officials have yet to implement it. The law requires that doctors consult clinical guidelines set by the medical industry before Medicare will pay for many…
by: Anna Almendrala Veronica Kelley was working at an office building across the street from the Inland Regional Center in San Bernardino, Calif., in December 2015 when a county employee and his wife entered with semiautomatic rifles and opened fire, killing 14 and wounding 22. Most of the victims were the shooter’s own co-workers. The couple…
by Rachel Bluth THE House Energy and Commerce Committee on Wednesda, July 17, approved its version of legislation to curb surprise medical bills. Though this step was an important advance, there’s still a long way forward before Congress agrees on a legislative solution to this high-profile consumer concern. These bills, the unexpected and often high…
by Barbara Feder Ostrov THE California agency that regulates doctors is investigating at least four physicians for issuing questionable medical exemptions to children whose parents did not want them immunized. The Medical Board of California’s investigations are unfolding amid the nation’s worst measles outbreak in more than a quarter-century, as California lawmakers consider controversial legislation…
DURING Wednesday night’s Democratic presidential primary debate — the first in a two-night event viewed as the de facto launch of the primary season — health policies, ranging from “Medicare for All” to efforts to curb skyrocketing drug prices, were among the key issues the 10 hopeful candidates onstage used to help differentiate themselves from…
With the first Democratic debates a week away, health care is the top issue the party’s voters say they want candidates to address, according to a poll released on Tuesday, June 18. But what they mean by that varies widely. Nearly 9 out of 10 Democrats or Democratic-leaning independents said it is very important for…
by Anna Maria Barry-Jester AS California lawmakers attempt to tighten the rules on childhood vaccinations, they’re getting pushback from unexpected quarters: high-profile officials who support vaccines. In the past few weeks, Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom and the members of the Medical Board of California have questioned a bill that would give the California Department of…
