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A coalition of 14 states along with Washington, D.C., and New York City sued Thursday to block the Trump administration from cutting off food stamp benefits from nearly 700,000 unemployed people, the first of three such planned measures to restrict the federal food safety net. The Agriculture Department finalized the new rule in December, eliminating states’ discretion to waive work requirements in distressed economic areas — a change that would slash nearly $5.5��billion from food stamp spending over five years. (Hsu, 1/16)

"Under well-settled law, the executive branch does not get to go forth with policies that Congress specifically rejected," District of Columbia Attorney General Karl Racine said in a call with reporters. He and New York State Attorney General Tish James are leading the lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. After a bitter partisan fight over the 2018 farm bill, congressional leaders agreed not to include sweeping changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program that were pushed by a Republican-led House. But last year, the Trump administration began its own effort to rein in the program, arguing that the government should promote self-sufficiency when the U.S. economy is strong. (Boudreau, 1/16)

The Trump administration finalized a rule last month that would raise the bar for states seeking to waive certain work requirements for able-bodied adults without dependents and living in economically distressed areas. The Agriculture Department estimated that the rule could push nearly 700,000 people off food stamps. “Now, in the midst of the strongest economy in a generation, we need everyone who can work, to work,” Mr. Perdue said at the time. (Fadulu, 1/16)

Why it matters: The stricter rule “eliminates State discretion and criteria” and will end “essential food assistance for benefits recipients who live in areas with insufficient jobs.” It intends to cut benefits for 688,000–850,000 unemployed people, the Post reports, and states' attorneys general who are backing the lawsuit argue the tightened SNAP requirements are unlawful. (Perano, 1/16)

Perdue��said that since 2000, the number of Americans receiving food stamp benefits has jumped from 17 million to 36 million, even though the unemployment rate is now lower than it was in 2000.��Under the new rules, a county must have an unemployment rate of at least 6 percent before the state can apply��for a waiver. The policy change, set to take effect April 1, would reportedly trim $5.5 billion from the��federal budget over the next two years. (Johnson, 1/16)

The final rule was widely criticized when it was announced last year, including by members of Congress. Michigan Democratic Sen. Debbie Stabenow said at the time the rule would hurt individuals who work in the tourism industry and others who have "unreliable hours like waiters and waitresses," and New York Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer called the rule "heartless" and "cruel." (Tatum, 1/16)

Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison is challenging a Trump administration rule that could eliminate food assistance for more than 8,000 Minnesotans. (Faircloth, 1/16)

HHS on Thursday proposed reversing an Obama administration policy so faith-based health and social service providers receiving federal funds no longer would have to inform clients about services they don't provide for religious reasons and would not have to refer them to alternative providers. The rule also would clarify that HHS would not discriminate against faith-based organizations on applications for grants or awards on the basis of the organization's religious policies. That could affect Title X reproductive healthcare funding for pregnancy counseling groups that oppose contraception and abortion. (Meyer, 1/16)

Contrary to what he tells his fans, Trump has broken more key promises than he has kept. With our latest update, Trump has broken about 43 percent of 60 key promises — and kept about 35 percent. He settled for a compromise on 12 percent. ... Kept: Provide veterans with the ability to receive public Department of Veterans Affairs treatment or attend the private doctor of their choice. In 2018, Trump signed the bipartisan VA Mission Act, which expanded access for veterans to VA-funded care in the private sector. (This built on a law passed under Obama.) Rules established under the law took effect in 2019, with VA paying veterans to see non-VA doctors if they have to wait longer than 20 days or drive more than 30 minutes for primary or mental health care at a VA facility. For specialty care, they can see private doctors at VA expense if they have to wait longer than 28 days or drive more than an hour to see a VA provider. (Kessler, 1/17)

The questionnaire 92-year-old Robert Cooper received in the mail in late December seemed so authentic. The sender appeared to be the U.S. Census Bureau and the package “looked so official and was so nicely printed that it was clearly a big effort” someone made to get him to respond. So Cooper filled it out. He answered questions about his age, education and who else lived with him. But about 10 questions in, the questionnaire asked for his and his wife’s Medicare card numbers. He said he thought the question was strange then, but still he mailed it back. Cooper said he believes now the questionnaire may have been a ploy disguised as a Census Bureau survey to get his Medicare number and he worries others may fall victim to it if they aren’t aware of this potential scam. (Manuel, 1/17)

After months of acrimony between California and the Trump administration over the state’s homelessness crisis, Gov. Gavin Newsom said on Thursday that he would send an envoy to meet with administration officials and discuss ways to address the issue together. Mr. Newsom spoke of the meeting in an interview after announcing at a news conference that the state was mobilizing 100 camping trailers to shelter some of the state’s more than 150,000 homeless people. (Fuller, 1/16)

Gov. Gavin Newsom repeatedly promoted a temporary solution to California’s most visible problem this week during a tour on homelessness that began at a shelter in the Sierra foothills and ended in a vacant city-owned lot in the shadow of the Oakland Coliseum: The state would dispatch 100 travel trailers to provide immediate shelter. Newsom and his aides publicized their plan again Thursday, posting a video on social media showcasing a caravan of 15 trailers traveling down the highway toward the Bay Area, where the shelters were on display for a news conference. (Luna, 1/16)

Planned Parenthood will spend $45 million on the 2020 elections, the nonprofit’s biggest electoral expenditure in its history, according to CBS News. The money will go toward the presidential election as well as congressional and state House races, according to Planned Parenthood Votes Executive Director Jenny Lawson, who told CBS, “The stakes have never been higher.” The Trump administration, she told CBS, “has managed to undo so much over the last three years ... the fact that this summer the Supreme Court might gut Roe v. Wade is an indicator of their intention and they've never been so bold." (Budryk, 1/16)

“For too long, politicians in power have stood on the wrong side of the people,” said Jenny Lawson, executive director of Planned Parenthood Votes, the organization’s super PAC that is behind the push. “From the wave of abortion bans to the gutting of affordable birth control programs to the confirmation of anti-abortion judges, the attacks on our health and rights from Trump and his buddies in Congress have been unprecedented.” (Dzhanova, 1/16)

Planned Parenthood's electoral efforts — which the group has dubbed "We Decide 2020" — hope to reach five million voters in nine battleground states: Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Michigan, Minnesota, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. A spokesperson for the organization said this week was the "official start" to the strategy. The investment intends to fund large-scale grassroots programs and canvassing, digital, television, and radio and mail programs, according to Planned Parenthood. Just this week, the organization and its affiliated political organizations have hosted over 60 events, according to a Planned Parenthood spokesperson. (Smith, 1/16)

The unprecedented spending likely came in response to a wave of state-level laws restricting abortion in addition to what pro-choice advocates say is a serious assault on the organization. Pro-life activists have claimed they are literally trying to save lives by imposing restrictions like the heartbeat bill, which would prohibit abortions after a doctor can detect a heartbeat. (Dorman, 1/16)

Before Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the Susan B. Anthony List, agreed to chair the Donald J. Trump for President Pro-life Coalition in 2016, she requested a list of commitments in writing from the Republican nominee. To ensure that Trump, who described himself as “very pro-choice” not two decades earlier, wouldn’t betray anti-abortion conservatives as president, Dannenfelser asked that he promise to strip Planned Parenthood of federal funding, codify into law the Hyde Amendment limiting the use of federal money for abortions, enact legislation to ban abortion after 20 weeks and strictly nominate anti-abortion justices to the Supreme Court. (Orr, 1/17)

Kaiser Health News: With Fate Of Roe V. Wade Unsure, Abortion Fight Shifts To New Territory

Jan. 22 marks the 47th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, the landmark case that legalized abortion nationwide. Those on both sides of the furious debate say this could be the year when everything changes. In March, the Supreme Court will hear its first abortion case since Justice Brett Kavanaugh replaced Anthony Kennedy, who had been the swing vote on abortion cases. A decision is expected by summer. (Rovner, 1/17)

The health insurance industry is donating big to Democrats even amid criticism of the industry and growing calls for “Medicare for All” from the progressive wing of the party. Four big insurance companies — Blue Cross Blue Shield, UnitedHealth Group, CVS Health and Cigna — and their employees have given about $4.5 million collectively in campaign contributions in the 2020 cycle, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. (Gangitano, 1/16)

House lawmakers introduced an emergency aid package on Thursday to help Puerto Rico rebuild after earthquakes devastated the already storm-battered island, challenging President Trump, who has resisted further assistance for the commonwealth. The $3.35 billion package includes $100 million for education, $1.25 billion to rebuild roads and $2 billion in general disaster relief. Representative Steny H. Hoyer of Maryland, the majority leader, said the House would take up the legislation after Martin Luther King’s Birthday on Monday. (Cochrane and Walker, 1/16)

HUD has held up the funding for months, blowing past a September legal deadline while the agency pursued financial safeguards in light of political unrest on the island. Puerto Rico has received just $1.5 billion of the roughly $20 billion Congress appropriated last summer in disaster funds HUD is supposed to distribute to the territory. (Emma, 1/16)

The Trump administration plans to impose several new requirements on billions of dollars in aid for Puerto Rico, including a new restriction on the wages paid by the island’s government to contractors working on disaster relief, according to two officials with knowledge of the plan. The White House has for months worked to enact new restrictions on about $8 billion in disaster mitigation aid Congress approved for the island, which was hit this month with recurring earthquakes just two years after Hurricane Maria devastated much of the U.S. territory. (Hernandez and Stein, 1/15)

Representative Nydia M. Velázquez, Democrat of New York and the first Puerto Rican woman elected to the House, called the move disdainful and contemptuous. “Why is Puerto Rico always subjected to different standards when it comes to this administration?” she demanded. (Fadulu and Walker, 1/15)

Nebraska's two-tiered approach to Medicaid expansion has spawned interest among health wonks because its work requirement could stand up to legal scrutiny. ... Rather than pursue a conventional Medicaid expansion, Nebraska opted to request a Medicaid 1115 or "state innovation" waiver from the CMS last month that would allow it to create two tiers of Medicaid benefits for the newly eligible population. ... The "Prime" tier will allow expansion enrollees to receive the same Medicaid benefits as Nebraska's traditional Medicaid population if they fulfill community engagement, personal responsibility and wellness activities. The "Basic" package would cover basic health services and prescription drugs, but drop coverage for dental, vision and over-the-counter drugs. (Brady, 1/16)

Medi-Cal had a big decade. The number of Californians enrolled in the state’s health insurance program for low-income residents swelled by 5.5 million from 2010 to 2019. It now covers 1 in 3 Californians and 40% of children. The program’s annual budget — a combination of state and federal money — tops $100 billion, more than the entire state budget of Florida. (Rowan, 1/15)

Republican lawmakers once again are pushing to make Missouri’s Medicaid recipients find jobs if they want to keep their health coverage. But it’s not clear how this latest effort would be squared with a proposal to extend benefits to additional low-income people. An ongoing petition to expand the state’s Medicaid program would specifically prohibit such eligibility standards.Both proposals could land on the ballot in November. (Stewart, 1/16)

The state’s technology system that determines whether adults and children are eligible for Ohio Medicaid has nearly 1,100 defects, the department’s director announced Tuesday. Ohio Benefits, an information technology system that has cost the state $1.2 billion since it was implemented six years ago, has been found to overwrite and eliminate historical documentation needed to prove Ohio Medicaid enrollees’ eligibility. (Hancock, 1/14)

A Republican member of the Federal Trade Commission on Thursday expressed support for allowing Medicare to directly negotiate the price of prescription medicines, a noteworthy break from GOP orthodoxy from a Trump administration appointee. The remarks from Christine Wilson, a business executive who President Trump appointed to the FTC in 2018, come as Washington remains split on how to tackle high drug prices and whether to allow Medicare to negotiate directly. (Facher, 1/16)

But President Trump and Senate Republicans have rejected that bill, backing more modest alternatives. “The federal government, which accounts for I think a third of pharmaceutical spending, is essentially a price-taker, and that seems like a problem to me,” Wilson added at a conference hosted by the Council for Affordable Health Coverage, a coalition of health care companies and other groups. (Sullivan, 1/16)

Republicans and Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar have strongly opposed Democratic proposals that would allow Medicare to negotiate drug prices. They argue that doing so would essentially allow Medicare to set drug prices and stifle development of innovative new drugs.She referred to H.R. 3 , the Democrats’ signature drug pricing bill, which was the House approved in December. The measure would require the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services to negotiate maximum prices for insulin products and at least 25 single-source brand-name names that don’t have generic competition. The CMS is currently prohibited from negotiating drug prices. (Hansard, 1/16)

BioMarin Pharmaceutical Inc. BMRN 0.29% is exploring pricing its experimental gene therapy for hemophilia patients between $2 million and $3 million if it is approved, which could make it the most expensive drug in the world. The company hasn’t yet announced a price for the therapy, but Chief Executive Jean-Jacques Bienaimé said in an interview at the J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference that the drugmaker has spoken to insurers, who have indicated they are comfortable with the range. (Hopkins, 1/16)

Eli Lilly and Co aims to announce roughly one $1 billion to $5 billion deal every quarter in 2020, its chief financial officer told Reuters, as the U.S. drugmaker looks to build up its pipeline of future products. It will focus largely on earlier stage opportunities across key therapeutic areas including oncology, pain, immunology, and neurology, CFO John Smiley told Reuters in an interview at the JP Morgan Healthcare conference in San Francisco earlier this week. (1/16)

Several months ago, Eli Lilly launched LisPro, an authorized generic version of its Humalog insulin at half price, or $137.35 a vial. The move was designed to defuse anger over the rising cost of insulin because LisPro would be more affordable to the uninsured or those with high-deductible insurance plans, whose copays are, typically, tied to list prices. But last month, a pair of U.S. senators issued a report saying the vast majority of pharmacies failed to offer LisPro and the effort was a bust. Lilly chief executive David Ricks called the findings “nonsense,” and argued the real access problem has been with middlemen — the pharmacy benefit managers — that prefer products with higher list prices because these offer higher rebates. (Silverman, 1/16)

Novo Nordisk's new diabetes pill, Rybelsus, will be covered by Express Scripts Holding Co, one of the largest U.S. pharmacy benefit managers, the Danish drugmaker said on Friday. Pharmacy benefit managers act as middlemen in the drug supply chain, and negotiate discounts on drugs on behalf of health insurers. (1/17)

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration recently approved an important vaccine against Ebola, five years after an epidemic in West Africa killed 11,310 people and after more than 2,200 have died of it in the Democratic Republic of Congo in the last 18 months. Alex Azar, who heads the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, quickly congratulated his department’s funding and “American global health leadership” for the vaccine, which is called Ervebo. (Herder, Graham and Gold, 1/16)

The annual J.P. Morgan health care conference is taking place this week in San Francisco. Here are some of the hot topics under discussion at the four-day event, which wraps up Thursday. (Wilde Mathews and Loftus, 1/16)

Aventure capitalist made some waves early in the J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference when he announced his new company’s mission is to make medicines less expensive. After all, two of his previous investments have fueled drug makers using genetics to treat cancer — the kind of approach that has produced remarkable outcomes but also driven up the price of drugs. Alexis Borisy, known for co-founding Foundation Medicine and Blueprint Medicines and wearing felt fedoras, seeks to bring down prices at his new company, called EQRx. (Feuerstein and Herper, 1/17)

Longtime venture capital star Beth Seidenberg and former Amgen R&D chief Sean Harper say they have funded 10 companies from their new fund, Westlake Village BioPartners. But only three — the cell therapy companies Kyverna, Tmunity, and Arsenal Biosciences — are publicly known. Any hints? Neuroscience, Seidenberg said in an interview with STAT during the J.P Morgan Healthcare Conference in San Francisco. (Herper, 1/16)

Patricia Hurter makes her pitch by pulling a white capsule apart and withdrawing a plastic star-shaped structure. Hurter is the new chief executive of Lyndra Therapeutics, based in Watertown. She spent much of the J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference in restaurants and hotel lobbies showing prototypes of a new drug delivery system designed to help patients stay on their medications. After a patient swallows the ordinary-looking capsule, the star’s six arms unfold inside the stomach and steadily release ingredients for a week; then the arms break off and leave the body like undigested food. (Saltzman, 1/16)

A pinch in the leg, a squeal, and a trickle of tears. One baby after another in Malawi is getting the first and only vaccine against malaria, one of history’s deadliest and most stubborn of diseases. The southern African nation is rolling out the shots in an unusual pilot program along with Kenya and Ghana. Unlike established vaccines that offer near-complete protection, this new one is only about 40% effective. But experts say it’s worth a try as progress against malaria stalls: Resistance to treatment is growing and the global drop in cases has leveled off. (1/16)

The leaders of a powerful House committee are aiming to break through a legislative quagmire as Congress tries to deliver on the stubbornly elusive goal of protecting patients from "surprise" medical bills. A one-page plan from Ways and Means Chairman Richard Neal (D-Mass.) and ranking member Kevin Brady (R-Texas) is at odds with a detailed bipartisan deal struck between key House and Senate committees late last year to settle billing disputes that can leave patients on the hook for thousands of dollars in unexpected expenses. (Roubein and Goldberg, 1/16)

The CMS earlier this month rejected a Wyoming Medicaid waiver proposal that aimed to lower air ambulance costs for all residents of the state. Wyoming essentially proposed making air ambulances into a public utility by using a Medicaid waiver to make all residents eligible for Medicaid coverage of air ambulances, regardless of their income level. The Wyoming Department of Health submitted the waiver to the CMS on Oct. 28, 2019 and it was denied on Jan. 3. (Cohrs, 1/16)

Gov. Brian Kemp pushed for a legislative remedy for the problem of surprise medical billing in his Thursday address to Georgia lawmakers.Kemp, a Republican, also touted his waiver proposals, passed last year by the General Assembly, as solutions to lower health care costs and add a pathway for uninsured Georgians to access medical services. The governor said he would establish a professorship for Parkinson’s disease research at the University of Georgia, in honor of recently retired U.S. Sen. Johnny Isakson. (Miller, 1/16)

The median salary for the CEO of a New York metropolitan area hospital or health system was more than $1.1 million in 2017, plus about $58,000 in other compensation such as retirement-plan contributions and fringe benefits. That calculation comes from a Crain's analysis of the 2017 IRS Forms 990 of more than 60 hospitals and health systems in New York City, Long Island, Westchester County and northern New Jersey. (LaMantia and Schifman, 1/16)

The Medicare Payment Advisory Commission on Thursday voted unanimously to recommend hospitals receive a 3.3% raise in 2021. The CMS has scheduled a 2.8% pay raise to hospitals for inpatient and outpatient services. MedPAC recommended that Congress increase net payments by 3.3% but change the structure of the pay boost to close the gap between reimbursement rates for physician offices and hospital outpatient departments. They also recommended incentivizing hospitals to reduce mortality and improve patient satisfaction by tying some of their raise to quality improvements. (Brady, 1/16)

The CMS should focus more on patient education and engagement when it develops alternative payment models such as the Kidney Care Choices Model, members of the CMS Advisory Panel on Outreach & Education said Wednesday. While many healthcare experts think alternative payment models give providers incentives to deliver cost-effective and high-quality care, patients could see it differently. They might think that their doctor is recommending a course of treatment because that's how their physician gets reimbursed, not because it's the best choice, said Dr. Margot Savoy, vice chair of the advisory panel and chair of Temple University Physician's department of family and community medicine. It could "feel shady to them." (Brady, 1/15)

Kaiser Health News: Employers’ Dream Of Controlling Health Costs Turns To Workers’ Sleep

Charlie Blakey had a sense he was sleeping poorly since he often would wake up tired and hear from his wife how loudly he breathed during the night. So he jumped at the chance when his employer, Southern Co., an Atlanta-based electric utility, offered to test him in 2018 for sleep apnea, a potentially serious disorder in which people repeatedly stop breathing while asleep. After he tested positive, the utility arranged for him to have a machine that provides continuous airflow through a mask while he sleeps — at no cost to him. (Galewitz, 1/17)

'Administrative complexity': that's the health policy term for every time you've tried and failed to understand a medical bill. Or needed multiple phone calls to get prior approval from your insurance company for care you needed. That complexity is increasingly seen as a massive and growing problem in the American health care system. A study published this month estimates that the country's health care bureaucracy costs over $800 billion a year. (Goldberg, 1/17)

Kaiser Health News: Listen: How High-Deductible Plans Hurt Rural America

KHN senior correspondent Markian Hawryluk joined Colorado Public Radio’s Avery Lill on “Colorado Matters” to discuss his recent story on how high-deductible health plans are especially hurting rural America. (His segment begins at 11 minutes and 40 seconds in, after you click on the link for the full show.) Such insurance plans are more prevalent in rural areas, where incomes tend to be lower, compared with urban areas, leaving patients with hefty bills they cannot afford when a health care crisis occurs. (1/16)

Ayanna Pressley loves playing with her hair. Before she became a Massachusetts Congresswoman (and a high-profile member of “The Squad”), Pressley would experiment with different hairstyles and textures, getting a weave and even cutting her own hair. ... But the wigs are a noticeable departure from her signature Senegalese and bomb twists, which have become synonymous with her political brand and made her the hero of little black girls across the country. Now, the congresswoman has decided to go public as to her reason why: She has alopecia. (Moulite, 1/16)

Representative Ayanna Pressley, Democrat of Massachusetts, revealed in a video released on Thursday that she has a condition called alopecia and is now bald. “This is about acceptance,” Ms. Pressley said of her decision to publicly discuss her baldness. “I hope this starts a conversation about the personal struggles we navigate, and I hope that it creates awareness about how many people are impacted by alopecia.” (Garcia and Rabin, 1/16)

The freshman Massachusetts Democrat made a touching video for The Root, the African American-focused website, in which she revealed her bald head and said she felt compelled to go public due to the impact her Senegalese twists had on supporters. Senegalese twists are a protective hairstyle worn by black women, much like braided hairstyles. Her style was noteworthy in how Afrocentric it was. In many corporations, black women are expected to wear their hair straightened (though their hair tends to be more coily) and the legacy of black women wearing their hair close to or in its natural state is fraught and intertwined with the legacy of racism. (Italie, 1/16)

“In the fall, when I was getting my hair retwisted, is the first time that I was made aware that I had some patches,” Pressley recalled. “From there, it accelerated very quickly. Soon enough, Pressley said, she began “waking up every morning to sinkfuls of hair. According to the National Alopecia Areata Foundation, the condition develops when the body’s immune system attacks healthy follicles, creating issues in hair production. While it affects 6.8 million people in the United States of all ages, genders and ethnic groups, according to the foundation, scientists have not yet determined what exactly triggers the disease. (Brice-Saddler, 1/16)

Pressley said she has been bald only in the privacy of her home and in the company of close friends. She said she experimented with different hairstyles, including weaves and wigs. (She nicknamed one wig "FLOTUS" because to her "it feels very Michelle Obama," and she calls another of her wigs "Trace," after the actress Tracee Ellis Ross.) (Griffith, 1/16)

A second person has died from pneumonia in the central Chinese city of Wuhan following an outbreak believed to be caused by a new coronavirus strain, local health authorities said. The 69-year-old man had been admitted to hospital with abnormal renal function and severe damage to multiple organs, the Wuhan Municipal Health Commission said in a statement on its website late on Thursday. He died on Jan. 15. (1/17)

So far, health authorities have not concluded that the virus can be spread among people, but they have been racing to learn more since the pneumonia cases started appearing in Wuhan, a city 700 miles south of Beijing, last month. They say, however, that if human transmission is possible, it appears to be rare. In Wuhan, where 41 cases have been confirmed, health authorities have been tracking 763 close contacts of the patients, including more than 400 health workers, and have not identified any related cases of the infection. (Joseph, 1/16)

Most of the coronavirus patients this time either worked at or visited a particular seafood market in Wuhan. The market has since been shut down for investigation and disinfection. Two patients in Thailand and another in Japan have been diagnosed with the virus.A 74-year-old tourist was intercepted at a Thai airport on Jan. 13 with symptoms of lung infection, the country’s public health ministry said Friday. She is being treated in the same hospital, east of Bangkok, as a Chinese woman who was diagnosed with the virus after entering the country last week. (Wang, 1/16)

Thailand confirmed its second case of the new coronavirus on Thursday -- the third case in total found outside of China. The virus was also confirmed Thursday to have been detected in Japan. In all three cases, the infected people had traveled to Wuhan. In Wuhan, the first, and the majority, of the infected patients have been traced to the Huanan Wholesale Seafood Market, which has been shut down for disinfection since January 1. Wuhan health authorities said on Wednesday that some "environmental samples" taken from the market tested positive for the virus. (Regan and Gan, 1/17)

“Cases like the ones who traveled to Thailand and Japan after being exposed in Wuhan are not unexpected,” Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, said in an email. “But public health officials are still laser-focused on whether any of the cases residing in China or now somewhere else in the world will turn out to be ‘super shedders’ and potentially infect many contacts.” (Gale and Jackman, 1/15)

More than 250,000 people in the U.S. are currently at the end stages of heart failure, up to 15% of whom are in desperate need of a transplant. A new method of “reanimating” donor hearts from those who have died from cardiac failure is currently being tested in the U.S., and may soon ease that burden. As part of the new procedure, known as “donation after cardiac death,” or DCD, transplants, organs are retrieved from those who have died because their heart stopped — either naturally or because physicians discontinued life support. (Chakradhar, 1/16)

More than 1 in 7 adults across all U.S. states and territories are physically inactive, new data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show. The findings were compiled from 2015-2018 data collected as part of the CDC’s Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, which is a telephone-based survey of people’s health activities, chronic conditions, and use of preventive health services. (Chakradhar, 1/16)

Sixty-one percent of millennials familiar with the anti-vaccination movement said they agreed with at least some of its beliefs, according to NBC News, citing a survey released Thursday by the American Academy of Family Physicians (AAFP). The survey, which polled 1,000 adults, also found that 55 percent of respondents in their 20s and 30s did not receive the flu vaccine this year, although the majority cited lack of time or forgetting as the reason rather than opposition to vaccination. (Budryk, 1/16)

Blood pressure begins to increase at younger ages in women than in men, and it goes up at a faster rate, a new study reports. On average, women who develop heart disease are about 10 years older than men who develop it. But this report, published in JAMA cardiology, suggests that high blood pressure, one of the most important controllable risk factors for cardiovascular disease, begins at a younger age in women than men, and rises faster. (Bakalar, 1/15)

Nearly 150 years ago, a German physician analyzed a million temperatures from 25,000 patients and concluded that normal human-body temperature is 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit. That standard has been published in numerous medical texts and helped generations of parents judge the gravity of a child’s illness. (McGinty, 1/17)

Adults in the United States who binge drink are consuming even more alcohol per binging episode, according to a new study published Thursday by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Researchers analyzed data from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System over a six-year period and discovered that the annual number of binge drinks among adults who reported excessive drinking jumped on average from 472 in 2011 to 529 in 2017. That's a 12% increase. (Erdman, 1/16)

Cardinal Health told its customers to stop using contaminated surgical gowns as the wholesale distribution giant orchestrates a recall with the Food and Drug Administration, according to a letter Cardinal sent to its customers Wednesday that Modern Healthcare exclusively obtained. Certain lots of AAMI Level 3 surgical gowns, which include widely distributed non-sterile and single-sterile gowns, were contaminated due to "environmental conditions" at a contract manufacturer's facility, Dublin, Ohio-based Cardinal wrote. Some of the packs that contained the gowns were also contaminated. The company said it will initiate a product recall. The first notice was sent Jan. 11, when Cardinal said it stopped distributing the gowns. (Kacik, 1/16)

In early December at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, two anxious scientists were about to send 20 years of research into orbit. "I feel like our heart and soul is going up in that thing," Dr. Emily Germain-Lee told her husband, Dr. Se-Jin Lee, as they waited arm-in-arm for a SpaceX rocket to launch.A few seconds later the spacecraft took off, transporting some very unusual mice to the International Space Station, where they would spend more than a month in near zero gravity. (Hamilton, 1/16)

A medical condition that often escapes public notice may be involved in 20% of deaths worldwide, according to a new study. The disease is sepsis — sometimes called blood poisoning. It arises when the body overreacts to an infection. Blood vessels throughout the body become leaky, triggering multiple-organ failure. (Harris, 1/16)

About 15 years ago, an Amish family in the eastern US was hit by an unexplainable tragedy -- one of their children died suddenly while playing and running around. Just a few months later, the same fate befell another one of their children. Six years later, they lost another child. Two years after that, another one. The autopsies didn't offer any clues. The children's hearts appeared normal. The family had what they referred to as "the curse of sudden death." And medical examiners couldn't figure out why. (Kaur, 1/16)

A bizarre tentacled microbe discovered on the floor of the Pacific Ocean may help explain the origins of complex life on this planet and solve one of the deepest mysteries in biology, scientists reported on Wednesday. Two billion years ago, simple cells gave rise to far more complex cells. Biologists have struggled for decades to learn how it happened. (Zimmer, 1/16)

Alarming calls online for a race war. The arrest of three suspected neo-Nazis. Memories of the explosive clashes in Charlottesville, Va., three years ago. A sense of crisis enveloped the capital of Virginia on Thursday, with the police on heightened alert and Richmond bracing for possible violence ahead of a gun rally next week that is expected to draw white supremacists and other anti-government extremists. (Williams, Goldman and MacFarquhar, 1/16)

Monday is the state’s traditional citizen lobbying day, and gun rights groups are organizing a large demonstration to oppose the proposed legislation. The rally has drawn interest from militias and extremist groups across the country, raising security concerns in Richmond. Northam has asked “nonessential” state employees not to come to work Monday, a state holiday during which legislative staffers would normally be on duty, since the legislature is in session. (Harris and Barrett, 1/16)

A Circuit Court judge upheld Gov. Ralph Northam's temporary ban on firearms in Capitol Square ahead of Monday's gun rights rally, which is expected to draw thousands of armed activists from across the country. From Friday night until Tuesday, weapons of any kind will be prohibited on the grounds of the Capitol under a state of emergency. Northam (D) said the precaution was necessary because of “credible intelligence” that militias and gun rights advocates are threatening violence at the rally. (Schneider, 1/16)

In the governor’s State of the State address on Wednesday, he recognized the mayors and their commitment to fighting violent crime. He spoke about working with them, and, through “respect and willingness to listen to one another,” they were able to come up with three solutions: providing greater protection for victims and witnesses, providing more mental health resources and services, and strengthening laws to target violent criminals. When asked about previously offering support for stiffer regulations for violent offenders and, more specifically, domestic abusers, which is commonly referred to as a red flag law, Parson said he does not support it. (Driscoll, 1/16)

Insys Therapeutics Inc., the first drugmaker driven to bankruptcy by fallout from the opioid crisis, won court approval of a bankruptcy plan that pays less than a dime for each dollar it owes to the people, cities, states and tribes claiming damage from the drug epidemic. Shareholders of the once-thriving company will be wiped out under the chapter 11 plan approved Thursday by Judge Kevin Gross in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Wilmington, Del. (Brickley, 1/16)

The experience spurred Hennepin County officials to reassess what they could do as the opioid epidemic continued to claim tens of thousands of lives each year across the country. The county has since implemented a policy explaining how best to treat overdoses. They have also started training 60 county officers and 80 contract security officers on how to administer naloxone, also known by the brand name Narcan — a medication that can reverse an opioid overdose. (Collins, 1/16)

Denver health officials see Lincoln Park across from the Colorado Capitol as a rat-infested, disease-harboring public danger they need to clean up. The few dozen people experiencing homelessness, who have been living there in tents, some for weeks, see it as home. On Wednesday morning the city used its public health authority to shut down the highly trafficked park and clear out a growing encampment. (Paul, 1/15)

As the wind picked up Thursday morning, the District government had a message for those living in tents beneath a railroad underpass near Union Station: Whatever had brought them there and wherever they were headed, it was time to go. As 10 a.m. approached — the hour set for the closure of a homeless encampment in the 100 block of K Street NE — city officials, police and sanitation workers gathered while advocates checked tents and residents tried to secure their possessions. (Moyer, 1/16)

Utah Gov. Gary Herbert has ordered state health officials to stop distributing condoms with suggestive Utah-themed packaging, created with federal funds as part of a new HIV awareness campaign. The wrappers riff on various Utah memes, with labels such as “Greatest Sex on Earth,” “SL,UT,” an image of a highway sign that displays the number of miles to towns “Fillmore” and “Beaver,” and “This is the Place” over a drawing of a bed.“ It’s really just to destigmatize HIV in Utah, and get everybody talking about sexual health,” said Erin Fratto, of the Utah Department of Health’s Prevention Treatment and Care Program, in an interview on Wednesday before the governor’s action. “If the condoms are fun, relatable, sex positive — people are more apt to talk about them, which we’ve already seen.” (Alberty, 1/17)

The Senate voted Thursday to require comprehensive sex education curriculum in schools that teach the topic, easily advancing a bill that has proved controversial in the past. Under the bill, which passed 33-2, schools offering sex education would be required to provide medically accurate and age-appropriate information, including LGBTQ-inclusive material and discussion of consent, while allowing parents to opt their children out. (Lisinski, 1/16)

Some 170 people who have spent time in Yosemite National Park in recent weeks have suffered from a gastrointestinal ailment "consistent with norovirus" and two have been diagnosed with the illness, park officials said on Thursday. Most of those who became ill spent time in Yosemite Valley during or around the first week in January, park spokesman Scott Gediman said in a written statement, while the number of new cases reported has declined in the past several days. (1/16)

Georgia liver patients may see fewer livers and organs of lower quality available for transplant within weeks following a significant legal ruling over how the U.S. allocates donated livers. There are not enough liver donors to supply all the patients who need them, and different regions of the country fight over whether the government is fairly distributing the scarce livers available. (Hart, 1/16)

State lawmakers came ready��to make decisions Wednesday about how to spend a��$732 million��surplus in federal anti-poverty funds. They left instead with fresh, unanswered questions about financial oversight of the program run by the state Department of Human Services.��There is "confusion" about financial data provided by DHS��to the federal government about��the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program, Russell Moore, an official with the state comptroller's office, told lawmakers. (Wadhwani, 1/16)

Republican senators renewed their effort Thursday to amend the Iowa Constitution to say it does not protect a right to abortion. Originally proposed around this time last year, the amendment is an attempt to undo a 2018 Iowa Supreme Court ruling that protects a fundamental right to abortion in the state. (Sostaric, 1/16)

Rep. Fred Deutsch and 44��other lawmakers are��proposing to make it a felony for medical professionals to treat transgender children with hormones and sex reassignment surgery��in South Dakota.Deutsch, R-Florence,��filed House Bill 1057, which he's calling��the Vulnerable Child Protection Act, on Tuesday that would make it a Class 4 felony for a medical professional to conduct several practices on children, including emancipated children, in an attempt to change or affirm the child's "perception" of their sex "if that perception is inconsistent with the minor's��sex."�� (Kaczke, 1/5)

Members of the Juvenile Justice Policy and Oversight Committee will recommend to lawmakers that children younger than 12 not be tried in the juvenile court system. Currently, minors as young as 7 who commit crimes can be referred to the juvenile courts. Under the new proposal, which would take effect in 2021 if passed by the General Assembly, children under age 12 would be spared from criminal proceedings. (Lyons, 1/16)

A day after Gov. Ron DeSantis endorsed the issue in his State of the State address, Republican lawmakers Wednesday continued moving forward with a proposal that would require parental consent before minors could have abortions. The Senate Judiciary Committee voted 3-2 to approve the measure (SB 404) which is now one step away from going to the full Senate. A similar House bill (HB 265) is ready for a vote in the full House. (Saunders, 1/16)

Austin Public Health officials are investigating Travis County’s first confirmed case of rubella since 1999. The rubella case comes less than a month after the county’s first case of measles in 20 years was reported. A person contracted rubella, likely overseas, earlier this month and was being quarantined at home, Austin Public Health spokeswoman Jen Samp said. The person, whom officials did not identify except to describe as an adult, became contagious Jan. 3 and will be contagious for about another day. (Bradshaw, 1/16)

A Senate panel on Wednesday took the first steps toward overhauling a complicated and expensive program designed to help thousands of Florida residents with developmental and intellectual disabilities. The proposal (SB 82), sponsored by Sen. Aaron Bean, R-Fernandina Beach, would represent a significant change to what is known as the iBudget program, which receives state and federal money to provide an array of Medicaid services so people with disabilities can live at home and outside of institutions. (Sexton, 1/16)

While this flu season got off to an early start around Dallas-Fort Worth, school districts say they are thankful their students and staff haven’t been hit hard with the illness — at least so far. Campuses around the region said they haven’t seen spikes in absences related to cases of the flu, but health authorities throughout North Texas warned it’s too soon to know whether the worst of the flu season is still to come. Schools may notice fewer flu cases after a break, they said, but flu activity could rise once students have spent more time around each otherJennifer Finley, director of health services at Dallas ISD, said the timing of winter break with a rise in cases of the flu may have coincidentally kept kids from contracting the illness at school. (Branham and Keomoungkhoun, 1/16)

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio on Thursday introduced a $95.3 billion preliminary budget for the coming fiscal year, nearly $1 billion more than the current year’s funds, even as officials expected tax revenues to grow at a slower pace and a state budget shortfall imperils the city’s health-care programs. The growth in the budget was lower than in previous years, with the increase in spending stemming from labor settlements, debt service and education and criminal justice mandates, including bail reform, city officials said. (Honan, 1/16)

Employees of a Johnson County hospital company say they made health care premium payments for months only to find out that their employer pocketed the funds, leaving them uninsured. Two nurses at Pinnacle Regional Hospital in Boonville, Missouri, filed a class action lawsuit against their employer Wednesday. That’s the same day the hospital announced it would abruptly close its doors within hours, citing a series of challenges with state regulators. (Hardy, 1/17)

Retired public employees will have to pay more for their health care starting in January 2022 following a 9-2 vote Wednesday by the Ohio Public Employees Retirement System board.“The basic problem is we have no money to fund health care,” OPERS Executive Director Karen Carraher said. The health care trust fund, which is separate from the pension fund, will last 11 years with no additional funding. But OPERS’ analysts estimate it will be at least 15 years before the pension fund can resume setting aside money for the health fund. (Staver, 1/16)

The State of California wants to spend $2 million to remind you that it is against the law to smoke in state parks and beaches. The California Department of Parks and Recreation issued a budget request in order to bring the state into compliance with Senate Bill 8, which bans smoking and vaping at state parks and beaches. If you’re caught, it’s a $25 fine. (Sheeler, 1/15)

Alissa Dumsch flips through her high school yearbook, pausing on a photo of a hulking young man with sandy hair and a chiseled jaw. “There’s Aaron,” she says, pointing to her brother. “He was so good-looking.” She turns a few more pages. “Here he is at student council. I ran every year — and I lost every year,” she says, laughing. “He ran one year and, like, won by a landslide!” (Jones, 1/13)

On the day Susan Gordon learned Venetucci Farm, in Colorado, was contaminated by toxins, the vegetables looked just as good as ever, the grass as green, and the cattle, hogs, chickens, and goats as healthy. The beauty of the community farm she and her husband managed made the revelation all the more tragic. Chemicals known as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, invisible and insidious, had tainted the groundwater beneath her feet. PFAS had seeped into the soil from decades of training exercises that involved spraying firefighting foam at the nearby Peterson Air Force Base, in Colorado Springs. (Marill, 1/15)

In the spring of 2014, as Ebola exploded across West Africa, a scientist named Gary Kobinger was following the news intently from Canada. Kobinger was the head of the special pathogens unit at the National Microbiology Laboratory in Winnipeg. He and the team he led had a well-deserved reputation for their work on Ebola and other viral hemorrhagic fevers; Kobinger himself had led development of a promising Ebola therapy. (Branswell, 1/7)

‘‘What do you think of this?’’ the 54-year-old woman asked her friend, who happened to be a doctor. They were at a popular bakery in downtown New Haven, Conn., on a Saturday afternoon making cupcakes with a church group they belonged to. All of a sudden, the woman noticed that the middle finger on her right hand had gone completely numb. She looked down and saw that the palm side of her finger looked bruised at the base. ‘‘It doesn’t hurt, it’s just numb,’’ she said. ‘‘I don’t think I banged it on anything.’’ (Sanders, 1/15)

Without Tony Bowdoin’s grandfather, Georgia Power might never have come to the quiet town of Juliette. The central Georgia hamlet, just off the Ocmulgee River and a little over an hour’s drive south of Atlanta, is mostly known as home to some of the state’s best shoal bass fishing. Juliette’s only other claim to fame is its turn as the setting for the 1991 Oscar-nominated film Fried Green Tomatoes. (Blau, 1/13)

One early summer evening in 2018, the biologist Anthony James drove from his office at the University of California, Irvine, to the headquarters of the Creative Artists Agency, a sleek glass-and-steel high-rise in Los Angeles. There, roughly 200 writers, directors and producers — many of them involved in the making of science-and-technology thrillers — were gathered for an event called Science Speed Dating, where James and other scientists would explain their work. The sessions were organized, James told me, “in hopes of getting the facts at least somewhat straight.” (Kahn, 1/8)

In sharp contrast to how German legislators behave, despite drug prices in the United States rising 139 percent between 2000 and 2016, Congress continues to forbid the Department of Health and Human Services from negotiating prescription drug prices on behalf of Medicare and Medicaid. These entities are the largest buyers of pharmaceuticals in the world, with massive purchasing power. While DHH is required to shop for the cheapest ballpoint pen, when it comes to chemotherapy medication, it is obligated to pay whatever price drug manufacturers want to charge. (David Dodson, 1/15)

The other day a correspondent asked me a good question: What important issue aren’t we talking about? My answer, after some reflection, is the state of America’s children. Now, it’s not entirely fair to say that we’re ignoring the plight of our children. Elizabeth Warren, characteristically, has laid out a comprehensive, fully financed plan for universal child care. Bernie Sanders, also characteristically, says he’s for it but hasn’t provided details. And as far as I can tell, all the other Democratic presidential candidates support doing more for children. (Paul Krugman, 1/16)

Last summer, my two older kids went to sleepaway camp. The camp is Jewish, but not religious, and it has a social justice mission. Like many Jewish camps in North America, it also sprinkles in Hebrew words here and there. Over the past few years, the camp has worked to foster an environment of LGBTQ inclusivity. As such, words in Hebrew that are gendered have been neutralized, unisex bathrooms have been introduced, and kids and counselors using “they/them” pronouns, or otherwise subverting traditional gender norms, have become more common. (Ellen Friedrichs, 1/16)

More than a decade ago, I was diagnosed with a string of autoimmune diseases, one after another, including a bone marrow disorder, thyroiditis, and then Guillain-Barré syndrome, which left me paralyzed while raising two young children. I recovered from Guillain-Barré only to relapse, becoming paralyzed again. My immune system was repeatedly and mistakenly attacking my body, causing the nerves in my arms, legs, and those I needed to swallow to stop communicating with my brain, leaving me confined to — and raising my children from — bed. (Donna Jackson Nakazawa, 1/17)

Two of the most significant predictions for the new decade are that AI will become more pervasive, and the U.S. health-care system will need to evolve. AI can augment and improve the health-care system to serve more patients with fewer doctors.��However, health innovators need to be careful to design a system that enhances doctors’ capabilities, rather than replace them with technology and also to avoid reproducing human biases. (Enid Montague, 1/16)

Gwyneth Paltrow’s reaction to the description of the vulva in episode three of her Netflix show, ironically titled “the goop lab,” appears like she didn’t know that the vagina is inside the body and the vulva is outside, or that she didn’t know much about pelvic floor muscles. While this knowledge gap is common among women, I expected more from Paltrow, whose lifestyle business is partially built on monetizing the vagina. Her comment makes me wonder what body part she is really referencing with her “This smells like my vagina” candle. (Jennifer Gunter, 1/17)

There has been a lot of talk in the U.S. about legalizing recreational cannabis, and about cannabis’ potential to help with health issues. Scientists working in medicine may have a lot to discover about cannabis’ ability to improve health. However, the medical community does know that short-term health consequences of cannabis use include impaired short-term memory, impaired attention, impaired coordination, and sleep problems. (Jon-Patrick Allem, 1/14)

If liberals and conservatives can agree on anything about family policies, it’s this: Parents should have choices. Senator Elizabeth Warren said her plan for universal child care would give parents “the freedom to choose the best work and child care situation for themselves.” Ivanka Trump, at a White House summit about family policies, said, “Our vision is to give each parent the resources and support they need to make the best choice for their children.” (Claire Cain Miller, 1/17)