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The FDA this week launched a crackdown on smoking and vaping — ordering the vaping system Juul to be taken off the market and asserting its intention to require makers of cigarettes and different tobacco merchandise to cut back the quantity of nicotine in them.
In the meantime, the Supreme Court docket didn’t announce a ruling in a high-stakes abortion case, but it surely mentioned that personal well being insurers may restrict the quantity of kidney dialysis care they supply, thus forcing some sufferers onto Medicare.
This week’s panelists are Julie Rovner of KHN, Joanne Kenen of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg College of Public Well being and Politico, and Rachel Cohrs of Stat.
Among the many takeaways from this week’s episode:
- The FDA has ordered Juul to take away its e-cigarettes from the U.S. market as a result of the corporate’s software to the company didn’t present sufficient info for regulators to find out whether or not Juul introduced a hazard to customers. The FDA mentioned there have been considerations concerning the threat of some dangerous chemical compounds leaching from the Juul pods. Juul is anticipated to enchantment the FDA choice to the courts.
- Juul helped ignite an explosion in e-cigarette use when it got here available on the market, and officers initially thought it will assist people who smoke looking for to kick the cigarette behavior. However the business’s use of flavored tobacco and aggressive advertising helped gasoline a dramatic rise in use amongst teenagers and led to a regulatory crackdown.
- The Supreme Court docket this week dominated that employers might decide to make all dialysis remedy out of community of their staff’ well being plans, a call that may seemingly drive many sufferers to hunt Medicare protection for his or her kidney issues. The choice was a disappointment for dialysis suppliers, who obtain much less in reimbursements from Medicare than they usually get from non-public insurance policy.
- The choice leaves many particulars unresolved and additional authorized fights may very well be coming. Dialysis suppliers may additionally flip to Congress to ascertain legal guidelines that may prohibit employers from such strikes.
- The Senate is more likely to contemplate a invoice proposed by Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.) that seeks to decrease the price of insulin. The invoice is taken into account extra pleasant to drugmakers than one other measure that handed the Home this 12 months. The Senate invoice seeks to get drugmakers to supply insulin on the worth they acquired from Medicare in 2021 by permitting them to bypass rebates and different expensive subsidies paid to pharmacy profit managers and insurance policy. It will additionally restrict out-of-pocket prices for insured shoppers to $35.
- Because the Senate strikes nearer to a vote on gun security laws, different efforts are underway to search out extra funding for applications to assist take care of psychological well being issues. These efforts may assist with campaigns to cut back suicides and home violence, that are additionally usually tied to weapons.
- The Home is launching efforts to cross appropriations payments, and the preliminary funding measure for the Division of Well being and Human Companies as soon as once more doesn’t embrace the so-called Hyde Modification, a long-standing coverage named for the late Rep. Henry Hyde (R-Unwell.) that bans federal funds from getting used for many abortions. Earlier efforts by the Home to jettison the Hyde Modification didn’t clear the Senate.
- President Joe Biden has nominated Arati Prabhakar, former head of the Protection Superior Analysis Initiatives Company (DARPA), to go the White Home Workplace of Science and Expertise Coverage. She would exchange Eric Lander, who was pressured to resign after experiences of employees harassment.
- Prabhakar seems to be a noncontroversial alternative and comes with a great deal of administration expertise. Her obligations will seemingly embrace overseeing pandemic planning, efforts to form a brand new biomedical analysis company known as ARPA-H, and techniques to boost most cancers prevention.
Additionally this week, Rovner interviews KHN’s Noam N. Levey concerning the new KHN-NPR mission on medical debt, known as “Analysis: Debt.”
Plus, for additional credit score, the panelists advocate their favourite well being coverage tales of the week they suppose you need to learn, too:
Julie Rovner: The AP’s “At Westminster Canine Present, New Concentrate on Veterinarians’ Welfare,” by Jennifer Peltz
Joanne Kenen: Fern.org’s “Again Forty: Methods to Defend Farmworkers From Warmth-Associated Kidney Illness,” by Nancy Averett
Rachel Cohrs: The Markup’s “Fb Is Receiving Delicate Medical Info From Hospital Web sites,” by Todd Feathers, Simon Fondrie-Teitler, Angie Waller, and Surya Mattu
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KHN (Kaiser Well being Information) is a nationwide newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about well being points. Along with Coverage Evaluation and Polling, KHN is likely one of the three main working applications at KFF (Kaiser Household Basis). KFF is an endowed nonprofit group offering info on well being points to the nation.
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