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May 14
Rachel Spears reads the week’s news: The Trump administration threatened to withhold federal funding if hospitals don’t get in line with its new dietary rules. Plus, tips to get the most out of prescription drug coupons.
May 7
Zach Dyer reads the week’s news: Millions of cancer survivors battle mounting medical bills, and Nebraska becomes the first state to enforce a Medicaid work requirement under the GOP’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act.
April 30
This week, Jackie Fortiér shares tips to make the most out of a high-deductible health plan. Plus, some Make America Healthy Again supporters...
GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. — Two state transportation workers were replacing a sign on the shoulder of U.S. Highway 6 in western Colorado one morning when a Jeep Grand Cherokee swerved off the road and struck them.
The workers, Nathan Jones and Trent Umberger, died in the September 2024 crash, as did a passenger in the Jeep. Tests found that the driver, Patrick Sneddon, then 59, had oxycodone and six times Colorado’s presumed impairment threshold for THC — the psychoactive compound in cannabis — in his blood. He pleaded guilty and is serving 30 years in prison on three counts of vehicular homicide...
Enrollment in the Affordable Care Act continues to erode as some customers struggle to make premium payments, with the declining numbers churning market uncertainty for insurers. In response, insurers are likely to raise rates again next year, following this year’s larger-than-typical hikes.
Overwhelmed by the demands of caregiving, Quette dialed 911 when she found her teenage son downstairs in their kitchen struggling to breathe.
He had rolled his wheelchair to the oven to keep himself warm as he tried to regulate his temperature, she recalled, and was drenched in sweat from an apparent infection.
In that moment, Quette knew that she and her son’s grandmother could no longer meet his medical needs on their own at their Illinois home just outside St. Louis. He had become paralyzed when he was shot in 2023, and, despite their efforts, they struggled to take care of him. But she...
President Donald Trump earlier this year bought as much as $680,000 in stock of Eli Lilly, the maker of blockbuster obesity drugs, as the agencies he oversees undertook an agenda that largely benefited the company.
In 1996, Guinea-Bissau seemed like an ideal research post for budding pediatrician Lone Graff Stensballe. Her supervisor, a fellow Dane named Peter Aaby, had spent nearly two decades collecting data on 100,000 people living in the mud brick homes of the West African country’s capital.
Aaby and his partner, Christine Stabell Benn, believed that the years of research in the impoverished country had yielded a major discovery about vaccines — and what they described as “non-specific effects”: The measles and tuberculosis vaccines, which were derived from live, weakened viruses and bacteria, they...
KFF Health News chief Washington correspondent Julie Rovner discussed federal policy on vaccine research, vaping, and drug access on Science Friday on May 8. Rovner also discussed the Supreme Court decision on the abortion pill mifepristone on NPR’s Morning Edition on May 5.
Here in Washington, we’ve been hearing about tensions between the White House and one of its most controversial — but, at least in some circles, most popular — figures: Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Polling of likely voters indicates that the Health and Human Services secretary can be an asset to Republicans when he’s talking about improving the nation’s food supply or labeling ultraprocessed foods. But when he’s talking about removing recommendations for routine childhood vaccinations, he can be a detriment.
So, when I learned Kennedy would be taking his show on the road to my home state of Ohio, ...
Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is caught between his Make America Healthy Again supporters who want him to do more to advance their priorities, including curtailing vaccines, and a White House trying to combat President Donald Trump’s unpopularity.
Protesters’ chants could be heard from inside the Cleveland City Club, where Kennedy was speaking to a bipartisan group of citizens as part of his recent tour of northern Ohio. His calls for parents to have more “choice” on vaccinating their children was met with applause from half of the room. The other half released...
The FDA’s recent decision to withhold approval of a new skin cancer treatment fell like a hammer on doctors who treat melanoma and patients who saw that the drug had prolonged the lives of a third of the participants in a clinical trial.
“It was devastating news,” said Trisha Wise-Draper, a dermatologist at the University of Cincinnati who had patients enrolled in the trial.
Minnesota lawmakers are wrestling with how to sustain the state’s financially distressed hospitals while patients confront growing medical debt.
One Minnesota lawmaker wants to steer money from an existing healthcare tax back to hospitals so they can expand their charity care programs for patients who can’t afford their bills.
The proposal follows a Minnesota Star Tribune-KFF Health News investigation that found hospitals across the state spend far less on charity care than hospitals in many other states, and use widely different standards to decide who qualifies for free or discounted care....
Several states have joined President Donald Trump’s deportation efforts and are taking federal reporting requirements to immigration authorities a step further — by using their public health agencies as arms of enforcement.
North Carolina, in late April, became the latest member of a growing group of Republican-led states to require their public health agencies to flag recipients of Medicaid to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security if their legal status is in question.
GWINNETT COUNTY, Ga. — In a midwife’s suburban Atlanta home with a playground and chicken coop outside, Madie Collins lay on an examination table while the midwife measured her pregnant belly. Unlike at many a doctor’s office, no crinkly paper sheet covered the table and no antiseptic chill lingered in the air. The room next door, where Collins’ appointment began, was filled with children’s toys and scented candles and warmed by a wood-burning stove.
The certified professional midwife pressed the button on a handheld Doppler ultrasound machine she placed on Collins’ belly. “That’s her...
Following a recent outbreak of the deadly hantavirus on the cruise ship MV Hondius, KFF Health News editor-at-large and infectious disease doctor Céline Gounder spoke to numerous media outlets about the risks from the disease. Here are some highlights from Gounder on the evolving story.
WHO: Hantavirus Outbreak Risk to Public Is ‘Absolutely Low’
Gounder joined MS Now on May 8 to explain who is at risk of contracting the disease and what is known about how hantavirus spreads, and to share her thoughts on whether people should be worried about traveling.
Comparing Hantavirus and Covid-19
Paul Boyer, a psychotherapist for Kaiser Permanente in Oakland, California, is experiencing the AI revolution firsthand. He’s a little underwhelmed.
The health giant has rolled out a new suite of note-taking software, made by healthcare AI pioneer Abridge, intended to summarize a patient’s visit at supersonic speed. For many clinicians, the technology soothes one of the persistent headaches of their lives — administration and paperwork.
But the AI scribe caused another headache for Boyer and his colleagues: It is “not super useful.” They end up correcting the computer-written notes.
TOLEDO, Ohio — The little boy, dressed in a Toy Story sweatshirt, wrapped himself around the nation’s health secretary.
“What do you guys want to be when you grow up?” Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. asked a carpet full of preschoolers.
“A dinosaur!” the boy replied, squeezing tighter.
Just weeks ago, Kennedy sat before lawmakers on Capitol Hill and faced intense questions about a dangerous uptick in infectious diseases among American children.
Now, with midterm primaries underway, Kennedy was seated in a toddler-sized chair in Ohio, on a mission to change the...
If you or someone you know may be experiencing a mental health crisis, contact the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline by dialing or texting “988.”
As a teenager, Rei Scott spent several weeks living out of a car with four family members and their dog. Each day, Scott worried about where they would spend the following night.
One day at school, Scott snuck away to the bathroom and called the national suicide hotline.
ST. CLOUD, Minn. — Cori Roberts was living in a rented basement four years ago when she was diagnosed with early-stage cervical cancer.
Recently divorced, the former stay-at-home mother had started working again in her mid-40s, taking a human resources job that paid $41,000 a year. Then, despite having insurance, she was hit with more than $8,000 in medical bills.
“I had my car and a basket of clothes,” Roberts recalled. “Medical bills were not something I could have afforded.”
Health insurance in the U.S. is notoriously confusing. So we’re covering the basics to make navigating your plan a little easier. We explain the difference between a deductible and an out-of-pocket limit, define copay and coinsurance, and point out where surprise bills can get you in trouble, from out-of-network providers to prior authorizations.
Read more coverage from our “Bill of the Month,” “Health Care Helpline,” and “Priced Out” series:
Céline Gounder, KFF Health News’ editor-at-large for public health, discussed the cruise ship hantavirus outbreak on PBS NewsHour, Fox’s LiveNow From Fox, and CBS News’ CBS Mornings on May 5. She also discussed the hantavirus outbreak on NPR’s Morning Edition on May 6.
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