First Edition: February 28, 2022

KHN:
From Alabama To Utah, Efforts To Vaccinate Medicaid Enrollees Against Covid Run Into Obstacles

Medicaid enrollees continue to get vaccinated against covid at far lower rates than the general population despite vigorous outreach efforts by government officials and private organizations to get low-income people inoculated, according to data from several states. That leaves many Medicaid enrollees — who tend to be sicker than those with private insurance — at higher risk for severe illness, hospitalization, or death from the virus. (Galewitz, 2/28)

KHN:
The Demise Of Single-Payer In California Trips Up Efforts In Other States

Single-payer health care didn’t stand a chance in California this year. Even in this deep-blue bastion, Democratic lawmakers shied away from legislation that would have put state government in charge of health care and taxed Californians heavily to do so — a massive transformation that would have forced them to take on the powerful health care industry. (Hart, 2/28)

KHN:
Journalists Discuss The Cost Of Service Dogs And Medicaid Coverage For People With HIV

KHN and California Healthline staff made the rounds on national and local media this week to discuss their stories. Here’s a collection of their appearances. (2/26)

AP:
CDC: Many Healthy Americans Can Take A Break From Masks

Most Americans live in places where healthy people, including students in schools, can safely take a break from wearing masks under new U.S. guidelines released Friday. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention outlined the new set of measures for communities where COVID-19 is easing its grip, with less of a focus on positive test results and more on what’s happening at hospitals. The new system greatly changes the look of the CDC’s risk map and puts more than 70% of the U.S. population in counties where the coronavirus is posing a low or medium threat to hospitals. Those are the people who can stop wearing masks, the agency said. (Johnson and Stobbe, 2/25)

Bloomberg:
CDC Loosens Guidelines For Mask-Wearing As U.S. Omicron Wave Recedes

The new guidelines are going into place as the U.S. comes out of a dizzying spike and rapid descent in Covid-19 infections caused by the fast-spreading omicron variant. With cases quickly ebbing, many states have already relaxed masking guidelines, and the CDC has come under criticism for not acting more quickly to set a new baseline for mitigation steps across the country. While the earlier risk system mainly focused on case counts, the CDC is now taking into account disease severity and local health resources. White House medical adviser Anthony Fauci said earlier this week that, although the pandemic is still a global concern, vaccines, treatments and tests have put the U.S. in a better position to pull back on restrictions. (Rutherford, 2/25)

The Washington Post:
What You Need To Know About The CDC’s New Coronavirus Guidance

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released a new framework for dealing with the coronavirus Friday that eases recommendations on mask-wearing for much of the country — a move that arrives as many state and local officials had already taken such steps. The guidelines illustrate that after more than two years of living with the virus, many communities have gained greater protection against severe illness through vaccination, treatments, better testing and higher-quality masks. (Stead Sellers and Rizzo, 2/25)

The New York Times:
Masking And Isolating Reduced Omicron Spread In Homes, C.D.C. Finds

The Omicron variant of the coronavirus has been so contagious that it may have seemed a foregone conclusion that if one person in a household became ill, other people living there would catch the virus, too. But that turns out to be less certain: A small study of households by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released on Friday found that when the first person infected wore a mask and stayed in a separate room at least part of the time, the risk of other household members contracting the virus became markedly lower. (Mueller, 2/25)

The New York Times:
New York Ends Its Mask Mandate For Schools

Mayor Eric Adams announced on Sunday that New York City was poised to eliminate school mask mandates and vaccine requirements for restaurants, gyms and movie theaters, by March 7, if case numbers remain low. The rollback of pandemic restrictions, which had served as a crucial weapon in the city’s battle against the coronavirus, is a milestone that many hope will help to restore a sense of normalcy in the city and boost its economic recovery. (Ashford, Shapiro and Fitzsimmons, 2/27)

AP:
Boston Health Officials To Consider Ending Mask Mandates

Public health officials in Boston are weighing lifting the city’s facemask requirement for schools and businesses. The city’s Public Health Commission will meet Tuesday to discuss the matter. It comes the day after students and staff at Massachusetts public schools are officially not required to wear face coverings indoors. Gov. Charlie Baker announced earlier this month that the statewide mandate for schools would end Feb. 28. (2/27)

The Wall Street Journal:
Community Workers Push To Get Covid-19 Tests To The Vulnerable

As the Biden administration distributes hundreds of millions of Covid-19 tests, some public-health workers are moving to deliver the kits a final mile to some of the people most vulnerable to the virus. Alejandra Flores-Miller, a community health worker at Johns Hopkins University, is referring people around Baltimore to a phone hotline and chatting with day laborers and others in the community about at-home Covid-19 tests. Some people say that they didn’t know tests were available or how to get them, Ms. Flores-Miller said, sometimes due to language barriers. (Abbott, 2/27)

The Wall Street Journal:
Covid-19 Booster Shots Are Slowing As Omicron Surge Fades

Fewer people are getting vaccine booster shots in the U.S. as the Omicron Covid-19 surge fades and more Americans return to normal patterns of life, federal data show. The seven-day average for booster shots administered daily was about 149,000 on Feb. 19, down from a little more than a million in early December, when authorities expanded access and Omicron was first detected in the U.S., the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates. The agency says about half of booster-eligible people have gotten one so far, compared with about 69% of the eligible population who have completed a regular vaccine series. (Kamp, 2/26)

The New York Times:
Experts Warn That The End Of The Omicron Surge Is Not The End Of The Pandemic

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shifted its guidelines on Friday to say that fewer communities were in need of coronavirus restrictions such as masks and social distancing, a change that coincided with moves by several states to drop such protections. But the rush to return to normality in light of an improving national outlook for coronavirus cases has many public health experts concerned that the end of the Omicron surge is incorrectly being conflated with the end of the pandemic. (Holpuch, 2/27)

Alaska Public Media:
Alaska Kids’ COVID Vaccination Rates Remain Low. Pediatricians Say Misinformation Is The Challenge

Vaccination rates for Alaska children lag far behind the rates for older kids and adults, according to data from the state health department. In Alaska, only 25% of kids ages 5 to 11 had received at least one shot by mid-February. Nationally, 31% have. (Anastas, 2/27)

Los Angeles Times:
Newsom Scales Back Some Special Pandemic Rules, But Not California’s State Of Emergency

Gov. Gavin Newsom on Friday rescinded a slate of COVID-19-related executive orders in response to signs of a subsiding pandemic, but did not end California’s nearly two-year-long state of emergency despite criticism from Republican lawmakers that he no longer needs its immense executive powers. The governor’s office summarized 19 provisions in executive orders that will be immediately terminated, which included requirements that all state-owned properties be made available for emergency use and state agencies to identify facilities for housing and medical treatment. (Willon and Luna, 2/25)

AP:
California Governor Ends 12 Emergencies, But Not For COVID

Multiple California emergencies declared by the last two governors officially ended on Friday — including for heat waves, an oil spill, wildfires and the civil unrest in reaction to George Floyd’s murder — but Gov. Gavin Newsom said the threat from the coronavirus lives on and so does the emergency he declared for it nearly two years ago. In all, Newsom signed an order ending 12 state of emergency declarations, which automatically terminate any associated executive orders relating to those events. But he offered no timeline for ending the statewide coronavirus emergency, meaning he will continue to wield broad authority to change or suspend state laws in response to the pandemic. (Beam, 2/26)

The New York Times:
‘An Extraordinarily Clear Picture’: New Research Points To A Wuhan Market As The Origin Of The Pandemic

Scientists released a pair of extensive studies that point to a market in Wuhan, China, as the origin of the coronavirus pandemic. Analyzing data from a variety of sources, they concluded that the coronavirus was very likely present in live mammals sold in the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in late 2019 and suggested that the virus twice spilled over into people working or shopping there. They said they found no support for an alternate theory that the coronavirus escaped from a laboratory in Wuhan. (Zimmer and Mueller, 2/27)

CNN:
Studies Offer Further Evidence That Coronavirus Pandemic Began In Animals In Wuhan Market 

Two preprint studies posted Saturday offer further evidence that the coronavirus originated in animals and spread to humans in late 2019 at the Huanan Seafood Market in Wuhan, China. One of the studies — neither of which has been peer-reviewed or published in a professional journal — used spatial analysis to show that the earliest known Covid-19 cases, diagnosed in December 2019, were centered on the market. The researchers also report that environmental samples that tested positive for the virus, SARS-CoV-2, were strongly associated with live-animal vendors. The other study says the two major viral lineages were the result of at least two events in which the virus crossed species into humans. The first transmission most likely happened in late November or early December 2019, the researchers say, and the other lineage was probably introduced within weeks of the first event. (Dillinger, 2/27)

The New York Times:
Study Finds High Rates Of Covid-Related Discrimination Against U.S. Minorities

People in the United States who belong to racial and ethnic minority groups reported experiencing Covid-related discrimination far more often than white people during the pandemic, and far more often than had been estimated, according to a new study that is one of the largest to date on the issue. The study, from the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities, a division of the National Institutes of Health, found that members of minority groups were more likely to report instances of being harassed or threatened and situations in which other people treated them as though they might be carrying the disease. People of Asian ethnicity, who have been victims of several high-profile bias crimes during the pandemic, reported the highest rates of being taunted by racist comments, insults, threats and name-calling related to Covid. (Caryn Rabin, 2/25)

AP:
Nearly Half Of 500 Million Free COVID Tests Still Unclaimed

Nearly half of the 500 million free COVID-19 tests the Biden administration recently made available to the public still have not been claimed as virus cases plummet and people feel less urgency to test. Wild demand swings have been a subplot in the pandemic, from vaccines to hand sanitizer, along with tests. On the first day of the White House test giveaway in January, COVIDtests.gov received over 45 million orders. Now officials say fewer than 100,000 orders a day are coming in for the packages of four free rapid tests per household, delivered by the U.S. Postal Service. (Alonso-Zaldivar, 2/27)

The Hill:
Advocates Criticize ‘Tepid’ Biden Request For Global COVID-19 Funding

Democratic lawmakers and advocacy groups say the Biden administration’s request for $5 billion from Congress for efforts to fight COVID-19 globally, including vaccinations, falls far short of what is needed. They had been pushing for months for $17 billion to step up global vaccination and treatment efforts, but the White House asked for less than a third of that amount in informal talks with Congress last week, without offering an explanation. “Honestly, it’s not enough,” said Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.), who has been helping lead the push in Congress for more funding. (Sullivan, 2/27)

The Hill:
House Lifting Mask Mandate Ahead Of State Of The Union Address

The House is lifting its mask mandate ahead of President Biden’s State of the Union address this week, making mask wearing optional throughout the Capitol complex. In a letter on Sunday, Capitol Physician Brian Monahan shared the changes with lawmakers returning to Washington this week. “Individuals may choose to mask at any time, but it is no longer a requirement,” he wrote. Monahan said positive COVID-19 test rates at the Capitol are down to 2.7 percent in the last two weeks, below the current rate for the DC-Metropolitan area (4.7 percent). (Oshin, 2/27)

Reuters:
Drug Distributors, J&J Agree To Finalize $26 Bln Opioid Settlement

The three largest U.S. drug distributors and drugmaker Johnson & Johnson (JNJ.N) have agreed to finalize a proposed $26 billion settlement resolving claims by states and local governments that they helped fuel the U.S. opioid epidemic. Distributors McKesson Corp (MCK.N), AmerisourceBergen Corp (ABC.N) and Cardinal Health Inc (CAH.N) along with J&J had until Friday to decide whether enough cities and counties nationally had opted to join the landmark settlement to justify moving forward with it. (Raymond, 2/25)

Stat:
J&J, Three Pharma Wholesalers Finalize $26 Billion Opioid Crisis Settlement

Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) and three major pharmaceutical wholesalers have finalized nationwide settlements over their role in the opioid crisis, paving the way to distribute $26 billion to numerous state and local governments across the country. The settlement is the largest so far among many lawsuits filed by communities seeking compensation for the decades-long expenses of coping with the fallout from addiction to opioid painkillers. J&J, AmerisourceBergen (ABC), Cardinal Health (CAH), and McKesson (MCK) agreed to the deal last year, but payouts have been contingent on getting participation from a majority of state and local governments. (Silverman, 2/25)

Politico:
FTC’s Top Economist Resigned Amid Dispute Over Pharma Study

The Federal Trade Commission’s top economist abruptly quit last week amid internal disagreements over a proposed study into pharmacy benefit managers, three people familiar with the situation said. Marta Wosinska, the FTC’s Bureau of Economics director, resigned on Feb. 16, a day before the FTC was set to vote on a study into PBMs, the companies that negotiate rebates from pharmaceutical manufacturers and develop lists of prescription drugs that health insurers will cover. Wosinska — who specializes in health care economics and previously worked for the Food and Drug Administration — had served as the FTC’s top economist since April 2021. (Nylen, 2/25)

Stat:
NIH Official Accused Of ‘Bias’ Against Applying March-In Rights 

The campaign to use so-called march-in rights to widen access to a cancer drug is getting personal. Universities Allied for Essential Medicines, one of several advocacy groups backing the use of a controversial U.S. law to counter high drug prices, is arguing that an official at the National Institutes of Health should be recused from any decision-making role in responding to a petition to sidestep patents for the Xtandi prostate cancer drug. (Silverman, 2/25)

Politico:
WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala Calls For More ‘Political Will’ On Covid, Future Pandemics

Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, the director-general of the World Trade Organization, told POLITICO that member states are still in “difficult” conversations about a potential agreement on an intellectual property waiver that would allow countries to more easily manufacture the Covid-19 vaccine.vFor more than a year, WTO members have discussed a possible agreement on a Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights waiver. In recent weeks, Okonjo-Iweala and a small group of representatives, including those from the U.S., European Union, South Africa and India, have held targeted talks about a potential agreement. Okonjo-Iweala met with the organization’s general council this week in Geneva to discuss what she described in an interview as a “landing zone.” (Banco, 2/25)

CIDRAP:
CDC: Flu Sporadic But Increasing In Some Spots; 6th Child Has Died Of Flu

US flu levels are mostly sporadic but some areas are seeing increasing flu activity, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said in its weekly FluView update, which also included a report of the sixth child to die this season of flu. Nationwide during the week ending on Feb 19, 1.5% of patient visits were for influenza-like illness (ILI), well below the national baseline. Just two states—Colorado and Oklahoma—reported moderate ILI activity, with all other states and territories reporting lower levels. The CDC did not specify which areas saw rising flu levels last week. (2/25)

CIDRAP:
WHO Advisors Switch 2 Strains For Next Northern Hemisphere Season

World Health Organization (WHO) flu vaccine strain selection advisors met this week to recommend the strains to include for the Northern Hemisphere’s 2022-2023 flu season, swapping out the components for the H3N2 and influenza B Victoria lineage strains. In an announcement today, the group recommends that flu shots use an A/Darwin/9/2021-like strain for the H3N2 component, rather than this season’s A/Cambodia/e0926360/2020. And for the influenza B Victoria lineage component, the experts recommend using a B/Austria/ 1359417/2021-like strain instead of this season’s B/Washington/02/2019. (2/25)

The Washington Post:
AAA Study: Unsafe Drivers Made Up Larger Share Of Motorists During Covid

Although there have been fewer cars on the road nationwide during the coronavirus pandemic, a study released Monday found that younger and riskier drivers were increasingly on the roads during a surge in traffic fatalities across the country. The more dangerous drivers made up a small proportion of drivers overall, but they were likely to take the most risks as traffic levels were down, according to an AAA study. The study sought to understand why traffic deaths rose while driving was down at least 20 percent during much of 2020. During that time, crashes involving impairment, speeding, red-light running, aggressiveness and non-seatbelt usage spiked to their highest level in more than a decade, AAA said. (George, 2/28)

AP:
Rash-Causing Moth Spreading Due To Warming, Scientists Find

A forest pest that bedevils Maine residents and tourists with hairs that cause an itchy rash appears to be spreading due to warming temperatures, a group of scientists has found. The browntail moth is a scourge in America’s most forested state, where it defoliates trees and causes a rash in humans that resembles poison ivy. The hairs of the caterpillars, which have been the subject of an outbreak in the state for about seven years, can also cause respiratory trouble. The growth and spread of the moth is tied to increasingly warm weather, especially in the fall, the scientists wrote recently in the journal Environmental Entomology. And, unfortunately, climate trends suggest upcoming years could be even worse, they wrote. (Whittle, 2/26)

The Wall Street Journal:
Sperm Banks Struggle To Recruit Black Donors And Other Donors Of Color

A few years after her marriage broke up, Aisha Jenkins started thinking about having a baby on her own. She used a leading sperm bank whose catalog contained hundreds of potential donors from which to choose. But when Ms. Jenkins, who is Black, narrowed the search down to Black donors, only six remained. “That can’t be right,” said Ms. Jenkins, a 46-year-old project manager for a software company who lives in the Washington, D.C., metro area. When she realized how difficult it is to find a Black sperm donor, Ms. Jenkins said she expanded her search, adding, “I knew there were other colors in the spectrum that would give me a brown child.” She now has two daughters, ages 7 and 2 1/2, using different donors—one with Egyptian ancestry, the other with Indian ancestry. (Dockser Marcus, 2/26)

Bloomberg:
Texas At-Home Abortion Pill Requests Spiked Following New Limits

The study provides yet another dataset detailing the impacts of Texas’s near total ban on abortions. The Texas law, which went into effect on Sept. 1, bans almost all abortions after fetal cardiac activity can be detected, usually about six weeks into a pregnancy. Not only have more Texans been looking to pill deliveries by mail, but they have also been going to neighboring states. Planned Parenthood said this week that its clinics in Oklahoma, New Mexico, Kansas, Colorado and Missouri saw a nearly 800% increase in abortion patients from Texas from Sept. 1 through Dec. 31, compared with the year before. (Hagan, 2/25)

Politico:
Abortion Pill Use Spikes In Texas As Thousands Of Patients Circumvent State’s Ban

Texans have been ordering abortion pills online at record rates in the wake of the state’s law banning the procedure after six weeks of pregnancy, according to a new study published Friday in JAMA Network Open. Orders for the drugs from the international nonprofit Aid Access spiked 1,180 percent in the first week after the Texas law took effect in September, increasing from about 11 purchases per day to more than 137 per day. And though orders decreased over the next few months, researchers found that they remained 175 percent higher than before the Texas law took effect. (Miranda Ollstein, 2/25)

Los Angeles Times:
Former Hawaii Quarterback Colt Brennan Had CTE At Time Of Death

Former Hawaii quarterback Colt Brennan was found to have had Stage 1 chronic traumatic encephalopathy in a post-mortem examination, his family was told this week. After his death in May of 2021, Brennan’s brain was sent to the CTE Center at Boston University. The test results confirmed what his parents had suspected. “We knew Colt was struggling,” said his father, Terry. “We just didn’t know everything. He certainly had his challenges… This is just a piece of the puzzle, I guess.” Brennan, who grew up in Orange County and played at Mater Dei High and Saddleback College, dealt with drug and alcohol issues and died after an overdose that included fentanyl. He was 37. (Miller, 2/25)

Reuters:
Degenerative Disease Found In More Than Half Of Donated Brains From Ex-Australia Athletes: Study

More than half of the first 21 brains donated to the Australian Sports Brain Bank by former athletes showed signs of chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), a degenerative disease caused by repeated concussions, a study showed. CTE, which can only be detected when the brain is examined after death, has been linked to mental health issues ranging from mood and behavioural symptoms to cognitive impairment and dementia. The study, which was approved by the Sydney Local Health District Ethics Review Committee (Royal Prince Alfred Hospital), reported its preliminary findings based on the first 21 completed donations up to March 26, 2021. (2/28)

The Washington Post:
Pandemic Leads Colleges To Revise, Improve Mental Health Efforts

With the pandemic dragging on, the string of setbacks that recently hit Lucas Regnier, a sophomore at Concordia University Wisconsin, seemed oddly routine. A wrestler and physical education major, he suffered a concussion and a sprained ACL. Then, he and half his team contracted covid-19, forcing him to isolate in the basement of his girlfriend’s parents’ home, disrupting his academics and prized training time with teammates. “I have been out eight weeks,” said Regnier, who has anxiety and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder and was sporting sweats as he finally attended practice in early February. “I have been struggling to keep mentally strong.” (Pappano, 2/25)

The Washington Post:
‘No-Strings-Attached’ Cash Boosts Mental Health, Food Security For Low-Income DC Families, Report Finds

Hundreds of low-income D.C. families reported better mental health and food security after participating in a direct cash pilot program that could be a model for efforts elsewhere, according to an Urban Institute analysis of the program’s effectiveness. The THRIVE East of the River cash-payment program, a combined effort of four established D.C. nonprofits, launched in 2020 soon after the pandemic began. It gave $5,500 with no-strings-attached to approximately 600 families in Ward 8, where the median income is $40,000, under half the Districtwide median. (Heim, 2/26)

San Diego Union-Tribune:
San Diego County Reimagines Response To Mental Health Calls

A man in the throes of a panic attack called 911 from his Chula Vista apartment on a recent morning. It’s the kind of call police officers would usually go to. Instead, the Chula Vista Police Department forwarded the call to Lauren Muecke, who works for the county’s Mobile Crisis Response Teams. “We’re not going to be sending an ambulance, and we’re not going to be sending police officers,” Muecke told the man. “We’re happy to talk to you today and support you today. How does that sound to you?” (Winkley and Murga, 2/27)

The Wall Street Journal:
Why Is Everyone Standing So Close? Personal-Space Boundaries Shifted During The Pandemic

If it feels as if everyone you encounter is a close talker these days, you’re not alone: Distances that would have felt comfortable for most people before the pandemic are much too close for many now, researchers and mental-health experts say. Among a small group of subjects whose personal-space boundaries were tested by researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital before and during the Covid-19 pandemic, personal-space requirements increased by 40% to 50% on average, says Daphne Holt, who led the study and is an associate professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. (Janin, 2/27)

CIDRAP:
Studies: No To Very Slight Risk Of Hearing Loss After COVID Vaccine

Two studies yesterday in JAMA Otolaryngology – Head & Neck Surgery explore sudden hearing loss after COVID-19 vaccination, one finding no link and the other showing a marginally higher incidence among Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine recipients. A team led by Johns Hopkins University researchers investigated 555 cases of sudden sensorineural hearing loss (SSNHL) among adults within 3 weeks of COVID-19 vaccination reported to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System (VAERS) during the first 7 months of the US COVID vaccine rollout (Dec 14, 2020, to Jul 16, 2021). (Van Beusekom, 2/25)

Reuters:
GSK Halts Three Trials Of Respiratory Virus Vaccine In Pregnant Women

Britain’s GSK (GSK.L) said on Monday it had halted enrolment and vaccination in three trials of its experimental vaccine against the respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) in pregnant women, the latest setback in developing a vaccine for the microbe. GSK said on Feb. 18 that it had paused a late-stage trial, dubbed “GRACE,” as well as two other studies, based on safety recommendations from an independent committee but did not give further details on what had prompted the recommendations. (2/28)

Reuters:
COVID-Related Diabetes May Be Temporary

Researchers studied 594 patients who showed signs of diabetes while hospitalized for COVID-19, including 78 with no previous diagnosis of diabetes. Compared to patients with pre-existing diabetes, many of the newly diagnosed patients had less severe blood sugar issues but more serious COVID-19. Roughly a year after leaving the hospital, 40% of the newly diagnosed patients had gone back to blood sugar levels below the cutoff for diabetes, researchers reported in the Journal of Diabetes and Its Complications. “This suggests to us that newly diagnosed diabetes may be a transitory condition related to the acute stress of COVID-19 infection,” study coauthor Dr. Sara Cromer of the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston said in a statement. (Lapid, 2/25)

Stat:
AI Gone Astray: How Shifts In Patient Data Send Health Algorithms Reeling

A novel investigation by STAT and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology found that subtle shifts in data fed into popular health care algorithms — used to warn caregivers of impending medical crises — can cause their accuracy to plummet over time, raising the prospect AI could do more harm than good in many hospitals. In a monthslong experiment, STAT and MIT traced the performance of algorithms past their early days of peak performance into the grinding years that follow, when the hype has faded and they must prove their reliability to caregivers. Instead of transforming care, the algorithms withered in the face of fast-moving clinical conditions — unable to keep up with the pace of change. Their frailty exposes gaping holes in the governance of products whose quiet deterioration in hospitals around the country threatens to mislead doctors and undermine patient safety. The initial signs of dysfunction are often faint, making it difficult to root out faulty information before it bleeds into decision-making. (Ross, 2/28)

Stat:
How STAT And MIT Rooted Out Weaknesses In Health Care Algorithms

In July 2021, STAT and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology set out to answer a simple question with big implications for the use of AI in medicine: How do popular algorithms used to warn of bad outcomes for patients hold up over time? The months-long experiment, born of a novel partnership in journalism and science, yielded an illuminating result: the algorithms deteriorated over several years, delivering faulty advice about which patients were at the highest risk of deadly complications and prolonged hospital stays. (Yang, Karstens, Ross and Yala, 2/28)

The Hill:
Advisory Panel Recommends Overhaul For US Transplant System

A scientific advisory panel said that the U.S. transplant system must be overhauled in the next five years, The Associated Press reported. A report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine published on Friday detailed flaws that prevent the country from performing more life-saving transplants, according to the AP. More than 41,000 organ transplants were performed last year in the U.S. — a record-breaking number, the AP noted. However, more than 106,000 patients are waiting for transplants, 17 of whom die each day before they are able to undergo surgery. (Folmar, 2/25)

CIDRAP:
Workforce In Nursing Homes, Other Healthcare Areas Shrank Amid COVID

US skilled nursing facilities (SNFs) faced sharp employment losses during the pandemic—particularly in counties with a large infection burden—and did not rebound like other healthcare sectors, finds a study today in JAMA Health Forum. In the study, a team led by RAND Corp. researchers examined the effect of COVID-19 on the US healthcare workforce in 2020 and the first half of 2021, a time of elevated health risks, burnout, and childcare disruptions. “While federal programs have provided financial assistance to hospitals and institutions, the net effect of these forces on health care employment levels and wages has not been examined,” the researchers wrote. (2/25)

Anchorage Daily News:
Alaska’s Depleted Public Health Nurse Program Is Evolving Amid Chronic Job Vacancies And Burnout

State officials are looking for new ways to operate Alaska’s decades-old public health nursing program as they struggle to fill scores of empty positions two years into a pandemic. They say the program, established in 1943, needs to evolve to address emotional fatigue and burnout, as well as better meet the needs of the communities served by public health centers. (Zaz Hollander, 2/27)

AP:
New $70 Million Hospital Planned For Louisville’s West End

A new hospital has been announced for Louisville’s west end, the first to be built in the predominantly African American area in 150 years. City leaders announced a $100 million investment by two major employers, including the $70 million hospital from Norton Healthcare, the Courier Journal reported. The large campus on Broadway and 28th Street will include a $30 million headquarters for Goodwill Industries of Kentucky. Russell Cox, CEO of Norton Healthcare, said during the announcement Wednesday that it was a “transformational day in the history of health care in our community.” (2/26)

Detroit Free Press:
Detroit Had 18 Black-Owned And Operated Hospitals: Why They Vanished

This year, the Association for the Study of African American Life and History set health and wellnes as the theme for Black History Month. In Detroit, the history of Black health care is largely a saga of Black physicians who established a parallel medical universe alongside the white hospitals that shunned them and their Black patients. In 1844, four Catholic nuns — Loyola Ritchie, Rebecca Delone, Felicia Fenwick and Rosaline Brown — came to Detroit. On June 9, 1845, they established St. Vincent’s Hospital, the first hospital in the entire Northwest Territory. It was located at Randolph and Larned in what is now downtown Detroit. (Jordan, 2/27)

Des Moines Register:
State Of Iowa Drops Its Case Against Nurse Accused Of Running Unlicensed Care Facility

The state agency that oversees nursing homes in Iowa has dropped its case against an Iowa nurse accused of running an illegal, unlicensed care facility. In the fall of 2020, the Iowa Department of Inspections and Appeals sent inspectors into the Sutton Senior Home, located just off Park Avenue in Des Moines. After reviewing the level of care being received by the six elderly people living in the house, DIA concluded the building was functioning illegally as an unlicensed residential care facility or assisted living program. (Kauffman, 2/26)

AP:
Two Hotels To Stop Housing Homeless Following Complaints

Two hotels in Maine will stop hosting hundreds of people experiencing homelessness because of complaints from neighboring businesses. The Days Inn and Comfort Inn near the Maine Mall in South Portland will not renew its contract with MaineHousing to provide emergency shelter when it expires May 31, the Portland Press Herald reports. Suresh Gali, head of New Gen Hospitality Management that operates the hotels, made the announcement at a meeting Friday, according to the newspaper. (2/26)

Bangor Daily News:
Bangor Motel Wants Judge To Say Whether It Has To Accept Homeless Guests Using Vouchers

A Bangor motel wants a judge to decide whether it has to take in homeless guests paying for their rooms with city-issued vouchers.The Travelodge on Odlin Road filed a lawsuit earlier this month in Penobscot County Superior Court after it received a notice from a legal aid group saying it and other motels had violated the Maine Human Rights Act when they turned away homeless guests with housing vouchers. (2/28)

Billings Gazette:
Severe Frostbite In Billings Homeless Follows Record-Breaking Cold

The record-breaking cold that settled over Billings this week is the kind of cold that can freeze bare skin in minutes. And for those experiencing homelessness, frostbite and hypothermia are a major concern. By Wednesday, temperatures dropped to minus 21 at the airport and minus 26 on the West End of Billings. The high for the day was minus 3. (Schabacker, 2/26)

AP:
University Starts Deer Cull On Detroit-Area Campus

A statement from the school on Tuesday said the objective was to “protect … biodiversity … to help reduce health risks … due to tick exposure and to reduce car-deer collisions near campus.” The university considered alternatives, including relocating deer, but concluded other methods either wouldn’t work or weren’t permitted. It is the third cull of deer by the university in recent years. There were others in 2015 and 2018. (2/27)

AP:
Arizona Health Agency Reduces Frequency Of Pandemic Updates

Arizona’s public health agency on Saturday provided its last planned daily update of the state’s coronavirus dashboard of pandemic data such as additional COVID-19 cases, new deaths and hospitalization levels. The state Department of Health Services announced Feb. 18 that it would switch to weekly dashboard updates starting next Wednesday because the outbreak is slowing and to be consistent with other infectious disease that are reported. (2/27)

AP:
Illinois Expects $760 Million From Opioid Settlement+

Illinois is expected to receive $760 million as part of a settlement with pharmaceutical distributors sued for their role in the opioid crisis, the state attorney general announced Friday. Attorney General Kwame Raoul’s office said the state’s share of a $26 billion opioid settlement agreement is the result of three years of talks. The majority of the state’s award will be used for programs around the state aimed at prevention and recovery from opioid addiction. (2/27)

Albuquerque Journal:
City’s Gateway Center To Open For Women Only

When the city of Albuquerque’s years-in-the-making homeless shelter finally opens, it will cater exclusively to women – and it will maintain that focus for the undetermined future. The city has decided to launch the Gateway Center in Southeast Albuquerque with 50 beds for women. While officials have in the past described the Gateway as a 24/7 operation to aid anyone regardless of gender, religion or sobriety, they say starting exclusively with women makes the most sense from a resources perspective. (Dyer, 2/28)

Billings Gazette:
Patients Find Care At Home With New St. V’s Cardiac Program

Debbie Ettleman is one of the first patients at St. Vincent Healthcare to receive a full-support heart pump that just a month ago would have required her to fly to a major city. When patients’ hearts are weak, surgeons attach the device to replace function of the left side of the heart – allowing those muscles to completely rest, said Dr. Simon Maltais, a cardiac surgeon recently hired at SCL Health. (Ackerman, 2/26)

Bloomberg:
Swedish Covid Inquiry Finds Fault With Nation’s Initial Response

Sweden’s initial response to the Covid-19 pandemic was partly misguided and slow, according to the findings of a government-appointed commission. However, the commission’s final report concluded that the country did relatively well during the pandemic. Sweden was one of the nations in Europe that had the lowest level of excess mortality in 2020 and 2021, despite a policy that shunned many of the harsh restrictions elsewhere on the continent. As death rates surged in early 2020, Sweden kept shops, restaurants and most schools open–a response that was blasted by critics at the time. The agency responsible for the strategy argued that all aspects of public health should be taken into account, including restricting people’s movements. It also said that a sustainable strategy should rely mainly on people’s willingness to adjust their lives voluntarily to help curb transmission. (Rolander, 2/25)

Reuters:
Medical Oxygen Running Out In Ukraine As War Rages, WHO Warns

Ukraine is running out of oxygen supplies that critically ill people need, the World Health Organization said on Sunday, calling for safe passage for emergency imports as combat rages. “The oxygen supply situation is nearing a very dangerous point in Ukraine. Trucks are unable to transport oxygen supplies from plants to hospitals across the country, including the capital Kyiv,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus and WHO Regional Director for Europe Hans Kluge said in a statement. (2/27)