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Some 8 percent of Americans, or an estimated 26 million people, lacked health insurance in 2023, according to the Commonwealth Fund 2024 Biennial Health Insurance Survey. Before implementation of the Affordable Care Act in 2010, nearly twice as many people, 16 percent of the population, were without health coverage, the Commonwealth Fund reported, citing data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (McMahan, 12/9)

Sixty-two percent of Americans say it’s the federal government’s responsibility to ensure everyone has health care coverage, a survey from Gallup found. The figure is the highest it’s been in more than a decade. It slipped to its low of 42 percent in 2013, during the difficult rollout of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), commonly known as ObamaCare. (Irwin, 12/9)

A federal judge on Monday issued a court order temporarily blocking a Biden administration rule that would have granted some people brought into the country illegally as children access to health coverage under the Affordable Care Act, a decision that could affect tens of thousands of Texans. (Edison, 12/9)

Nemaha Valley Community Hospital CEO Kiley Floyd is pleading with her local school district not to switch its retired teachers from traditional Medicare to Medicare Advantage. Floyd believes it’s her only hope to slow enrollment in the program in Seneca, the small city in northeastern Kansas where her 18-bed facility is located. Fee-for-service Medicare can't compete with the marketing, benefits and low premiums Medicare Advantage plans offer, she said. But insurers finance those perks by paying her critical access hospital 52 cents for every dollar billed, she said. (Tepper, 12/9)

Weight-loss drugs could be a boon for insurers, but it is too soon to tell whether the industry will be transformed, the head of Swiss Re’s life and health reinsurance arm said. The market for obesity drugs such as Eli Lilly’s Zepbound and Novo Nordisk’s Wegovy is booming after studies found the treatments helped patients shed weight and showed promise for health problems ranging from heart-attack risk to alcohol abuse. Lower rates of obesity—which has long been a public health crisis in the U.S. and is linked to many chronic conditions—could lead to smaller health-related claims for insurers and better underwriting margins. (Vardon, 12/10)

Getting to the MRI machine at one of this city’s largest public hospitals means taking a trip through time. Plastic waiting room chairs in radiology sit amid centuries-old blue and white Azulejo tiles, while a nearby chapel glimmers with Renaissance statuary and paintings. Hospital de São José’s ambulance bays, exam rooms, and labs, after all, occupy a former college the Jesuits started building in 1579. (McFarling, 12/10)

Across the world, the Covid-19 pandemic laid bare the fact that widespread racial and ethnic inequities often determine whether people can access health care, and who survives. The United States was among nations that saw far higher death rates among its Black and immigrant communities. Was the same true in Portugal? No one knows. (McFarling, 12/10)