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An Idaho judge on Friday denied a request by the state’s top legal chief to throw out a lawsuit seeking to clarify the exemptions tucked inside the state’s broad abortion ban. Instead, 4th District Judge Jason Scott narrowed the case to focus only on the circumstances where an abortion would be allowed and whether abortion care in emergency situations applies to Idaho’s state constitutional right to enjoy and defend life and the right to secure safety. Scott’s decision comes just two weeks after a hearing where Idaho’s Attorney General Raul Labrador’s office attempted to dismiss the case spearheaded by four women and several physicians, who filed the case earlier this year. (Kruesi, 12/29)

Strategists on both sides of the abortion debate are gearing up to make Arizona the next center of the fight over the contentious issue. The efforts in the swing state could have big impacts on other contests on the 2024 ballot, including a key U.S. Senate election, control of the U.S. House and the race for the White House. President Biden won the state by just 10,000 votes out of more than 3 million cast in 2020, the first time the state voted for a Democratic presidential candidate since 1996. (Bustillo, 12/23)

There has been a shift in the litigation, away from the broad, head-on challenges and toward narrower issues arising from the bans. A newer wave of lawsuits has focused on when emergency medical exceptions to abortion bans apply and whether states can stop their citizens from traveling to states where abortion remains legal- a trend experts expect to continue in the new year. All of the 18 states that have banned or sharply restricted abortion allow exceptions for medical emergencies when continued pregnancy would endanger the mother's life, or, in some states, health. But in practice, according to allegations in multiple lawsuits and public testimony from women, those exceptions are often unavailable because the laws are so vague that physicians are not sure when they apply, and so are unwilling to perform abortions for fear of prosecution. (Pierson, 12/27)

More reproductive health news from North Carolina and Missouri —

This year kicked off with confetti, new tax laws and a baby boy for the Cannon family near Charlotte, North Carolina. Six minutes after midnight, parents Jonathan and Rachel Cannon celebrated the start of 2024 with the birth of their 7-pound, 3-ounce, 19.76 inches-long baby boy at Atrium Health Cabarrus hospital. (May, 1/1)

Free emergency contraception kits are now available through the City of St. Louis Department of Health. The department joins 60 other organizations taking part in the Missouri Family Health Council’s “Free EC” initiative. The goal is to provide access to emergency contraception and reproductive health resources. Suzanne Alexander, the department’s Communicable Disease Bureau Chief, said this option will benefit many in the city. (Lewis-Thompson, 12/29)

In other health news from across the U.S. —

Statewide, there are about 190 nursing homes. The state agency tasked with regulating them has just one active inspection team that travels the state to check on them, though it’s close to activating a second. By federal law, each team of five must include a registered nurse, and that division of the state Department of Health and Environmental Control has just one nurse with the necessary credentials.Even if it were fully staffed at one inspector for every 11 homes — the state-funded ratio a federal report relied on — it would still have the lowest ratio in the nation. (Holdman, 12/22)

Eleven years ago, local officials promised voters in the most liberal county in Texas that if they supported tens of millions of dollars in new taxes, they’d deliver a win-win scenario: Austin would get a new medical school, and poor people navigating the health care system in a state with the country’s worst uninsured rate would get more health care services. (Cohrs, 1/2)

Hundreds of people with developmental disabilities have finally returned to critically important day programs thanks to new investment from MassHealth. But many more remained on waiting lists last fall, exiled from programs they’re entitled to attend. Programs still don’t have the staff to serve everyone eligible, providers reported. Statewide, 20 percent of jobs at day habilitation programs were unfilled as of October, according to a survey of members conducted by the Association of Developmental Disabilities Providers and shared with the Globe. (Laughlin, 1/1)

Mass General Brigham, the largest health care system in Massachusetts, is expanding a program called Home Hospital. It is a model administrators say can improve outcomes and save money. ... The model uses a combination of nurses and other caregivers who come to the home, along with a telemedicine system that is set up by the hospital. MGB takes care of all of the equipment, including the internet connection. It may sound expensive, but Dorner said it's still cheaper than inpatient care. (Marshall, 12/29)

Gun violence in America is increasing, not only on crowded city streets, but in small towns in remote parts of the country that lack resources to save people from life-threatening gunshot wounds. ... Cities and suburbs typically have quick access to trauma centers equipped to handle gun injuries. It’s different for the estimated 60 million people living in rural America. For them, being shot means they are more likely to die. (Edwards, Thompson and Martin, 12/29)

�鶹Ů�� Health News: Child Care Gaps In Rural America Threaten To Undercut Small Communities 
Candy Murnion remembers vividly the event that pushed her to open her first day care business in Jordan, a town of fewer than 400 residents in a sea of grassland in eastern Montana. Garfield County’s public health nurse, one of few public health officials serving the town and nearly 5,000 square miles that surround it, had quit because she had given birth to her second child and couldn’t find day care. (Rodriguez, 1/2)

�鶹Ů�� Health News: Mental Health Courts Can Struggle To Fulfill Decades-Old Promise
In early December, Donald Brown stood nervously in the Hall County Courthouse, concerned he’d be sent back to jail. The 55-year-old struggles with depression, addiction, and suicidal thoughts. He worried a judge would terminate him from a special diversion program meant to keep people with mental illness from being incarcerated. He was failing to keep up with the program’s onerous work and community service requirements. “I’m kind of scared. I feel kind of defeated,” Brown said. (Whitehead, 12/28)