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Missouri this week became the last state in the nation to put a statewide prescription drug monitoring service in place as its new database went online. Prescription drug monitoring programs allow health workers to compile patients’ drug history in an electronic database. Dentists, doctors, pharmacists and other professionals who dispense controlled substances now will be required to enter patient and prescription information into the database. (Fentem, 12/15)

The city’s public advocate, Jumaane Williams, who is a sponsor of the bill, said that isolating detainees was cruel and that the bill still allowed for people to be separated when needed. “Losing privileges is something that is understandable,” he said. “Losing a basic human right shouldn’t be.” Solitary confinement, also known as punitive segregation, is the practice of holding a detainee alone in a cell for most of the day as punishment. The bill would ban the practice beyond a four-hour “de-escalation” period during an emergency. Correction officers would be required to check on detainees every 15 minutes during that period and refer health concerns to medical staff. (Fitzsimmons, 12/18)

Walgreens-backed VillageMD is exiting Indiana. The primary care provider plans to shutter all 12 of its Village Medical practices across the state, effective Jan. 19, a VillageMD spokesperson confirmed Friday. Some of the locations are co-located with Walgreens stores, but the stores are not closing, the spokesperson said. (Hudson, 12/15)

Since states started rolling back pandemic-inspired flexibilities that allowed physicians to easily practice telehealth across state lines, virtual health care providers have criticized state-based medical licensure rules as unnecessarily burdensome, expensive, and detrimental to patient care. Now, two of them are arguing in a lawsuit that they can also be unconstitutional. (Palmer, 12/18)

Viral hepatitis C is curable. Hepatitis B is treatable. Both are preventable — so, why does one U.S. state have such high rates of it? Did you know that Hawaii has higher liver cancer mortality due to hepatitis B and C than the continental United States? "When we look at hepatitis B, and hepatitis C specifically, we also see higher death rates of both of those compared to the continental U.S.,” says Hawaii Department of Health’s Viral Hepatitis Prevention Coordinator Thaddeus Pham. “People who die from hepatitis in Hawaii — hepatitis C specifically — can die up to 20 years earlier than residents in the rest of the state.” (Harjo-Livingston, 12/16)

Tampa officials are bringing a new technology to the U.S. that removes organic matter from drinking water, and it's supposed to make it easier to filter out forever chemicals, known as PFAS. The city gets its water from the Hillsborough River and is hoping to remove things like decaying vegetation through a Dutch technology called Suspended Ion Exchange, or SIX. The initial installation at the David L. Tippin Water Treatment Facility will cost $200 million and should be done by 2032. Once completed, it’s expected to be the first in the U.S. and largest in the world. (Meszaros, 12/15)

Eric Chen never met Yu Lun Kao. But in February, he helped bury the 72-year-old ballroom dancer known to his friends as “Mr. Nice.” Kao, who went by Andy, was shielding his longtime dance partner from the hail of bullets when he was killed during the shooting at Star Ballroom Dance Studio in Monterey Park. He’d been a fixture in the dance community since immigrating from Taiwan two decades ago. (Lin, 12/17)

�鶹Ů�� Health News: In New Year, All Immigrants In California May Qualify For Medicaid Regardless Of Legal Status

Milagro, a Peruvian immigrant in Riverside County, California, has had spotty access to health care in the two decades she’s been in this country. The 48-year-old, who works as the office manager at a nonprofit, can get emergency care through a narrow set of benefits the state makes available to immigrants without legal residency. And she has been able to get mammograms, X-rays, and blood tests at clinics that charge according to income. But it can take a long time to get such appointments, and they are often far from home. (Wolfson, 12/18)