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In 2001, President George W. Bush issued an executive order banning federal funding for new sources of stem cells developed from preimplantation human embryos. The action stalled research and discouraged scientists. Five years later, a Kyoto University scientist, Shinya Yamanaka, and his graduate student, Kazutoshi Takahashi, re-energized the field by devising a technique to “reprogram” any adult cell, such as a skin cell, and coax it back to its earliest “pluripotent” stage. From there it can become any type of cell, from a heart muscle cell to a neuron. ... I interviewed [Yamanaka] recently in San Francisco. (Wallace Ravven, 1/16)

Six years ago, the Iowa Department of Human Services was put on notice by the federal government that a West Des Moines company called Ultimate Nursing Services of Iowa appeared to be improperly billing Medicaid for a large portion of the home health care services it provided Iowans. ... but just a few weeks ago, federal officials announced that ... Ultimate Nursing Services continued to successfully bill Iowa’s Medicaid program for improper expenses (1/16)

The Boston Globe brought to light the desperate need to improve our behavioral health care system to better protect and effectively treat children and adults who have mental health or substance-use conditions. ... We call on ourselves, our policy makers, and our government leaders to rise together to the challenge of implementing comprehensive reforms. We need the community’s continued support for systemic reform, innovative treatment, and the reporting of recovery results in order to destigmatize mental illness and ensure timely access to prevention, treatment, and support services. (Paul Guzzi and Barry White, 1/16)

Opioid overdoses have claimed more than 300,000 lives in the last 15 years, including some 33,000 in 2015 alone. But those numbers do not tell the full horror of this epidemic, which has devastated the lives of countless children whose parents have succumbed to addiction to prescription painkillers and other opiates. In one terrible case last month, a Pennsylvania couple died of apparent overdoses, and their baby perished from starvation a few days later. (1/16)

Mr. B undid his arm bandages and revealed two large, gaping wounds where he injected his heroin. He lay back in his hospital bed, looked up at the ceiling and said with a quivering voice, “I can’t inject into my veins anymore because they are all shot. I know I have a problem, Doctor. I’ve been trying to quit, but it’s so hard.” (Douglas Jacobs, 1/14)

More than 119,000 people woke up this morning hoping that this will be the day they get a call saying that a heart, a liver, a lung or other organ donation has been found — and they will get a chance to live. Multiply that number by perhaps dozens of parents, spouses, children and friends of those who are waiting lists for an organ transplant, and the news that a record number of transplants took place last year in the United States is cause for hope and joy. (1/17)

As an infectious diseases specialist married to a pediatrician, I am going to propose, in most unhumble fashion, that I have the ideal perspective to assess the worthiness of vaccines. So when Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a notorious anti-vaccine crusader, announced this week that he was under consideration to head a government commission on vaccine safety and scientific integrity, and is planning to step away from his environmental job to take that post, I had several thoughts. (Paul Sax, 1/13)

On Thursday, Governor Charlie Baker of Massachusetts added his voice on that matter in a long letter to House majority leader Kevin McCarthy. Baker’s primary focus was protecting this state’s near-universal health care law, but his broader message was equally important. Part of that: Congress must be careful to do no harm as it maneuvers on Obamacare. (1/14)

We were all horrified by the senseless shooting at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport that resulted in death and injury to innocent citizens. For those of us who witnessed this on television and online, our reactions ranged from “not again” to “it could have been one of us or members of our family.” For the majority of South Floridians, the horror of this day will fade and we will go back to our normal routines. But for others, the trauma will last. Whether you were at the airport or watching it unfold on television or the internet, the images of violence may leave you feeling vulnerable. (Charles Nemeroff, 1/16)

Ten years ago, I did not expect my brand new Twitter account to have much of an impact on my life. Yet it certainly has — affecting my career, my choice of where to live, my friendships, my adoption of pets, my intellectual lifestyle and even my emoji use. Now, Twitter has cost me a body organ. Yet my (voluntary!) loss is another Twitter user’s gain: I recently donated a kidney to a fellow journalist, Michelle Minkoff, who works at The Associated Press. (Tiff Fehr, 1/13)