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Two major health insurance mergers – Anthem with Cigna, and Aetna with Humana – are winding their way through the regulatory process. As with all large mergers, the Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division or the Federal Trade Commission will weigh in with an opinion as to whether the merger will substantially impact consumer prices. As with most mergers in highly regulated industries, various other regulatory agencies and state governments will step in as well. (Robert Book, 3/31)

Blue Cross/Blue Shield, which is the largest player in the individual exchange market under the Affordable Care Act, has taken a close look at its enrolled population since the exchanges opened for business on Jan. 1, 2014. For some reason the Blues seem to be surprised at this finding: Members who enrolled in 2014 and 2015 "have higher rates of certain diseases such as hypertension, diabetes, depression, coronary artery disease, human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and Hepatitis C than individuals who already had BCBS individual coverage....received significantly more medical services in their first year of coverage, on average..., (and) used more medical services across all sites of care—including inpatient hospital admissions, outpatient visits, medical professional services, prescriptions filled and emergency room visits." (Michael Hiltzik, 3/30)

More than 86 million people, including 22 million people 65 or older, have pre-diabetes, which increases their risk of heart disease, strokes or diabetes. As we’ve watched that number grow, it has somehow felt that despite billions of dollars of research and intervention, there’s little we can do. That feeling shifted last week when Sylvia Mathews Burwell, the secretary of health and human services, announced that Medicare was planning to pay for lifestyle interventions focusing on diet and physical activity to prevent Type 2 diabetes. It’s an example of small-scale research efforts into health services that have worked and that have expanded to reach more people. (Aaron E. Carroll, 3/30)

The CMS on Tuesday agreed to pay for the Diabetes Prevention Program. Writing for the Upshot blog at the New York Times website today, Dr. Aaron Carroll makes this curious statement: “Articles appear every day on “major breakthroughs,” which later never pan out, while this one, full of successes, rarely made the news.” The headline proclaimed it “an unsung success.” Unused, maybe. Unsung? Hardly. (Merrill Goozner, 3/30)

My patient was a college student brought into the emergency room after a minor car accident. Although CT scans showed no spinal fractures, he had severe neck pain and spasms. Instinctively, I prescribed Percocet for pain and Valium for muscle spasms. But I didn’t know then what I know now: These two drugs, when taken together, could interact and cost him his life. (Leana S. Wen, 3/30)

Here are 4 health care proposals that have been made by politicians running for office. How many do you agree with? 1. “[Health care reform] should expand competition in the marketplace, it should empower consumers and patients to make healthcare decisions in consultation with their doctors and it should disempower the government from getting in between doctors and their patients.” 2. “[We need to transform] our health care system to reward value and quality.” 3. “[Congress must] require price transparency from all healthcare providers, especially doctors and healthcare organizations like clinics and hospitals. Individuals should be able to shop to find the best prices for procedures, exams or any other medical-related procedure.” 4. “We must ensure … that the money we put into health coverage goes to the delivery of health care, not to paper-pushing, astronomical profits and lining CEOs’ pockets.” (David Cutler, 3/30)

If the agency that runs Medicare can’t even test out ways of holding down spending on prescription drugs, the entire US health care system will be worse off for it. Unfortunately, interest groups within the health care industry are trying to keep the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services from launching a common-sense experiment on lowering costs. (3/31)

Arizona has a real problem with uninsured kids. But we also have a time-tested solution that now has no cost to the state budget: KidsCare. Arizona created KidsCare health coverage for children in working families in 1998 with bipartisan support and the leadership of Gov. Jane Hull. For years, KidsCare succeeded in giving hundreds of thousands of families the chance for medication, doctor visits and therapies with premiums they could afford. (Regina Cobb, 3/30)

The Legislature’s emphatic rejection of the latest attempt to tap into federal Medicaid funding for low-income residents is a strong indication that Nebraskans will be in a state of denial for quite some time. Senators voted 28-20 to bracket the bill after only 90 minutes of debate. Ideology won. Pragmatism lost. (3/31)

John Kasich has received some campaign knocks for his decision to expand Medicaid. To his credit, the governor has not backed away. The numbers are compelling, with roughly 600,000 newly eligible Ohioans enrolling in the public health-care program. Emergency room traffic has declined as visits to primary care doctors have increased. Those with little means struggle less to pay for necessities such as food and housing. There is another benefit of much significance. The Medicaid expansion has aided efforts to address the heroin problem touching so many Ohio communities. (3/30)

It has long been a nightmare moment for me, and probably a lot of women who still get their, uh, monthly visitors: I'm out in public rifling through my purse. I drop it, it falls open, and out flies my stash of tampons. (Martha Ross, 3/30)

Hundreds of thousands of Floridians each year struggle with mental-health problems and substance abuse. Their hardship extends to their families and even to the state's economy, which loses billions of dollars a year in productivity. State lawmakers took some significant steps during their regular session this year to improve mental-health and substance-abuse care. But once again, they squandered the opportunity that would have made the biggest positive difference. (3/31)

The most consistent and profound message emerging from the drug summit this week in Atlanta is that drug addiction is a disease. And we’re failing at treating that disease. The Centers for Disease Control, in a recent statement, noted, “in the past decade, while the death rates for the top leading causes of death such as heart disease and cancer have decreased substantially, the death rate associated with opioid pain medication has increased markedly.” (3/30)

We lose two people between the ages of 14 and 24 to suicide in Washington state every week. That’s a tragedy, and every parent’s worst nightmare. Washington has a higher suicide rate than the national average, with more than 1,100 people taking their own lives in 2014. (Tina Orwall, 3/29)

The outbreak of Zika in Latin America has renewed the often-heard call to “get rid of mosquitoes.” That’s a naïve and foolish idea. It would also be hard — if not impossible — to do. (Andrew P. Dobson, 3/30)