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The Affordable Care Act wasn’t directly on the ballot in any state, but voters did decide a host of health-related issues in Tuesday’s elections. And there was no clear theme to what won and lost. For example, voters in two states – North Dakota and Colorado – rejected so-called “personhood” amendments that would have recognized rights for unborn fetuses. (Rovner, 11/5)

Aleady a financial bonanza for health insurers, Obamacare paid off for the industry again at the ballot box as Californians soundly rejected a bid to rein in health insurance rates. Even so, the companies still face heat over their ever-increasing health insurance premiums, and pressure will build on California's Obamacare exchange to hold the line on rates. (Terhune and Lifsher, 11/5)

What's next after Proposition 45? Will the subject surface again in the Legislature? California voters yesterday rejected the proposal to give the state insurance commissioner power to deny health insurance rate increases deemed excessive. (Gorn, 11/5)

A month ago, North Dakota's Measure 1 looked like a winner. The proposal sought to enshrine "the inalienable right to life of every human being at any stage of development" in the state constitution. It was up 17 points in the polls. But on November 4, Measure 1 was crushed, and with it the hopes of both the state's Catholic hierarchy and the national band of activists who make up what has become known as the personhood movement. A proposed Colorado amendment with similar aims also went down to defeat. (Martin, 11/5)

Voters in Berkeley, Calif., have passed the nation’s first soda tax with a resounding 75 percent of the vote. The measure aims to reduce the effects of sugar consumption on health, especially increased rates of obesity and diabetes. Across the bay in San Francisco, however, a similar proposal failed to get the two-thirds supermajority it needed. (Aliferis, 11/5)

Like minimum wage, paid sick leave was among the few midterm bright spots for Democrats, with four ballot measures passing in Massachusetts, Trenton, N.J., Montclair, N.J., and Oakland, Calif. (Levine, 11/5)

The United States is the only developed country without paid sick leave policies for all workers and their families, which increases burdens on the millions balancing work with caregiving for an older family member, according to a new review. In 2009, unpaid caregiving services provided by family members at home added up to an estimated economic value of $450 million, Mei-Lan Chen of the School of Nursing at the University of North Carolina, Greensboro writes in The Gerontologist. There were some 67 million unpaid caregivers in the U.S., and two thirds of adults with disabilities got all their care and assistance from family members. (Doyle, 11/5)