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The Supreme Court on Monday will hear a dispute over the Food and Drug Administration's refusal to approve flavored e-cigarettes over public health concerns. The case puts the FDA's role in approving new tobacco products under the microscope at a time when e-cigarettes, or vapes, have flooded the market. Makers of flavored vapes have brought various cases around the country challenging FDA decisions. (Hurley, 12/2)

FDA v. Wages and White Lion Investments, which the Supreme Court will hear on the first Monday in December, is a significant case in its own right. It involves the Food and Drug Administration’s long-delayed attempt to regulate flavored nicotine vapes and to prevent children from becoming addicted to nicotine because they are enticed by vapes with fruit or candy flavors. But the case is also significant for another reason. Seven federal appeals courts unanimously rejected legal challenges to the FDA’s decision not to authorize certain flavored vapes and e-cigarettes. Only one outlier court, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, took a position that is unusually favorable to tobacco companies, which led us to this Supreme Court case. (Millhiser, 11/25)

Six years after teen vaping was declared an epidemic, the use of e-cigarettes by young people has declined to its lowest level in a decade. “That’s a big deal,” Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra said in September when announcing usage had dropped to 6% among middle and high school students. Now the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments on Monday about whether one of the moves that contributed to that decline – the federal government’s blocking of millions of e-cigarette products with flavors like “Jimmy the Juice Man Peachy Strawberry,” “Killer Kustard,” and “Iced Pineapple Express” – was correctly handled. (Groppe, 12/1)

When the Supreme Court hears an appeal Wednesday from transgender youths challenging a Tennessee ban on their medical care, fundamental principles forbidding sex discrimination will be on the line. The justices’ view of whether landmark decisions tracing back a half-century apply to transgender rights will affect more than the access of young people to puberty blockers and hormone treatments. At the case’s core is the crucial question of how much judicial scrutiny laws regarding transgender individuals demand. (Biskupic, 12/2)

When the Supreme Court this week wades into the contentious issue of transgender rights, the justices will hear from an attorney with knowledge that runs deep. Chase Strangio will be the first openly transgender attorney to argue before the nation’s highest court, representing families who say Tennessee’s ban on health care for transgender minors leaves their children terrified about the future. (Whitehurst, 12/2)

President Joe Biden and first lady Jill Biden held an emotional commemoration for World AIDS Day at the White House on Sunday, expressing empathy with families who have lost loved ones and telling them they “felt a special obligation to use this sacred place to ensure everyone is seen.” Behind the Bidens, a giant red ribbon hung on the South Portico and the AIDS Memorial Quilt was placed across the South Lawn. The quilt now with 50,000 panels with 110,000 names and weighs 54 tons. This was the first time it has been displayed on the lawn. (Gomez, 12/1)

President Biden called for a fight against “stigma” and “misinformation” on World AIDS Day in remarks at the White House. “We stand united in the fight against this epidemic,” Biden said Sunday. “It matters, it matters. … I remember as senator, when this epidemic was raging, the stigma, the misinformation, the government failing to act and acknowledge the dignity of [LGBTQ] lives and the seriousness of the AIDS epidemic.” ... “It caused serious harm,” the president said Sunday of the government’s inaction at the time. “It compounded pain and trauma for a community watching a generation of loved ones and friends perish. It was horribly, horribly wrong.” (Suter, 12/1)

A. Cornelius Baker, 63, who spent nearly 40 years working with urgency and compassion to improve the lives of people with H.I.V. and AIDS by promoting testing, securing federal funding for research and pushing for a vaccine, died on Nov. 8 at his home in Washington. Mr. Baker — who was gay and who tested positive for H.I.V. — became active in Washington in the 1980s, during the early years of the AIDS epidemic. In 1995, as the executive director of the National Association of People with AIDS, he helped establish June 27 as National H.I.V. Testing Day. (Sandomir, 11/30)

The National Institutes of Health, the world’s leading public funder of biomedical research, has an enviable track record. Research supported by the agency has led to more than 100 Nobel Prizes and has supported more than 99 percent of the drugs approved by federal regulators from 2010 to 2019. No surprise, then, that the agency has been called “the crown jewel of the federal government.” But come January, when President-elect Donald J. Trump and congressional Republicans take charge, the N.I.H. may face a reckoning. (Rosenbluth and Anthes, 12/1)

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has been a crusader for decades, first for the environment and then about vaccines, often clashing with the medical establishment in his quest. He once brought his own PowerPoint presentation to meet with Dr. Anthony Fauci, to convince the nation’s then-top infectious-disease expert that scientifically proven and widely accepted childhood vaccines weren’t actually safe. Now his distrust of authority has taken him to the unlikely pinnacle of that establishment—if he can convince lawmakers that he will be a responsible steward of the U.S. health system.  (Peterson, Whyte and Andrews, 12/2)

Scott Gottlieb, who served as Food and Drug Administration commissioner in the first Trump administration, is raising concerns with Senate Republicans about the president-elect’s selection of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, he said in a television appearance Friday. Gottlieb maintained that there is “skepticism in the Republican caucus [on RFK Jr.’s nomination], more than the press is reporting right now.” (Zhang, 11/29)

Dr. Dave Weldon, a former Republican congressman who is President-elect Donald J. Trump’s pick to lead the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, has been off the political stage for more than 15 years. Now running a private medical practice in Malabar, Fla., Mr. Weldon was hardly regarded as a leading candidate to run the federal agency, a $9 billion behemoth with a staff of more than 13,000 that has become a locus of conservative rage. (Mandavilli and Mueller, 11/29)

�鶹Ů�� Health News: Journalists Dish On New Weight Loss Drugs, RFK Jr.'s Fluoride Claims, And Reproductive Health

�鶹Ů�� Health News chief Washington correspondent Julie Rovner discussed a proposed weight loss drug rule by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services on CBS News’ “CBS News 24/7” on Nov. 26. (11/30)

YouTube plays a unique role in people’s everyday lives, says Garth Graham, the company’s global head of healthcare and public health. “People come to us to learn how to fix their fridge and to learn about medicines,” he said in an interview. “There’s a lot of responsibility, and we take that seriously. Responsibility is at the core of how YouTube works and how we treat sensitive information, particularly around health.” (St. Fleur, 11/29)

Radiation is a core part of cancer treatment, and has been for generations. But over the last couple of years, there’s been a surge of interest in a new type of treatment, one that is testing drug developers and health care practitioners alike. (DeAngelis, 12/2)

About a third of cancer patients struggle with depression, anxiety and other psychiatric disorders, although these conditions often go undetected and undiagnosed. ... Mental health has long been deprioritized, with health care centers losing money caring for psychiatric patients. But this neglect comes at a significant cost, with mortality rates up to 39% higher among cancer patients with depression when compared to those without mental illness. Research also shows that the risk of suicide is 13 times higher in the week following a cancer diagnosis — and three times the average even a year later. (Bajaj, 11/29)

On the count of three, Governor Maura Healey and Brown University Health chief executive John Fernandez unfurled the banner outside St. Anne’s Hospital. The old sign reading “Steward Family Hospital” was covered by a spiffy new BrownHealth logo. The ceremony in November marked the $175 million handoff of St. Anne’s and Morton Hospital in nearby Taunton to Rhode Island’s largest health care system. (Weisman, 12/2)

�鶹Ů�� Health News: Homebound Seniors Living Alone Often Slip Through Health System’s Cracks

Carolyn Dickens, 76, was sitting at her dining room table, struggling to catch her breath as her physician looked on with concern. “What’s going on with your breathing?” asked Peter Gliatto, director of Mount Sinai’s Visiting Doctors Program.“I don’t know,” she answered, so softly it was hard to hear. “Going from here to the bathroom or the door, I get really winded. I don’t know when it’s going to be my last breath.” (Graham, 12/2)

�鶹Ů�� Health News: Who Gets Obesity Drugs Covered By Insurance? In North Carolina, It Helps If You’re On Medicaid

After losing and regaining the same 20-plus pounds more times than she could count, Anita Blanchard concluded that diets don’t work. So when the University of North Carolina-Charlotte professor learned that Ozempic — developed to treat Type 2 diabetes — helped people lose weight and keep it off, Blanchard was determined to try it. The state employee’s health insurance initially covered the prescription with Blanchard kicking in a $25 copayment. (Newsome, 12/2)

Researchers from the University of British Columbia (UBC) have developed what’s being considered "a groundbreaking coating" that could make medical devices safer. For millions of patients, this could mean reducing the risk of thrombosis (or blood clot formation) and dangerous bleeding, according to a UBC press release. The new material, which is designed for tubing in various medical devices, mimics the "natural behavior of blood vessels." (Stabile, 11/30)

Siemens Healthineers launched two new, more affordable photon-counting CT scanners on Dec. 1. The new models come three years after the company introduced its Naeotom Alpha, which was the first commercially available photo-counting CT available for clinical use. Photon-counting CT can produce higher-resolution images by counting each X-ray photon that travels through the patient and generating anatomical and functional information. It requires lower radiation doses than traditional CT and can detect small structures with fewer artifacts. (Dubinsky, 12/1)

Missouri's Republican attorney general has pledged to enforce some laws restricting abortion despite a new constitutional amendment widely expected to undo the state's near-total ban on the procedure. In an opinion requested by incoming GOP governor Mike Kehoe, Attorney General Andrew Bailey wrote that his office will continue enforcing a ban on abortion after fetal viability. There is an exception carved out in the amendment for cases in which a health care provider deems an abortion necessary to “protect the life or physical or mental health of the pregnant person.” (Ballentine, 11/30)

Dr. Betsy Wickstrom understands where some of the voices opposed to abortion are coming from. She used to be one of them. The Kansas City OB-GYN specializing in high-risk pregnancies is a Republican and a Christian, but her more than three decades in maternal-fetal medicine have moved her away from the “pro-life” movement and into abortion advocacy. The past two-and-a-half years practicing under an abortion ban in Missouri have strengthened her resolve. (Spoerre, 12/2)

Arizonans overwhelmingly voted to make abortion a fundamental right, but overturning the state’s current 15-week gestational ban — and multiple other anti-abortion laws still on the books — isn’t automatic. Just an hour after she joined Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs, Democratic Secretary of State Adrian Fontes and Republican Arizona Supreme Court Chief Justice Ann Timmer on Monday to certify the results of the 2024 general election, Democratic Attorney General Kris Mayes said that officially nullifying the 15-week ban will need to take place in the courts. (Gomez, 11/28)

The morning-after pill is legal across the U.S., even in the states with the strictest abortion bans — but many Americans don’t know that, in part due to a mistaken belief that the pill is abortion medication.  Nearly a third of American adults are unsure if emergency contraception like the morning-after pill is legal in their state and 5 percent think it is illegal there, according to a 2023 survey from health policy nonprofit �鶹Ů��.  (O'Connell-Domenech, 12/1)

Anti-abortion activists are elated about Donald Trump’s return to power despite annoyances with the president-elect's lack of appetite for national restrictions. Now, they are cautiously optimistic, looking ahead to what his administration might do for their movement. “President Trump has said, loudly, that he doesn't believe abortion is a federal issue – something I deeply disagree with him on,” said Kristan Hawkins, president of Students for Life of America. “However, we can work with him.”   (Kuchar, 11/29)

Up to 90% of people who menstruate experience pain during their periods. For some, that pain is severe and linked with symptoms of depression, which are often thought to be a result of the intense throbbing or cramps. But a new study published Wednesday in the journal Briefings in Bioinformatics suggests it may be depression causing period pain, due to specific genes the authors identified — while other researchers said the interplay of internal mechanisms is more complicated than that. (Rogers, 11/29)

Private health information of over 600 veterans in Minnesota was obtained in a nationwide cyberattack, according to the Minneapolis Veterans Affairs Health Care System. The agency says documents with information of 2,302 Veterans around the country were encrypted and potentially copied by a "malicious party." The documents were managed by the contracted medical transcription company DBP, Inc. and contained some or all of the following information: full names, medical record information and social security numbers. (Lentz, 11/29)

The Office of Cannabis Management says it will not add any additional delivery methods to the medical cannabis program in 2025. The office defines delivery method as the form in which a medication is taken. Three petitions to expand delivery method to include dry powder inhalation, infused flower and concentrates were presented to the office for review before the state's Dec. 1 deadline. (11/27)

In the first major update to assisted living and residential care regulations in more than 15 years, the Maine Department of Health and Human Services has proposed significantly increasing staffing requirements, among other changes. The proposed updates follow an investigation by The Maine Monitor and ProPublica into the state’s largest residential care facilities. It found dozens of violations of resident rights, including incidents of abuse and neglect, as well as more than 100 cases in which residents wandered away from their facilities and hundreds of medication and treatment violations. (Lundy, 11/27)

Idaho has known for at least 73 years that its frontier-era coroner system does not work. For just as long, the state has failed to make meaningful changes to it. In a review of legislative records and news archives going back to 1951, ProPublica found a pattern — repeating almost every decade — of reform-minded legislators, trade groups, members of the public, doctors, lawyers and even some coroners pushing to change how Idaho handles death investigations. (Dutton, 12/2)

At the end of 2025, Michigan Medicine will discontinue the University of Michigan Health Plan. The university, who announced the move on Wednesday, says the move will allow University of Michigan Health to focus resources on direct patient care, education and research. Michigan Medicine is the majority owner of the UM Health Plan, which operates the Michigan Care and Michigan Care Advantage plans. University officials say the move won't impact current Michigan Care benefits or benefits for 2025. (Lentz, 11/30)

Two Indianapolis police officers are set to stand trial in the death of Black man after being shocked with a Taser and restrained during a mental health crisis in his parents’ home. (Callahan, 12/2)

Most food banks are seeing more demand than last year going into the holiday season, according to the nonprofit Feeding America's survey of 157 food banks. Food insecurity has steadily risen since before the pandemic, with 65% of food banks recording an increase in the number of people served in October 2024 compared to October 2023. (Rubin, 11/28)

America’s drug crisis has many survivors. Jerry Schlesinger, 72, is among the longest tenured. He tried heroin at 15. Today, he has been sober for two years. In between, decades of illicit drug use wrecked his lungs and teeth and compromised his liver. America spent millions of dollars imprisoning, housing and treating him before he stopped using. “You’re not done until you’re done,” Schlesinger said. His is a living history of a drug crisis that has left millions of people in poor health and searching for purpose. The most senior are entering old age. Their struggles show how the damage wrought by addiction will linger long after the death toll drops. (Wernau, 12/1)

The cartel recruiter slipped onto campus disguised as a janitor and then zeroed in on his target: a sophomore chemistry student. The recruiter explained that the cartel was staffing up for a project, and that he’d heard good things about the young man.“ ‘You’re good at what you do,’” the student recalled the recruiter saying. “‘You decide if you’re interested.’” In their quest to build fentanyl empires, Mexican criminal groups are turning to an unusual talent pool: not hit men or corrupt police officers, but chemistry students studying at Mexican universities. (Kitroeff and Villegas, 12/1)

Doctors have long taken for granted a devil’s bargain: Relieving intense pain, such as that caused by surgery and traumatic injury, risks inducing the sort of pleasure that could leave patients addicted. Opioids are among the most powerful, if not the most powerful, pain medications ever known, but for many years they have been a source of staggering morbidity and mortality. (Friedman, 11/29)

Many social drinkers who take obesity medications, such as Wegovy or Mounjaro, say they don't enjoy alcohol as much. A new study of Weight Watchers members who take obesity drugs — and were in the habit of drinking — finds about half of them cut back after they started the medication. (Aubrey, 12/2)

On a recent Friday morning, Alyssa Laxamana arrived at a laboratory on the UC Davis campus to continue California’s race against bird flu. A note from her supervisor had alerted Laxamana that about 130 samples of cow milk and other dairy products were en route — a large but manageable workload. ... Laxamana’s plans, however, quickly went out the window. More samples kept popping up in a digital queue as another lab worker logged unexpected shipments. Around noon she had to draw a line. She calculated she could get through about 270 samples that day. The rest would have to wait. (Hussain, 12/1)

Since the start of the bird flu outbreak in U.S. cattle more than eight months ago, health authorities have reported 55 human cases of H5N1 viral infections, a startling number in a country that had previously reported only one. All, though, have been mild. The fact that none has been severe has been a shock, though a welcome one, certainly. (Branswell, 12/2)

New Zealand has halted all poultry exports after confirming its first case of bird flu on an egg farm in the southern region of Otago. Exports of poultry products worth about NZ$190 million ($112 million) a year will cease until New Zealand can once again attest to being free of bird flu, Food Safety Minister Andrew Hoggard said Monday in Wellington. (Brockett, 12/2)

The Los Angeles County Department of Public Health is investigating a case of Hepatitis A at a Buffalo Wild Wings restaurant in Monterey Park, the department announced Wednesday. Public health officials have told customers who visited the restaurant between Nov. 13 and Nov. 22 to get vaccinated for Hepatitis A, a liver infection caused by the highly contagious Hepatitis A virus. (Wenzke, 11/27)

A Fresno County woman died after being bitten by a rabid bat in the middle school classroom where she taught art, according to public health officials and published reports. The Fresno County Department of Public Health reported last week that a county resident had died from rabies after being bitten by a bat in Merced County. Health officials did not name the victim, but friends identified her as Leah Seneng, 60, an art teacher at Bryant Middle School in the small Merced County city of Dos Palos, according to reports in the Fresno Bee and KFSN-TV. (Ormseth, 12/1)

A farm that supplies organic, pasture-raised eggs for Costco has issued a recall for more than 10,000 products sent to 25 retail locations in five southern states. Handsome Brook Farms said the eggs, which were sold in packs of 24 under the label of Kirkland Signature, could be contaminated with salmonella. The recalled eggs were sent to Costco stores in Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Tennessee, the farm said. The affected products were sent beginning Nov. 22 and bear the UPC 9661910680, along with the code 327 and a “use by” date of Jan. 5, 2025 printed on the side. (Heil, 11/29)

An Arizona produce company is recalling all sizes of its whole, fresh American cucumbers in 26 states and parts of Canada because they could be contaminated with salmonella, it said. SunFed said in an announcement posted online Thursday by the Food and Drug Administration that cucumbers it sold from Oct. 12 to Nov. 26 were recalled because of the potential contamination, which can cause serious and sometimes fatal infections in young children, frail or elderly people and others with weakened immune systems. (Rudy, 11/29)

Nearly every family and friend group has someone with type 2 diabetes, auto-immune disease and/or cardiovascular disease. Though these conditions can have multiple causes, a new study suggests that RFK Jr. is right that one underlying trigger of all of them may be our diet. More precisely, what and how we're eating. In a study published Wednesday in the scientific journal Cell, biologist Richard Young shows that continuously eating too much added sugar causes traffic jams inside cells. And these traffic jams are what leads to many chronic diseases, Young thinks. (Weintraub, 11/27)

The meltdown started with a small thing — a bag of suckers. Rachel Damgen's four-year-old son wanted one. She said no. ... With their extended families far away in other states, she and her husband, Chris Damgen, began asking themselves if there was any way to reconfigure their lives in order to optimize for more support and community. The answer they found was cohousing. Today, the Damgens live in a 30-unit planned community called Daybreak Cohousing in Portland, Oregon. The couple says the move has been a game changer, both for their own mental health and for that of the entire family. (Riddle, 12/1)

Belgium made history on Sunday as the first country in the world to allow sex workers to sign formal employment contracts — granting them access to sick days, maternity pay and pension. The new law also guarantees fundamental rights for sex workers, including the ability to refuse clients, set the conditions of an act, and stop an act at any moment. Lawmakers passed the law in May but it officially took effect on Sunday. (Kim, 12/1)

Artificial intelligence is revolutionizing medicine, making health care more accurate and less expensive for everyone. (11/27)

Just before the election, the telehealth company hims & hers ran a full-page ad in The New York Times purporting to show that obesity is a nonpartisan issue. Featuring a map of obesity rates in each state, the company, which sells weight loss drug injections among other products and services, argued that the disease knows no political ideology. “Across state lines and beyond political divides, obesity is a shared and growing crisis for Americans,” the ad read. (Renee Loth, 11/29)

With the recent conclusion of the 2024 election, the spotlight now shifts back to Congress as it enters the final weeks of the 118th session. While time is limited and there is much to accomplish, Congress has a critical opportunity to reshape health care affordability, enhance transparency, reduce costs, and lay a strong foundation for future reforms through the Lower Costs, More Transparency Act (LCMT) and Health Care PRICE Transparency Act 2.0. Taking action on key provisions during the lame-duck session could serve as a catalyst for addressing issues such as health care consolidation, cost disparities, and opaque pricing structures before turning the page to a new legislative chapter. (Jared Perkins and Chris Whaley, 12/2)

Many children benefit from medication to address mental health conditions, whether anxiety, depression, or ADHD. This can be particularly true of children who have undergone trauma, such as being removed from their home. For years, officials in the state Department of Children and Families have struggled to ensure that they provide necessary medication to children in their agency’s care — without overmedicating them. (12/2)

Yesterday, for the first time in my life, I walked into the operating room to perform surgery, on the stomach of a 4-year-old child whose house was destroyed by bombing. He was bleeding a lot from his stomach, but I somehow managed to perform the operation and thank God I was able to save that child’s life. We are working beyond our areas of specialization because we no longer have a qualified surgical team. We have called upon the world for protection for over 50 days but unfortunately there has been no response. I’m confounded by this world that claims to believe in humanity and democracy but does not respond. Not even the World Health Organization has any protection here. The human mind cannot imagine all the death and body parts and blood that surround us around the clock. But it remains our responsibility to keep on providing humanitarian services. (Dr. Hussam Abu Safyia, 12/2)