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The Supreme Court is hearing arguments over a nationwide settlement with OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma that would shield members of the Sackler family who own the company from civil lawsuits over the toll of opioids. The agreement hammered out with state and local governments and victims would provide billions of dollars to combat the opioid epidemic. The Sacklers would contribute up to $6 billion and give up ownership, and the company would emerge from bankruptcy as a different entity, with its profits used for treatment and prevention. (Sherman, 12/4)

Families that have lost relatives to overdoses share plenty of outrage at Purdue Pharma, the bankrupt maker of OxyContin that has been accused in lawsuits of helping ignite the nation’s opioid crisis. But they are split over a legal challenge that could upend Purdue’s agreement to settle thousands of lawsuits and provide billions of dollars that underwrite state campaigns fighting addiction and that offer compensation to victims. The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear arguments Monday about a controversial aspect of the company’s bankruptcy plan that shields Purdue owners the Sackler family from future lawsuits in exchange for the family’s contributing up to $6 billion and relinquishing control of the company. (Ovalle and Barnes, 12/3)

The revised deal is supported by all financial stakeholders in the case, including all state attorneys general, but is opposed by the Justice Department's bankruptcy watchdog and some individual opioid plaintiffs. Under the deal, the Sacklers would pay up to $6 billion to a trust that would be used to settle claims filed by states, hospitals, people who had become addicted and others who have sued Purdue. (Kruzel, 12/4)

Ellen Isaacs lost her son to an opioid overdose. But she wants none of the settlement money offered by the family that sold billions of the same OxyContin pills that got her boy hooked. Isaacs would rather see the family suffer years in court. “There’s not enough money that’s going to bring any of our kids back,” said Isaacs, 58 years old. (Gladstone, 12/3)

By the time Belmarie Lugo stepped into the treatment clinic in January 2022, her body was malnourished. Her connections to her family had fractured, and she estimates she had overdosed on heroin and fentanyl more than a dozen times. Now, nearly two years later, Lugo is in recovery. She’s mended her relationships with her parents and brother, and she is finally able to contemplate her future — something that was not possible in the past when she was under the influence of illicit opioids. (Brown, 12/3)

Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida said on Sunday that, if elected president, he would pursue legislation that would “supersede” the Affordable Care Act, echoing former President Donald J. Trump’s comments, which Democrats seized upon last week. “What I think they’re going to need to do is have a plan that will supersede Obamacare, that will lower prices for people so that they can afford health care, while also making sure that people with pre-existing conditions are protected,” Mr. DeSantis said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” He went on to say that repealing and replacing the Affordable Care Act was a broken promise from Mr. Trump’s 2016 campaign. (Astor, 12/3)

Ron DeSantis told NBC’s Kristen Welker: “Here’s what I will do. What I think they’re going to need to do is have a plan that will supersede ObamaCare, that will lower prices for people so that they can afford health care while also making sure that people will preexisting conditions are protected. And we’re going to look at the big institutions that are causing prices to be high: Big Pharma, big insurance and big government,” he said Sunday on “Meet the Press.” However, he offered scant details for his proposal when asked what “supersede” meant. He said that his plan will have coverage that is “different and better” at the “lowest possible price.” (Sforza, 12/3)

Since enacting the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, President Joe Biden and the Democrats have talked up its Medicare drug pricing and health insurance subsidy provisions, but haven't gotten much traction. Now, Trump has jump-started the healthcare debate by again proposing to repeal the Affordable Care Act of 2010, a goal that eluded him during his presidency. (McAuliff, 12/1)

�鶹Ů�� Health News and PolitiFact: Explosive DeSantis-Newsom Debate Reflects Nation’s Culture Wars

Fox News officially titled it “The Great Red vs. Blue State Debate.” But the faceoff quickly turned into a full-out political brawl between Gavin Newsom, California’s Democratic governor who isn’t running for president; and Ron DeSantis, the Florida Republican governor who is, and is not gaining ground against former President Donald Trump in voter polls. The event was held in Alpharetta, Georgia, aired on Fox News, and moderated by Sean Hannity. Our PolitiFact partners examined the two state officials’ wide-ranging statements. (Hart and PolitiFact staff, 12/1)

Flu is picking up steam while RSV lung infections that can hit kids and older people hard may be peaking, U.S. health officials said Friday. COVID-19, though, continues to cause the most hospitalizations and deaths among respiratory illnesses — about 15,000 hospitalizations and about 1,000 deaths every week, said Dr. Mandy Cohen, head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (Stobbe, 12/1)

Deaths held steady nationally last week, but a few states saw rises, including Colorado, Maine, Minnesota, and West Virginia. Regarding ED visits for COVID, Iowa reported a substantial rise, and Wisconsin reported a moderate increase. Test positivity was highest in the lower Midwestern states, followed by those in the upper Midwest and the Mountain West. Wastewater SARS-CoV-2 detections, another early marker, are at high levels nationally, according to the CDC's new dashboard, especially in the Midwest. (Schnirring, 12/1)

Despite reported spikes of pneumonia cases among kids in two states, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says U.S. transmission rates are still considered "typical" for this time of year. Health officials in Massachusetts and Ohio have reported a sharp uptick in pediatric pneumonia caused by the bacteria Mycoplasma pneumonia, often the cause of what's known as "walking pneumonia" because of its typically mild symptoms. (Reed, 12/1)

The Bay Area is seeing a resurgence of COVID-19 at the same time as a pronounced influenza wave and a troubling climb in the prevalence of respiratory syncytial virus. The gathering “tripledemic” prompted a coalition of regional health officers to issue joint recommendations on Thursday for safely navigating the upcoming holiday season — and it included strongly worded advice for some people to wear protective masks. (Vaziri, 12/1)

At a Pilsen school’s gym, 12-year-old Sofia Lemus sat down to get her third COVID-19 shot. The seventh grader, who wore stacks of friendship bracelets on her wrists, pulled up her sleeves, saying she wanted to get the vaccine so she didn’t get sick. “I was a little bit scared, because I thought it was going to hurt,” Lemus said. “But it didn’t hurt so I was OK.” (Johnson, 12/3)

Respiratory illnesses are on the rise. COVID-19 and more recently influenza have been leading to more hospitalizations, but respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) is currently increasing fastest among the three in the Twin Cities seven-county region. Over the most recent two weeks, the number of RSV-related hospital admissions in the Twin Cities more than doubled, compared with increases of about one-quarter for both COVID-19 and the flu. For the time being, however, COVID-19 hospitalization rates in the region, at 5.6 per 100,000, remain much higher than either RSV (1.9 per 100,000) or influenza (0.5 per 100,000). (Clary and Helmstetter, 12/1)

Silly cat videos could be good for your health — at least if you are about to get one of the seasonal vaccines. For instance, when people who were in a positive mood got a flu shot that day, they produced higher levels of antibodies to help them fight the disease, according to one British study. This data on mood and vaccines is limited, but a substantial body of research shows many other lifestyle factors — such as diet, exercise and even social interactions — may affect how much protection people get from vaccines, including, it appears covid-19 jabs. (Zaraska, 12/3)

People in high-income countries who are considered "solo diners" rate their quality of life lower than more social diners, according to a recent study from Gallup and the Ajinomoto Group. The study constitutes another piece of evidence that the "epidemic of loneliness" that was exacerbated by COVID "has real consequences," Andrew Dugan, the research director of the study, told Axios. (Saric, 12/2)

The long-awaited ban on menthol cigarettes may not be announced by the end of the year, but pushed to 2024, according to officials from two national public health groups working to remove the products from the market. Both requested anonymity to discuss the decision ahead of any announcement from the Biden administration. The delay could be announced as early as next week, they suggested. (Edwards and Miller, 12/1)

Some “non-menthol” cigarettes that are being marketed as a “fresh” alternative in states where traditional menthol cigarettes are banned use synthetic chemicals to mimic menthol’s distinct cooling sensations, researchers at Yale and Duke University have found. The synthetic additives could undermine existing policies and a U.S. Food and Drug Administration ban on menthol cigarettes expected later this year that is intended to discourage new smokers and address the harmful health effects of tobacco use. (Poltras, 10/16)

Five years ago, the National Institutes of Health abruptly pulled the plug on an ambitious study about the health effects of moderate drinking. The reason: The trial’s principal scientist and officials from the federal agency’s own alcohol division had solicited $60 million for the research from alcohol manufacturers, a conflict of interest and a violation of federal policy. Recently, that scientist and another colleague from the aborted study with alcohol industry ties were named to a committee preparing a report on alcohol and health that will be used to update the federal government’s guidelines on alcohol consumption. (Rabin, 12/1)

Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital announced Friday that it has tentatively reached a new collective bargaining agreement with the United Steel Workers 4-200, which represents the 1,700 nurses who went on strike Aug. 4. The agreement comes after months of bitter negotiations, with the nurses demanding better pay, benefits — and above all — enforceable nurse-to-patient ratios similar to what California mandates by law. (Kent, 12/2)

More than 600 nurses at Kapiolani Medical Center for Women and Children are working without a contact starting Friday. And even though they’re not going on strike, they will let management and the public know that they’re unhappy with the situation. The union held an informational picket line Friday morning on Punahou Street fronting the medical center. (Gutierrez, 12/1)

Nurses spoke out about alleged mismanagement at their hospitals, including 16 facilities HCA operates along the Gulf Coast in Southwest Florida, ahead of union contract expirations next year, according to a press release. HCA facilities will begin bargaining on new union contracts in 2024, which nurses say is an opportunity to address workplace issues. (Woo, 12/1)

Nearly 1,300 resident physicians and fellows at Northwestern University are planning to unionize as they seek to improve working conditions in the training programs at its affiliated healthcare facilities. The group of physicians across Northwestern's McGaw Medical Center filed their intent to join the Committee of Interns & Residents, a division of the Service Employees International Union, with the National Labor Relations Board and have requested voluntary recognition of the union from Northwestern management, according to a statement today. (Davis, 12/1)

Dr. John Wust does not come off as a labor agitator. A longtime obstetrician-gynecologist from Louisiana with a penchant for bow ties, Dr. Wust spent the first 15 years of his career as a partner in a small business — that is, running his own practice with colleagues. Long after he took a position at Allina Health, a large nonprofit health care system based in Minnesota, in 2009, he did not see himself as the kind of employee who might benefit from collective bargaining. (Scheiber, 12/3)

Outpatient physical therapist (PT) practices are experiencing severe staff shortages, with the highest vacancy rates at 17%, according to a recent report by the American Physical Therapy Association (APTA), a nonprofit group based in Virginia. The report is based on survey responses from 133 outpatient physical therapy practices across the U.S., which include 2,615 clinics and some 11,000 full-time employees, ranging from support staff to PTs. The survey was conducted between May 25 and June 16. (Sudhakar, 12/3)

About five years ago, Sarah Barak badly tore a ligament in her thumb and needed surgery to get it reattached. But when she went in for the operation, she got some unsolicited advice: The surgeon said she should lose weight, suggesting that her size and her injured thumb were connected. "He was making the argument that my posture was affecting my arm pain and that my posture was made worse by my size, all of which could be true," Barak says. "But I still had a disconnected thumb, and even if I lost 100 pounds, the thumb would not have been reattached on its own." (O'Neill, 12/2)

Matthew Beil looks out at the city of St. Pete from his 26th-story apartment. "Entourage" is playing on his TV as he pulls two Fiji waters out of the fridge. The intrigue: He's not entertaining a friend. He's at a doctor's appointment. State of play: Beil is a patient of Khalid Saeed, aka the Tampa Bay Concierge Doctor, one of thousands of doctors practicing concierge medicine around the country in an industry merging old fashioned house calls with new telemedicine technology. (San Felice, 12/4)

�鶹Ů�� Health News: Doctors On (Video) Call: Rural Medics Get Long-Distance Help In Treating Man Gored By Bison

Rural medics who rescued rancher Jim Lutter after he was gored by a bison didn’t have much experience handling such severe wounds. But the medics did have a doctor looking over their shoulders inside the ambulance as they rushed Lutter to a hospital. The emergency medicine physician sat 140 miles away in a Sioux Falls, South Dakota, office building. She participated in the treatment via a video system recently installed in the ambulance. (Zionts, 12/4)

The state Office of Health Strategy announced on Friday the approval of a plan to terminate labor and delivery services at Windham Hospital, bringing an end to a three-year saga that pitted community organizers against one of the state’s largest health systems. (Golvala, 12/1)

Community Health Systems sold three Florida hospitals to Tampa General Hospital in a $294 million cash deal that closed Friday, the for-profit health system announced. ...Tampa General said in a Friday news release the acquired facilities, which will form TGH North, mark its largest expansion in recent years. It operates six hospitals and more than 150 care locations. (Hudson, 12/1)

Tampa General Hospital on Friday announced it had completed the estimated $290 million purchase of Bravera Health properties in Citrus and Hernando counties from Community Health Systems. The transaction, announced in July, includes TGH Brooksville, TGH Spring Hill and TGH Crystal River, a freestanding emergency department, two ambulatory surgery centers, and 10 primary and specialty care clinics. (Mayer, 12/1)

HCA Healthcare continues to increase its free-standing emergency room network following its latest acquisition. The Houston division of the 184-hospital for-profit system acquired 11 Houston-area emergency departments Friday from SignatureCare Emergency Center. With the acquisition, HCA Houston has 26 free-standing emergency departments. Financial terms were not disclosed. (Kacik, 12/1)

New data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) show significant declines in healthcare-associated infections (HAIs) at US acute care hospitals in 2022. According to the CDC's 2022 National and State Healthcare-Associated Infections Progress Report, which includes data from more than 38,000 US healthcare facilities, acute care hospitals saw a 19% decrease in ventilator-associated events from 2021 to 2022, a 16% decrease in hospital-onset methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus bacteremia, a 12% decrease in catheter-associated urinary tract infections, a 9% decrease in central line–associated bloodstream infections, and a 3% decrease in hospital-onset Clostridioides difficile (CDI) infections. The declines follow 2 years in which HAIs climbed sharply at US acute care hospitals, driven primarily by the COVID-19 pandemic's impact on hospital staffing and infection prevention and control efforts. (Dall, 12/1)

�鶹Ů�� Health News and The New York Times: Desperate Families Search For Affordable Home Care 

It’s a good day when Frank Lee, a retired chef, can slip out to the hardware store, fairly confident that his wife, Robin, is in the hands of reliable help. He spends nearly every hour of every day anxiously overseeing her care at their home on the Isle of Palms, a barrier island near Charleston, South Carolina. Robin Lee, 67, has had dementia for about a decade, but the couple was able to take overseas trips and enjoy their marriage of some 40 years until three years ago, when she grew more agitated, prone to sudden outbursts, and could no longer explain what she needed or wanted. He struggled to care for her largely on his own. (Abelson, 12/4)

�鶹Ů�� Health News and The New York Times: What To Know About Home Care Services 

Most older Americans want to live at home as long as they can, but finding and affording the help they need often isn’t easy. There are severe shortages of home health aides in many parts of the country. Hiring them is costly. And most middle-class people will have to pay for home care themselves if it’s needed for the long haul. Here’s a guide to locating home care for an older person. (Abelson, 12/4)

As America's population of seniors grows, affordable long-term care is increasingly hard to find. Nearly 70% of older adults will need long-term care services, according to Harvard's Joint Center for Housing Studies. Medicare doesn't cover these services, and Medicaid often has long wait lists for at-home support, said Samara Scheckler, a research associate. (Rubin and Pandey, 12/3)

Drugmaker Novo Nordisk paid U.S. medical professionals at least $25.8 million over a decade in fees and expenses related to its weight-loss drugs, a Reuters analysis found. It concentrated that money on an elite group of obesity specialists who advocate giving its powerful and expensive drugs to tens of millions of Americans. (Terhune and Respaut, 12/1)

Pfizer shares sank Friday when the drugmaker said it would abandon a twice-daily obesity treatment after more than half the patients in a clinical trial stopped taking it. The pharmaceutical company said it will focus instead on a once-daily version of the pill, danuglipron, instead of starting a late-stage study of the other version. Late-stage studies are usually the last and most expensive trials a drugmaker undertakes before seeking regulatory approval. (Murphy, 12/1)

The booming obesity market is attracting another player, as pharma giant Roche said Monday it was acquiring Carmot Therapeutics and the company’s line of weight loss drug candidates for $2.7 billion upfront. (Joseph, 12/4)

Eli Lilly said on Friday the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) gave a second approval for its drug Jaypirca, which is used to treat a form of blood cancer. The company said the health regulator gave the new approval to the drug for the treatment of chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL), a type of cancer in which the bone marrow makes too many of certain white blood cells. (12/4)

Nearly a decade ago, consultants delivered to Rodger Novak a kind of Sears catalog of human malady: 200 pages, listing dozens of different diseases, each annotated with — from a business standpoint — their best and worst attributes. The document was supposed to help Novak, then the chief executive of CRISPR Therapeutics, navigate a pressing quandary. His company, along with two others, were founded to commercialize the new revolutionary gene-editing tool CRISPR-Cas9, which promised to cure numerous genetic diseases. But which should they target first? What was the best proof-of-concept? (Mast, 12/4)

Scientists have created tiny living robots from human cells that can move around in a lab dish and may one day be able to help heal wounds or damaged tissue, according to a new study. A team at Tufts University and Harvard University’s Wyss Institute have dubbed these creations anthrobots. The research builds on earlier work from some of the same scientists, who made the first living robots, or xenobots, from stem cells sourced from embryos of the African clawed frog (Xenopus laevis). (Hunt, 11/30)

The Trace conducted a comprehensive analysis of gun laws in all 50 states and found that only five states—California, Connecticut, Hawaii, New York, and Washington—impose some form of a gun ban after an emergency mental health hospitalization that’s not followed by a court-ordered commitment. (Mascia, 12/4)

RemArms, formerly Remington Arms Company, informed union officials Thursday that it plans to close the gun manufacturing facility in Ilion, N.Y., this coming March, the Observer-Dispatch reported. ... Remington, the nation’s oldest gun manufacturer, was founded in Ilion, N.Y., in 1816. In recent years, however, the company has been burdened with financial difficulties. RemArms twice filed for bankruptcy and, in 2022, reached an historic settlement with families of Sandy Hook for a total of $73 million. ... In an auto-reply email from the company’s press team, the company confirmed that “RemArms is excited to expand our facilities in Georgia, a state that not only welcomes business but enthusiastically supports and welcomes companies in the firearms industry.” (Fortinsky, 12/3)

The Army and Air Force Exchange Service, or AAFES, says that beginning Jan. 1 it will no longer sell alcohol between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m. at its stores in the U.S. and around the world. The change on Army and Air Force bases is meant to support the Pentagon's suicide prevention initiative, which said that limiting when alcohol is available "reduces heavy drinking and other adverse outcomes associated with alcohol misuse," including suicide, according to Defense Department research and recommendations. (Lawrence, 12/1)

Now at least 16 of the 20 largest U.S. public school districts are offering online therapy sessions to reach millions of students, according to an analysis by The Associated Press. In those districts alone, schools have signed provider contracts worth more than $70 million. The growth reflects a booming new business born from America’s youth mental health crisis, which has proven so lucrative that venture capitalists are funding a new crop of school teletherapy companies. Some experts raise concerns about the quality of care offered by fast-growing tech companies. (Gecker, 12/3)

The products that produce shiny, frizz-free hair emit high levels of substances that could endanger human health, research published last month concludes — and heated styling tools may make the problem worse. Published in Environmental Science & Technology, the analysis focused on compounds known as siloxanes. These substances smooth, straighten and add shine to hair and are “ubiquitous” in hair care products, the authors write. (Blakemore, 12/3)

Even brief exposure to highway pollution could cause significant increases in blood pressure, a new study from the University of Washington has found, adding to a growing body of work correlating vehicle exhaust with negative health outcomes. The effects are near immediate: Two hours in Seattle’s rush hour was enough to increase blood pressure by nearly 5 millimeters of mercury, a jump that would push someone with normal levels to elevated or from elevated levels to stage 1 hypertension. (Kroman, 11/30)

The ranks of stay-at-home parents are perennially dominated by mothers. But as women make educational and economic strides, turning some of them into the bigger earners in their households, a growing number of dads are opting to care for their kids full-time. One in five stay-at-home parents are now fathers, a recent Pew Research Center study found.   ... Experts attribute the rise of the stay-at-home dad to changes in economic conditions for families. (O'Connell-Domenech, 12/3)

A West Virginia coalition that helps support a network of anti-abortion pregnancy centers in the state is receiving $1 million in taxpayer dollars to distribute to organizations committed to encouraging people not to end their pregnancies. The West Virginia Pregnancy Center Coalition has been selected to manage the new West Virginia Mothers and Babies Support Program, the state department of health and human resources announced this week. (Willingham, 12/1)

Tennessee’s decades-old aggravated prostitution statute violates the Americans with Disabilities Act, the U.S. Department of Justice announced Friday after an investigation, warning that the state could face a lawsuit if officials don’t immediately cease enforcement. Tennessee is the only state in the United States that imposes a lifetime registration as a “violent sex offender” if convicted of engaging in sex work while living with HIV, regardless of whether the person knew they could transmit the disease. (Kruesi, 12/1)

State officials are warning of two alarming trends in the deaths of Missouri children: increasing numbers of infants suffocated during sleep, and children accidentally poisoned by fentanyl. The findings from 2022 were released this week in the annual Missouri Child Fatality Review Program report compiled by the Missouri Department of Social Services. (Munz, 12/3)

Colorado’s uninsured rate — the percentage of people without health care coverage — hit an all-time low this year, but federal policy changes mean it’s unclear whether that success can last. (Ingold, 12/2)

At some point in your life, you could have about a one in five chance of developing an autoimmune disease. The odds are greater if you are a woman, you have a genetic predisposition to autoimmunity, or you are exposed to certain pollutants. These diseases include more than 100 lifelong and costly illnesses such as type 1 diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, lupus and multiple sclerosis. They are often difficult to diagnose and currently impossible to cure. (Olivia Casey and Frederick W. Miller, 12/1)

The medical community today faces a deceptively simple question: How quickly should we act when a child’s life is on the line? I’m a pediatric oncologist, so my answer won’t surprise you — I think we should act immediately. But a new Food and Drug Administration policy could delay things for children who need treatment now. (E. Anders Kolb, 12/4)

In San Francisco in the 1970s, a group of people who cared about and respected the role of seniors in their community created a new model of care that allowed their elders to be fully cared for while living independently at home. This was the genesis of what we know as the Program of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly, or PACE. (Shawn Bloom, 12/4)

What a year it has been for healthcare. In addition to technological, pharmaceutical and clinical advancements, there are new investors and non-traditional players seeking opportunities in the space, expanded care models, significant labor wins, a widening of the talent pipeline amid the continued staffing crisis, and either mergers between systems or the formation of partnerships designed to expand services while mitigating risk. (Mary Ellen Podmolik, 12/4)

For years health experts have argued that criminalizing marijuana use was a mistake, and that rather than handling the drug as a law enforcement problem, with cops, lawyers, and jails, we should manage it as a public health problem, with prevention, treatment, and harm reduction. I have served as health commissioner for both New York City and Philadelphia, and at one time I had hopes of moving to a public health approach to illegal drugs. But instead, to my horror, the legalization freight train rolling across the nation is replacing law enforcement with corporate marketing reminiscent of the tactics of Big Tobacco in the 20th century. It’s time for us to respond to marijuana now as we belatedly responded to tobacco. (Thomas Farley, 12/4)

Poor mental health costs the United States nearly $50 billion in lost productivity annually. Sixty two percent of missed workdays are attributed to mental health conditions such as burnout, anxiety and depression. (Kate Woodsome, 12/4)

It wasn’t until this year that a social media post from the Hispanic Federation, a beneficiary of The New York Times Communities Fund, about a mental health workshop it funded called “Una Mente Sana es el Mayor Tesoro a Encontrar” (“A Healthy Mind Is the Greatest Treasure to Find”) gave Ms. Flores the push she needed to seek help. She attended support groups and lessons on how to deal with stress and live a healthy lifestyle. (12/2)