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As a growing number of Republican-led states look for end runs around the Affordable Care Act, Iowa is embracing a strategy that contends that not all health plans are actually health insurance. Gov. Kim Reynolds (R) on Monday signed into law a bill allowing the century-old Iowa Farm Bureau to collaborate with the state’s dominant insurer to sell “health benefit plans,” which are expected to cost health customers less than ACA coverage because they will not have to comply with federal requirements. (Goldstein, 4/2)

A new law in Iowa could provide the path forward for Republican-led states that are looking for ways around ObamaCare’s rules and regulations. Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds (R) on Monday signed a law that will allow the Iowa Farm Bureau to collaborate with Wellmark Blue Cross and Blue Shield on self-funded “health benefit plans.” (Weixel, 4/3)

Iowans who are struggling to afford health insurance through the Affordable Care Act’s individual marketplace gathered around Gov. Kim Reynolds today as she signed legislation allowing a lower-cost, unregulated product to take the place of traditional insurance. Under the bill, the plans will not be required to cover pre-existing conditions or other mandates of Obamacare. (Russell, 4/2)

Kaiser Health News: Americans Have Mixed Feelings About The ACA’s Future — But Like Their Plans

Most Americans are happy with the insurance they buy on the individual market, yet those same people think the markets are collapsing before their eyes. A poll by the Kaiser Family Foundation, released Tuesday, found that 61 percent of people enrolled in marketplace plans are satisfied with their insurance choices and that a majority say they are not paying more this year compared with last year’s premium costs. (Bluth, 4/3)

Some can’t afford to insure their children. Others are seeking cheaper care abroad. Some older adults are counting down the years until they qualify for Medicare. While these people are among the 27 million Americans who remain uncovered despite the large expansion of health insurance under the Affordable Care Act, their stories transcend politics, reflecting tough kitchen-table decisions about health care faced by many families. (Tozzi and Ockerman, 4/3)

Obamacare backers predicted President Donald Trump’s decision to halt subsidy payments last fall would destroy the law. But six months later, the troubled insurance markets appear more stable than ever, and many Obamacare customers benefited from Trump’s decision in ways the law’s supporters didn’t expect. (Demko, 4/2)

As new digital tools from wearables to electronic health records to boxes that can track patients’ movements in their homes promise to reshape health care, it is crucial to scrutinize the massive amount of data being generated to ensure that interventions are actually improving health outcomes. That was a takeaway message from a group of regulatory and drug development experts at a conference held at MIT on Friday focused on how digital health and artificial intelligence are affecting translational medicine. (Joseph, 4/3)

Five healthcare giants are diving into blockchain, looking into how to use the technology to improve data quality and lower administrative costs. Humana, Multiplan, UnitedHealth Group's Optum, UnitedHealthcare and Quest Diagnostics are embarking on a pilot program to apply blockchain to healthcare provider demographic data. By using the encrypted system of data exchange that relies on a distributed ledger, they aim to make this data both more accurate and administratively friendly. (Arndt, 4/2)

UnitedHealth Group is joining forces with a rival health insurer and one of the nation’s largest lab testing companies to see if blockchain technology can improve health care data. On Monday, UnitedHealth is announcing the pilot project in conjunction with Kentucky-based Humana, New Jersey-based Quest Diagnostics and a New York firm called MultiPlan. Financial terms were not disclosed. (Snowbeck, 4/2)

The gay hookup app Grindr, which has more than 3.6 million daily active users across the world, has been providing its users’ HIV status to two other companies, BuzzFeed News has learned. The two companies — Apptimize and Localytics, which help optimize apps — receive some of the information that Grindr users choose to include in their profiles, including their HIV status and “last tested date.” (Ghorayshi and Ray, 4/2)

In a point-by-point response on its Tumblr page, Grindr said: "It's important to remember that Grindr is a public forum. We give users the option to post information about themselves including HIV status and last test date, and we make it clear in our privacy policy that if you choose to include this information in your profile, the information will also become public." (Neuman, 4/3)

Grindr, a gay dating app, will stop sharing users' HIV statuses with third parties after a report disclosed that the company passed the information on to two vendors. The West Hollywood company's policy change came after a BuzzFeed report Monday that said personal data was being passed to two outside vendors hired by Grindr to test the performance of its app. (Pierson, 4/2)

The White House is being urged to sidestep patents on a high-priced opioid overdose antidote as one way to stem the rising cost of combating the opioid crisis. In a letter sent last Thursday, an advocacy group argues the White House should use a little-known federal law that would permit the government to take title to patents on Evzio. This is a decades-old version of naloxone, which is widely used to reverse the effect of opioid and heroin overdoses. (Silverman, 4/2)

At the very moment that the Trump administration has thrown its weight behind a particular medication meant to deter opioid addiction, a new paper in a public-health journal is warning that too little is known about one of the medication’s possible downsides: a heightened chance of overdose among those who stop taking it prematurely. (MacGillis, 4/3)

The Drug Enforcement Administration arrested 28 drug prescribers and pharmacists, and revoked the licenses of 147 people who handle controlled substances, as part of a nationwide crackdown on the illegal use and distribution of opioids and other prescription medications, the Justice Department announced Monday. The 45-day enforcement “surge” stemmed from a review, ordered by Attorney General Jeff Sessions, of 80 million drug transactions. The review revealed dispensers who sold disproportionately large amounts of drugs, particularly opioid painkillers, and sparked 188 investigations. (Bernstein, 4/2)

The U.S. Justice Department on Monday sought court permission to participate in settlement negotiations aimed at resolving lawsuits by state and local governments against opioid manufacturers and distributors. The Justice Department said in a brief it wanted to participate in talks overseen by a federal judge in Cleveland as a "friend of the court" that would provide information to help craft non-monetary remedies to combat the opioid crisis. (Raymond, 4/2)

When Brigham and Women's Hospital surgeon and best-selling author Atul Gawande turns his attention to a health care issue, people take notice. But last week, during a Brigham-only event, staff packed an auditorium to, in Gawande's words, welcome another doctor "home." (Bebinger, 4/3)

New surges in use of methamphetamine and cocaine mixed with a powerful synthetic opioid are contributing to rising drug overdose death tolls in already hard-hit Ohio. As county coroners have begun releasing their 2017 tallies, a trend has emerged of more deaths involving meth or cocaine mixed with fentanyl, the painkiller blamed for increasing U.S. fatalities in recent years as authorities focused on reducing heroin overdoses. (Sewell, 4/2)

Minneapolis police want every officer to be trained by the end of the year in how to administer a medication called Narcan, which can reverse an opioid overdose. The program is rolling out as the city faces a big increase in reported overdoses in the first few months of 2018. (Collins, 4/2)

Mercy Health – Cincinnati, which has stepped up its efforts to care for patients with opioid addiction, announced Monday that its Mercy Health Foundation has invested in Crosswave Health, the technology company behind the treatment finder. Users of FindLocalTreatment can type in their gender, insurance provider, ZIP code and more to locate accredited addiction treatment services in the region. (DeMio, 4/2)

Governor Chris Sununu has vetoed a bill relating to prison sentences for those struggling with substance abuse. In New Hampshire, if a prisoner is out on parole but has that parole revoked, he or she must be recommitted for at least 90 days. (Greene, 4/2)

In Licking County, Prosecutor Bill Hayes said he has about 100 drug-related cases awaiting final lab results. In the meantime, suspected drug dealers and users are out on the streets, some committing more crimes. (Kovac, 4/3)

Can legalizing marijuana fight the problem of opioid addiction and fatal overdoses? Two new studies in the debate suggest it may. Pot can relieve chronic pain in adults, so advocates for liberalizing marijuana laws have proposed it as a lower-risk alternative to opioids. But some research suggests marijuana may encourage opioid use, and so might make the epidemic worse. (Ritter, 4/2)

The studies are the latest in a long line of research showing that marijuana availability is associated with reductions in opiate use and misuse. But the Wen and Hockenberry report is significant for finding a link between recreational marijuana and opiate use — most previous research has focused on medical marijuana. There is widespread agreement among doctors and public-health experts that marijuana is effective at treating chronic pain. Doctors often treat that condition with opiate medication, despite little evidence that opiates are effective for it. (Ingraham, 4/2)

Many people end up abusing opioid drugs such as oxycodone and heroin after starting off with a legitimate prescription for pain. The authors argue that people who avoid that first prescription are less likely to end up as part of the opioid epidemic. "We do know that cannabis is much less risky than opiates, as far as likelihood of dependency," says W. David Bradford, a professor of public policy at the University of Georgia. "And certainly there's no mortality risk" from the drug itself. (Harris, 4/2)

States that have legalized marijuana for medical or recreational purposes have seen fewer opioid prescriptions for Medicaid patients, according to a study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. States with medical marijuana laws had a 5.8 percent lower rate of Medicaid-covered prescriptions for opioids, the study found. (Hellmann, 4/2)

“In this time when we are so concerned — rightly so — about opiate misuse and abuse and the mortality that’s occurring, we need to be clear-eyed and use evidence to drive our policies,” said W. David Bradford, an economist at the University of Georgia and an author of one of the studies. “If you’re interested in giving people options for pain management that don’t bring the particular risks that opiates do, states should contemplate turning on dispensary-based cannabis policies.” (Sheridan, 4/2)

As Illinois officials search for new ways to combat an opioid epidemic that continues to claim a growing number of lives, state Sen. Don Harmon, D-Oak Park, is pushing new legislation that would expand the state’s medical cannabis program to give people who have been prescribed opioids a different option for treating their pain. After hearing testimony last spring from medical cannabis patients, Harmon learned they were experiencing fewer side effects than they had while taking opioids — and that medical cannabis was actually giving them “a pathway out of opioid use.” (Schuba, 4/2)

As Congress moved to clarify that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention can conduct research on gun violence, a number of states and healthcare providers have taken it upon themselves to fill the gap in research left by decades of federal government inaction. "If Congress will not appropriate the necessary funds to do that research, then we need to mobilize those funds in a different way," said Dr. Megan Ranney, a practicing emergency physician and researcher and director of the Emergency Digital Health Innovation program at Brown University. (Johnson, 4/2)

People convicted of domestic abuse in New York will be required to hand over their firearms to authorities, Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced Saturday after state lawmakers passed legislation to update a law that required domestic abusers to surrender only their handguns. (Seiger, 4/2)

On Monday, the mayors joined six others as named plaintiffs in a suit against Gov. Rick Scott and other state officials in an effort to strike down the 2011 law containing Florida’s uniquely harsh penalties for local gun regulations. (Hanks, 4/2)

The student had been caught vaping in school three times before he sat in the vice principal’s office at Cape Elizabeth High School in Maine this winter and shamefacedly admitted what by then was obvious. “I can’t stop,” he told the vice principal, Nate Carpenter. So Mr. Carpenter asked the school nurse about getting the teenager nicotine gum or a patch, to help him get through the school day without violating the rules prohibiting vaping. (Zernike, 4/2)

At Northern High School in Dillsburg, Pa., Principal Steve Lehman’s locked safe, which once contained the occasional pack of confiscated cigarettes, is now filled with around 40 devices that look like flash drives. The device is called a Juul and it is a type of e-cigarette that delivers a powerful dose of nicotine, derived from tobacco, in a patented salt solution that smokers say closely mimics the feeling of inhaling cigarettes. It has become a coveted teen status symbol and a growing problem in high schools and middle schools, spreading with a speed that has taken teachers, parents and school administrators by surprise. (Chaker, 4/2)

Delivering meals to vulnerable sick people might be a simple way to cut back on emergency room visits and hospitalizations, reining in some of the costliest kinds of medical care, according to a new Health Affairs study. Low-income seniors or disabled younger people who received home-delivered meals — particularly meals designed by a dietitian for that person's specific medical needs — had fewer emergency visits and lower medical spending than a similar group of people who did not receive meal deliveries. (Johnson, 4/2)

Imagine you are the tightfisted potentate of a small republic, plotting the least expensive way to care for subjects in fragile health who depend on your beneficence. You could watch while your subjects who are elderly or disabled (or both) scramble to find and pay for healthy meals. And you could open your checkbook each time one of these subjects lapses into a health crisis that calls for a trip to a hospital's emergency department in an ambulance. But you might just try feeding these needy subjects instead. (Healy, 4/2)

Good food isn’t just good for the body — it might also curb hospital stays and health care costs for some patients with chronic conditions, according to new research. The study, published Monday in Health Affairs, followed patients who received medically tailored meals from Community Servings. The Boston-based nonprofit has been dishing up chickpea curries, quinoa salads, and turkey chilis for nearly three decades to individuals with chronic diseases who have trouble shopping for and preparing meals. (Thielking, 4/2)

The $1.455 billion “All of Us” project that the National Institutes of Health is launching this spring stands on the shoulders of the $3 billion Human Genome Project, which was (mostly) completed in 2003. All of Us will collect DNA, health, lifestyle, and other data from 1 million Americans to, among other things, identify the genetic and environmental roots of disease and understand why different people respond differently to the same drug. The genome project, which determined the sequence of most of the 3 billion biochemical “letters” that spell out human DNA, had similar goals. Some have been realized, others not. (Begley, 4/2)

Stress from dealing with racism and sexism seems to be a key reason that highly educated black women are far more likely lose their babies than are equally educated white women, says Keisha Bentley-Edwards, a co-author of a new report, which is titled “Fighting at Birth: Eradicating the Black-White Infant Mortality Gap.” The stress can lead to premature delivery of low birth-weight babies. (Coy, 4/2)

Babies given antibiotics or antacids in infancy may be at increased risk for allergies in childhood. Researchers retrospectively studied 792,130 infants covered by a health insurance program. Of these, 131,708 received antibiotics, 60,209 got histamine-2 receptor antagonists and 13,687 were given proton pump inhibitors. Both H2 blockers and P.P.I.s are prescribed for gastroesophageal reflex, or GERD. (Bakalar, 3/2)

Myrtle Beach , South Carolina, has a busy boardwalk and all kinds of attractions, from mini-golf courses and water parks to a zip line and a Ferris wheel. So it might not be an obvious destination for families with kids on the autism spectrum who may be easily overwhelmed by noise and commotion. But an organization called Champion Autism Network is working with hotels, restaurants and other venues to make the area autism-friendly. (Harpaz, 4/2)

Every week in Murfreesboro, Tenn., Zibin Guo guides veterans in wheelchairs through slow-motion tai chi poses as a Bluetooth speaker plays soothing instrumental music. "Cloudy hands to the right, cloudy hands to the left," he tells them. "Now we're going to open your arms, grab the wheels and 180-degree turn." The participants swivel about-face and continue to the next pose. Guo, a medical anthropologist at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, has modified his tai chi to work from a seated position. (Farmer, 4/2)

You’re feeling depressed. What have you been eating? Psychiatrists and therapists don’t often ask this question. But a growing body of research over the past decade shows that a healthy diet—high in fruits, vegetables, whole grains, fish and unprocessed lean red meat—can prevent depression. And an unhealthy diet—high in processed and refined foods—increases the risk for the disease in everyone, including children and teens. (Bernstein, 4/2)

Baby boomers, determined to keep moving no matter what wear and tear and arthritis have wrought, are fueling a surge in joint replacements. Taking advantage of improved artificial joints and surgical methods, aging Americans are getting so many new hips, knees, shoulders, and ankles that orthopedic surgeons are having trouble meeting the demand. (Weisman, 4/2)

Imagine uncoiling a condom and stuffing it up one side of your nose, then plugging the other nostril and inhaling until the long piece of latex slides into your throat. Then what? You reach back and pull it from your mouth. Why would someone do that?Apparently for the same reason young people have dared each other to pour salt in their hands and hold ice until it burns, douse themselves in rubbing alcohol and set themselves on fire, or bite into colorful liquid laundry detergent packets. (Bever, 4/2)

April is Parkinson’s Disease Awareness Month, a time to think about how much you know about the disease. You may know about the tremors and stiffness that gradually take over patients’ bodies. You may know about famous people with the disease, including Michael J. Fox. For what you may not know, there’s the PD Library. (Blakemore, 4/2)

A review of medical responses after the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history in Las Vegas found confusion led to a fire department broadcast that the only top-tier regional trauma center was too full to accept any more victims of the attack, a newspaper reported Monday. The problem began when University Medical Center called an "internal disaster" alert following the Oct. 1 shooting at an open-air concert venue on the Las Vegas Strip, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported. (4/2)

Health officials dealing with a spate of youth suicides in a northeastern Ohio county are getting help from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Officials say five students and one former student from the Perry Local School District in Stark County killed themselves within a six-month period from 2017 into 2018, spurring vigils, prevention efforts, community meetings and discussion about a possible contagion effect. (4/2)

Persistent water and sewage leaks in and around the operating rooms of Washington’s largest hospital are at the center of a lawsuit seeking millions in damages in the infection-related death of a retired Northern Virginia schoolteacher. The lawsuit comes after D.C. health inspectors last year found that MedStar Washington Hospital Center had not ensured a safe, sterile environment for patients. Investigators reported at least seven sewage leaks during an 11-month period, and during a tour last summer described a “black, grainy, foul smelling substance” on the floor between two operating rooms. (Marimow, Jamison and Hermann, 4/2)

Governor Charlie Baker has signed legislation to give Massachusetts consumers more privacy over their medical information. The law requires health insurers to send forms containing information about medical treatments to the patient who received the care — not to the policyholder. (McCluskey, 4/2)

Two dozen companies recently settled accusations by the federal government that they paid kickbacks in return for referrals. Two of those companies have ties to an Overland Park radiation oncology clinic. SL Kansas City Leasing, LLC and Sightline Kansas City Holdings, LLC were among the defendants that agreed to pay up to $11.5 million to settle allegations they violated the Anti-Kickback Statute. ... The government intervened in the case after it was filed by a whistleblower in 2016. According to the recently unsealed complaint, Sightline approached physicians in cities where it established radiation clinics and enticed them to invest in ventures that leased space to the clinics. (Margolies, 4/2)

A New Hampshire website comparing cost and quality at the state’s health care facilities has made it easier to do the comparison – as long as you’re comparing hospitals rather than urgent care centers or walk-in facilities. Those non-hospital facilities have become increasingly popular in recent years and perform an growing percentage of health care procedures, but at the long-running website NHHealthCost.org you can only compare their costs, not their quality. (Brooks, 4/2)

Still waiting: Earlier this month, Mayor Mark Farrell announced the opening of 54 new psychiatric beds at St. Mary’s Medical Center on Stanyan Street to help mentally ill homeless people. But the beds aren’t ready yet, according to the Department of Public Health. (Swan, 4/2)

A merger between Downers Grove-based Advocate Health Care and Wisconsin’s Aurora Health Care became official Sunday, creating the 10th-largest not-for-profit hospital system in the country. The new combined system, called Advocate Aurora Health, has 27 hospitals and about $11 billion in annual revenue. The merged system will keep dual headquarters in Illinois and Wisconsin. (Schencker, 4/2)

Teen birth rates have been going down for a while now but in one mountain west state -- Colorado -- they’ve gone down more than the rest of the nation. Could it be related to the national trend of kids having less sex or an attempt to make IUDs more accessible? (Budner, 4/2)

Republican gubernatorial candidate Travis Allen says he'd build state-run institutions and force homeless people to live in them against their will, if necessary. ...Allen, currently in the state Assembly, is pushing the idea as part of his platform in public debates, interviews and newspaper editorial board meetings. (Hart, 4/3)

A sports medicine complex set to open next year in Katy will offer a "one stop shopping" approach for the health of athletes. On March 29, officials with Memorial Hermann Katy Hospital and Athletic Training and Health broke ground at the $15 million Memorial Hermann Sports Park - Katy. "This unique collaboration between Memorial Hermann and (Athletic Training and Health) will benefit the full range of athletes in our community, from high school students to professional competitors, weekend warriors and beyond," said Heath Rushing, Memorial Hermann Katy's chief executive officer. (Glenn, 4/2)

Kaiser Health News: Psychiatrist Stays Close To Home And True To Her Childhood Promise

Dr. Yamanda Edwards, the daughter of a truck driver and a stay-at-home mom, grew up just a few miles from Martin Luther King/Drew Medical Center, at the time an iconic yet troubled hospital in South Los Angeles. As a child in the 1990s, she knew little of its history — how it rose from the ashes of the Watts riots. And she knew no one in the medical profession. (Gorman, 4/3)

Texas' cancer-fighting agency is pumping $27.8 million into research of breast, prostate, brain and other forms of cancers in North Texas, as well as creation of lung and liver cancer screening programs in underserved areas. More than a dozen UT Southwestern researchers received grants in the latest round of funding from the Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas. Voters approved a constitutional amendment in 2007 to create a $3 billion cancer-fighting fund. (O'Donnell, 4/2)

The mission of the Department of Veterans Affairs was laid down in the wake of the Civil War, in a promise by President Abraham Lincoln to care for the men who fought, as well as their widows and orphans. The scope of that promise has broadened as women have enlisted. It is the only department that focuses exclusively on caring for veterans and their families in times of crisis spawned by injury, illness and death, a mission most Americans would agree is vital, if not sacred. Yet every administration going back decades has failed to appoint a leader capable of guiding the agency to fulfill its mission. Ronny L. Jackson, President Trump’s pick to lead the department after Secretary David Shulkin was fired, will continue that legacy. And veterans will continue to pay for it. (Mikki Kendall, 4/2)

When he was ousted as veterans affairs secretary by President Donald Trump last week, David Shulkin joined the line of inept bunglers in the revolving door of secretaries sacked for failure to reform the system. If Rear Adm. Ronny Jackson, the president’s personal physician, a man whose administrative credentials are currently under question, does win Senate confirmation, he will become the sixth head of the department since 2007, not counting four interim chiefs.We surely owe our veterans better than this. (Cory Franklin, 4/2)

It is clear little has changed in VA’s management since the systemic failures and fallout from 2014. The Veterans Choice Program is a solution to help the VA better manage health care for veterans by providing community care, reducing VA bureaucracy and making the department more manageable — but we cannot rely on Choice alone. We must look to VA leadership to change its entrenched “business as usual” mindset. (Sen. Jerry Moran, 4/2)

The Department of Veterans Affairs includes the largest health system in the United States and the second largest agency in the federal government. The system, which accounts for close to $200 billion in federal spending and has more than 350,000 employees, covers the health-care needs of 9 million veterans. The idea of doing away with the entire system and turning it over to the private sector is not only frightening, it’s morally reprehensible. And yet, if some high-level VA officials in the Trump administration get their way , that’s what would happen. (Nancy M. Schlichting, 4/2)

Scott Pruitt, administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency and second only to President Trump in the climate denial game, proposed on Monday revising — which definitely means relaxing and probably means crippling — the ambitious, groundbreaking greenhouse gas and fuel-economy standards approved during the Obama administration. ...Backsliding now on public health and the environment would not do the automakers a lot of good. (4/2)

The world is increasingly speeding toward a future of clean, zero-emissions cars. ...But here in the United States, President Trump and his anti-environmental protection sidekick, Scott Pruitt, are determined to head recklessly in the opposite direction. It's up to California and other environmentally responsible states to stop them. ...Pruitt has used his tenure at the EPA to systematically attack responsible, science- and health-based regulations. (4/3)

For decades California has used its market power and its policy innovation to push America toward a cleaner energy future. But the Trump administration seems just as determined to drag America backward to more dependence on dirty fossil fuels. While expected, the official announcement Monday that the Environmental Protection Agency is rolling back landmark fuel economy rules is still sweeping in its significance – and stunning in its stupidity. (4/2)

I don’t remember when, exactly, I dropped my NRA membership. Perhaps it was 1988 or 89, but I do remember it was my silent but conscious protest to what I felt were their more extremist positions. ...I’m not sure if they had changed or I had. Maybe it was after the shift with six different gunshot victims, or maybe after seeing a young man shot with an assault weapon. I remember him clearly, as I had never before seen a human being so completely destroyed physically. (Michael Paterson, 4/1)

More than one million students and supporters in 62 U.S. cities participated in the recent March For Our Lives protest to create action on gun control. Others acted in 800 sister marches across the world with support from teachers, parents and survivors of school shootings.  We can take the lead from these nonviolent student organizers. Instead of proposing funding for training teachers in K-12 as well as secondary education to use guns in classrooms, we need policies to fund the training teachers on social emotional intelligence. (Cynthia Yung, 4/2)

I am an emergency room pediatrician and an accidental politician — someone who never thought much about politics until I was recruited to run for state office after making a statement about the importance of expanding Medicaid. That decision — plus some twisted reporting and presidential tweets — ended up costing my husband, Andrew, his job and our family a significant portion of his pension my husband had worked hard for over 21 years of federal service. For the past year and a half of this nightmare, I have not been free to speak out about what happened. Now that Andrew has been fired, I am. (Jill McCabe, 4/2)

Don’t worry, coffee-addled Seattleites: You and your morning ritual are safe. Despite a Los Angeles judge’s ruling that in California coffee must carry a warning label, there’s little cause for concern.California’s Proposition 65 labeling certainly delivers a jolt, notifying consumers of the presence of chemicals the state has listed as causing cancer and birth defects. And while it’s smart to be cautious about food and drink, here’s something to ease your caffeinated mind. California’s coffee shop warning relates to acrylamide, a chemical produced when coffee beans are roasted. Acrylamide has been shown to cause cancer in rodents, but that’s when they are given doses up to 1,000 to 10,000 times higher than what people might be exposed to in foods, according to the American Cancer Society. (4/2)

On March 21, the House of Representatives passed its “Right to Try” bill H.R. 5247 by a 267-149 margin, with 35 Democrats joining Republicans in voting for the legislation. The bill moves to the Senate, which unanimously passed a similar bill on August 3 of last year, but where its current path into law is uncertain. The Senate should pass the House Right to Try legislation.Designated the ‘‘Trickett Wendler, Frank Mongiello, Jordan McLinn, and Matthew Bellina Right to Try Act,” H.R. 5247 gives informed, terminally ill patients the freedom to take, and their physicians the freedom to prescribe, promising medicines that have completed initial safety testing but have not been approved by the Food and Drug Administration. Thirty-eight states have passed Right to Try laws, but federal law supremacy probably renders these merely symbolic. A federal Right to Try law is unlikely to have much direct impact for different reasons. (Roger D. Klein , 4/2)

‘We need a Disney princess who’s had an abortion,” tweeted a Pennsylvania branch of Planned Parenthood last week. Though the tweet was deleted, Planned Parenthood Keystone chief Melissa Reed stands by it. “Planned Parenthood believes that pop culture . . . has a critical role to play in educating the public and sparking meaningful conversations around sexual and reproductive health issues and policies, including abortion,” she said in a statement to Fox News. (Faith Moore, 4/2)

Sergei Neubauer had a problem with pens. He was always losing the caps, so he left his mark everywhere. The laundry, the furniture, and even the family cars were often streaked with ink spots and accidental squiggles.It became a family joke: “Sergei was here.” Sergei is gone now. He took his own life last September. His funeral was held on what would have been his 19th birthday. His mother, Mary Neubauer, and father, Larry Loss, of Clive have spent nearly every day since then telling the story of how Iowa’s mental-health system failed their son and urging lawmakers to act. (Kathie Obradovich, 4/2)