�鶹Ů��

The Democratic National Committee released the latest draft of its 2016 platform late Friday afternoon, a week after Sen. Bernie Sanders (Vt.) promised to fight "on the floor of the convention" if more progressive planks did not make it in. ... [On health care] there's more for Sanders here, in one half-sentence: "Americans should be able to access public coverage through Medicare or a public option." Sanders campaigned on a Medicare-for-all, single-payer health-care system, and this nods at that, without promising it in four years. ... For the first time, the 2016 Democratic platform says that the party will attempt to repeal the Hyde Amendment (which bars the use of federal funds for most kinds of abortion) and the Helms Amendment (which prevents foreign aid from being spent on abortion). (Weigel, 7/1)

Tennessee marketplace consumers may experience some sticker shock when they try to sign up for health insurance plans during open enrollment this year. Carriers in the state have requested premium rate increases with the Tennessee Department of Commerce and Insurance, and the hikes are high. (Tolbert, 7/1)

It was a quiet announcement that landed with a big boom: Blue Cross Blue Shield would be pulling out of Minnesota’s individual insurance market. The news last week sent insurance companies and customers alike scrambling, trying to figure out what the fallout will be from 100,000 Blue Cross customers seeking new coverage. (Montgomery, 7/1)

The Obama administration is making a push to get young adults covered on the health insurance marketplaces, both for their own good and that of the marketplaces, which need healthy people to balance sicker ones in the risk pool. While experts applaud the beefed up outreach planned for the coming months, they point to several factors that may throw a wrench into enrollment plans for young people. (Andrews, 7/5)

Graduate students have long relied on health insurance subsidies awarded as part of financial-aid packages as they try to earn a living and a degree. But the future of that benefit could be jeopardized by the Internal Revenue Service’s interpretation of a provision of the Affordable Care Act that casts the subsidies as an attempt to elude ACA’s employer mandate. Seventeen U.S. senators, including Virginia Sens. Mark R. Warner and Timothy M. Kaine, both Democrats, wrote a letter last month urging the Obama administration to clarify the IRS language and warning that it runs counter to ACA’s primary goal to expand insurance coverage. (Kapsidelis, 7/3)

Opponents of Medicaid expansion in South Dakota say Gov. Dennis Daugaard's chances of broadening eligibility for the program have likely diminished since he announced he won't call a special legislative session to consider it. It's "very possible" the Republican will propose in the 2017 session to open the program to roughly 50,000 more low-income residents, the governor said. But expansion foes predict the Legislature will be less receptive after the November elections because several conservative Republicans triumphed over moderates in primaries for Senate seats, and an expansion would require majority support in both legislative chambers, which almost certainly will remain in Republican hands. (7/4)

The TennCare expansion plan unveiled this week by House Speaker Beth Harwell's task force — hailed a "significant first step" to closing the Medicaid gap — is raising a lot of questions for industry observers as it moves into the review and negotiation phase. The plan, still light on details, takes a different approach to limit early enrollment and prioritizes outcomes. It does not include vouchers to help people pay for employer-sponsored coverage. (Fletcher, 7/1)

Kentucky's new Republican Gov. Matt Bevin is under fire from healthcare providers and patients for proposing that Medicaid expansion beneficiaries be required to participate in job training, community service or wellness activities to continue receiving dental and vision care coverage. (Meyer, 7/1)

Last year, healthcare leaders had their eyes trained on one big case – King v. Burwell – and they celebrated when the justices voted to uphold a key provision of the Affordable Care Act. This year wasn't nearly so straightforward for healthcare leaders watching the Supreme Court, which wrapped up its latest term this week. (Schenker, 7/3)

Abortion providers in Louisiana filed suit Friday to invalidate state laws regulating the procedure, an early example of litigation likely to target antiabortion laws following a Supreme Court ruling earlier this week. The Center for Reproductive Rights, a New York-based advocacy group representing two of Louisiana’s four abortion clinics, filed the action in federal court in Baton Rouge, alleging seven abortion-related laws enacted in the state this year are unconstitutional. (Bravin and Radnofsky, 7/1)

Abortion clinics and their doctors in Louisiana are challenging new abortion restrictions that include making women wait longer and barring a common second-trimester procedure. The federal lawsuit filed Friday in Baton Rouge seeks to keep the new rules from taking effect on Aug. 1. Among other restrictions, lawmakers voted to force many women to wait 72 hours and undergo ultrasounds before getting abortions, and they banned a procedure called dilation and evacuation. (7/1)

In the shadow of the Supreme Court’s decision on Texas abortion clinics on Monday was a second one, a day later, that saved the one remaining abortion clinic in all of Mississippi. The decision brought a momentary breath of relief for clinic staff, but they say they don’t expect it to mean new clinics will open in the state anytime soon. ... The state’s only other abortion clinic closed its doors in 2006. Women from across the state travel for three to four hours to the Jackson clinic for abortions or for reproductive care, including birth control and routine checkups. (Seervai, 7/1)

A federal judge's decision to block a new Indiana abortion law from taking effect was a setback for anti-abortion activists who backed the push to tighten restrictions on the procedure that are already among the most strict in the country. Provisions put on hold a day before they were to take effect Friday would have banned abortions sought because of a fetus' genetic abnormalities, such as Down syndrome or because of the race, gender or ancestry of a fetus, and required that aborted fetuses be buried or cremated. (7/4)

And, new data show that Hispanic women were the most affected by the Texas regulations that were just overturned —

The number of Texas Hispanic women who had abortions in 2014 dropped 18 percent compared with the year before, proving that the state’s now-overturned tough restrictions on clinics had an adverse effect on a woman’s constitutional right to the procedure, advocates said Friday. (Lepro, 7/1)

Private health insurers can pay more than $4,000 for each dialysis treatment. Government health plans like Medicaid pay around $200. That gaping price difference was the motivation for a scheme, orchestrated by a for-profit dialysis chain, that illegally pushed poor people in Florida and Ohio out of inexpensive government programs and into expensive private plans sold by UnitedHealthcare, according to a lawsuit the giant insurer filed in federal court on Friday. UnitedHealthcare says the arrangement needlessly exposed the patients to medical bills. (Abelson and Thomas, 7/1)

UnitedHealth Group Inc. sued kidney-care chain American Renal Associates Holdings Inc., accusing it of fraud as health-industry fights escalate over who is allowed to help consumers pay for Affordable Care Act coverage. The lawsuit by the biggest U.S. health insurer, filed Friday in U.S. District Court in Florida’s Southern District, said American Renal Associates engaged in a “fraudulent and illegal scheme” to get larger payments from the insurer by convincing patients to sign up for UnitedHealth plans and connecting them with a charity that helped pay their premiums. (Wilde Mathews, 7/1)

Amid the growing national focus on patient safety, hospitals are increasingly hiring experienced physicians to work overnight shifts on general medical floors. Residents — doctors in training — and nurses often have managed patients during these off hours, with help from attending, or staff, physicians on-call at home. But nocturnalists, or nocturnists as they are also known, give patients the benefit of a supervising doctor who checks on them in person. Groggy attending physicians who have already put in a full day are not repeatedly woken up to provide guidance. (Kowalczyk, 7/4)

In other news concerning doctors, a lack of geriatricians is hitting the nation hard —

At Edgewood Summit retirement community in Charleston, W.Va., 93-year-old Mary Mullens is waxing eloquent about her geriatrician, Dr. Todd Goldberg. "He's sure got a lot to do," she says, "and does it so well." West Virginia has the third oldest population in the nation, right behind Maine and Florida. But Goldberg is one of only 36 geriatricians in the state. "With the growing elderly population across America and West Virginia, obviously we need healthcare providers," says Goldberg. (Lofton, 7/3)

The deaths of David Bowie, Glenn Frey and Natalie Cole may have caught music fans by surprise, but they can be assured their heroes died receiving the best medical treatment possible. Most musicians, however, struggle to pay the bills, and those who may have enjoyed the spoils of fame in their heyday are finding that often doesn’t translate to covering the mounting medical costs they face in their twilight years. Accelerating the problem are changes in the music business itself. Artists who enjoyed hit records in the pre-digital era once were assured they could rely on continuing royalties that would allow them to enjoy retirement in comfort. Not anymore. (Guarino, 7/2)

Lisa Lynn Kotnik has been a singer on the New Orleans club circuit for more than 15 years. ... While Kotnik sings to revelers at night under the stage name Lisa Lynn, in the daytime she's battled health problems — fibroids, ovarian cysts, a hysterectomy and even a brain aneurysm. "So, I've had a lot of surgeries," she says. She counts at least five. And like many of her fellow musicians, Kotnik has never really had health insurance. Her income as a singer is tenuous and fluctuates with the seasons, so insurance has always just been too expensive, she says. (Kodjak, 7/1)

An outbreak of the Zika virus in the continental United States could begin any day now. But while there is plenty of discussion about mosquito bites, some researchers are beginning to worry more about the other known transmission route: sex. Intimate contact may account for more Zika infections than previously suspected, these experts say. The evidence is still emerging, and recent findings are hotly disputed. All experts agree that mosquitoes are the epidemic’s main driver. (McNeil, 7/2)

A showdown over Planned Parenthood has moved to the center of the battle over funding to battle the Zika virus. Senate Democrats [last] Tuesday blocked a Zika funding bill put forward by Republicans, objecting to a range of measures, including most prominently limits on funding for Planned Parenthood. The bill allows Zika funding for community health centers and other providers but not Planned Parenthood. (Sullivan, 7/4)

And media outlets report on the virus in the states —

Efforts to stop the spread of the Zika virus within the U.S. have been largely focused on minimizing the risk of sexual transmission of the disease by infected travelers. But the unseasonably warm weather and the expected onslaught of mosquitos are redirecting the spotlight on the perpetrators: the Aedes aegypti and Aedes albopictus mosquitos. (Johnson, 7/3)

Texas' social services czar, trying to halt spread of the Zika virus, has urged state leaders to allow Medicaid and other programs to supply free or reduced-price mosquito repellent this summer to females of childbearing age. If approved, several state and state-federal health programs would pick up the tab for about 565,000 Texas girls and women, ages 10 to 45, to receive up to two cans or bottles of repellent each month through October. (Garrett, 7/1)

Ohio will receive more than $476,000 in funding from the Centers for Disease Control to prepare for the Zika virus, the agency announced today. The funding is a piece of $25 million in national funding from the CDC's Public Health Emergency Preparedness (PHEP) cooperative agreement awarded to 53 state, city, and territorial health departments in areas at risk for outbreaks of Zika virus. (Zeltner, 7/1)

Cincinnati has registered its first case of Zika virus, in a middle-aged man who traveled to a Caribbean nation in May. That led city public health officials to caution residents at the start of the July Fourth weekend to take greater precaution against mosquito bites. (Saker, 7/1)

The number of people in Maryland with the Zika virus has grown to 31, state health officials said Friday as they reminded people to take steps to avoid contracting the disease. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also announced that it was awarding the state $366,427 as part of $25 million in funding to support Zika prevention efforts. (McDaniels,7/1)

A boy in Pakistan became a local legend as a street performer in recent years by traversing hot coals and lancing his arms with knives without so much as a wince. A thousand miles away, in China, lived a family wracked by excruciating bouts of inexplicable pain, passed down generation after generation. Scientists eventually determined what the boy and the family had in common: mutations in a gene that functions like an on-off switch for agony. Now, a bevy of biotech companies, including Genentech and Biogen, are staking big money on the idea that they can develop drugs that toggle that switch to relieve pain without the risk of addiction. (Garde, 7/5)

Our genes are not just naked stretches of DNA. They’re coiled into intricate three-dimensional tangles, their lengths decorated with tiny molecular “caps.” These so-called epigenetic marks are crucial to the workings of the genome: They can silence some genes and activate others. Epigenetic marks are crucial for our development. Among other functions, they direct a single egg to produce the many cell types, including blood and brain cells, in our bodies. But some high-profile studies have recently suggested something more: that the environment can change your epigenetic marks later in life, and that those changes can have long-lasting effects on health. (Zimmer, 7/1)

Women with a mutation in the BRCA1 gene, which is already linked to breast and ovarian cancers, also face a higher risk of a deadly type of uterine cancer, according to a new study. Lead author Noah Kauff, director of Clinical Cancer Genetics at the Duke Cancer Institute, said the study was the first "conclusive link" between the gene defect and an increased likelihood of serous endometrial carcinoma, a type of cancer that affects the lining of the uterus and has a mortality rate of 50 percent. Many women with BRCA mutations have their breasts, ovaries and fallopian tubes removed to reduce their risk of developing cancer. (McGinley, 7/1)

Days after the Orlando gay nightclub shooting, a fed-up emergency room doctor from New Orleans flew to Washington, hoping the assault-rifle massacre that claimed 49 victims might spur movement on gun legislation. In particular, Dr. Jay Kaplan, like many of his colleagues, wanted Congress to lift a 20-year-old amendment that effectively bans most federally sponsored academic research into gun violence. It seemed like low-hanging fruit to Kaplan, president of the American College of Emergency Physicians. (Jan, 7/5)

As the ancient Chinese proverb says, from crisis comes opportunity. That is certainly true for Garen Wintemute, a leading gun-violence researcher and emergency room doctor who finds “teaching moments” in the grief-filled days and weeks following mass shootings in America. He is currently seizing a window of opportunity recently opened by the recent mass shooting in Orlando, Florida. Wintemute, once named a “hero of medicine” by Time magazine, has led the Violence Prevention Research Program at the University of California, Davis Medical Center for 25 years. (Craft, 7/1)

The ongoing crisis in Flint, Mich., has shined a spotlight on the public-health hazards that lead continues to pose in U.S. drinking water. In particular, it has led to renewed pressure to test for the problem in the nation’s schools, where millions of young children, the age group most vulnerable to lead poisoning, spend their days. ... Public health officials agree that no amount of lead exposure is safe. Even at low levels, lead can cause serious and irreversible damage to the developing brains and nervous systems of young children. The result can be lasting behavioral, cognitive and physical problems. In short, it can alter the trajectory of a child’s life. (Dennis, 7/4)

The Food and Drug Administration has recently approved a host of new weight-loss interventions that make millions more people eligible for obesity treatments. Among the devices are balloons that inflate inside the stomach and leave less room for food, electrical impulses that trick the brain into thinking the stomach is full and a tube that lets people drain out some of their stomach contents after meals. The new interventions don’t require major surgery and are reversible; several are aimed at the estimated 60 million Americans who are only moderately obese, with a body-mass index of 30 to 40. (Beck, 7/4)

The recent team-building exercise was what her company, health scientists and IT experts refer to as “gamification.” This gaming trend includes “sedentary disruption activities” — getting people out of their seats and onto their feet, even if only briefly. Some health games have gained acceptance as team-building exercises, too. (Kanne, 7/4)

Episiotomy, a once-routine surgical incision made in a woman's vaginal opening during childbirth to speed the baby's passage, has been officially discouraged for at least a decade by the leading association of obstetrician-gynecologists in the United States. Nonetheless, despite evidence that the procedure is only rarely necessary, and in some cases leads to serious pain and injuries to the mother, it is still being performed at much higher than recommended rates by certain doctors and in certain hospitals. (Wiener, 7/4)

When I tore my rotator cuff in 2008, I had conventional laparoscopic surgery to repair it. The outcome was excellent, but the recovery was long and horrible. The orthopedist wouldn’t let me drive for six weeks, or run, swim or lift weights for three months. I suffered through weeks of torturous physical therapy. It was nearly six months before I felt normal again. So in 2014, after a nurse improperly administered a vaccination that resulted in chronic pain and an MRI revealed another rotator-cuff tear, I vowed I would not go through shoulder surgery (or its aftermath) again. (Cimons, 7/4)

Connecticut's health insurance exchange announced Thursday about 15 percent of low-income parents set to lose their state-sponsored Medicaid coverage at the end of July have transitioned to new insurance plans. Officials said 2,134 affected parents and caregivers have enrolled in a different state-sponsored Medicaid plan or a new plan through the exchange, Access Health CT. The Department of Social Services estimates 13,811 parents will lose their HUSKY A coverage when the eligibility levels become more stringent on Aug. 1. (Constable, 7/1)

Debate over the next two-year state budget won’t start for seven months, but state officials already are wrestling with a looming billion-dollar budget hole, plus a $400 million local funding hit that includes bus services. Federal regulators are putting an end to a state sales tax structure that allowed Ohio to collect hundreds of millions of dollars per year in federal Medicaid matching funds. That has Gov. John Kasich and legislative leaders staring at a $1.1 billion state funding loss in the next two-year budget. (Siegel, 7/3)

Some 140,000 Medicaid recipients became eligible for addiction recovery services last week under revisions to state Medicaid practices, state health officials said. The pool represents New Hampshire residents who had long been eligible for Medicaid, including the elderly, children and disabled adults who meet income guidelines, according to state officials. (Hayward, 7/4)

The number of psychiatric beds in state hospitals has dropped to a historic low, and nearly half of the beds that are available are filled with patients from the criminal justice system. Both statistics, reported in a new national study, reflect the sweeping changes that have taken place in the half-century since the United States began deinstitutionalizing mental illness in favor of outpatient treatment. But the promise of that shift was never fulfilled, and experts and advocates say the result is seen even today in the increasing ranks of homeless and incarcerated Americans suffering from serious mental conditions. (Beachum, 7/1)

The shortage of beds comes as a complex mix of social and legal forces is driving up demand for mental health services. There is much less stigma today in seeking treatment for a mental problem. Changing attitudes have also led to regulations establishing parity in insurance coverage for treatment of behavioral and physical health. (Sachdev, 7/1)

Friday, the Massachusetts Department of Mental Health issued new “Fresh Air” rules for psychiatric patients across the state. ... The rules require hospitals to grant mental health patients daily access to the outdoors. But up to 20 hospitals, including Massachusetts General, plan to seek waivers to the new rules, citing a lack of space. Those hospitals represent about one-third of psychiatric facilities statewide. The rules present a tug-of-war over patients’ rights, doctors’ judgment, and the logistical demands of running a hospital in an urban environment. (Bailey, 7/5)

The state health commissioner is assuring hospital executives that patient units at New Hampshire Hospital will be “appropriately staffed,” despite a contract dispute that led some physicians and nurse practitioners to walk off the job Thursday. Dartmouth-Hitchcock took over care of patients at the state psychiatric hospital on Friday. (Wickham, 7/1)

Alarms no longer go off when a resident shifts in bed or rises from a wheelchair at Oakwood Village Prairie Ridge in Madison. Nurses no longer place fall mats next to beds or lower beds to the floor when residents sleep. The changes, which took effect at the nursing facility in June, are part of a nationwide movement to phase out personal alarms and other long-used fall prevention measures in favor of more proactive, attentive care. Without alarms, nurses have to better learn residents' routines and accommodate their needs before they try to stand up and do it themselves. (7/2)

Complaints about seniors and younger disabled adults being evicted from nursing homes was the top-reported problem about long-term care facilities in Ohio in 2015. ... No one tracks evictions specifically, but there were 805 complaints in Ohioabout involuntary discharges or transfers last year, the majority of which — 653 — involved nursing homes, (Beverley) Laubert said. It's a troubling trend nationwide that is poised to get worse as the number of older adults grows, advocates say. (Pyle, 7/4)

And in Texas —

It took more than 40 years for Leonard Barefield to finally get to choose where he lived. The intellectually-disabled Texas native moved to a group home in Lubbock in September after he had first lived in near slavery conditions for more than three decades in a squalid house in Iowa and worked at a turkey processing plant there for 41 cents an hour. After being freed by social workers from that situation, he was sent in 2008 to a nursing home in Midland, Texas. His plight is not uncommon in Texas, where people with such disabilities are routinely warehoused in nursing homes. (7/3)

The yearlong impasse forced many health departments and social service agencies to scale back HIV screening and halt community outreach programs. So while new HIV cases in Chicago's collar counties plunged by 50 percent, experts say that was in part a consequence of fewer people being screened. Testing is down nearly 70 percent in some areas, said Erdman, assistant director for programs at the nonprofit Illinois Public Health Association. (Eldeib, 7/4)

Gov. Jerry Brown signed a bill Friday allowing the state to use $2 billion in bond money to house and treat mentally ill Californians who are homeless. The bipartisan bill, called “No Place Like Home,” will send counties bond money from future Proposition 63 mental-health revenues to create affordable-housing programs for mentally ill homeless people. Prop. 63, which is also known as the Mental Health Services Act, passed in 2004 and has raised more than $13 billion through a 1 percent income tax on residents who earn more than $1 million a year. (Gutierrez, 7/1)

The report by Castlight, a company that looks at millions of patient claims a year, ranked by price the 30 most populated U.S. cities, including Tampa, Orlando and Miami. Cesarean and vaginal deliveries in these Florida cities ranged from $8,000 dollars to $13,000 and included prenatal visits, ultrasounds, delivery, hospital stay and a follow-up visit. Costs varied amongst cities, and even within the same city depending on the hospital or health care facility. (Miller, 7/5)

An entire generation has come of age since the last time Missouri raised its cigarette tax, from 13 cents a pack to 17 cents, in 1993. Today, it's the lowest tax in the nation. And Missouri is one of just three states — along with North Dakota and California — that has held cigarette taxes flat since the turn of century. In that time, other states have increasingly tapped smokers to fill budget gaps and raise money for services such as health care and education. (7/2)

Tufts has more patients on the transplant list — by far — than any other New England hospital, with 122 people as of June 24. According to the United Network for Organ Sharing, that’s more than triple the number of any other hospital in the region. (Thebault, 7/5)

Although long used to assist doctors in surgery, including knee replacements, robotics aren't as prevalent in hip replacements, at least not in central Ohio. The cost of the equipment and technology might lock out some providers, and others have been wary of the emerging technology. Ohio State is the only local hospital system doing it, although OhioHealth has made it a priority to acquire the same technology — Stryker's Mako computer-navigated, robotic-arm assistance — for hips in the next year. (Kurtzman, 7/5)

At the top of a hill in Cave Spring sits the Cave Spring Center, part of the Georgia Vocational Rehabilitation Agency. The center’s mission is to help people with disabilities develop self-discipline, work ethics and job skills. ...The building is a study in how to enable, with wide doorways and halls, smooth and clearly marked flooring featuring rubberized, textured entryways to make navigating easier for blind students, message boards that also scroll the daily news and open spaces with plenty of natural light. (Wilder, 7/4)

As Gov. Matt Bevin continues what may be the greatest recoupment of executive power in Frankfort since the 1947-50 gubernatorial term of Democrat Earle Clements (who had no meaningful Republican opposition), most of the talk in the state capital is about executive orders reorganizing boards that are supposed to have varying degrees of independence. The courts will sort out those disputes, perhaps drawing new boundaries for the governor in the absence of a change in law or the state’s 1891 constitution (changes that are unlikely as long as Bevin’s fellow Republicans control the state Senate). (Al Cross, 7/1)

Rarely do the words “Medicaid” and “mystery” pop up in the same sentence, or even the same thought, but people are puzzling over whether Gov. Matt Bevin’s Medicaid revamp is an elaborate ruse that he knows the federal government will not approve. Then, goes the speculation, Bevin will do what he promised early in his dark horse Republican campaign — end the Medicaid expansion, leaving more than 400,000 low-income Kentuckians without health care — and blame Democratic President Barack Obama. (7/2)

Uninsured Louisianians lack access to medication or other preventative treatments that they badly need. The Medicaid expansion will change that for hundreds of thousands of residents. And that could alter not only their lives but, over time, the state's health measurements. One in four deaths in Louisiana is due to heart disease, according to statistics compiled by the National Conference of State Legislatures. The state also has one of the highest rates in the nation for high blood pressure. Diabetes is a major problem as well. (7/3)

Rep. Cameron Sexton, R-Crossville, and his fellow members of the “3-Star Healthy Project” task force deserve kudos for proposing a serious plan to expand health insurance coverage to some of Tennessee’s most vulnerable. Is it a perfect plan? Not at all, but then neither was Gov. Bill Haslam’s Insure Tennessee plan, nor is the Affordable Care Act’s Medicaid expansion provision. (Frank Daniels III, 7/4)

For the pro-life movement, the Supreme Court’s decision on Monday in two Texas abortion regulations was the most devastating defeat in decades. Representative Chris Smith, a New Jersey Republican who is one of the movement’s most vocal supporters, described the decision as “tragic,” irrefutable proof of “the incredibly high stakes the Supreme Court vacancy holds for the unborn child.” The sting of the defeat in this case, Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt, is hard to overstate. (Mary Ziegler, 7/2)

Let’s be charitable and say that state officials do not lie when they say what they are doing — but are just being selective for purposes of persuasion. ... That’s why the sales pitch for 2013’s abortion restrictions emphasized women’s health. The Legislature passed a law that cut the number of abortions but camouflaged it as an effort to protect women seeking abortions. (Ross Ramsey, 7/5)

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday fired a warning shot in Ohio's direction by overturning a Texas anti-abortion law. That Texas law, and Ohio's abortion laws, aren't identical. But there are enough similarities that the Ohio General Assembly has some serious thinking to do. Otherwise, taxpayers will end up paying the tab for unnecessary, costly and likely futile lawsuits. (7/1)

Having served on the Kentucky Supreme Court and the Kentucky Board of Medical Licensure, I find your editorial reveals a misunderstanding of the limitations and functions of appellate courts. The editorial characterizing as “preposterous” a unanimous Court of Appeals decision reversing Fayette Circuit Judge Ernesto Scorsone’s March decision to allow an unlicensed abortion facility in Lexington to continue operating ignores the rule of law in favor of result-oriented political correctness. (J. William Graves, 7/1)

About seven years after the Republicans promised to “Repeal and Replace” the Affordable Care Act, we have their "replacement" plan. It is not a coherent policy alternative but a mishmash of recycled ideas. It increases costs for Americans with pre-existing conditions, increases costs for the middle-class, and guts the Medicaid and Medicare program. Consider core elements of the plan. The Republican plan strips away important consumer protections and standards for health insurance. (Ezekiel J. Emanuel and Topher Spiro, 7/4)

In a moment remarkable for its symbolism, six former Food and Drug Administration commissioners last month sat together on a stage and argued that their former agency needs more autonomy from Washington bureaucracy. The solution: make the FDA independent and maybe give it a cabinet seat at the White House, too. ... Yet the panel discussion at the Aspen Ideas Festival has refocused attention on the notion that the FDA — and by extension, the American public — would be better off if the agency’s status was elevated. And the suggestion carried still more weight since the former commissioners worked for both Republican and Democratic administrations. (Ed Silverman, 7/5)

Friday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit released two opinions in Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) cases. In one case, the federal government prevailed. In the other, it did not. Both opinions were unanimous and (in my opinion) likely correct. The two cases are also further confirmation that Obamacare litigation is far from over. To the contrary, for reasons I explained here, the PPACA created a perfect storm for ongoing litigation. (Jonathan H. Adler, 7/1)

Needless patient suffering, fatal delays in medical treatment and retaliation against whistleblowers. These are among the well-publicized failures investigators found at hospitals run by the Department of Veterans Affairs. Yet they are also the shameful hallmarks of another federal health-care system: the Indian Health Service. Part of the Department of Health and Human Services, the Indian Health Service is required by treaty to deliver health care to Native Americans around the country, with more than two million depending on this federal agency. (Sen. John Barrasso and Sen. John Thune, 7/1)

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one part of the American people to affirm the political bands which connect them to the other parts, and to assume within the nation, the connected and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of their fellow citizens requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to affirm their connection. (Danielle Allen, 7/3)

The Supreme Court ensured that millions of working people would get fairer treatment when it decided last week not to consider Home Care Association of America v. Weil. That case was the last attempt by home care employers (mostly for-profit agencies) to avoid paying home care workers (mainly women of color) the minimum wage and overtime pay. By declining to hear the case, the court has confirmed that there is no legal rationale for denying basic labor protections to home care workers, who care for the elderly and disabled in the clients’ homes. The court’s action also marks the end of a long and shameful era in labor law. (7/2)

When it comes to providing care for individuals living with serious mental illnesses, we are caught in a vicious cycle. Extreme events bring about calls for change, but enthusiasm and accountability quickly wane. Initiatives begin, but rarely succeed. As a report from the National Alliance on Mental Illness noted, funding for mental illness increased after the Sandy Hook Elementary School shootings, but funding decreased in many states the following year. We can and should do better. (Andrew Sperling, 7/1)

The Zika virus may be deadly serious, but is it really a potent enough reason to explain the withdrawal of Jason Day, Rory McIlroy and many other star golfers from the Olympics in Rio de Janeiro? There's a more likely explanation: The Olympics simply are not a priority for them. Which is why golfers, along with stars from other already enriched sports, have no place in the Olympics. (David Kahn, 7/4)

The state of mental health services in Iowa, especially as it relates to jails and prisons, has been in the news recently. There is no question the current mental health system needs improvement. We want Iowans to know there are many of us working hard, collectively and independently, to make that happen. (Craig Matzke, Teresa Bomhoff and Jessica Peckover 7/3)

The HPV vaccine should be called a miracle drug. It can prevent half a dozen of the most common cancers caused by the human papillomavirus, including cervical, vaginal, anal, vulvar, throat and penile cancers. If administered before children become sexually active, preferably when a child is 11 or 12, it could prevent tens of thousands of cases of cancer decades later, averting untold suffering. (7/5)

What if there were a vaccine for young people that could help avert thousands of cancer cases, saving untold American lives? Wouldn't you expect to hear a strong recommendation from your pediatrician that your son or daughter take that shot? Of course you would. And of course, there is such a vaccine. (7/4)

The residents of West Baltimore currently spend nearly twice as much on health care as the state average. One reason for the high cost in this area is that there aren't enough local skilled nursing and rehab beds to care for these residents after they are discharged from area hospitals. (Stephen N. Davis, 7/3)

The time has come. The Pentagon and Department of Veterans Affairs must stop dragging their feet. They must own up to the serious chemical and radioactive hazards that U.S. service members were exposed to in the line of duty. It’s not as if the health damage from such exposure expires once the mission is over. As Arla Harrell can attest, a lifetime of suffering can follow an irresponsible sergeant’s or young lieutenant’s order to step forward and serve as a test dummy for a chemical munition. (7/2)

Last year my primary care doctor felt a mass in my belly. “It’s probably nothing, but I’m going to send you for a CT scan right now,” she said. I had lymphoma. Part of my workup involved a PET scan, and my thyroid lit up. Lighting up is bad in PET-scan speak, and can indicate a cancer. I was told we would have to revisit this once I was done with the lymphoma treatment. (Debora Ruth Hoffman, 7/1)