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House Speaker Mike Johnson, who shepherded President Trump's "one big, beautiful bill" through Congress, said Sunday that the Medicaid work requirements — which could affect his home state of Louisiana — have a "moral component" to them because people on Medicaid who "refuse" to work are "defrauding the system." "If you are able to work and you refuse to do so, you are defrauding the system," Johnson said Sunday on "Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan." "You're cheating the system. And no one in the country believes that that's right. So there's a moral component to what we're doing. And when you make young men work, it's good for them, it's good for their dignity, it's good for their self-worth, and it's good for the community that they live in." (Linton, 5/26)

House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) defended the House GOP’s proposed changes to the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) on Sunday, arguing that states will better administer food stamp benefits if they have to shoulder more of the costs. “The states are not properly administering this because they don’t have enough skin in the game,” Johnson told CBS’s Margaret Brennan in an interview on “Face the Nation.” (Crisp, 5/25)

Jordan Musenbrock, 35, said Medicaid helped pay for her manual wheelchair and its repairs, shower chair, catheters and multiple medications. Musenbrock, who has been wheelchair-bound since she was 17 years old following a car accident, said without Medicaid she will have to choose between a drastic decline in health, even death, or financial hardship. (Kukulka, 5/26)

�鶹Ů�� Health News’ ‘What The Health?’ Podcast: Bill With Billions In Health Program Cuts Passes House
With only a single vote to spare, the House passed a controversial budget bill that includes billions of dollars in tax cuts for the wealthy, along with billions of dollars of cuts to Medicaid, the Affordable Care Act, and the food stamp program — most of which will affect those at the lower end of the income scale. But the bill faces an uncertain future in the Senate. (Rovner, 5/23)

�鶹Ů�� Health News’ ‘On Air’: Journalists Talk Medicaid Cuts And New Limitations On Weight Loss Drugs And Covid Shots
�鶹Ů�� Health News journalists made the rounds on national and local media recently to discuss topical stories. Here’s a collection of their appearances. �鶹Ů�� Health News chief Washington correspondent Julie Rovner discussed Medicaid cuts in the House budget bill on CBS News on May 22. Céline Gounder, �鶹Ů�� Health News’ editor-at-large for public health, discussed weight loss drugs and covid-19 vaccines on CBS’ “CBS Mornings” on May 22 and May 21, respectively. (5/24)

Democrats are preparing to launch an ad war against Republicans over President Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill.” House Majority Forward, the nonprofit affiliated with House Democratic leadership and House Majority PAC, will start running digital ads next week attacking House Republicans voting to cut Medicaid spending, according to a spokesperson for the group. The ads will appear in 25 battleground districts in California, Iowa, Michigan, Missouri, New York, North Carolina, Virginia and Wisconsin. (Schneider, 5/23)

From food to pharma, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. took on all the suspects he’s long maligned in a report on health threats to kids — along with one unexpected one: Doctors. Laced throughout the report from Kennedy’s Make America Healthy Again Commission are accusations against doctors — for reportedly being influenced by the pharmaceutical industry to overprescribe certain medications and for failing to treat the root causes of disease. (Cirruzzo, 5/23)

The "Make Our Children Healthy Again" report issued yesterday by the Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) Commission—spearheaded by Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.—focuses on addressing chronic disease in kids in four areas, one of which includes the "growth of the childhood vaccine schedule." The approach indicates that officials will probe whether vaccines contribute to autism in kids, among other chronic health issues. (Wappes, 5/23)

One program distributes laptops in rural Iowa. Another helped people get back online after Hurricane Helene washed away computers and phones in western North Carolina. Programs in Oregon and rural Alabama teach older people, including some who have never touched a computer, how to navigate in an increasingly digital world. It all came crashing down this month when President Donald Trump — on his own digital platform, Truth Social — announced his intention to end the Digital Equity Act, a federal grant program meant to help bridge the digital divide. (Ortutay and Rush, 5/25)

Privacy and hunger relief groups and a handful of people receiving food assistance benefits are suing the federal government over the Trump administration’s attempts to collect the personal information of millions of U.S. residents who use the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. The lawsuit filed in Washington, D.C., on Thursday says the U.S. Department of Agriculture violated federal privacy laws when it ordered states and vendors to turn over five years of data about food assistance program applicants and enrollees, including their names, birth dates, personal addresses and social security numbers. (Boone, 5/23)

This week, Julie Eshelman has been holding her breath, waiting to see if President Donald Trump delivers on his campaign promise to make in vitro fertilization free. Eshelman is a military wife and, thanks to IVF, a mom. She first began fertility treatments in 2016, and she and her husband finally welcomed a baby girl — five years, several miscarriages and $80,000 later. “It’s been a financial burden, but it’s one that we would do over and over again so that we can have our family,” Eshelman told NBC News. (Brooks and Alcindor, 5/23)

On funding and workforce cuts —

Twenty-seven minutes into a town hall with staff last week, US National Institutes of Health Director Dr. Jay Bhattacharya acknowledged that he was going to get into uncomfortable territory. “This one’s a tough one for me,” Bhattacharya told the audience of researchers and other NIH employees gathered in an auditorium at the biomedical research agency’s headquarters in Bethesda, Maryland, last Monday, before introducing one of the most divisive topics in science. (Tirrell, 5/26)

Before the Trump administration, grant cancellations were a rarity — often reserved for cases of outright fraud or data manipulation. But, just months into the current administration, some 2,100 National Institutes of Health grants, totaling around $9.5 billion, have been terminated. For some time, there was no record of the devastation on the scientific community. (Oza, 5/27)

Becks Padrusch‘s fondest memories growing up were of trips to Boston’s Museum of Science, where the Arlington native got to touch animal organs and watch with fascination as chickens hatched in incubators. As a toddler, Padrusch, who uses they/them pronouns, insisted on bedtime stories about the solar system and how the planets formed. By age 5, Padrusch knew they wanted to be a scientist. (Serres and Parker, 5/27)

Water safety officials usually spend Memorial Day weekend warning families that more toddlers die from drowning than any other cause. This year, fewer people will know about the risk. In April, President Donald Trump laid off the team at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention responsible for tracking and publicizing drownings. That team also worked with partners like the YMCA and the American Red Cross to get at-risk children into swimming lessons. That collaboration has halted. (Gardner, 5/26)

USAID updates —

The cries of distressed children filled the ward for the severely malnourished. Among the patients was 1-year-old Maka’il Mohamed. ... The victim of complications related to malnutrition, the boy did not survive. ... The death earlier this month at Banadir Hospital captured the agony of a growing number of Somalis who are unable to feed their children — and that of health workers who are seeing hundreds of millions of dollars in U.S. support disappear under the Trump administration. The U.S. Agency for International Development once provided 65% of Somalia’s foreign aid, according to Dr. Abdiqani Sheikh Omar, the former director general of the Ministry of Health and now a government advisor. (Faruk, 5/27)

A video showing dozens of people marching toward the office of Haiti’s prime minister elicited gasps from some viewers as it circulated recently on social media. The protesters, who were HIV positive, did not conceal their faces — a rare occurrence in a country where the virus is still heavily stigmatized. ... The protesters risked being shunned by society to warn that Haiti is running out of HIV medication just months after the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump slashed more than 90% of USAID’s foreign aid contracts and $60 billion in overall aid across the globe. (Coto and Sanon, 5/24)

With all of the healthcare funding cuts currently going on in Washington, there is one health service that has survived mostly unscathed -- the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline. "As of now, federal funding for 988 is holding steady," said Hannah Wesolowski, chief advocacy officer for the National Alliance on Mental Illness in Washington. According to an HHS "passback" document -- a preliminary budget outline, which was leaked to the press -- the department is planning to hold funding for the crisis line steady at $500 million, but is considering cutting a specialized service by which LGBTQ+ youth who call the crisis line can press a button and be connected to a specially trained counselor, she explained. (Frieden, 5/23)

A day rarely goes by when Officer Jonnie Moeller-Reed's eyes don't fall on a small, framed photograph on the bookshelf in her office. It shows two smiling young men in casual, colorful shirts and shorts. Both died by suicide in the past few years. Looking at the photo of her late colleagues "is my daily reminder of what truly motivates me," says Moeller-Reed, her voice quivering ever so slightly. Moeller-Reed is a law enforcement veteran of 25 years and the wellness officer at the Marietta Police Department in suburban Atlanta. It's a new position the agency created a year ago. (Ridderbusch, 5/26)

If you need help —

Former Surgeon General Vivek Murthy accused Congress of failing “in its responsibility to protect our kids” from the harms of social media and called on lawmakers to “step up and act now” in an interview on NBC News’ “Meet the Press” that aired Sunday. Murthy, who served as surgeon general during the Obama and Biden administrations, said he would specifically like to see Congress pass legislation that would force social media apps to include warning labels about their harms to children and would allow for more data transparency from social media companies so that researchers can more accurately study the effects of the internet on kids. (Marquez, 5/25)

Former U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, in a Sunday interview, warned about the adverse effects of chronic loneliness, which could lead to a shorter lifespan. Murthy, on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” told host Kristen Welker that struggling with loneliness and isolation increases the risks of depression, anxiety and suicide, along with the risk of heart disease, stroke and dementia in older adults. “The overall mortality increase that can be related to social disconnection is comparable to the mortality impact of smoking and obesity,” he said. (Limon, 5/25)

Health insurance companies initially declined to pay more than one dollar for every $10 providers submitted in claims last year, an increase from 2023. Payers in 2024 initially denied 11.8% of dollars associated with hospital-based claims, according a report from consultant Kodiak Solutions. That compares with 11.53% of dollars denied in 2023. (Tepper, 5/23)

The clock is ticking louder for Florida Blue policyholders as the insurer and Broward Health remain at an impasse on a new agreement after three months of negotiations. If no deal is reached, Broward Health will be out of network for Florida Blue customers after June 30, when the current hospital-insurer contract ends. (Mayer, 5/26)

Regarding Medicaid tax and cuts —

State officials and a group representing New Hampshire’s hospitals say they’ve settled a lawsuit over the state’s Medicaid Enhancement Tax – ending a year-long dispute that had threatened a key source of funding for the safety-net insurance program. (Cuno-Booth, 5/23)

Proposed cuts to Medicaid could dampen the growth Uber Health and Lyft Healthcare have seen by aligning with the federal assistance program. A bill that would cut Medicaid and other programs by more than $1 trillion passed the House Thursday and moves to the Senate, where it faces a tough road to passage in its current form. The measure could reduce Medicaid enrollment by 7.6 million people, according to an estimate from the Congressional Budget Office. (Perna, 5/23)

Mickey Mouse wishes he had the profit margins of some hospitals. AdventHealth is currently more profitable than the average company within the S&P 500. The tax-exempt, religious system, which runs 53 hospitals across nine states, generated a 17% operating margin and 23% net margin, inclusive of investments, in the first three months of 2025. Its net margin was larger than that of Amazon, ExxonMobil, and, yes, Walt Disney. (Herman, 5/27)

In pharma and tech news —

More than 2% of Americans are taking the blockbuster class of GLP-1 drugs for overweight or obesity, up nearly 600% over six years, according to a report from FAIR Health given to Axios first. The data from FAIR Health's repository of over 51 billion commercial healthcare claim records shows the explosion in use of the drugs specifically for weight loss — roughly half of all users. (Reed, 5/27)

Despite ongoing efforts to improve patient safety, it’s estimated that at least 1 in 20 patients still experience medical mistakes in the health care system. One of the most common categories of mistakes is medication errors, where for one reason or another, a patient is given either the wrong dose of a drug or the wrong drug altogether. In the U.S., these errors injure approximately 1.3 million people a year and result in one death each day, according to the World Health Organization. (Cox, 5/25)

Excess deaths in the United States kept rising even after the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, with more than 1.5 million in 2022 and 2023 that would have been prevented had US death rates matched those of peer countries, estimates a Boston University (BU)-led study today in JAMA Health Forum. The data show a continuation of a decades-old trend toward increasing US excess deaths, mainly among working-age adults, largely driven by drug overdoses, gun violence, auto accidents, and preventable cardiometabolic causes, the researchers say. (Van Beusekom, 5/23)

For the ailing gene editing industry, hope came earlier this month in the tiny, smiling, fuzzy-headed form of KJ Muldoon. At just 6 months old, KJ received a gene editing treatment custom-built to correct his unique mutation. He’s not cured, researchers explained at the annual American Society of Gene & Cell Therapy meeting in New Orleans. But he has been able to resume a normal diet and is no longer on the path to a liver transplant. (Mast, 5/26)

�鶹Ů�� Health News: A Ministroke Can Have Major Consequences
Kristin Kramer woke up early on a Tuesday morning 10 years ago because one of her dogs needed to go out. Then, a couple of odd things happened. When she tried to call her other dog, “I couldn’t speak,” she said. As she walked downstairs to let them into the yard, “I noticed that my right hand wasn’t working.” But she went back to bed, “which was totally stupid,” said Kramer, now 54, an office manager in Muncie, Indiana. “It didn’t register that something major was happening,” especially because, reawakening an hour later, “I was perfectly fine.” (Span, 5/27)

The new world of contact lenses has arrived: ones that allow individuals to see in the dark with their eyes closed. In the journal Cell, neuroscientists explained how they created contact lenses that make the breakthrough possible by converting infrared light to visible light. Per the research, there is no power source necessary, and the wearers can see both visible and infrared light simultaneously, with the latter increasing when one’s eyes are closed. (Djordjevic, 5/24)

A study published yesterday in Eurosurveillance highlights the substantial costs associated with respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) infections in children ages 5 and under. ... Costs were assessed from an outpatient healthcare sector and societal perspective, with the results stratified by country and the age-group of children diagnosed as having RSV. (Dall, 5/23)

For people with chronic gynecological pain conditions, pain can be constant, making everyday activities like sitting, riding a bicycle and even wearing underwear extremely uncomfortable. For many of these people — most of whom identify as women — sexual intercourse and routine pelvic exams are unbearable. (Hintz and Berke, 5/26)

Also —

Even the hospital walls may soon have ears. A fast-growing technology known as ambient listening is taking over an onerous but necessary task in healthcare: documenting what happens in the doctor-patient encounter. Already gaining traction for outpatient medical visits, the AI-powered systems are also moving into hospital rooms and emergency departments to capture discussions at the bedside, update medical records, draft care plans and create discharge instructions. (Landro, 5/27)

Food apps that rate the healthfulness of packaged foods have become increasingly popular. You can scan a food package with your phone camera and the app will rank it for its nutritional content. Some apps will flag ingredients and additives. If the product you scan gets a poor rating, many apps will suggest an alternative in the same food category. But do they really help consumers make healthier choices? (Godoy, 5/26)

It’s easy to feel as though you’re doing something wrong these days if you don’t know your VO2-Max and how many hours of REM sleep you get each night, or if you’re not taking a dozen different supplements and scrutinizing every morsel of food that makes its way into your mouth. “Biohackers” and other longevity seekers — with their many podcasts, YouTube channels, and X accounts — would have you believe that if you diligently measure your every bodily function and meticulously tailor your nutrition and exercise regimens, you can reprogram your body to live longer and evade dreaded diseases, just as a computer can be programmed to perform virtually any desired task. (Alex Harding, 5/27)

Texas Republicans are rolling ahead with a controversial bill that seeks to further restrict abortion access in the state, while making it impossible for it to be challenged in state courts, despite Democratic objections. Senate Bill 2880 advanced through the state Senate and is now heading for a House vote, after being moved Friday out of the Committee on State Affairs, with its chair facing growing pressure ahead of a deadline that had been slated for Saturday. (O’Connell-Domenech, 5/25)

The Texas Senate gave preliminary approval Monday to a bill that would prevent cities or counties from holding a gun buyback program. The proposal also seeks to stop local governments from sponsoring or organizing such a program. State Sen. Bob Hall, R-Edgewood, told lawmakers Monday it was a “necessary guardrail against misuse of local authority.” (Carver, 5/26)

Reproductive health in Iowa, Minnesota, and New Hampshire —

Four of the six Planned Parenthood clinics in Iowa and four in Minnesota will shut down in a year, the Midwestern affiliate operating them said Friday, blaming a freeze in federal funds, budget cuts proposed in Congress and state restrictions on abortion. The clinics closing in Iowa include the only Planned Parenthood facility in the state that provides abortion procedures, in Ames, home to Iowa State University. Services will be shifted and the organization will still offer medication abortions in Des Moines and medication and medical abortion services in Iowa City. (Hanna, 5/24)

In recent years, New Hampshire has seen a rise in so-called "unplanned location births." That means dozens have given birth unexpectedly at home, in a car or en route to a hospital, according to state data. That’s also meant that emergency responders are playing a growing role in labor and delivery, by guiding new parents through giving birth outside of a hospital setting. (Liu and Furukawa, 5/23)

In Colorado and Montana —

Surrounded by smiling supporters and curious fourth graders, Gov. Jared Polis on Friday signed a bill into law that will require universal dyslexia screenings in Colorado schools starting in the 2027-28 school year. (Schimke, 5/26)

The 100 or so children in Colorado who rely on backpacks of liquid nutrition to survive got a lifeline from lawmakers this spring. Legislation passed in the final days of the session will raise the reimbursement rates for pharmacies that make the unique-to-each-person mix of calories, vitamins, minerals, fats and sugars that keep them alive. The measure is a relief to parents who’ve grown increasingly nervous in the past year as all but one pharmacy left the state or stopped offering the bags of nutrition, citing low reimbursements from Medicaid. (Brown, 5/26)

�鶹Ů�� Health News: Federal Cuts Ripple Through A Bioscience Hub In Rural Montana
Scientists are often careful to take off their work badges when they leave the campus of one of the nation’s top research facilities, here in southwestern Montana’s Bitterroot Valley. It’s a reflection of the long-standing tension caused by Rocky Mountain Laboratories’ improbable location in this conservative, blue-collar town of 5,000 that was built on logging. (Houghton, 5/27)

In Kansas, West Virginia, Georgia, and North Carolina —

After six teachers at one Liberty elementary school were diagnosed with breast cancer in the past five years, advocates desperate for answers are making a plea for more information. They want to know if former students or past teachers at Warren Hills Elementary have been diagnosed with cancer or other illnesses since leaving the school, which has a 120 foot cell phone tower located 130 feet from the building. The goal, advocates say, is to understand the scope of what they may be dealing with and ultimately see what, if anything, is making people sick. (Bauer, 5/26)

Two groups filed a lawsuit Friday over an executive order by West Virginia Republican Gov. Patrick Morrisey granting religious exemptions from required school vaccinations. The American Civil Liberties Union’s West Virginia chapter and Mountain State Justice filed the lawsuit against the state Department of Health, its Bureau for Public Health and agency leaders on behalf of two parents in Kanawha County Circuit Court. (Raby, 5/23)

CARE USA, the humanitarian organization headquartered in Atlanta, says it has laid off hundreds of employees across the nation and thousands abroad in the wake of the Trump administration’s massive cuts to federal foreign aid. Founded at the end of World War II, the nonprofit has also temporarily slashed wages for its employees, including CEO Michelle Nunn, said Ritu Sharma, CARE’s vice president of U.S. programs and policy advocacy. (Redmon, 5/25)

A new report by Disability Rights North Carolina found that a legal tool used to hold patients against their will for psychiatric treatment is frequently misused — violating patients’ rights and causing them long-term harm. (Knopf, 5/27)

Warmer weather is finally here in the Northern Hemisphere, and with it, many pools and beaches are opening for the summer. That’s great for families who want to spend time by the water, but it’s also a good time to be reminded about the importance of water safety. (Hetter, 5/24)

The supermarket chain Publix has recalled fruit and vegetable baby food sold in eight states because product testing found elevated levels of lead, according to federal health officials. ... The pouches were produced by Bowman Andros, a French company with a manufacturing plant in Mount Jackson, Virginia, according to the company’s website. Publix issued the voluntary recall on May 9, but it wasn’t added to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration recall list until late Thursday. (Aleccia, 5/23)

More than 1 in 10 veterans ages 65 to 84 used cannabis in the previous month, a new analysis of Veterans Health Administration (VHA) data published in JAMA Network Open suggests. To learn more about cannabis use in older adults, researchers turned to the Veterans Affairs Cannabis and Aging Study, which follows a national cohort of veterans and their cannabis use. The respondents’ mean age was 73.3, and 85.4 percent of them were men. (Blakemore, 5/24)

People with darker skin still need to wear sunscreen — for more reasons than one. Too much ultraviolet exposure from the sun can lead to sunburn, dark spots and wrinkles, and increased risk of skin cancer. The melanin in darker skin offers some extra protection from the sun, but dermatologists say that isn’t enough on its own. (Ramakrishnan, 5/24)

Outbreak updates —

Measles cases have reached 1,046 as the virus continues spreading across the United States, according to data updated Friday from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Cases have been confirmed in 30 states including Alaska, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Tennessee, Texas, Vermont, Virginia and Washington. (Kekatos and Tachi Udoh, 5/23)

Colton George felt sick. The 9-year-old Indiana boy told his parents his stomach hurt. He kept running to the bathroom and felt too ill to finish a basketball game. Days later, he lay in a hospital bed, fighting for his life. He had eaten tainted salad, according to a lawsuit against the lettuce grower filed by his parents on April 17 in federal court for the Southern District of Indiana. The E. coli bacteria that ravaged Colton’s kidneys was a genetic match to the strain that killed one person and sickened nearly 90 people in 15 states last fall. (Armour, 5/26)

Cases of the new COVID-19 variant NB.1.8.1, linked to a large surge in China, have been detected in multiple locations across the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. "CDC is aware of reported cases of COVID-19 NB.1.8.1 in China and is in regular contact with international partners," a CDC spokesperson said in a statement last week. The spokesperson said that, so far, too few U.S. sequences have been reported of NB.1.8.1 to be included in the agency's variant estimates dashboard. (Moniuszko, 5/26)

More than five years after the first cases of COVID-19 were detected in the United States, hundreds of people are still dying every week. Last month, an average of about 350 people died each week from COVID, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).While high, the number of deaths is decreasing and is lower than the peak of 25,974 deaths recorded the week ending Jan. 9, 2021, as well as weekly deaths seen in previous spring months, CDC data shows. (Kekatos, 5/24)

The United States is currently in the grips of a massive physician shortage estimated to be over 60,000. As the workforce ages, the Association of American Medical Colleges estimates the physician shortage will increase to over 86,000 physicians by 2036. Connecticut is not immune with almost 20% of residents already living in designated Health Professional Shortage Areas (HPSAs) with fewer than one primary care physician per 3,500 residents. (Dr. Anthony Yoder and Ryan Englander, 5/27)

As a dentist trained in India and a global health researcher based in the United States, I have observed the fluoride debate from a broader, global lens. In many parts of the world, fluoride is not controversial — it is simply unavailable. Millions suffer from preventable tooth decay because they lack access to fluoride, and therefore the protection it provides against oral disease. (Mannat Tiwana, 5/24)

In an era when speed, efficiency and turnover have come to dominate the hospital psyche — just watch an episode of “The Pitt” — what role is left for human connection in our clinical toolbox? More than you might imagine. (Panagis Galiatsatos, 5/26)

On the long list of ways that leading thinkers warn AI could end humanity is one that feels very comic-book villain: helping a rogue actor use modern biology tools to synthesize a lethal pathogen that would “cause more than a billion deaths in a matter of months.” While I am deeply concerned about the long-term existential threat of AI and synthetic biology to create new or modified pathogens, my extensive experience detecting and controlling outbreaks around the world makes me fear a more immediate threat: a rogue actor using existing AI tools to simulate a bioterrorism attack that would destabilize a region or the world. (Jay K. Varma, 5/27)