About health insurance
Biden reverses Trump order barring immigrants who cannot afford healthcare: “President Biden on Friday revoked a 2019 proclamation signed by then-President Trump that prevented immigrants from obtaining visas unless they proved they could obtain health insurance or pay for health care.”
Pandemic accelerates employer voluntary benefit offerings, Willis Towers Watson survey finds: From a Willis Towers Watson survey: “The Emerging Trends in Health Care Survey found that employer interest in offering voluntary benefits has been burgeoning, with 94% of employers finding voluntary benefits to be important to their employee value proposition and Total Rewards strategy three years from now, compared with just 36% of employers deeming them to be important in 2018.”
Growth was seen in critical illness, identity theft and pet insurance benefits.
House bill mandates Medicare Advantage [MA] plans adopt electronic prior authorization: “New legislation in Congress would require Medicare Advantage plans to create an electronic prior authorization process, targeting a major source of administrative burden for providers.
The House legislation, introduced Thursday, would also create a process for payers to quickly clear items and services that are routinely approved and improve transparency on the extent of prior authorization used by MA payers.”
About healthcare IT
Cancer Treatment Centers of America Announces 105,000-Record Data Breach: “Cancer Treatment Centers of America is alerting 104,808 patients of its Midwestern Regional Medical Center that some of their protected health information was contained in an email account that was accessed by an unauthorized individual.”
Telehealth Firms Continue To Report Revenue Growth, Net Losses In Q1: “Telehealth companies continued to see revenue gains in 2021’s first quarter as they prepare their business for a world not dominated by the COVID-19 crisis.
Amwell posted $57.6 million in revenue for the quarter, up 7.2% from the year-ago period, while Teladoc Health, a market leader in the telehealth space, continued to see sizeable growth with $453.7 million in quarterly revenue, up 150.9% year-over-year. SOC Telemed, which focuses on the acute-care sector, posted $14.8 million, up 0.1%.
The three companies, all of which reported net losses, are working to differentiate themselves in a crowded market—in part by convincing investors they can be a single vendor for all or many of their customers’ virtual care needs.”
And in a related article: Modernizing Medicare Coverage Pathways For Prescription Digital Therapeutics: A really good discussion of Medicare coverage for telehealth services
About Covid-19
U.S. administers 273.5 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines: CDC: “The United States has administered 273,545,207 doses of COVID-19 vaccines in the country as of Sunday morning and distributed 344,503,495 doses, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said.
Those figures are up from the 270,832,342 vaccine doses the CDC said had gone into arms by Saturday out of 344,503,395 doses delivered.
Scientists tracking coronavirus variants struggle with global blind spots: The article highlights the need for world-wide monitoring of variants. Ten (rich) of 152 countries for which data is available account for 82% of the reported sequences.
National Nurses United 'outraged' over CDC's rolled-back mask guidance: “National Nurses United, the country's largest nurses union, is condemning the CDC's decision to roll back indoor mask guidance for fully vaccinated people.
The agency's new guidance, announced May 13, says fully vaccinated Americans no longer need to wear masks or follow social distancing guidelines in most indoor settings.
‘This newest CDC guidance is not based on science, does not protect public health, and threatens the lives of patients, nurses, and other frontline workers across the country,’ Bonnie Castillo, RN, executive director of the union, said in a May 14 statement. ‘Now is not the time to relax protective measures, and we are outraged that the CDC has done just that while we are still in the midst of the deadliest pandemic in a century.’”
723 Epidemiologists on When and How the U.S. Can Fully Return to Normal: From a survey by The NY Times. Take a look at the graphics for the “bottom lines” on the opinions.
Johns Hopkins launches pandemic data initiative: “Johns Hopkins University launched a pandemic data initiative to address the lack of a consistent real-time health data infrastructure, the Baltimore-based university announced May 17.
Throughout the pandemic, the university's Coronavirus Resource Center has served as a resource for healthcare professionals and public health officials to better understand how COVID-19 is affecting communities, as it tracks positivity rates, new cases and other trends.
However, the resource center's researchers, as well as data scientists worldwide, have struggled to effectively and accurately compile COVID-19 data, as it is often inconsistent, incomplete and lagging. Johns Hopkins' new data initiative will establish a standardized system to collect, confirm, report and share data in near-real time so that countries can be better equipped to deploy rapid, unified responses to the next public health crisis.
The university said it hopes the new data infrastructure will allow rapid communication between researchers so federal, state and local governments can make data-informed decisions.”
About the public’s health
Biden hopes to dig up the nation’s lead water pipes. This city wants his help.: “The Biden administration wants to spend $45 billion via grants and low-interest loans to replace more than 6 million lead-pipe service lines across the country. The measure is one of the most popular parts of his $2.3 trillion infrastructure proposal — a CBS News poll showed 85 percent approval — and may help overcome Republican lawmakers’ resistance to the package.”
U.S. Supreme Court takes up major challenge to abortion rights: “The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday agreed to consider gutting the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling that legalized abortion nationwide, taking up Mississippi's bid to revive a Republican-backed state law that bans the procedure after 15 weeks of pregnancy.
By hearing the case in their next term, which starts in October and ends in June 2022, the justices will look at whether to overturn a central part of the landmark ruling, a longstanding goal of religious conservatives.
The eventual ruling by the conservative-majority court, expected next year, could allow states to ban abortions before a fetus is viable outside the womb, upending decades of legal precedent. Lower courts ruled against Mississippi's law.”
About medical devices
Large Medicare study finds no increased death risk with paclitaxel-coated balloons, stents: “Remember the FDA’s cautions on paclitaxel-laden devices? Think again: An audit of nearly four years of Medicare data spanning more than 168,000 beneficiaries found no evidence of additional harm with balloons and stents coated with the chemotherapy drug compared to bare ones.”
About pharma
GoodRx to acquire discount drug company for $50M: “Pharmacy discount company GoodRx is acquiring its competitor RxSaver for $50 million…”
6 drugmakers in violation of 340B statute, HRSA says: “Six drugmakers are in violation of the 340B statute and must immediately begin offering their drugs at discounted prices to hospitals participating in the federal drug-pricing program, Diana Espinosa, acting administrator of the Health Resources and Service Administration, said.
Ms. Espinosa sent letters to six drugmakers May 17 stating that HRSA determined their policies that place restrictions on the 340B drug pricing program for hospitals that dispense drugs through contract pharmacies have resulted in overcharges and are in direct violation of the 340B statute…
The letters were sent to AstraZeneca, Eli Lilly, Novartis, Novo Nordisk, Sanofi and United Therapeutics.”
Health care and prescription drug costs top voter concerns in new poll: “In the Morning Consult-Politico poll, 88 percent of Americans said that Congress should make lowering health care costs a priority, including 59 percent who said it should be a top legislative priority. Eighty-five percent said lawmakers should prioritize passing a bill to bring down prescription drug costs, with 50 percent saying it should be a top priority.
Reducing health care and prescription drug costs, moves that enjoy support across party lines, outrank all other issues surveyed, including stimulating the economy during the coronavirus pandemic, at 84 percent; reforming immigration policy, at 71 percent; regulating tech companies, at 57 percent; and legalizing marijuana, at 43 percent.”
About healthcare quality
An Evolving Hospital Quality Star Rating System From CMS: A very thoughtful explanation and critique of CMS’ Star Rating System. Read the entire article.