About Covid-19
CDC expected to update mask guidance as early as next week: “The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to loosen its indoor masking guidelines to states soon, according to several people familiar with the matter. The agency’s update could come as early as next week.
Dr. Rochelle Walensky, the director of the CDC, is expected to discuss masking guidance [next] Wednesday at a White House Covid-19 Response Team briefing.”
Texas Republicans sue Biden administration over airline mask mandates: “Attorney General Ken Paxton (R), U.S. Rep. Beth Van Duyne (R-Tex.) and their allies argue that the mandates were unlawfully issued because they weren’t approved by Congress. They also say the CDC didn’t place the mask order up for notice and comment, which Paxton and others say is ordinarily required for such regulations.”
Ex-NIH chief Collins returns as science adviser to Biden weeks into retirement: “That was quick. Francis Collins, M.D., Ph.D., after exiting the top perch at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in the last weeks of 2021, is back in the upper echelons of U.S. scientific leadership as President Joe Biden's science adviser.
Collins also assumes the role of co-chair of Biden's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology…
Alongside Collins' appointment, Biden promoted Alondra Nelson, Ph.D., to director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, or OSTP. Nelson was previously deputy director for science and society at the OSTP. Nelson was also president of the Social Science Research Council from 2017 to 2021.
Nelson and Collins are filling a vacancy left by Eric Lander, who resigned from his post last week after a White House investigation found evidence that he violated workplace conduct rules by demeaning his staff.”
About health insurance
State to merge health insurance markets in bid to help small businesses: A new approach to ACA exchanges: “The state will merge the Affordable Care Act insurance markets for individuals and small groups to create more stable pricing for health coverage, particularly needed among the declining group market used by small businesses.
Maine will be first in the nation to combine the two markets into a subsidized reinsurance program, officials said. The merger was authorized by the Made for Maine Health Coverage Act, signed into law by Gov. Janet Mills in 2020.”
BCBS of Louisiana to face antitrust suit over rates: “The initial lawsuit, which seeks class action status, was brought by Opelousas General Hospital Authority in 2016. In it, the hospital authority alleges Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Louisiana violated antitrust laws by leveraging discounted rate reimbursements created by its BlueCard Program.
The program allows Blue Cross Blue Shield members to receive care from facilities in other states at a discounted rate, according to the lawsuit. When a patient visits a facility outside of its plan's network but in-network with another Blue Cross Blue Shield affiliate, they pay a rate equivalent to those negotiated with in-network providers in their state's plan.”
UnitedHealth Wants High Court Review Of Medicare Rule: “UnitedHealth Group is asking the U. S. Supreme Court to review a Medicare Advantage overpayment rule that has multibillion-dollar implications for insurer reimbursement and False Claims Act enforcement, calling a D. C. Circuit opinion against it ‘egregiously wrong.’ In its Monday petition to the high court, UnitedHealth said the justices should take up its challenge to an August D. C. Circuit reversal of a lower court decision that vacated the rule. The clawback rule at issue requires Medicare Advantage insurers to return excess payments within 60 days.”
Biden administration to reverse the Trump-era 'public charge' rule that denied green cards to poor immigrants: “The Biden administration is throwing out the Trump administration's "public charge" rule, which denied permanent residency to immigrants who used public assistance programs or were suspected of using them in the future.
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas on Thursday said in a statement the 2019 rule’was not consistent with our nation's values.’”
About hospitals and healthcare systems
New Data Finds 69% of Americans Would Consider Switching Healthcare Providers for More “Appealing” Services – Same Day Appointments Top the List: “Some Americans might say they are pleased with their current healthcare provider, but a new Tegria survey conducted by The Harris Poll reveals that nearly 7 in 10 Americans (69%) would consider switching to another provider that offers more appealing services. Top drivers that could inspire people to switch include the availability of same-day appointments for non-routine issues (35%), convenient locations where they already go (30%) and self-scheduling (29%). In fact, more than 4 in 5 Americans (81%) believe the ability to schedule healthcare appointments online would make the scheduling process much easier and more than three quarters (79%) want the ability to use technology when managing their healthcare experience.”
Baylor Scott & White's operating income dips 13% as expenses climb: “Dallas-based Baylor Scott & White saw its operating income fall more than 13 percent in the six months ending Dec. 31, largely driven by an increase in expenses, according to recently released financial results.
For the first half of fiscal year 2022, Baylor Scott & White recorded an operating income of $644 million, down from the $742 million recorded in the same period one year before. The health system's operating margin was 10.2 percent for the first half of fiscal 2022. In the same period in fiscal 2022 the operating margin was 12.8 percent…
The health system also saw its expenses rise in the first half of fiscal 2022 to $5.7 billion, up 12.6 percent from the same period in fiscal 2021. The health system attributed the expense jump to rising costs for employee wages and supplies.”
About pharma
Judge sides with AstraZeneca in 340B dispute: “A federal judge ruled Feb. 16 that HHS violated procedural rules by compelling AstraZeneca to resume drug discounts for hospitals participating in the 340B program… In May 2021, HHS notified six drugmakers, including AstraZeneca, that they were in violation of 340B requirements by restricting discounts for hospitals that use contract pharmacies. In the warning letter, HHS said the drugmakers must immediately begin offering their drugs at discounted prices or potentially face civil monetary penalties.”
Generic drug approvals continued to fall in 2021: “The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved or tentatively approved 776 Abbreviated New Drug Applications (ANDAs) for generic drugs in 2021, continuing a steady decline in generic approvals in recent years.
In calendar year 2020, FDA approved or tentatively approved 948 ANDAs for generic drugs, which was down from 1,014 in 2019. The latest figures are part of the FDA’s Office of Generic Drugs (OGD) 2021 Annual Report.”
Statin intolerance is 'over-estimated and over-diagnosed': World’s largest study shows less than 10% suffer side-effects caused by the drug: “As many as one in two patients stop taking statins, reduce the dose or take them irregularly because they believe the cholesterol-lowering drugs cause muscle pain and other side-effects. Now, a new study of over four million patients has shown that the true prevalence of statin intolerance worldwide is between six to ten percent.
The authors of the research, published in the European Heart Journal, say that their findings show that statin intolerance is over-estimated and over-diagnosed, with the result that patients are at greater risk of heart and blood vessel problems, including death, caused by high cholesterol levels.”
Teva takes 'skinny' label dispute with GlaxoSmithKline to the Supreme Court: reports: “The case comes down to ‘skinny’ labeling, a popular type of carve-out in the world of copycat drugmakers. For decades, generic drugmakers have been able to get their copycats approved for one or several–but not necessarily all–approved indications of their brand-name counterparts. If a generic doesn’t cover all the indications of its reference product, then its label is ‘skinny.’
Branded companies, for their part, argue that pharmacists sometimes ignore the skinny labels, leading to infringement when patients take generics for unapproved indications.”
About the public’s health
Recommended Adult Immunization Schedule, United States, 2022: FYI
About healthcare IT
Top 15 specialties for telehealth: “Telehealth adoption rates are highest for specialties that manage chronic illness, according to the "State of Telemedicine" report released Feb. 16 by health IT and telehealth networking platform Doximity.”
At the top is endocrinology.