Immunization programs nationwide have been left brittle by years of stagnant funding by federal, state and local governments. In Texas and elsewhere, this helped set the stage for the measles outbreak and fueled its spread. Now cuts to federal funding threaten efforts to prevent more cases and outbreaks.
While much of the country is focused on the spiraling measles outbreak concentrated in the small, dusty towns of West Texas, cases of pertussis have skyrocketed by more than 1,500% nationwide since hitting a recent low in 2021 amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Deaths tied to the disease are also up, hitting 10 last year, compared with about two to four in previous years. Cases are on track to exceed that total this year.
DaVita says it was hit by a ransomware attack that encrypted certain elements of its network, and some of its operations remained disrupted despite interim measures. While the dialysis service provider continued to provide patient care as it took measures to restore certain functions, it could not 'estimate the duration or extent of the disruption at this time', DaVita said in a regulatory filing.
Dozens of state attorneys general are urging Congress to pass a law prohibiting PBMs from simultaneously owning pharmacies, arguing such a move would boost competition and create more affordable prescription drug prices for Americans. Their concern is these arrangements create conflicts of interest that allow PBMs to dominate the design of health plans for tens of millions of Americans, and also distort the distribution and pricing for prescription medicines.
In the U.S., thousands of donated organs never reach the patients who need them. CBS News found that last year, one in three kidneys recovered from deceased donors were never transplanted. Specialized organ recovery teams made more than 26 million attempts to place these kidneys with transplant centers, offering them again and again in search of a suitable match--before they were ultimately discarded as medical waste. And it's not just kidneys. Nearly 12,000 potentially life-saving organs were discarded last year in the United States.
Around 250 doctors at Hennepin County Medical Center have been certified as the first unionized resident and fellow physicians in Minnesota, according to union officials. The physicians are represented by the Committee of Interns and Residents, a local of the Service Employees International Union, who said the Minnesota Bureau of Mediation Services made the certification on April 3.