The Host
Julie Rovner
KFF Health News
Julie Rovner is chief Washington correspondent and host of KFF Health News’ weekly well being coverage information podcast, “What the Health?” A famous professional on well being coverage points, Julie is the writer of the critically praised reference guide “Health Care Politics and Policy A to Z,” now in its third version.
Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is already performing on his anti-vaccine views, ordering an finish of analysis into why individuals develop into vaccine-hesitant and requesting new analysis on the long-debunked idea that vaccines may cause autism in youngsters. Coincidentally, the Trump administration on the final minute pulled the nomination of former GOP congressman and vaccine skeptic Dave Weldon to go the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, maybe signaling that Republicans within the Senate are rising uncomfortable with the problem.
Meanwhile, Congress continues to ponder how one can reduce as a lot as $880 billion in spending — presumably from Medicaid — at a time when extra beneficiaries of the federal government well being program for these with low incomes and disabilities have develop into Republican voters.
This week’s panelists are Julie Rovner of KFF Health News, Anna Edney of Bloomberg News, Shefali Luthra of The nineteenth, and Alice Miranda Ollstein of Politico.
Panelists
Anna Edney
Bloomberg
Shefali Luthra
The nineteenth
Alice Miranda Ollstein
Politico
Among the takeaways from this week’s episode:
The Trump administration’s last-minute choice to tug the nomination of Dave Weldon to go the CDC — shortly earlier than his affirmation listening to earlier than the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee was set to start Thursday morning — has fueled hypothesis that Weldon’s anti-vaccine views meant he didn’t have sufficient Senate assist to win affirmation. Weldon, a doctor and former Florida congressman, has superior debunked theories about vaccines and autism.
Senate Democrats threatened to vote in opposition to a unbroken decision, or CR, to fund the federal government via Sept. 30. The measure handed narrowly within the House, with only one Democrat, Jared Golden of Maine, voting for it. Senate Democrats oppose the stopgap spending invoice on many fronts, together with its proposed cuts to medical analysis and its lack of a “fix” to forestall cost cuts to medical doctors who settle for Medicare sufferers. The Democrats suggest a 30-day authorities funding invoice to permit negotiations on a bipartisan measure. The House adjourned after passing the CR on Tuesday and isn’t scheduled to return to Washington till March 24.
The Medicaid program could also be garnering extra assist as Republicans proceed to debate how one can reduce federal spending to finance a significant tax reduce package deal. The affect of Medicaid funding cuts on rural hospitals and on the Medicaid growth inhabitants that gained protection as a part of the Affordable Care Act are two areas of debate as House Republicans deliberate.
Continued staffing reductions at federal companies are stoking considerations about decrease ranges of service to constituents and worsening psychological well being within the federal workforce. If federal employees are dismissed for poor efficiency — a cost many federal staff have known as false as a result of they obtained optimistic job efficiency evaluations — then they don’t obtain severance and can’t acquire unemployment. With 8 in 10 federal employees employed outdoors the Washington, D.C., space, the sweeping impacts of reductions within the federal workforce are being felt far past the Beltway.
The Trump administration’s choice to cancel $250 million in National Institutes of Health grants to Columbia University is the most recent in an ongoing marketing campaign to chop federal analysis funding. The uncertainty in federal funding has brought about a number of colleges to freeze hiring and rescind some graduate pupil admissions, elevating considerations that the Trump administration’s insurance policies are disrupting scientific analysis. Recent strikes from HHS to permit new guidelines and rules with out public remark and new restrictions from the National Cancer Institute on what matters require evaluate earlier than publication (vaccines, fluoride, and autism are actually on the checklist) are elevating considerations that politics is enjoying a bigger position in federal well being coverage.
Also this week, Rovner interviews Jeff Grant, who not too long ago retired from CMS after 41 years in authorities service.
Plus, for “extra credit,” the panelists recommend well being coverage tales they learn this week they assume you must learn, too:
Julie Rovner: NBC News’ “‘You Lose All Hope’: Federal Workers Gripped by Mental Health Distress Amid Trump Cuts,” by Natasha Korecki.
Shefali Luthra: The New York Times’ “15 Lessons Scientists Learned About Us When the World Stood Still,” by Claire Cain Miller and Irineo Cabreros.
Alice Miranda Ollstein: The Atlantic’s “His Daughter Was America’s First Measles Death in a Decade,” by Tom Bartlett.
Anna Edney: Bloomberg News’ “India Trade Group Blasts Study Linking Drugs to Safety Risks,” by Satviki Sanjay.
Also talked about on this week’s podcast:
Credits
Francis Ying
Audio producer
Mary Agnes Carey
Editor
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