The Cutting Continues – KFF Health News

The Host

Julie Rovner
KFF Well being Information

@jrovner

Learn Julie’s tales.

Julie Rovner is chief Washington correspondent and host of KFF Well being Information’ weekly well being coverage information podcast, “What the Well being?” A famous professional on well being coverage points, Julie is the creator of the critically praised reference ebook “Well being Care Politics and Coverage A to Z,” now in its third version.

Well being and Human Providers Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is already performing on his anti-vaccine views, ordering an finish of analysis into why individuals grow to be vaccine-hesitant and requesting new analysis on the long-debunked idea that vaccines may cause autism in kids. Coincidentally, the Trump administration on the final minute pulled the nomination of former GOP congressman and vaccine skeptic Dave Weldon to go the Facilities for Illness Management and Prevention, maybe signaling that Republicans within the Senate are rising uncomfortable with the difficulty.

In the meantime, Congress continues to ponder how one can minimize 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 grow to be Republican voters.

 This week’s panelists are Julie Rovner of KFF Well being Information, Anna Edney of Bloomberg Information, Shefali Luthra of The nineteenth, and Alice Miranda Ollstein of Politico.

Panelists

Anna Edney
Bloomberg

@annaedney

Learn Anna’s tales.

Shefali Luthra
The nineteenth

@shefalil

Learn Shefali’s tales.

Alice Miranda Ollstein
Politico

@AliceOllstein

Learn Alice’s tales.

Among the many takeaways from this week’s episode:

• The Trump administration’s last-minute resolution to drag the nomination of Dave Weldon to go the CDC — shortly earlier than his affirmation listening to earlier than the Senate Well being, Training, 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 towards a unbroken decision, or CR, to fund the federal government via Sept. 30. The measure handed narrowly within the Home, 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 “repair” to stop fee cuts to docs who settle for Medicare sufferers. The Democrats suggest a 30-day authorities funding invoice to permit negotiations on a bipartisan measure. The Home 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 minimize federal spending to finance a serious tax minimize package deal. The affect of Medicaid funding cuts on rural hospitals and on the Medicaid enlargement inhabitants that gained protection as a part of the Inexpensive Care Act are two areas of dialogue as Home Republicans deliberate.
• Continued staffing reductions at federal companies are stoking issues 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 acquired optimistic job efficiency evaluations — then they don’t obtain severance and can’t gather 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 resolution to cancel $250 million in Nationwide Institutes of Well being grants to Columbia College 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 scholar admissions, elevating issues that the Trump administration’s insurance policies are disrupting scientific analysis. Latest strikes from HHS to permit new guidelines and laws with out public remark and new restrictions from the Nationwide Most cancers Institute on what matters require assessment earlier than publication (vaccines, fluoride, and autism at the moment are on the checklist) are elevating issues that politics is enjoying a bigger position in federal well being coverage.

Additionally this week, Rovner interviews Jeff Grant, who lately retired from CMS after 41 years in authorities service.

Plus, for “additional credit score,” the panelists counsel well being coverage tales they learn this week they suppose it is best to learn, too:

Julie Rovner: NBC Information’ “‘You Lose All Hope’: Federal Staff Gripped by Psychological Well being Misery Amid Trump Cuts,” by Natasha Korecki.

Shefali Luthra: The New York Instances’ “15 Classes Scientists Realized About Us When the World Stood Nonetheless,” by Claire Cain Miller and Irineo Cabreros.

Alice Miranda Ollstein: The Atlantic’s “His Daughter Was America’s First Measles Demise in a Decade,” by Tom Bartlett.

Anna Edney: Bloomberg Information’ “India Commerce Group Blasts Examine Linking Medication to Security Dangers,” by Satviki Sanjay.

Additionally talked about on this week’s podcast:

Credit

Francis Ying
Audio producer

Mary Agnes Carey
Editor

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