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What We're Reading |
This weekend is the
beginning of Passover as well as the Easter weekend. Additionally, we are in
the midst of Ramadan. We wish a very happy holidays to all those who celebrate!
Now check out what we’re reading this week:
- Many small
companies are expected to face double-digit hikes to their health insurance premiums next
year — increases that would add to the broader strain on the take-home pay and
budgets of millions of American workers, families and small-business owners.
- Widespread
healthcare workforce exits seen during the pandemic’s initial peak in 2020
“largely recovered” through October 2021 with the exception of long-term care workers
and physicians, according
to a recently published study of federal labor data. Long-term care was the
only setting where turnover increased following the pandemic’s onset and then
worsened in 2021.
- The federal “test-to-treat” program was designed to be a one-stop shop for
people to get tested for COVID and to receive treatment. But as COVID-19 cases
rise again, many communities have no participating locations, and website bugs
make it difficult to book an appointment at the biggest participant.
- Providence Health
will pay the federal government $22 million to settle allegations that it billed government programs for
unnecessary spinal surgeries. The Justice Department announced on Tuesday that
the 51-hospital system entered the settlement over allegations it falsely
billed Medicare, Medicaid and other federal government programs for unnecessary
procedures performed by two unnamed doctors.
- A year after a new
Montana law stripped local health boards of their
rulemaking authority,
confusion and power struggles are creating a patchwork oversight system that
may change how public health is administered long after the pandemic is over.
- On Wednesday,
health officials in New York said that two new omicron variants are spreading rapidly in the state. Known
as BA.2.12 and BA.2.12.1, the variants are closely related to the BA.2 variant
– a version of omicron that has caused surges across Europe and is now dominant
across the U.S.
- A new study from the Employee Benefit Research Institute finds that today's early-
and mid-career employees' financial picture looks markedly different from the
financial picture of yesterday's early- and mid-career employees. EBRI finds
that Generation X families were less likely to own a home, have any retirement
plan, and were more likely to have debt than Baby Boomers families at the same
ages.
- The pharmaceutical
industry is making progress to incorporate digital endpoints into clinical
trials as the industry shifts to decentralized clinical trials and as digital
evidence plays a bigger role in drug development. To prepare for the first drug
labels and approvals based on data from digital endpoints, the nonprofit
Digital Medicine Society partnered with Anthem and major pharmaceutical
companies to develop a toolkit to support reimbursement for new drugs developed using digital
endpoints.
- This week in
California, Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration said it is moving forward with afirst-in-the-nation plan to manufacture and distribute more
affordable versions of insulin under its generic label, dubbed Cal Rx. As part
of that plan, the administration wants to spend $100 million in this year’s
budget, spending half of that amount to develop low-cost insulin with the help
of a drug manufacturer.
- In this week’s bit
of feel-good news: Researchers in the UK have developed a method to “time jump” human skin cells by 30 years, turning back the aging clock
for cells without losing their specialized function. While in the early stages
of exploration, this breakthrough from the Babraham Institute could
revolutionize regenerative medicine.
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