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.