Thinner benefits and coverage changes await many older Americans shopping for health insurance this fall. That’s if their plan is even still available in 2025. More than a million people will probably have to find new coverage as major insurers cut costs and pull back from markets for Medicare Advantage plans, the privately run version … Read more
NEW ORLEANS — A constitutional challenge to the Biden administration program enabling Medicare to negotiate lower prices for widely used prescription drugs was revived by a federal appeals court in New Orleans in a 2-1 decision Friday. Congress created the program as part of the Inflation Reduction Act passed in 2022. The first 10 drugs … Read more
NEW ORLEANS — A longtime donor who has given more than $160 million to Tulane University is the new namesake of the university’s expanding 112-year-old school of public health, Tulane officials announced Wednesday. The amount of Celia Scott Weatherhead’s latest gift wasn’t revealed, but school officials indicated it will help transform the institution into one … Read more
More women chose to have their tubes tied after Roe v. Wade was overturned in 2022, a new study shows, and the biggest increases were in states that ban abortion. A research letter published Wednesday in JAMA examined insurance claims data from 2021 and 2022 for around 4.8 million women who got tubal ligations, which … Read more
Darrell Dixon’s father was just 25 when he had a major heart attack in the rural Mississippi Delta. By his early 40s, a series of additional attacks had left his heart muscle too weak to pump enough blood to his body. He died in 2013 at the age of 49. “It was a big jolt … Read more
Haywood Park Community Hospital was the closest hospital for many in Brownsville, Tennessee, a rural city in the eastern part of the state. Some residents believe it kept their loved ones alive. But others in this majority-Black city said they drove to a hospital miles away or skipped care completely. The facility eventually closed in … Read more
WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden is zeroing in on the policy goals closest to his heart now that he’s no longer seeking a second term and will visit New Orleans on Tuesday to promote his administration’s “moonshot” initiative aiming at dramatically reducing cancer deaths. The president and first lady Jill Biden will tour medical facilities … Read more
WASHINGTON — Federal health regulators on Friday declined to approve the psychedelic drug MDMA as a therapy for PTSD, a major setback for groups seeking a breakthrough decision in favor of using mind-altering substances to treat serious mental health conditions. Drugmaker Lykos Therapeutics said the FDA notified the company that its drug “could not be … Read more
U.S. health officials on Friday approved a nasal spray to treat severe allergic reactions, the first needle-free alternative to shots like EpiPen. The Food and Drug Administration said it approved the spray from drugmaker ARS Pharmaceuticals Inc. as an emergency treatment for adults and older children experiencing life-threatening allergic reactions known as anaphylaxis. Anaphylaxis occurs … Read more
CAPE TOWN, South Africa — Twice-yearly shots used to treat AIDS were 100% effective in preventing new infections in women, according to study results published Wednesday. There were no infections in the young women and girls that got the shots in a study of about 5,000 in South Africa and Uganda, researchers reported. In a … Read more
