The Biden administration is investing $1.6 billion to increase COVID-19 test and genomic sequencing efforts in the United States, the White House announced Wednesday (Feb. 17) . Members of the White House COVID-19 Response Team said the investment will help protect the public from emerging variants of the virus. However, they also added the funding is only a fraction of what is needed, and they reiterated that President Joe Biden’s COVID-19 relief proposal, the American Rescue Plan, needs to be...
More than 150 Democratic members of Congress and 23 attorneys general are backing plaintiffs in an appeals case that seeks to prevent FDA from enforcing in-person prescribing restrictions for the abortion medication mifepristone. The lawmakers assert FDA’s prescribing and dispensing restrictions conflict with the Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act, and they, like the attorneys general, argue the restrictions exacerbate health disparities. Women’s health advocacy organizations have called for President Joe Biden to force FDA to loosen the restrictions, but the...
CVS Health President and CEO Karen Lynch announced Tuesday (Feb. 16) that Aetna will re-enter the Affordable Care Act marketplace for the 2022 plan year. Other large commercial insurers also have been returning to -- or expanding -- their presence the markets: United is now selling plans in eight states and Cigna extended its marketplace footprint by 50% for the 2021 plan year. “As the ACA has evolved, there is evidence of market stabilization and remedies to earlier issues,” Lynch...
A federal appeals court on Tuesday (Feb. 16) upheld a lower court’s decision to dismiss a lawsuit by cancer doctors against sequestration cuts to Medicare Part B drug reimbursement rates . The Community Oncology Alliance (COA) sued to reverse the 2% sequester cut to Medicare reimbursement for administering drugs. The cancer doctor lobby alleged the cuts are unconstitutional. Part B pay rates are set by law, so the cuts violate the separation-of-powers doctrine in the Constitution by lowering the payments,...
