Category: NPR

The National Institutes of Health will partner with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid to create a database of Americans with autism, using insurance claims, medical records and smartwatch data.

Trump’s Justice Department asked for a lawsuit against the abortion medication mifepristone to be dismissed. It’s a surprising move, given that it is similar to one the Biden administration made.

Health insurer Aetna will exit the federal health insurance exchange next year. Forbes contributor Bruce Japsen tells NPR’s Ayesha Rascoe that will leave around a million people without coverage.

Planned Parenthood is closing some clinics that offer abortions, even in states where abortion has broad protections, due to new financial pressures.

Under the new Trump administration, some states are reviving plans to require adults to prove they are working in order to get Medicaid. When Arkansas did this in 2018, 18,000 people lost coverage.

The action is intended to build upon the existing program for Medicare drug price negotiations, which was created by the Inflation Reduction Act that passed during the Biden administration.

Measles is an extremely contagious disease. It’s also extremely preventable. There’s a vaccine. It’s highly effective.

For decades it has made measles outbreaks in the U.S. relatively rare, and measles deaths rarer still. But the U.S. has now seen more than 700 measles cases this year, and 3 deaths so far with active outbreaks across six states.

The federal response is under scrutiny because Health and Human Services Secretary, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. has made a career spreading false information about vaccines.

What are this administration’s views on vaccines, and what do they mean for what is already one of the worst U.S. measles outbreaks this century.

Kennedy publicly promised he would support vaccines. Dr. Peter Marks, who was forced out as the nation’s top vaccine regulator says his department isn’t doing enough.

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It’s been 25 years since measles was officially “eliminated” from the United States.

That’s a technical term. In public health, it means measles has not had a steady twelve month spread.

Right now there are measles cases in several states The biggest number of cases are in West Texas where two kids have died.

A quarter of a century after measles was officially eliminated in the US, the disease is once again spreading in West Texas, New Mexico and there are cases in several other states. What can be done to get the virus under control?

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Just because a medical bill arrives in the mail doesn’t mean you have to pay that exact price. NPR’s Life Kit has tips to eliminate, reduce or negotiate a medical bill.

At issue is whether a state, in this case, South Carolina, can remove Planned Parenthood clinics from its state Medicaid program, even though Medicaid funds cannot generally be used to fund abortions.