Category: states

Rural Patients Face Tough Choices When Their Hospitals Stop Delivering Babies

More than 100 rural hospitals have stopped delivering babies since 2021, including a South Dakota hospital that serves small towns, farming communities, and a Native American reservation. Patients there now travel at least an hour to give birth.

Californians Receiving In-Home Care Fear Medicaid Cuts Will Spell End to Independent Living

Bay Area senior Carol Crooks doesn’t know where congressional Republicans will land on Medicaid cuts as they look to fund a tax bill, but her health has already deteriorated as she worries about losing the help she needs to remain in her Oakland apartment — and out of a nursing home.

Even Where Abortion Is Still Legal, Many Brick-and-Mortar Clinics Are Closing

Some clinics that provide abortions are closing, even in states where voters have passed some of the nation’s broadest abortion protections. It’s happening in places like New York, Illinois, and Michigan, as reproductive health care faces new financial pressures.

KFF Health News’ ‘What the Health?’: GOP Poised To Cut Billions in Health Benefits

GOP-controlled House committees approved parts of President Donald Trump’s “one big, beautiful bill” this week, including more than $700 billion in cuts to health programs over the next decade — mostly from Medicaid, which covers people with low incomes or disabilities. Meanwhile, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. testified before Congress for the first time since taking office and told lawmakers that Americans shouldn’t take medical advice from him. Julie Appleby of KFF Health News, Alice Miranda Ollstein of Politico, and Joanne Kenen of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and Politico Magazine join KFF Health News’ Julie Rovner to discuss these stories and more.

Pain Clinic CEO Faced 20 Years for Making Patients ‘Human Pin Cushions.’ He Got 18 Months.

Michael Kestner, CEO of Pain MD, was convicted of 13 fraud felonies after his company gave patients hundreds of thousands of questionable injections at clinics in Tennessee, Virginia, and North Carolina.

Prisons Routinely Ignore Guidelines on Dying Inmates’ End-of-Life Choices

Correctional officers often dictate end-of-life care for incarcerated people who are terminally ill. Most states either don’t have a formal policy or are given leeway — a big concern for families and advocates, as the incarcerated population rapidly ages.

Newsom’s Pitch as He Seeks to Pare Down Immigrant Health Care: ‘We Have To Adjust’

Gov. Gavin Newsom said that he’s proud his state expanded health care to all low-income residents regardless of immigration status but that tough budget times call for some adjustments. The Democrat’s new budget proposes scaling back benefits to adults living in the country illegally, as well as charging them a $100 monthly premium.

Newsom’s Pitch as He Seeks to Pare Down Immigrant Health Care: ‘We Have To Adjust’

Gov. Gavin Newsom said that he’s proud his state expanded health care to all low-income residents regardless of immigration status but that tough budget times call for some adjustments. The Democrat’s new budget proposes scaling back benefits to adults living in the country illegally, as well as charging them a $100 monthly premium.

Newsom’s Pitch as He Seeks to Pare Down Immigrant Health Care: ‘We Have To Adjust’

Gov. Gavin Newsom said that he’s proud his state expanded health care to all low-income residents regardless of immigration status but that tough budget times call for some adjustments. The Democrat’s new budget proposes scaling back benefits to adults living in the country illegally, as well as charging them a $100 monthly premium.

Trump’s Fast-Tracked Deal for a Copper Mine Heightens Existential Fight for Apache

Apache tribal members are already feeling psychological and spiritual harm as the Trump administration moves to fast-track a deal to turn their sacred land of Oak Flat, Arizona, into a copper mine.