The host

Julie Rovner KFF Health News @jrovner

Julie Rovner is chief Washington correspondent and host of KFF Health News’ weekly well being coverage information podcast, “What the Health?” A famous skilled on well being coverage points, Julie is the creator of the critically praised reference e book “Health Care Politics and Policy A to Z,” now in its third version.

The Biden administration continued a bipartisan, decades-long effort to make sure that medical insurance treats psychological diseases the identical as different illnesses, with a brand new set of rules geared toward making certain that companies are literally accessible with out years-long waits or extreme out-of-pocket prices.

Meanwhile, two extra committees in Congress accepted payments this week geared toward reining within the energy of pharmacy profit managers, who’re accused of preserving prescription drug costs excessive to extend their backside strains.

This week’s panelists are Julie Rovner of KFF Health News, Anna Edney of Bloomberg, Joanne Kenen of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and Politico, and Sarah Karlin-Smith of the Pink Sheet.

Panelists

Among the takeaways from this week’s episode:

• The Biden administration’s new guidelines to implement federal psychological well being parity necessities embody no risk of sanctions when well being plans don’t comply; noncompliance with even probably the most minimal federal guidelines has been an issue relationship to the Nineteen Nineties. Improving entry to psychological well being care will not be a brand new coverage precedence, nor a partisan one, but it stays troublesome to realize.
• With the anniversary of the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline, extra individuals are changing into conscious of tips on how to entry assist and get it. Challenges stay, nevertheless, such because the hotline service’s lack of ability to attach callers with native care. But this system seizes on the ability of an preliminary connection for somebody in a second of disaster and presents a lifeline for a nation experiencing excessive charges of despair, anxiousness, and suicide.
• In information concerning the so-called Medicaid unwinding, 12 states have paused disenrollment efforts amid issues they don’t seem to be following renewal necessities. A serious consideration is that the majority people who find themselves disenrolled would qualify to acquire cheap and even free protection via the Affordable Care Act. But reenrollment may be difficult, significantly for these with language boundaries or housing insecurity, for example.
• With a flurry of committee exercise, Congress is revving as much as go laws by 12 months’s finish focusing on the position of pharmacy profit managers — and, primarily based on the commercials blanketing Washington, PBMs are nervous. It seems laws would enhance transparency and inform policymakers as they ponder additional, extra substantive modifications. That could possibly be a troublesome promote to a public crying out for aid from excessive well being care prices.
• Also on Capitol Hill, far-right lawmakers are pushing to insert abortion restrictions into annual authorities spending payments, threatening yet one more authorities shutdown on Oct. 1. The situation is inflicting heartburn for much less conservative Republicans who don’t need extra abortion votes forward of their reelection campaigns.
• And the injury to a Pfizer storage facility by a twister is amplifying issues about drug shortages. After troubling issues with a manufacturing facility in India precipitated shortages of essential most cancers medication, decision-makers in Washington have been maintaining a tally of the rising points, and a response could also be brewing.

Also this week, Rovner interviews KFF Health News’ Céline Gounder concerning the new season of her “Epidemic” podcast. This season chronicles the profitable public well being effort to eradicate smallpox.

Plus, for “extra credit,” the panelists counsel well being coverage tales they learn this week that they suppose it is best to learn, too:

Julie Rovner: The Nation’s “The Anti-Abortion Movement Gets a Dose of Post-Roe Reality,” by Amy Littlefield.

Joanne Kenen: Food & Environment Reporting Network’s “Can Biden’s Climate-Smart Agriculture Program Live Up to the Hype?” by Gabriel Popkin.

Anna Edney: Bloomberg’s “Mineral Sunscreens Have Potential Hidden Dangers, Too,” by Anna Edney.

Sarah Karlin-Smith: CNN’s “They Took Blockbuster Drugs for Weight Loss and Diabetes. Now Their Stomachs Are Paralyzed,” by Brenda Goodman.

Also talked about on this week’s episode:

Credits

Francis Ying Audio producer Emmarie Huetteman Editor