News
Collaborating with KFF Health News with focus on Medicaid, Medicare, Rural & Public Health
-
RFK Jr.’s MAHA Movement Has Picked Up Steam in Statehouses. Here’s What To Expect in 2026.
Posted on January 13, 2026
When one of Adam Burkhammer’s foster children struggled with hyperactivity, the West Virginia legislator and his wife decided to alter their diet and remove any foods that contained synthetic dyes.
-
This California Strategy Safeguarded Some Medicaid Social Services Funding From Trump
Posted on January 13, 2026
When Virginia Guevara moved into a studio apartment in California’s Orange County in 2024 after nearly a decade of homelessness, she needed far more than a roof and a bed.
-
Millions of Americans Are Expected To Drop Their Affordable Care Act Plans. They’re Looking for a Plan B.
Posted on January 12, 2026
It’s feeding time for the animals on this property outside Nashville, Tennessee. An albino raccoon named Cricket reaches through the wires of its cage to grab an animal cracker, an appetizer treat right before the evening meal.
-
California Ends Medicaid Coverage of Weight Loss Drugs Despite TrumpRx Plan
Posted on January 09, 2026
SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Many low-income Californians prescribed wildly popular weight loss drugs lost their coverage for the medications at the start of the new year.
-
Iowa Doesn’t Have Enough OB-GYNs. The State’s Abortion Ban Might Be Making It Worse
Posted on January 09, 2026
Jonna Quinn was initially thrilled when she got her first job after her medical residency, working as an OB-GYN in Mason City, Iowa. It was less than two hours down the road from West Bend, where she grew up on a farm.
-
In Lodge Grass, Montana, a Crow Community Works To Rebuild From Meth’s Destruction
Posted on January 08, 2026
LODGE GRASS, Mont. — Brothers Lonny and Teyon Fritzler walked amid the tall grass and cottonwood trees surrounding their boarded-up childhood home near the Little Bighorn River and daydreamed about ways to rebuild.
-
New Year, Same Health Fight
Posted on January 08, 2026
Congress returned from its holiday break to the same question it faced in December: whether to extend covid-era premium subsidies for health plans sold under the Affordable Care Act. The expanded subsidies expired at the end of 2025, leaving more than 20 million Americans facing dramatically higher out-of-pocket costs for insurance.
-
On the Hook for Uninsured Residents, Counties Now Wonder How They’ll Pay
Posted on January 06, 2026
In 2013, before the Affordable Care Act helped millions get health insurance, California’s Placer County provided limited health care to some 3,400 uninsured residents who couldn’t afford to see a doctor.
-
Medical Bills Can Be Vexing and Perplexing. Here’s This Year’s Best Advice for Patients.
Posted on December 23, 2025
A Texas boy’s second dose of the MMRV vaccine cost over $1,400. A Pennsylvania woman’s long-acting birth control cost more than $14,000.
Treatment for a Florida Medicaid enrollee’s heart attack cost nearly $78,000 — about as much as surgery for an uninsured Montana woman’s broken arm.
-
It’s the ‘Gold Standard’ in Autism Care. Why Are States Reining It In?
Posted on December 23, 2025
ALEXANDER, N.C. — Aubreigh Osborne has a new best friend.
Dressed in blue with a big ribbon in her blond curls, the 3-year-old sat in her mother’s lap carefully enunciating a classmate’s first name after hearing the words “best friend.” Just months ago, Gaile Osborne didn’t expect her adoptive daughter would make friends at school.