Healthcare, in particular its rising costs, is a key issue for voters in both parties this fall. But lawmakers are offering a variety of remedies on the campaign trail, suggesting that neither party has an agreed-upon approach.

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OAK HILL, W.Va. — Each day at New River Health in Oak Hill, Lisa Emery finds disheartening signs of what she describes as a slow-motion repeat of the Hawks Nest Tunnel disaster.

Emery is director of New River’s Breathing Center and chair of the National Coalition of Black Lung and Respiratory Disease Clinics.

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The 2026 KFF Women’s Health Survey finds that health care providers remain the most trusted source of reliable health information for reproductive-age women. Large shares, though, also report using online sources and social media, and many report being exposed to false or misleading information that can lead to changes in contraceptive use, like starting, changing, or stopping a birth control method.

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About half of rural American voters believe the economy is worse off now than when President Donald Trump returned to office, according to a new survey that points to economic frustration among a key group that has backed Trump and other Republicans in recent elections.

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The San Vicente de Paúl Nursing Home in the South Bronx hasn’t admitted a patient since December 2024. ArchCare, which operates the facility, has reduced its capacity from 120 available beds to 53 and plans to shrink it further.

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On July 4, 2025, President Trump signed a budget reconciliation bill—once known as the “One Big Beautiful Bill”—into law that included significant reductions in federal health care spending, large tax cuts, and other changes. It was projected that the law would reduce federal Medicaid spending by $911 billion over ten years (based on estimates released shortly after enactment), including by an estimated $137 billion in rural areas, according to KFF analysis. To help mitigate the impact on rural areas, the law created the Rural Health Transformation Program (referred to here as the “rural health fund”), which will award $50 billion in state grants from 2026 to 2030 to support rural health care.

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Starting next year, most states will begin reviewing who is sick enough to be excused from new federal Medicaid work rules. People who study the nation’s public aid system have said they have an idea of headaches likely to come.

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On a weekday morning in a quiet Boston neighborhood, a kitchen bustled with activity. Volunteers sliced chicken breasts, stuffed bell peppers, filled trays, and carefully labeled each item. It was part of an experiment to offer nutritious and medically tailored meals to Medicaid patients who are unable to shop for groceries and cook for themselves.

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When Josh Fleig, Louisiana’s chief innovation officer, learned his state had set aside $20 million a year, for five years, to invest in startup rural health companies, his reaction was not surprising: “Wow!”

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Taya Hailstone has been in remission from childhood Hodgkin lymphoma for five years. But the cancer’s lasting damage to her organs and nerves can make basic tasks, like loading a dishwasher, hard.

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