 | FRI, JUL 12, 2019 | | | | Think a friend or colleague should be getting this newsletter? Share this link with them to sign up.
If you feel like you have a case of whiplash, you're not alone. It's been a wild week for health policy news. Obamacare was on trial — again. Two of Trump's key drug price proposals collapsed, even as Trump unveiled plan to overhaul the kidney transplant and dialysis industry. This is what we call the year before an election year. Whether anything actually gets done in Washington remains an open question.
(Are there any stories we should be chasing? Email tips, ideas, suggestions to CNBC Health Editor Dawn Kopecki at dawn.kopecki@nbcuni.com.)
| | Conservative judges seem to lean toward striking down Obamacare mandate | Led by the state of Texas, the Trump administration and 18 Republican state attorneys general argued this week with more than a dozen Democratic AGs over the constitutionality of Obamacare before a three-judge federal appeals court. Two of the judges — Jennifer Walker Elrod and Kurt D. Engelhardt — grilled Democrats and appeared likely to uphold a lower court ruling that said the health law was unconstitutional because of the move by Congress to eliminate the so-called individual mandate penalty, according to audio from the court hearing. A decision is expected as early as this fall. But policy experts tell me the issue will likely all the way to the Supreme Court, which upheld Obamacare in a narrowly divided 2012 ruling.
-Berkeley Lovelace Jr. | | | | Trump administration can't force drug price disclosure in TV ads | In a victory for pharma, a federal judge ruled this week that HHS can't require companies to disclose list prices in TV commercials. The drug industry had argued it could confuse patients, because list prices don't include rebates, discounts and what insurance covers. But the legal argument that won was simpler: HHS doesn't have the authority. Congress does. The industry's sigh of relief was short-lived, though, as the administration suggested other moves were imminent.
-Meg Tirrell | | | | Trump administration punts on rebate ban | In a surprise move, the Trump administration dropped its push to get rid of pharmacy benefit plan rebates, which health officials had targeted as a key measure to bring down drug prices. HHS Secretary Alex Azar says the president decided against the ban because it would have raised premiums. Wall Street saw it as a victory for insurers and PBMs, a loss for pharma, and another sign the administration's bold efforts to reign in health-care prices are easier said than done.
-Bertha Coombs | | | | Trump's kidney care executive order sends dialysis stocks higher | President Trump signed an executive order this week to try to boost kidney transplants, and to push for more convenient home dialysis care. Shares of DaVita and Fresenius Medical Care plunged ahead of the news, but rallied after the actual announcement. Investors found the proposal is long on ambition, but not as strong on incentives to change the dialysis paradigm in the short term.
-Bertha Coombs | | | | CVS names new HealthHUB markets | CVS will open HealthHUBs in Boston, Dallas, North Carolina and a few other markets in the first half of next year. CVS Pharmacy President Kevin Hourican told me Aetna, the health insurer CVS acquired last fall, identified these markets as places where its members have a higher likelihood for chronic diseases. HealthHUBs offer more health services than traditional CVS stores and aim to treat more chronic conditions like diabetes instead of simply coughs, ear infections and other minor illnesses CVS' MinuteClinics are typically known for.
-Angelica LaVito | | | | Why Anthem has been hiring key leaders from Apple | Anthem, one of the largest health insurers, isn't known for its commitment to user-friendliness or design, which is why it's been quietly scooping up talent from Apple Health. In the past six months months, Anthem has poached Warris Bokhari, Toni Trujillo Vian (a 24-year Apple vet), former Apple VP Ted Goldstein and senior machine learning researcher Stefanos Giampanis. Neither Apple or Anthem cared to comment on the hires, but we find the competition for talent pretty interesting.
-Christina Farr | | | | Merck helping combat Ebola outbreak in the Congo | This story hasn't gotten a lot of attention in the U.S. yet. But Ebola is once again wreaking havoc in Africa, claiming an estimated 1,625 lives in the Democratic Republic of the Congo in recent months in the virus' second-deadliest outbreak ever. Merck's experimental Ebola vaccine, called rVSV-ZEBOV, which was still undergoing clinical trials during the last outbreak, is being used on a wide scale this time. World Health Organization officials says it's been a "savior" in keeping the often-fatal disease under control.
-Ashley Turner | |
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