The "KFF Health News Minute" brings original healthcare and health policy reporting from our newsroom to the airwaves each week.
In a church in rural Missouri, mourners lined up to say goodbye to Lloyd Gilmore, a 44-year-old Black father who died in police custody last month. His death sparked protests in a city with a long history of racial violence, even as the national conversation about police brutality has waned. Six years after worldwide calls for change, what’s happened to the movement?
A year after the Environmental Protection Agency stripped grant money from dozens of communities nationwide during Trump’s DEI crackdown, a small Georgia city is struggling to address environmental health concerns.
The Office of Personnel Management said it will “pseudonymize” medical records it collects on more than 8 million people — federal workers and retirees, and their family members. Democrats and employee unions say the agency’s move is an overreach.
Federal officials charged two virologists they stopped en route from an African disease outbreak with violating import rules. But scientists tell KFF Health News the inactivated samples they carried posed no threat to the public, and they characterize the arrests as part of a government harassment campaign.
Prisoners with severe medical conditions can be granted compassionate release, but without a long-term care facility willing to accept them, many continue to wait in prison as their conditions worsen.
Complex computer systems that decide whether people, including the disabled, get Medicaid benefits have a history of errors. Now changes to comply with Trump’s signature tax and domestic policy law are inundating those systems.
The opioid settlements are a multibillion-dollar windfall with only loose spending suggestions rather than strict requirements. Some people directly affected by the crisis want stronger guardrails. But New York state’s experience highlights the challenge in finding a fiscal watchdog.
Final regulations on Medicaid work requirements say enrollees must regularly obtain documentation — possibly from medical professionals — to prove that they’re too sick to work. Doctors say the rules put them in a tough spot.
Nursing homes and assisted living facilities can be fertile ground for violence between residents with dementia, including fatal assaults. A KFF Health News examination of health reports and court records shows how warning signs are missed and safeguards fall short.