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A major Medicare Advantage company has paid the government more than $342 million to help settle allegations that it overcharged the federal healthcare program for years. Elevance Health, which covers about 2 million people on Medicare, sent the money to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services via wire transfer on May 27, court records show. Government lawyers disclosed the payment in a June 22 court filing. In an email to CMS staff, Elevance described the money as a “remittance of the total overpayment amount” estimated by government audits, court records show. Company spokesperson Leslie Porras told KFF Health News…
The opening of the fourth Inter-parliamentary Conference on Family, Sovereignty and Values in Ghana. Human rights and legal experts have urged African governments not to buy into a draft charter being incubated by conservatives that will undermine the rights of women and girls. Conflict, repressive laws and harmful cultural and religious practices conspire to undermine the health and safety of African women, girls and sexual minorities. Now, one of the few continental treaties that protects women’s rights and promotes gender equality – known as the Maputo Protocol – is under threat from a conservative alliance with its roots in the…
Nearly 2,000 people unknowingly living with HIV have been diagnosed by a pioneering NHS programme, which tests anyone needing a blood test in A&E, saving lives and preventing new infections, shows new data. Under the first-of-its kind, large scale programme, adults in need of a blood test in A&E in 88 areas of England with the highest rates of HIV are routinely tested for the virus alongside hepatitis B and C unless they opt out. Latest NHS data shows that 1,900 previously undiagnosed cases of HIV have now been identified by the programme since it began in April 2022. If…
Wildfires have evolved into a year-long threat for the European region. As Europe sweats through the hottest week on record for June, the continent faces the looming spectre of wildfires – just one year after last year’s deadly events in Turkiye and Southern Europe. But wildfire season is no longer episodic. It has evolved into a year-long threat, fueled by a warmer climate and its side effects. Increased temperatures, prolonged droughts and unpredictable weather patterns are creating more fire-prone conditions, and countries around the world are feeling the consequences, whether they are in the direct path of fires or thousands…
Highlights The latest KFF Tracking Poll on Health Information and Trust finds roughly three in ten adults report turning to social media (31%) or AI chatbots (29%) at least monthly for health information and advice. The top reasons people report turning to social media for health advice are wanting to hear from those with similar experiences or a desire for quick information. But nearly one in five say they turned to social media due to difficulties accessing or affording care, similar to the shares who cited access and cost as reasons for turning to AI for health information in a previous KFF poll. These findings as…
WHITESBURG, Ky. — Drugs and the consequences of addiction are woven into the fabric of Jamie Madden’s life. Her earliest memory is of standing on the passenger seat of her dad’s car as a toddler, wearing a peach-colored blouse, while he drove from their Kentucky home to Florida to pick up drugs. On a stop for a burger, she met Ronald McDonald. “I grew up with the impression that that’s how you paid your bills,” Madden said. “That’s how your kids got things.” By 16, she was addicted to pain pills. By 30, methamphetamine. She lost custody of two children…
The Trump Administration and Congress continue to focus on rooting out fraud, waste, and abuse in federal programs, including Medicaid. Those efforts include 50-state initiatives and targeted actions that focus on issues in specific states. Given the quickly evolving Medicaid program integrity landscape, this page tracks emerging developments in the federal government’s approach to program integrity in Medicaid, along with the implications of those actions for different states. For more detailed analyses and context, see ‘Related Resources’ in Section 2. This page tracks the federal government’s 50-state initiatives and targeted actions focused on Medicaid program integrity (Figure 1 and Table 1). The map and…
Sen. Ron Wyden and 14 Democratic co-sponsors plan to introduce legislation Thursday to cap consumers’ potential out-of-pocket costs in traditional Medicare, resurfacing a long-running debate over why the program doesn’t limit beneficiary spending. Even the bill’s backers say securing passage this year is a long shot. But the effort is one more opportunity for Democrats to highlight voters’ frustration about healthcare costs leading into the November election. Polls show Americans are very concerned about affordability, with a recent Gallup survey finding fewer than half of Americans say they can consistently afford healthcare. Wyden’s bill would focus on what many consider…
Hundreds of women with aggressive cervical cancer are to be offered a new immunotherapy on the NHS, which could help more women survive and stay cancer-free in the long-term. Pembrolizumab – which experts describe as being able to ‘take the handbrake off the body’s immune system’ to target cancer – will now offer a new option for women in England with locally-advanced cervical cancer. This means the cancer has grown beyond the cervix to regions such as the pelvic wall, but not yet spread further around the body. Trials found that adding pembrolizumab to standard chemoradiotherapy helped keep cancer at…
WHO Director-General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus A clinical trial of two antivirals that may be effective in treating Ebola Bundibugyo is expected to start in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) next week. “The trial will evaluate whether MVPC 134 and remdesivir can help to reduce mortality in patients with Bundibugyo virus disease, alone or in combination,” World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told a media briefing on Wednesday. The two interventions will be tested on confirmed cases of people with Bundibugyo, and the WHO estimates that it will need around 1,000 people to be enrolled to…
On June 9, 2026, the Medicare Trustees issued the annual report on the financial status of the Medicare program for 2026. The Trustees highlighted that the Medicare Part A trust fund is projected to be depleted in 2033, the same year but one quarter earlier than last year’s projection. In addition to discussing the status of the Part A trust fund, the report also provides substantial additional details on federal spending for Medicare Part B and Part D benefits, the distribution of spending for traditional Medicare and Medicare Advantage, and revenue sources for Medicare, along with updated spending and revenue…
Angel Foster had a backup plan. It was the first weekend in May. A federal appeals court had just made it illegal to mail mifepristone, a pill that’s part of the most widely used abortion method in the U.S. But Foster, a doctor who specializes in reproductive health, was prepared. As leader of the Massachusetts Medication Abortion Access Project, which ships abortion pills to some 3,500 patients a month nationwide, including in states with abortion bans, she told patients they had three options. They could get a refund. They could wait to see if the legal situation changed. Or she…
One afternoon in late 2024, a sixth-grader nicknamed Bug came home from school with an announcement to make. Bug, who was assigned female at birth, told his parents he was a boy — and would be using he/him pronouns. “OK, cool,” his mother, J, remembered saying. (J asked to be identified by only her first initial, and Bug by his nickname, because the family fears harassment.) “‘What do you need to be supported?’” she recalled asking next. “He asked to get healthcare.” This was the kind of moment J had been anticipating since the family had moved earlier that year…
US Ambassador Tammy Bruce, deputy representative to the United Nations. The United States and Russia were part of a group of eight countries that voted against the United Nations (UN) Political Declaration on HIV/AIDS, which was adopted by 149 votes at the High-Level Meeting (HLM) on Tuesday afternoon. Israel, Burkina Faso, Burundi, North Korea, Niger and Senegal also voted against the declaration, while there were 14 abstentions, including nine from countries in the Middle East. US Ambassador Tammy Bruce said that the declaration diverged from the 95-95-95 targets “by including divisive topics, reaffirming documents that do not enjoy consensus or…
This tracker provides a listing of global health-related legislation being considered by the 119th Congress (Jan. 3, 2025 – Jan. 3, 2027). Currently, there are more than 50 pieces of legislation related to global health. They address topics ranging from global health security to reproductive health to the World Health Organization (WHO). Sometimes a bill may address broader topics, but this tracker focuses on the global health aspects of the legislation. The tracker includes the bill title, sponsor(s), current status, and topic, as well as a short description of its global health-related provisions. The tracker includes bills only; resolutions are…
Newborn screening can prevent lifelong impairment, ensuring vulnerable infants receive early, critical medical care. Universal newborn screening needs to be dramatically expanded to improve infant mortality, says the World Health Organization (WHO). Without intervention, many of the estimated eight million infants born worldwide annually with congenital anomalies face severe impairment or death, warns a new technical report. The WHO report reflects a paradoxical landscape. As low- and middle-income countries (LMIC) successfully reduce deaths in infancy and early childhood by tackling the most deadly infectious disease, birth anomalies are now driving an increasing proportion of under-five mortality. Between 2000 and 2023,…