The big picture: The XBB.1.5 COVID subvariant — nicknamed the “Kraken” variant — is representing more and more cases, and experts are questioning the variant's severity as real-world data emerges.
The departure of COVID chief science officer David Kessler, announced Friday by the White House, marks the unofficial end of the "Operation Warp Speed" era and the extraordinaryall-of-government response to the pandemic.
Why it matters: The cross-agency effort the Trump and Biden administrations ran to speed up production and distribution of COVID therapeutics is widely viewed as one of the few legitimate successes in the federal pandemic response.
Any U.S. military veteran in "acute suicidal crisis" will be able to access emergency health care at any facility for free starting next week, the Department of Veterans Affairs announced Friday.
The big picture: Veterans must be enrolled in the VA system to be eligible for most medical benefits, but that requirement won't apply to emergency suicide care under the new policy. The move grants access to care to up to nine million veterans who are not currently enrolled, according to the VA.
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced Friday that David Kessler, the chief science officer overseeing the U.S.'s COVID response, is set to retire after serving as a key adviser to President Biden.
U.S. cancer death rates have fallen by a third since 1991, with about 3.8 million deaths averted in that time, according to study published Thursday in CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians.
Why it matters: Cancer is still the second leading cause of death, but the data shows progress from improved treatments and prevention efforts.
House Republicans don't have much of a path to get major health care changes passed with a Democratic Senate and president, with one possible exception: the debt ceiling fight.
Why it matters: It's not clear which spending cuts House Republicans will push for in exchange for expanding the government's borrowing authority later this year — but at least some say health care programs like Medicare and Medicaid should be on the table.
A very soggy edition of the JPMorgan Healthcare Conference, better known as JPM, wrapped up Thursday in San Francisco after filling downtown eateries and crowding hotel lobbies all week.
Why it matters: The annual health care takeover of San Francisco is arguably still the most influential gathering in the business, offering a chance for investors to get a pulse on the upcoming year and for health execs to humblebrag about how many meetings they squeezed in.
