Washington is now one of a dozen states that have enacted laws to try to stop other states' restrictive abortion policies from crossing state lines.
Driving the news: Gov. Jay Inslee signed a bill into law Thursday that will prevent law enforcement officials and courts in Washington from aiding other states' abortion-related investigations.
Kaiser Permanenteon Wednesday acquired the Pennsylvania nonprofit Geisinger Health in what, if approved, would be the biggest hospital acquisition so far this year.
Why it matters: The acquisition represents the beginning of an expansion for Kaiser Permanente, which plans to add five or six more health systems to its Risant Health network in the next five years and invest $5 billion in the nonprofit enterprise.
Momentum is building in Congress to address the way hospitals charge more for the same services private doctors deliver in their offices— a sign of broader lawmaker frustration with the industry.
Driving the news: Lawmakers on the House Energy and Commerce Committee showed bipartisan interest Wednesday in changing Medicare payment policies to pay the same for some services, regardless of where they're delivered.
The Department of Justice filed a lawsuit Wednesday challenging Tennessee's new law that bans gender-affirming care for minors, which is due to take effect on July 1.
Driving the news: The DOJ argues in its court filing that the legislation violates the Fourteenth Amendment's Equal Protection Clause.
Nonprofit hospitals could be subject to investigations for anticompetitive conduct under a bipartisan House plan first shared with Axios.
Why it matters: The nonprofits comprise nearly half of all facilities in the U.S. but fall outside the purview of the Federal Trade Commission. There's been growing concern in Congress over secret contracting practices and other behavior that some lawmakers contend justifies more oversight.
Hunger rates were highest among Black and Latino households, women and adults with disabilities in a snapshot of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to new Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data.
As the federal government continues to wrestle with a response to long COVID, Food and Drug Administration officials are turning to patients who've experimented with unproven treatments for clues about how to manage the condition and design clinical trials.
The big picture: More than three years into the pandemic, there's still no standard protocol for diagnosing or treating the neurological issues, cognitive difficulties, breathing problems and other health problems that plague millions of people after they fell ill with the virus.
The Biden administration wasted little time making it clear that abortion access will be a cornerstone of President Biden's 2024 re-election bid as red states continue to enact bans and restrictions.
About 600,000 people would become uninsured under the House Republican debt bill's plan to impose Medicaid work requirements, the Congressional Budget Office estimated Tuesday.
Why it matters: The estimate from Congress' nonpartisan scorekeeper gives a sense of the coverage loss from the proposal, while also highlighting the federal savings.
As Tampa drag queen Jelitza Fierce boarded a bus to Tallahassee to protest Florida's restriction of drag and LGBTQ rights, she wondered if the eight hours of travel and potential risk to her safety were worth it.
But once she got there, things changed.
Driving the news: Hundreds of drag artists and advocates from around Florida converged on the State Capitol Tuesday, nearly a week after the House sent a bill to Gov. Ron DeSantis' desk that LGBTQ activists say would allow the policing of drag performances and Pride celebrations.
The one-minute video is an obvious ploy for publicity that capitalizes on the national controversy surrounding Bud Light and its use of transgender social-media influencer Dylan Mulvaney to hype its product.
