Axios

U.S. Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) on Tuesday introduced a bill seeking to lift barriers to mental health care among Latinos.

Why it matters: The pandemic exacerbated mental health needs in the U.S., especially among Latinos, whose rates of depression, anxiety and suicide have grown since 2020.

The U.S. outranks other developed nations in the percentage of rural adults who skip medical care because they can't afford it, per a new Commonwealth Fund analysis of 11 high-income countries.

• About 15%, or nearly 46 million people, live in outlying areas in the U.S., and rural Americans have poorer health outcomes than their urban counterparts, in part due to access issues.

The Biden administration today proposed strengthening requirements so that health insurers cover behavioral health at the same level as physical health.

Why it matters: Advocates have long argued that health plans are not adequately covering mental health services, despite a 2008 law intended to ensure parity. The issue has become a priority for policymakers as the aftereffects of the pandemic become clear.

Faced with steep health care costs in the U.S., an increasing number of women are going abroad for fertility treatments, including egg freezing and IVF.

Why it matters: The number of women seeking to freeze their eggs surged after the onset of the pandemic, but sky-high costs, coupled with a lack of insurance coverage, have put some fertility treatments out of reach for many people.

Cigna Healthcare is facing a federal class action lawsuit which alleges the company used algorithms to "deny payments in batches of hundreds or thousands at a time," as part of an almost completely automated claims decision process.

• The suit was filed in California's eastern district on Monday, alleging violations of California law, which require medical professionals to conduct "thorough, fair, and objective" reviews of insurance claims.

Registered Republicans experienced a "significantly higher" rate of excess deaths than Democrats in Florida and Ohio in the months after COVID-19 vaccines were made widely available, a new study has found.

Why it matters: The Yale researchers note in their study, published in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine Monday, the findings "suggest that well-documented differences in vaccination attitudes and reported uptake between Republican and Democratic voters may have been a factor in the severity and trajectory of the pandemic."

The Palo Alto VA Medical Center is set to become the first completely 5G-enabled hospital in the U.S. this week, officials told Axios first.

Why it matters: 5G is expected to be a game changer when it comes to enabling smart technology in and around hospitals.

Newly proposed merger guidelines from the Federal Trade Commission could chill dealmaking in the health care sector, as well as increase the costs and time it takes to get transactions to close, experts say.

Why it matters: The FTC this month withdrew two antitrust policy statements and with the Department of Justice issued updated guidance for merger reviews, committing to review deals and conduct on a case-by-case basis.

The power of genomics is already being harnessed to develop therapies customized to a patient's biological makeup. Now, it's being applied to cosmetics.

Driving the news: L'Oreal is teaming up with Google life sciences spinout Verily to create a 10,000-person study to understand the biological, social, and environmental factors behind skin and hair health.