Midweek update

No Surprises Act

Midweek update

David Ermer–CDC, COVID-19, FDA, Medical / Rx research, Mental health care, No Surprises Act, SCOTUS, Telehealth, U.S. Healthcare–
Thanks to Alexandr Hovhannisyan for sharing their work on Unsplash.

From Washington, DC,

  • Bloomberg Law tells us,
    • US Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s decision to pull the Covid-19 vaccine from the CDC’s recommended immunization list for healthy children and pregnant women means health plans must navigate whether to keep providing coverage for the shot. * * *
    • “Kennedy’s announcement in a video posted on X appeared to skip recommendations from the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, a panel of outside medical experts who guide the CDC on vaccine policy and vote for any new or updated recommendations to the schedule.
    • “The ACIP holds weight because the Affordable Care Act and the Inflation Reduction Act tie coverage in the commercial and Medicaid markets to the committee’s recommendations, attorneys say. That committee also votes on whether vaccines should be added to the federal Vaccines for Children program, which provides vaccines to children who can’t to afford them. 
    • “The panel is currently scheduled to meet starting June 26 to consider Covid-19 vaccines.
    • “The HHS did not respond to request for comment on further details of the announcement.”
  • Fierce Pharma informs us,
    • “While the Trump administration’s threat of pharmaceutical import tariffs and most favored nation (MFN) drug pricing has weighed heavily on the pharmaceutical industry in recent months, many branded drugmakers are well-positioned to handle the pressures.
    • “That was the perspective offered in a new report by S&P Global, which suggests that many global pharma companies can endure pricing pressures, trade duties and more, and that some of the most concerning policies floated by President Donald Trump are unlikely to materialize as planned.
    • “Still, Trump’s ambition to impose a most favored nation (MFN) drug pricing policy—which would attempt to close the gap between the costs of U.S. drugs and those in other countries—would be “highly negative” to branded drugmakers’ credit quality if enacted, the S&P team cautioned.”

In Food and Drug Administration news,

  • BioPharma Dive lets us know,
    • “Abbott said Tuesday it received Food and Drug Administration approval for the Tendyne transcatheter mitral valve replacement system to treat calcium buildup in the ring that supports the heart valve.
    • “The device is available for patients with severe mitral annular calcification who are not candidates for open heart surgery or transcatheter mitral valve repair.
    • “Abbott’s MitraClip system for mitral valve repair competes with Edwards Lifesciences’ Pascal repair device. The rivals are now set to compete in mitral valve replacement: Edwards won Europe’s CE mark last month for the Sapien M3 transfemoral system and expects U.S. approval in 2026.”
  • and
    • “Boston Scientific said Wednesday it plans to end worldwide sales of its transcatheter aortic valve replacement systems, citing regulatory hurdles. The company will discontinue its Acurate Neo2 and Acurate Prime TAVR systems, which are sold in Europe, and will not pursue Food and Drug Administration approval for the devices. 
    • “Boston Scientific said in a regulatory filing that the decision followed recent discussions with regulators, adding that the products faced increased requirements to maintain approvals in global markets and to obtain approvals in new regions.”

From the judicial front,

  • Yesterday, the U.S. Solicitor General filed with the Supreme Court a requested amicus brief recommending that the Court not review a U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit decision that overrode parts of Oklahoma’s PBM reform law based on ERISA and Medicare preemption. The Supreme Court is likely to make a ruling on this issue next month. The FEHBlog is happy about this development.
  • Modern Healthcare reports,
    • “An Elevance Health subsidiary is suing the billing dispute consulting company HaloMD and two hospital-based Georgia providers, alleging they conspired to exploit the No Surprises Act.
    • “Blue Cross Blue Shield Healthcare Plan of Georgia, which operates under Elevance Health’s Anthem brand, filed the suit in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia on Tuesday. The company alleges HaloMD and its out-of-network clients inappropriately won higher reimbursements through the No Surprises Act’s independent dispute resolution, or IDR, system.
    • “Defendants procured improper payments from [Blue Cross Blue Shield of Georgia] on thousands of disputes. Indeed, nearly 70% of disputes on which defendants received an IDR payment determination were clearly ineligible for the process. Since 2024, defendants’ scheme has caused millions of dollars in damages, and it continues to harm [Blue Cross Blue Shield of Georgia], employer plan sponsors and other managed care companies,” the insurer wrote in its complaint.
    • “Elevance Health estimates it spent $5.9 million on excess reimbursements and IDR fees from Jan. 3, 2024, to April 29, 2025.”
    • Unquestionably the IDR system needs to become more transparent to the parties.

From the public health and medical research front,

  • ABC News relates,
    • “About a month ago, the rate of new measles cases was accelerating at a seemingly unprecedented rate with more than 100 infections being confirmed every week.
    • “However, over the last couple of weeks, the rate of newly confirmed cases appears to be slowing.
    • “The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) confirmed an average of 22 weekly cases over the last two weeks.
    • “Even in western Texas, which had been driving most new cases in the U.S., about 11 cases have been confirmed since May 23.
    • “Public health experts told ABC News they believe measles cases are slowing down due to a mix of vaccination, a build of natural immunity and people staying home when sick.”
  • The Washington Post points out,
    • “Scores of researchers have produced new tools that can deliver genes and selectively activate them in hundreds of different cell types in the brain and spinal cord, a breakthrough that scientists hope advances them toward developing targeted therapies to treat neurodegenerative diseases such as ALS, Parkinson’s disease and Alzheimer’s.
    • “The discoveries, made through the National Institutes of Health’s BRAIN initiative, show with unprecedented clarity and precision how neural cells work together, but also how diseases disrupt their tight choreography. The insight offers the promise that doctors may one day treat diseases by manipulating dysfunctional cells.
    • “Looking ahead, with sustained investment, the advances we can achieve in understanding consciousness — and in repairing neurological and neuropsychiatric disorders — will be nothing short of life-changing,” Gord Fishell, a professor of neurobiology at Harvard Medical School and one of the scientists involved in the discoveries, said in an interview for the BRAIN webpage. “This will revolutionize both our grasp of how the brain works and our ability to treat currently intractable conditions.”
  • Per MedPage Today,
    • “Self-reported maternal mental health declined in recent years, as did maternal physical health, though less drastically, a cross-sectional study suggested.
    • “After adjustments for secular changes in sociodemographic groups, “excellent” physical health decreased by 4.2 percentage points, “excellent” mental health decreased by 12.4 percentage points, and “fair/poor” mental health increased by 3.5 percentage points from 2016 to 2023, reported Jamie Daw, PhD, of the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health in New York City, and colleagues in JAMA Internal Medicine.
    • “Daw told MedPage Today that this decline in mental health was even greater than what she and her team were expecting to find. Recent research has focused on the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on mental health, but this study indicated that the downward population-level trends were happening before 2020.
    • “This is not just a pandemic story — it’s much broader than that,” Daw said. “This study helps us expand our thinking about when we should be caring about the health of mothers, and in pointing out that it is well beyond the perinatal period.”
  • and
    • “For patients with major depression, there was a clinically meaningful but not statistically significant improvement in the primary endpoint with 20-mg azetukalner.
    • “There were significant improvements in secondary endpoints.
    • “A phase III trial of azetukalner in major depressive disorder is now underway.”
  • The McKinsey Health Institute discusses how “the advent of weight management drugs such as GLP-1s have brought the treatment of obesity to the forefront of public attention, provoking a larger opportunity to work toward metabolic health for all.”

From the U.S. healthcare business front,

  • HHS’s Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality notes,
    • “In 2022, the top 1 percent of people ranked by their healthcare expenditures accounted for 21.7 percent of total healthcare expenditures, while the bottom 50 percent accounted for less than 3 percent.
    • “People with the top 1 percent of expenses had an average of $147,071 in healthcare expenditures in 2022, which was lower than in 2021.
    • “People ages 65 and older and non-Hispanic Whites were disproportionately represented in the above median expenditure tiers.
    • “Ambulatory events, inpatient stays, and prescribed medicines each accounted for about 30 percent of healthcare expenses for people with the top 5 percent of expenses.
    • “Over three-quarters of expenses for people with the top 5 percent of expenses were paid for by private insurance or Medicare.
    • “Among adults in the top 5 percent expenditure tier, 75.1 percent had two or more of the AHRQ-designated priority conditions.”
  • MedCity News tells us,
    • “Most large employers plan to uphold their well-being benefits in 2025 even though they’re facing increasing healthcare costs and global economic headwinds, according to a recent survey from the Business Group on Health.
    • “The Business Group on Health is a nonprofit advocacy organization for large employers. The survey included responses from 131 employers that employ 11.2 million people across the world. Conducted in January and February, it follows another Business Group on Health survey that projected healthcare costs to rise nearly 8% in 2025, the highest increase in over a decade.
    • “The new survey found that 73% of employers plan to maintain their well-being programs in 2025, while 20% will be expanding their programs. The remainder will either decrease their well-being programs or are unsure.” 
  • Fierce Healthcare informs us,
    • “Customer satisfaction with health plans is on the decline, and the gap between the highest and lowest performers is getting wider, according to a new report.
    • “J.D. Power released its annual study looking at consumers’ attitudes toward commercial health plans, which found that the average satisfaction score for this market is 563 on a 1,000-point scale. But there is notable variation in scores based on geography and plan, with a high of 594 and a low of 523.
    • “The J.D. Power report said this means plan members in different parts of the country are having different experiences and finding varied value in their coverage.
    • “Member experience is a critical differentiator for employers and plan sponsors, with 20% of employers saying they switched plans due to low satisfaction among employees. Plans that separate themselves from the pack have invested in engagement, education and service, according to the study.”
  • STAT News lets us know,
    • “A new digital health care marketplace, launched last week, has a good amount of Amazon in its DNA. General Medicine, with $32 million in funding, came out of stealth with three former Amazon employees as co-founders and investors, a business model that could compete with Amazon’s One Medical — and behind the scenes, a current senior Amazon executive. 
    • “The former employees, including the founders of PillPack — the pharmacy company that Amazon bought in 2018 for about $750 million and grew into Amazon Pharmacy — bill General Medicine as a “one-stop shop for expert care” that connects patients to its own telehealth medical practices and to outside care. Sunita Mishra, Amazon Health Services’ chief medical officer, is the physician owner of one of those practices and advised the company early on, General Medicine and Mishra confirmed.”
  • Modern Healthcare reports,
    • “ChristianaCare plans to assume operations of five Crozer Health outpatient facilities in Pennsylvania after submitting the highest bid of $50.3 million. 
    • “The auction was held as Prospect Medical Holdings, Crozer’s parent company, seeks to sell the system’s assets after filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in January. The sale to Wilmington, Delaware-based ChristianaCare is subject to court approval, according to a Wednesday news release. 
    • “The sale includes two facilities in Glenn Mills, Pennsylvania as well as single facilities in Havertown, Broomall and Media, Pennsylvania. ChristianaCare said it is evaluating the programs and services offered at each location to determine what will be continued, expanded or revamped.”
  • Per Beckers Hospital Review,
    • “Secaucus, N.J.-based Hudson Regional Health, a four-hospital system, has been created as part of the final step in CarePoint Health’s bankruptcy exit.
    • “U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Kate Stickles approved the plan April 17, which went into effect May 22. The system comprises Secaucus-based Hudson Regional Hospital, Jersey City-based Christ Hospital, Hoboken (N.J.) University Medical Center and Bayonne (N.J.) Medical Center, and more than 70 affiliated locations, according to a May 27 Hudson Regional Health news release shared with Becker’s.”
  • “and provides a list of ten new shortages and discontinuations, according to drug supply databases from the FDA and the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists.” 

Tuesday Report

David Ermer–ACA, AHRQ, CDC, Congress, FDA, Generative AI, Medical / Rx research, NIH, No Surprises Act, Obesity, OPM, Rx coverage, Telehealth, U.S. Healthcare–
OPM Headquarters a/k/a the Theodore Roosevelt Building

From Washington, DC

  • Today, the U.S. Office of Personnel Management released a list of its accomplishments during the Biden-Harris administration.
  • Here is a link to Andreessen Horowitz bio of Scott Kupor who is President elect Trump’s designee for OPM Director.
  • The Washington Post is maintaining a website outside its paywall providing comprehensive news on Mr. Trump’s nominations.
  • The Wall Street Journal reports,
    • “Two vaccine skeptics who had been advising Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. as he prepares to become health secretary have been sidelined by Trump transition officials, people familiar with the matter said, underscoring a split over immunizations in the “Make America Healthy Again” movement.
    • “Adviser Stefanie Spear and lawyer Aaron Siri had asked prospective administration hires about their beliefs around vaccines even if they were interviewing for posts that had little to do with immunizations, people familiar with the interviews said. Kennedy, whose hearings to lead the Department of Health and Human Services could start on Capitol Hill as early as next week, also lobbed questions related to inoculation, the people said.
    • “The questions were different from those asked in separate meetings with President-elect Donald Trump’s staff, according to some of the people. Trump’s team asked about topics traditionally important to conservatives, such as the size of government and deregulation.
    • “Siri is no longer advising the presidential transition, a transition spokeswoman confirmed, and people familiar with the matter said his vaccine stances played a role. Spear, who had told others she would be Kennedy’s chief of staff, was passed over for that post in favor of a veteran of the first Trump administration—in part because of her vaccine priorities and in part because of her lack of experience, according to people familiar with the matter.”
  • The No Surprises Act regulators, which group includes OPM, released FAQ 69 which concerns an important opinion from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit handed down October 30, 2024. The Court has not issued its mandate in the case while it considers the Texas Medical Association’s motion for rehearing and rehearing en banc. The FAQ also includes compliance advice about the No Surprises Act anti-gag clause.
  • Per a Federal Trade Commission news release,
    • “The Federal Trade Commission today published a second interim staff report on the prescription drug middleman industry, which focuses on pharmacy benefit managers’ (PBMs) influence over specialty generic drugs, including significant price markups by PBMs for cancer, HIV, and a variety of other critical drugs.
    • “Staff’s latest report found that the ‘Big 3 PBMs’—Caremark Rx, LLC (CVS), Express Scripts, Inc. (ESI), and OptumRx, Inc. (OptumRx)—marked up numerous specialty generic drugs dispensed at their affiliated pharmacies by thousands of percent, and many others by hundreds of percent. Such significant markups allowed the Big 3 PBMs and their affiliated specialty pharmacies to generate more than $7.3 billion in revenue from dispensing drugs in excess of the drugs’ estimated acquisition costs from 2017-2022. The Big 3 PBMs netted such significant revenues all while patient, employer, and other health care plan sponsor payments for drugs steadily increased annually, according to the staff report.” 
  • STAT News adds,
    • “In response to the latest report, a CVS spokesperson wrote that “any proposed policy regulating PBMs should face a simple test: will this increase or decrease drug costs? Nearly all recently proposed ‘anti-PBM’ policies would ultimately increase U.S. drug costs and serve as a handout to the pharmaceutical industry. Instead of focusing on the impact to consumers and organizations that pay for prescription drugs, the FTC has prioritized comments from the conflicted pharmaceutical and pharmacy industries that would profit from a weakened PBM guardrail.”
    • “The company also argued it is “inappropriate and misleading to draw broad conclusions from cherry-picked” generic drugs. Between 2017-2022, specialty generic products have represented less than 1.5% of total spending on medicines by health plans contracted with CVS. In contrast, branded specialty products represent more than 50% of total spending.
    • “A spokeswoman for Cigna, which owns Express Scripts, wrote to say “this is another set of misleading conclusions based on a subset of medications that represent less than 2% of what our health plans spend on medications in a year — much like their first interim report that the FTC itself has already said is ‘limited’ and ‘tentative’. Nothing in the FTC’s report addresses the underlying cause of increasing drug prices, or helps employers, unions, and municipalities keep prescription benefits affordable for their members. We look forward to continuing to address the blatant inaccuracies in the Commission’s reports.”
    • “One Wall Street analyst maintained the FCC report does not tell the complete PBM story. TD Cowen analyst Charles Rhyee wrote in an investor note that “the fundamental issue with the FTC’s claims… is that they use only data on specialty generics, a small subset of the overall drug market – 0.9% of total drug spending – and is not representative of the value that the PBM industry delivers as a whole.”
  • Per a Food and Drug Administration press release,
    • “Today, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration is announcing an important step to provide nutrition information to consumers by proposing to require a front-of-package (FOP) nutrition label for most packaged foods. This proposal plays a key role in the agency’s nutrition priorities, which are part of a government-wide effort in combatting the nation’s chronic disease crisis. If finalized, the proposal would give consumers readily visible information about a food’s saturated fat, sodium and added sugars content—three nutrients directly linked with chronic diseases when consumed in excess.  
    • “The proposed FOP nutrition label, also referred to as the “Nutrition Info box,” provides information on saturated fat, sodium and added sugars content in a simple format showing whether the food has “Low,” “Med” or “High” levels of these nutrients. It complements the FDA’s iconic Nutrition Facts label, which gives consumers more detailed information about the nutrients in their food.” * * *
    • “Comments on the proposed rule can be submitted electronically to http://www.regulations.gov by May 16, 2025.”
       
  • The Wall Street Journal adds,
    • “It is unclear how the incoming Trump administration will view the rule. Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the prospective next head of U.S. health policy, is a critic of processed foods and has been outspoken about his view that U.S. food companies are partly to blame for sickening Americans.
    • “Consumer advocacy groups and public health organizations cheered the rule, though some said they hoped the Trump administration would consider labels similar to those adopted in other countries that bear more pointed warnings.
    • “Industry groups have warned the FDA that they could sue to challenge mandatory front-of-package labels. Such labels, they said, could threaten First Amendment rights—because companies could consider them a form of forced speech—and only Congress has the authority to require them.” 
  • The New York Times reports,
    • “Among both men and women, drinking just one alcoholic beverage a day increases the risk of liver cirrhosis, esophageal cancer, oral cancer and various types of injuries, according to a federal analysis of alcohol’s health effects issued on Tuesday.
    • “Women face a higher risk of developing liver cancer at this level of drinking, but a lower risk of diabetes. And while one alcoholic drink daily also reduces the likelihood of strokes caused by blood clots among both men and women, the report found, even occasional heavy drinking negates the benefits.
    • “The report, prepared by an outside scientific review panel under the auspices of the Department of Health and Human Services, is one of two competing assessments that will be used to shape the influential U.S. Dietary Guidelines, which are to be updated this year.”
  • Monica M. Bertagnolli, M.D., issued a statement on ending her tenure as NIH director January 17, 2025. The FEHBlog has enjoyed her Director’s blog entries.

From the public health and medical research front,

  • The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force today gave B grades to the following recommended preventive services:
    • “The USPSTF recommends screening for osteoporosis to prevent osteoporotic fractures in women 65 years or older.”
    • “The USPSTF recommends screening for osteoporosis to prevent osteoporotic fractures in postmenopausal women younger than 65 years who are at increased risk for an osteoporotic fracture as estimated by clinical risk assessment.”
  • and an inconclusive grade to the following preventive service
    • “The USPSTF concludes that the current evidence is insufficient to assess the balance of benefits and harms of screening for osteoporosis to prevent osteoporotic fractures in men.”
  • The USPSTF notes,
    • “This recommendation updates the 2018 USPSTF recommendation on screening for osteoporosis. In 2018, the USPSTF recommended screening for osteoporosis with bone measurement testing to prevent osteoporotic fractures in women 65 years or older and in postmenopausal women younger than 65 years who are at increased risk of osteoporosis, as determined by a formal clinical risk assessment tool.45 For the current recommendation, the USPSTF has noted that screening can include DXA BMD, with or without fracture risk assessment. The current recommendation is otherwise generally consistent with the 2018 recommendation.”
  • The Journal of the American Medical Association expands on this USPSTF note in an editorial comment.
    • “At first glance, the updated US Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) Recommendation Statement on osteoporosis screening1 appears nearly identical to the previous 2018 statement, especially regarding the recommendation for universal screening in women 65 years or older and insufficient evidence to support a recommendation for or against screening in men. However, subtle revisions to the 2018 recommendation2 may result in substantive changes in screening of younger postmenopausal women in clinical practice. While a B recommendation for higher-risk postmenopausal women younger than 65 years is common to both statements, the 2018 statement recommended assessing risk of osteoporosis in these women using a formal clinical risk assessment tool, whereas the 2024 Recommendation Statement1 recommends screening those at increased risk for an osteoporotic fracture as estimated by clinical risk assessment. Additionally, the screening test for both younger and older postmenopausal women in the 2018 recommendation is specified broadly as bone measurement testing. By contrast, the 2024 statement is more specific and defines screening as central (hip or lumbar spine) dual-energy x-ray absorptiometry (DXA) bone mineral density (BMD) testing with or without fracture risk assessment.
    • “In postmenopausal women younger than 65 years, osteoporosis screening presents several challenges. While time is often limited and resources scarce in the overstretched primary care practice environment, the USPSTF recommends a 2-step process to identify women in this age group who warrant screening. The clinician first determines whether traditional osteoporosis risk factors such as low body weight or tobacco use are present. For women with 1 or more risk factors, the USPSTF then advises risk assessment with a clinical risk assessment tool (eg, the Osteoporosis Self-Assessment Tool [OST], the Osteoporosis Risk Assessment Instrument [ORAI], or the Fracture Risk Assessment Tool [FRAX]) calculated without BMD information to further select women who warrant BMD testing. Primary care clinicians should be aware that the OST and ORAI were designed to identify osteoporosis (BMD T score ≤−2.5), while FRAX was developed to estimate 10-year absolute probabilities of hip and major osteoporotic fracture. Use of the OST or ORAI entails a simple calculation with few inputs (e.g., the OST is based on age and weight alone), whereas use of FRAX requires entering information on 11 clinical risk factors into a web-based algorithm. Table 2 in the Recommendation Statement1 provides “frequently used thresholds for increased osteoporosis risk” for OST (score <2) and ORAI (score ≥9), indicating that these thresholds identify women for whom central DXA BMD testing is suggested. In contrast to the 2011 and 2018 recommendations, the 2024 USPSTF Recommendation Statement1 does not suggest a specific FRAX threshold to define increased osteoporosis risk.
  • Per a National Cancer Institute news release,
    • “Feeding fructose to lab animals with cancer made their tumors grow faster, a new study has shown. But the tumors didn’t directly consume fructose, the researchers found. Instead, the liver converted it into a type of fat that cancer cells gobbled up.
    • “Studies have suggested that diets containing excess fructose—which is found in high-fructose corn syrup and table sugar—can help tumors grow. But how this common dietary sweetener might do so has been a bit of a mystery. The researchers believe their study provides some important answers. 
    • “The NIH-funded study, published December 4 in Nature, showed that several types of cancer cells lacked the enzyme needed to use fructose directly. However, liver cells have the necessary enzyme, called KHK, and used it to convert fructose into fats called lipids. 
    • “The findings could open up a new avenue for potential cancer treatments, said the study’s senior researcher, Gary Patti, Ph.D., of Washington University in St. Louis. A drug that blocks the KHK enzyme slowed fructose-fueled tumor growth in mice, the scientists showed.”
  • The National Institutes of Health released an NIH research matters bulletin concerning “Cancer prevention and screening | Improving flu vaccines | LDL structure.”
  • AP reports,
    • “A group of global experts is proposing a new way to define and diagnose obesity, reducing the emphasis on the controversial body mass index and hoping to better identify people who need treatment for the disease caused by excess body fat. 
    • “Under recommendations released Tuesday night, obesity would no longer be defined solely by BMI, a calculation of height and weight, but combined with other measurements, such as waist circumference, plus evidence of health problems tied to extra pounds. 
    • “Obesity is estimated to affect more than 1 billion people worldwide. In the U.S., about 40% of adults have obesity, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 
    • “The whole goal of this is to get a more precise definition so that we are targeting the people who actually need the help most,” said Dr. David Cummings, an obesity expert at the University of Washington and one of the 58 authors of the report published in The Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology journal.”
  • Per MedPage Today,
    • “Integrating smoking cessation into a lung cancer screening program had the biggest benefit for patients who wanted to quit, a randomized trial showed.
    • “Self-reported tobacco abstinence was greater at both 3 and 6 months with higher levels of integration of smoking cessation assistance in the lung cancer screening program, reported Paul Cinciripini, PhD, of the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, and colleagues in JAMA Internal Medicine.”
  • and
    • “Antiviral drugs commonly used to treat non-severe influenza appeared to have little or no effect on key clinical outcomes, except for baloxavir (Xofluza), according to a systematic review and meta-analysis of 73 randomized trials.”

From the U.S. public health front,

  • STAT News adds,
    • “Since society rebounded from the pandemic, Teladoc Health has gone from a soaring rocket ship considered an emblem of the potential of health tech to a cautionary tale about overblown hype. Its telehealth services are now viewed by many as an interchangeable commodity in a crowded market.
    • “In his first prominent public appearance as CEO of the virtual care giant, Chuck Divita showed up [at the JPM Conference] and played the part — promising growth and stability and reminding investors of the company’s strong foundation.”
  • Beckers Hospital Review points out,
    • Eli Lilly is leading a push with other pharmaceutical companies to request a pause in the Biden administration’s drug pricing negotiations, even as officials prepare to release a new list of medications to be targeted for price reductions, Bloomberg reported Jan. 13. 
    • Speaking at the JPMorgan HealthCare Conference in San Francisco, Eli Lilly CEO Dave Ricks emphasized the need for changes to the Inflation Reduction Act before additional drugs are included in the program. 
  • MedCity News relates, “Nvidia announced four new partnerships focused on scaling AI models across the healthcare industry. The company is teaming up with Mayo Clinic, Illumina, IQVIA and Arc Institute” at JPM Conference.
  • BioPharma Dive lets us know,
    • “Eli Lilly on Tuesday said the company’s revenue in 2024 totaled about $45 billion, a 32% jump on 2023’s total but less than what it had estimated in October.
    • “Third quarter sales of Mounjaro and Zepbound, its GLP-1 drugs for diabetes and obesity, were below Wall Street analysts’ expectations at $3.5 billion and $1.9 billion, respectively. CEO David Ricks said GLP-1 market growth was slower than the company anticipated.
    • “Shares of the Indianapolis-based company fell by as much as 8% in morning trading, shaving tens of billions of dollars from its market valuation. Since hitting a high of $960 apiece in late August, shares have tumbled in value by about one-fifth as Zepbound sales have fallen short of forecasts.”
  • McKinsey & Company explains “How healthcare entities can use M&A to build and scale new businesses.”

Thursday Report

David Ermer–CDC, CMS, Congress, FDA, Federal employment benefits, Medical / Rx research, Medicare, NIH, No Surprises Act, OPM, U.S. Healthcare, Uncategorized–

From Washington, DC,

  • This evening, the House of Representatives turned down the President-elect approved, 121-page long version of the Continuing Resolution this evening. The Wall Street Journal adds that “Talk circulated among lawmakers about a possible weeklong funding extension, which would push the shutdown deadline past Christmas. But that too would need bipartisan support to get through the Senate.” The current CR funding the federal government expires at 12:01 AM on December 21.
  • Govexec informs us,
    • “The House passed a compendium of veterans care proposals, packaged into a single bill, on Monday, sending it to the president’s desk in the waning days of the congressional session. 
    • “The Senator Elizabeth Dole 21st Century Veterans Healthcare and Benefits Improvement Act (S.141) — which provides the Veterans Affairs Department with everything from community care improvements to expanded home care and educational assistance benefits — cleared the chamber in a 382-12 vote Monday night after previously passing the Senate by unanimous consent on Dec. 12.
    • “The legislation serves as an omnibus package of previous House and Senate bills designed to improve VA community care offerings, quality care standards and other programs, while offering benefit increases for veterans and some providers. 
    • “We worked hard to craft this legislation to put veterans – not government bureaucracy – at the core of it,” said House Veterans Affairs Committee Chairman Mike Bost, R-Ill., in a statement. “The Dole Act will do that by expanding economic opportunities, simplifying the disability claims process, reforming services for aging veterans, opening more doors for mental health support and a lot more.”
  • Federal News Network lets us know,
    • “Federal agencies will be closed on Tuesday, Dec. 24, President Joe Biden announced, giving federal employees an extra day off the day before Christmas.
    • “The president made the announcement via an executive order that he signed Thursday.
    • “All executive departments and agencies of the Federal Government shall be closed and their employees excused from duty on Tuesday, December 24, 2024, the day before Christmas Day,” the executive order states.”
  • Modern Healthcare reports,
    • “A mandatory hospital payment model finalized this year by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services could make earnings uncertain for providers, researchers said.
    • “Under the Transforming Episode Accountability Model, or TEAM, hospitals could lose out on an average of $500 per episode of care covered in the model, according to a December report from the Institute for Accountable Care. But the forecast results vary widely: Hospitals in the Minneapolis-St. Paul region could gain an average of $900 per episode of included care, the report said, while Denver providers stand to lose $1,300 per episode, on average. 
    • Beginning in 2026, TEAM sets 30-day episode-based payments for lower-extremity joint replacements, femur fracture surgeries, spinal fusions, coronary artery bypass grafts and major bowel procedures. CMS will set bundled payments for these services based on regional benchmarks. In other words, hospitals will need to reduce spending for select care to a threshold set by their neighbors, or risk having to make up the difference.  
    • “It creates a really strong incentive” to manage costs, said Rob Mechanic, executive director of the Institute for Accountable Care, an independent nonprofit initially funded by the National Association of ACOs. On the flip side, he said, the regional benchmarks mean hospitals can significantly reduce their costs but still lose money.
    • The government selected 741 hospitals to participate in the five-year model, which gives safety-net hospitals extra time to prepare before taking on downside risk. Since the model is mandatory, hospitals can’t opt out. Ambulatory surgical centers are not included. According to the IAC report, the covered services represent about 15% of Medicare revenue, on average, for participating hospitals.

From the judicial front,

  • The Wall Street Journal reports,
    • “Federal prosecutors charged ex-Ivy Leaguer Luigi Mangione with murder and stalking Thursday for the Dec. 4 shooting of UnitedHealth executive Brian Thompson, alleging he was arrested with a notebook stating an intent to “wack” the CEO of an insurance company.” * * *
    • “The latest charges, brought by the Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office, mean federal prosecutors could pursue a death-penalty case against him.” * * *
    • The new federal charges capped a whirlwind day that began in Pennsylvania, where Mangione agreed at a hearing to waive his right to contest his transfer to New York. He had been detained in Pennsylvania since his arrest last week.”

In Food and Drug Administration News,

  • Healthcare Dive relates,
    • “The Food and Drug Administration on Thursday reaffirmed its assessment that Mounjaro and Zepbound, popular drugs for diabetes and obesity, are no longer in shortage,
    • “The agency’s decision will largely prevent so-called compounding pharmacies from making off-brand copies of the drug, closing a lucrative market niche that had opened as Eli Lilly, the drug’s maker, found itself unable to meet skyrocketing demand.
    • “However, the FDA won’t take enforcement action against compounding pharmacies until early next year, a grace period the agency said is to “avoid unnecessary disruption to patient treatment.”
  • Per STAT News,
    • “Ionis Pharmaceuticals on Thursday won Food and Drug Administration approval for a therapy that treats patients with a rare and deadly genetic disease that impedes the body’s ability to break down fats, setting the stage for the company to kick off the first solo drug launch in its 35-year history.
    • “The treatment, Tryngolza, also known by its scientific name of olezarsen, was approved for patients with familial chylomicronemia syndrome, or FCS, on the basis of late-stage trial results showing the therapy lowered triglyceride levels and was generally safe. Patients on the drug were less likely to develop an inflamed pancreas, an excruciating and sometimes life-threatening complication.
    • “Ionis executives believe the drug could also help patients with more common forms of sky-high triglycerides and have ongoing trials aiming to show that. If the drug is approved for more common conditions, market analysts have forecasted that Tryngolza could bring in $1.8 to $2 billion in peak sales.”
  • and
    • “Spinal cord injuries dramatically reduce a person’s mobility and independence, but a new device could aid rehabilitation efforts.
    • “Onward Medical received Food and Drug Administration clearance on Thursday for its non-invasive spinal cord stimulator, the ARC-EX. In a recent trial, the stimulator boosted hand sensation and strength in 72% of participants. While the treatment cannot replace rehabilitative therapy, device users rave about its effects.
    • “They tell patients the golden window of recovery is that first year or two,” said Sherown Campbell, one of the trial participants who signed up after he broke his neck wrestling in 2014. “I’ve made significant progress since then. I didn’t think that I would be able to move as much as I do, or I guess, as close to normal as I am.”
  • Per an FDA press release,
    • “Today, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration is announcing a final rule to update the definition of the nutrient content claim “healthy.” There is an ever-growing crisis of preventable, diet-related chronic diseases in the U.S. that requires immediate action. The updated “healthy” claim marks an important step in fulfilling the FDA’s nutrition priorities, which are part of a whole-of-government approach to address this crisis. This rule will help ensure that consumers have access to more complete, accurate, and up-to-date nutrition information on food labels.
    • “The “healthy” claim has been updated to help consumers find foods that are the foundation of a healthy dietary pattern and could also result in the development of healthier foods. Manufacturers can voluntarily use the “healthy” claim on a food package if a product meets the updated definition.”
  • The Wall Street Journal adds,
    • “Under the updated claim, eggs, nuts and seeds, olive oil and higher-fat fish such as salmon will now qualify to use the “healthy” claim. Examples of products that qualified as healthy under the original claim but not the updated one include fortified white bread, highly sweetened yogurt, and highly sweetened cereals.
    • The agency said it would work with interested parties to support use of the updated claim, adding it had entered a partnership with grocery-delivery company Instacart to help shoppers find products.
    • Both the original and updated claims have limits on saturated fat and sodium. The updated claim has a limit on added sugars, while ending the limit on total fat.

From the public health and medical research front,

  • The American Hospital News lets us know,
    • “Life expectancy in the U.S. grew an average of 10.8 months in 2023, to 75.8 years for men and 81.1 years for women, according to a report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The overall death rate declined by 6%.  
    • “The 10 leading causes of death were unchanged from 2022, with heart disease, cancer and unintentional injuries remaining the top three. COVID-19 dropped from fourth to 10th, which moved stroke up to fourth, followed by chronic lower respiratory diseases, Alzheimer’s disease, diabetes, kidney disease, and chronic liver disease and cirrhosis.”
  • Per Healio,
    • “As many as 15 million adults in the United States have a 10% or greater risk for heart failure, results of a research letter published in Annals of Internal Medicine showed.
    • “The majority of those at higher risk for heart failure (HF) had uncontrolled modifiable risk factors for the condition, including obesity and hypertension, according to the researchers.
    • “Identifying populations at such a risk, along with implementing prevention strategies, “has the potential for dramatic public health impact,” the researchers wrote.”
  • The National Institutes of Health Director, Dr. Monica Bertagnolli, writes in her blog,
    • “Clinical trials are essential for advancing new treatments that improve patient care and lives. But far too many clinical trials face challenges in identifying and enrolling eligible trial participants. Now, an NIH-led team has introduced an artificial intelligence (AI) tool that promises to speed up the process of matching patients to clinical trials to help boost enrollment. They call it TrialGPT.
    • “As reported in Nature Communications, TrialGPT takes advantage of large language models, a type of AI that can generate human-like responses to questions and explanations familiar to users of ChatGPT. The research team adapted it for matching patients to thousands of possible clinical trials in a data-efficient and transparent way. While earlier studies have shown the potential for using this type of AI for answering clinical questions, designing clinical trials, and retrieving initial lists of potential trials, TrialGPT is the first end-to-end solution, generating a list of potential trials before more precisely matching and ranking them. The team’s preliminary testing of this tool suggests TrialGPT can achieve a high degree of accuracy while cutting the time required of clinicians for screening patients. * * *
    • “In a pilot user study conducted at NCI, the researchers compared patient-trial evaluations based on short summaries about six patients made by one medical expert with TrialGPT and another who made the same evaluation manually without TrialGPT. Both experts conducted evaluations with and without AI to account for any differences in their speed or skill. The study found that clinicians using TrialGPT could generate similarly accurate lists of trial options in 40% less time.
    • “More study is needed to assess TrialGPT’s practical application in real-world settings across diverse groups of patients. But these findings already show the remarkable potential of AI technology for connecting patients to relevant trial opportunities, with tremendous potential for speeding trial recruitment and treatment advances while giving clinicians more time for other tasks only humans can do, including caring for their patients.”
  • The National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute offers an update featuring the “latest research on hypertension, educational resources on blood donation, and more.”
  • The Wall Street Journal reports,
    • “Roche said a Parkinson’s disease experimental drug missed its primary goal in a mid-stage trial, the second setback this week for candidate treatments for the neurodegenerative condition.
    • “The update from the Swiss pharmaceutical giant came after Belgian peer said a similar drug candidate for Parkinson’s developed jointly with Novartis failed to meet key goals in a clinical trial.
    • “Roche said Thursday that its drug candidate, prasinezumab, didn’t delay progression of motor symptoms in the trial, which included early-stage Parkinson’s patients, to an extent considered statistically significant.
    • “However, the company said the drug did show potential clinical efficacy, as well as positive trends on several other goals of the trial and was well tolerated. Roche will continue to evaluate the data and work together with health authorities to decide on next steps, it said.”
  • Per BioPharma Dive,
    • “Merck & Co. has long been dominant in cancer immunotherapy, with its drug Keytruda earning 40 approvals en route to becoming the world’s best-selling medicine. But the New Jersey-based drugmaker has had difficulty finding a successor, and a Monday announcement is the latest evidence.
    • “In a statement, Merck said it will end development of two experimental cancer drugs that are currently in late-stage testing. One, called vibostolimab, is aimed at a target called TIGIT. The other, favezelimab, homes in a protein named LAG-3. Both were being evaluated in combinations with Keytruda and have been touted by Merck as a way to extend Keytruda’s market advantage beyond 2028, when its main U.S. patent will expire.”

From the U.S. healthcare business front,

  • The Wall Street Journal explores the question “Why Are Americans Paying So Much More for Healthcare Than They Used To?”
    • “National healthcare spending increased 7.5% year over year in 2023 to $4.867 trillion, or $14,570 per person, according to data released Wednesday by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. 
    • “Total spending on healthcare goods and services, everything from prescription drugs to back surgeries, accounted for 17.6% of gross domestic product, a measure of goods and services produced by the U.S. economy.
    • “The 7.5% rise represented a much faster pace of growth than the 4.6% increase in 2022. It came as pandemic federal funding for the healthcare sector expired and private health insurance enrollment increased. More people with insurance led to increased demand for medical procedures, and spending on hospital care grew at the fastest pace since 1990. Spending on drugs also rose, including for medications to treat diabetes and obesity.  
    • “A full 92.5% of Americans were covered by insurance last year, and 175.6 million, or just over half the population, got it through their employer, according to the government’s new annual data. 
    • “Over 65 million Americans are on Medicare, a government health-insurance program mainly for people ages 65 and older, and nearly 92 million are on Medicaid, a state-federal program for the low-income and disabled.”
  • STAT News relates,
    • “Most of the formularies run by some of the largest health plans in the U.S. generally provide “fair access” to 11 treatments for several serious diseases, although transparent coverage information is often lacking for some medicines, a new analysis has found.
    • “Almost uniformly, the 11 formularies made the drugs available fairly when judged on three criteria: eligibility based on clinical data, restrictions placed on prescribers, and step therapy, which requires patients to try other medicines before insurers approve a prescription. The formularies are run by health plans, pharmacy benefit managers, and the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.
    • “But only 81% of the formularies scored well on a fourth criterion: cost-sharing, which is the portion of expenses paid by insured individuals. Although there is a caveat: This particular metric was based on a subset of just three drugs that were deemed to be fairly priced based on a cost-effectiveness assessment — the Mounjaro type 2 diabetes treatment, and the Wegovy and Qsymia obesity drugs.
    • “Meanwhile, transparency into coverage information for three gene therapies — Zynteglo for combating beta thalassemia, the Hemgenix hemophilia B treatment, and Roctavian for treating hemophilia A — remains less than optimal. Of the six formularies covering the therapies, 83% provided clinical criteria, cost-sharing information was only available in two or three, and none provided site of care information.”
  • Per Fierce Healthcare,
    • “Tech platform Uno Health is rolling out a self-service guide that shows users financial savings they could be eligible to obtain.
    • “The tool boasts of its ability to save the average user $4,500 a year after asking just a few questions. It is designed to improve accessibility and simplify the application process for everything ranging from federal and state health programs, heating bills, phone and internet services and the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program.
    • ‘These programs and benefits can be difficult for individuals to sift through, potentially leaving hundreds, or thousands, of dollars on the table if they do not enroll. Uno Health CEO Anna de Paula Hanika, formerly at Clover Health and Google, says the tool is an encapsulation of the company’s broader offerings.
    • “She said at least 50% of Medicare members are eligible for, but not enrolled in, other financial assistance programs. That figure increases to nearly 90% for Medicaid members. Unused benefits strain health programs and insurers.”

Midweek Update

David Ermer–Congress, FDA, Medical / Rx research, NIH, No Surprises Act–
Photo by Manasvita S on Unsplash

From Washington, DC,

  • MedPage Today tells us,
    • “A bipartisan group of House members introduced a bill Tuesday that would reverse a proposed 2.8% Medicare Physician Fee Schedule payment cutopens in a new tab or window and give physicians a raise equivalent to half of the increase in the Medicare Economic Index (MEI), a measure of healthcare inflation.
    • “America’s physicians are at a breaking point and access to high-quality, affordable care is at risk for millions of Medicare patients,” Rep. Greg Murphy, MD (R-N.C.), one of the bill’s co-sponsors, said in a statement. “When a physician sees a Medicare patient, they do so out of the goodness of their heart, not because it makes financial sense … Unfortunately, reimbursements continue to decline, putting immense pressure on doctors to retire, close their practices, forgo seeing new Medicare patients, or seek a less efficient employment position. This bipartisan legislation would stop yet another year of reimbursement cuts, give them a slight inflationary adjustment, and protect Medicare for physicians and patients alike.”
  • Roll Call lets us know,
    • ​”With all eyes on next week’s elections, appropriations battles are simmering on the back burner for Congress. But lawmakers won’t have long to make some tough decisions when they return starting on Nov. 12 for the lame-duck session.
    • “The priorities are twofold: first, passing an emergency relief package after two major hurricanes battered the Southeast, compounding pent-up demands for disaster aid going back to last year. Second, congressional leaders need to figure out what to do about funding the government beyond the stopgap law’s Dec. 20 deadline.
    • ‘The current betting is that there simply won’t be enough time in the five weeks of session remaining to strike the deals needed to put together thousands of pages of text fleshing out a dozen full-year fiscal 2025 spending bills. Top Democrats and appropriators on both sides of the Capitol will push that option, but without GOP leadership buy-in, it’s very unlikely.”
  • Today the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit handed a loss to the Texas Medical Association (TMA) in the No Surprises Act cases.
    • The Court summarized its holdings as follows
      • “We conclude that the provisions of the Rule related to QPA calculations are lawful and therefore REVERSE the district court’s holdings as to those provisions. We further conclude that the Rule’s deadline provision is unlawful and therefore AFFIRM the district court’s holding as to that provision. Finally, we conclude that the Rule’s disclosure requirements are lawful and therefore AFFIRM the district court’s holding as to those provisions.”
    • The first and third holdings are the TMA loss.  Last December, CMS implemented the district court’s QPA calculation decision in its NSA guidance.  The FEHBlog imagines that CMS may reverse that December 2023 guidance soon.
    • The second holding means that health plans must pay or deny an NSA claim within 30 calendar days after receipt. The clean claim consideration was rejected by the district court and the court of appeals. 

From the public health and medical research front,

  • The Washington Post reports,
    • “The bird flu outbreak in dairy cows has spread to at least one pig on a backyard farm in Oregon, the first detection of the H5N1 virus in swine in the United States, the U.S. Department of Agriculture said Wednesday.
    • “The discovery is particularly concerning to scientists and public health officials because pigs can become coinfected with bird and human viruses, allowing genes to swap to form a new, more dangerous virus that can more easily infect humans.
    • “Bird flu was first detected in poultry on the noncommercial farm, the Oregon agriculture department said Friday. The USDA’s National Veterinary Services Laboratories confirmed that one of the farm’s five pigs was infected with the virus on Tuesday but did not publicize the discovery until Wednesday.” * * *
    • “Once an avian virus like H5N1 gets into a pig, it can mix with other viruses — a process known as reassortment — and pick up the ability to grow better and adapt to make humans sicker, Webby said. At least 31 people have been sickened in the current bird flu outbreak, all with mild symptoms.
    • ‘Animals on the farm are not part of the commercial food supply, the USDA said. The discovery of bird flu in the swine has no impact on the safety of the nation’s pork supply.
    • “The farm’s small size gives the virus less opportunity to spill into humans, experts said.”
  • The New York Times informs us,
    • “The blockbuster drug semaglutide, sold as Ozempic for diabetes and as Wegovy for weight loss, now has a new proven benefit: It markedly soothed knee pain in people who are obese and have moderate to severe osteoarthritis, according to a large study.
    • “The effect was so pronounced that some arthritis experts not involved with the clinical trial were taken aback.
    • “The magnitude of the improvement is of a scope we haven’t seen before with a drug,” said Dr. Bob Carter, deputy director of the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases. “They had an almost 50 percent reduction in their knee pain. That’s huge.”
    • “Dr. David T. Felson, an arthritis expert and professor of medicine at Boston University School of Medicine, said the study “changes the landscape,” adding that the pain reduction is greater than anything that can be achieved short of knee replacement surgery.”
  • and
    • “For decades, people with failing heart valves who nevertheless felt all right would walk out of the cardiologist’s office with the same “wait and see” treatment plan: Come back in six or 12 months. No reason to go under the knife just yet.
    • “A new clinical trial has overturned that thinking, suggesting that those patients would be much better off having their valves replaced right away with a minimally invasive procedure.
    • The trial, whose results were published this week in The New England Journal of Medicine, could change the way doctors treat severe aortic stenosis, a narrowing of the valve that controls blood flow from the heart. The disease, which has a prognosis worse than that of most cancers, afflicts more than 3 percent of people ages 65 and older. It is expected to become more common as people live longer.
    • “Replacing people’s heart valves, even if they were not yet experiencing any ill effects, appeared to roughly halve their risk of being unexpectedly hospitalized for heart problems over at least two years, the trial found.”
  • The Wall Street Journal adds,
    • “It is hard to mend a broken heart, but in a few years doctors might be able to do essentially that.
    • “Scientists are closing in on ways to help patients grow new heart muscle after a heart attack, as well as new lung tissue to treat fibrosis, corneas to erase eye pain and other body parts to gain a new chance at life.
    • “If the science works, it could represent a new approach to medicine: reversing rather than alleviating chronic illnesses.”
    • “The idea “is really to restore function to the organ such that the quality of life of that person is normalized,” says Peter Schultz, president and chief executive of Scripps Research, a nonprofit scientific institute in La Jolla, Calif., that is testing medicines to regenerate hearts, lungs and other organs.
    • “These treatments eventually might also be used to reverse the effects of aging, Schultz says. If they prove effective in people with disease, he says, they could be tested in healthy people to see if they can, say, “turn a 70-year-old heart into a 40-year-old heart.”
  • STAT News relates,
    • “An experimental Alzheimer’s therapy from Roche successfully cleared a protein that’s a hallmark of the disease from patients’ brains, the company reported Wednesday, adding to evidence that the drug shows promise.
    • “The data are from an early-stage trial and so far, Roche has not yet assessed whether there has been any corresponding change in cognitive function or disease progression. But U.S. regulators have in recent years approved similar medicines that can reduce levels of the protein, called amyloid, in patients’ brains and that in trials modestly slowed the worsening of Alzheimer’s.
    • “What’s more, the early findings of Roche’s treatment, an antibody called trontinemab, suggest it could be safer than some of the other amyloid-clearing treatments, although larger studies would need to confirm that. In particular, there have been comparatively few cases of an issue called ARIA, a type of brain swelling or bleeding, that has been seen with the other antibodies and that has led regulators in some parts of the world to take negative views of the existing drugs.”
  • Beckers Hospital Review alerts us,
    • “A recent study revealed a 17.5% increase in asthma-related hospitalizations in the three months following the announcement that GSK would discontinue the widely used asthma medication Flovent, and 24.1% in the following three to six months, ABC News reported Oct. 30. 
    • “The research, conducted by EPIC Research, analyzed data from over 3 million patients and highlighted the potential risks associated with the switch to alternative medications. 
    • ‘Five-year-old Burton Hayes, whose asthma was previously well managed on Flovent, faced significant health challenges after his mother was forced to switch his medication, ABC News reported. Reports indicated a sharp rise in asthma exacerbations among patients following the discontinuation, leading to an increase in emergency room visits and hospital admissions. 
    • “The decision to halt Flovent’s production came after a Federal Trade Commission warning about its patent. To comply with regulatory changes and avoid potential financial penalties, GSK shifted to an authorized generic, fluticasone propionate. However, many patients are finding that the new generic is not covered by insurance, complicating access, according to the ABC News report.”
  • CIGNA points out “fifteen stats illustrating cancer’s impact on people, employers, and health care costs.”
  • Per an NIH press release,
    • “New insights from multiple studies provide critical information on how cancer tumors develop, spread, and respond to treatments. The 10 studies from the Human Tumor Atlas Network (HTAN), a National Institutes of Health (NIH)-funded Cancer Moonshot℠ initiative to construct three-dimensional maps of human tumors, will be published Oct. 31, 2024, across several Nature journals.
    • “Several studies explore the role of the tumor microenvironment and the immune system in promoting the spread of cancer and its resistance to treatment. Three studies map the trajectory of precancerous colorectal tissues toward cancer by measuring the contributions of multiple molecular and cellular events. Multiple new HTAN papers describe the development of innovative single-cell technology and analysis platforms. An accompanying research briefing by W. Kimryn Rathmell, M.D., Ph.D., director of NIH’s National Cancer Institute (NCI), and Dinah Singer, Ph.D., NCI deputy director for scientific strategy and development, discusses the history, progress, and future of HTAN.
    • “Launched in 2018, HTAN constructs three-dimensional maps of human tumors that capture their molecular features and surrounding microenvironments over time. The work is being done by teams of investigators from research institutions across the country using a variety of technologies and computational approaches to study tumors at the single-cell level. This comprehensive, publicly available resource aims to help researchers better understand the development and progression of cancer to inform its prevention and treatment. The first tumor atlas studies from this initiative were published in 2020 and 2021.” * * *
    • “The collection page is available at https://www.nature.com/collections/fihchcjehc.”

From the U.S. healthcare business front,

  • Healthcare Dive points out,
    • “Actions taken by Humana to weather tumult in the Medicare Advantage program appear to be bearing fruit. On Wednesday, the insurer reported better-than-anticipated third quarter results and modestly increased its 2024 earnings guidance after retaining more MA seniors than expected — and those members having higher risk scores, boosting reimbursement.
    • “Humana now expects to add 265,000 individual MA members this year, representing 5% growth, compared to its previous guidance of 225,000 new MA members.
    • “Despite the stronger membership, Humana doesn’t expect earnings growth in 2025 because of heavy investments the insurer plans to make to boost its MA stars — valuable quality ratings linked to plans’ revenue in the privatized Medicare program.”
  • Per BioPharma Dive,
    • “Eli Lilly’s seemingly inexorable growth hit a speed bump Wednesday, when the Indianapolis drugmaker reported earnings for the third quarter that missed Wall Street expectations and sent shares down sharply.
    • “Overall, revenue reached $11.4 billion between July and September, up 20% from the same period last year but higher by only 1% versus the second quarter and well below the consensus forecast of about $12.1 billion.
    • “Lilly’s sales and stock price have swelled on surging demand for the company’s GLP-1 medicines Mounjaro and Zepbound, which it respectively sells for diabetes and obesity.
    • “The company has had difficulty meeting that demand, though, leading to shortages that have hampered the drugs’ availability. (In October, the Food and Drug Administration officially removed Mounjaro and Zepbound from its shortage list, but is now reconsidering that decision.)
    • “Compared to the third quarter last year, sales of the two drugs are significantly higher, respectively reaching $3.1 billion and $1.26 billion during the period. But both totals were lower than analysts expected and roughly flat compared to the second quarter.”
  • and
    • “All doses of Novo Nordisk’s popular GLP-1 medicines Ozempic and Wegovy are available in the U.S. and being regularly shipped to wholesalers, the drugmaker confirmed Wednesday.
    • “One dose form or another of both drugs, which respectively treat diabetes and obesity, has been in shortage since March 2022, according to a database maintained by the Food and Drug Administration. The database was updated Wednesday to reflect the drugs’ new availability, although both remain listed.
    • “In an emailed statement, Novo cautioned that, “even when a medication is available, patients may not always be able to immediately fill their prescription at a particular pharmacy.” The statement added that people seeking to fill a prescription may experience this “variability” regardless of whether a drug is actively in shortage.”
  • Per Fierce Pharma,
    • “It’s a new era for AbbVie. For the first time in years, the company has a new top sales driver as Skyrizi has overtaken Humira in quarterly sales.
    • “Humira heir Skyrizi has been slowly creeping up on the once-dominant Humira ever since biosimilar competition prompted the immunology king’s decline. With Skyrizi salesskyrocketing 50% to $3.2 billion during the third quarter, the drug took the sales crown from Humira, which has been trending down and generated $2.2 billion during the period.
    • “Skyrizi holds biologic share leadership in approximately 30 countries and boasts a “best-in-class profile” that presents a “very high bar” for rivals, AbbVie’s chief commercial officer Jeffrey Stewart said on the company’s third-quarter earnings conference call.
    • “After Skyrizi’s recent debut in ulcerative colitis, feedback and initial prescription trends have been “overwhelmingly positive,” Stewart added. The crowded ulcerative colitis market recently gained another competitor in Johnson & Johnson’s Tremfya, setting up a fierce fight for dominance between the pharma giants. However, Skyrizi has a leg up with its prior Crohn’s disease nod, which represents the second form of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD).”
  • Fierce Healthcare tells us,
    • “Online therapy company Talkspace grew its revenue 23% in the third quarter, bringing in $47.4 million, and turned last year’s net loss into a profit of $1.9 million.
    • “The company continues to expand its business with payers and employers and now covering 158 million people in-network and through Medicare/Medicare Advantage plans, an increase of 40% year-over-year, Talkspace announced in its third-quarter earnings report released Tuesday. As Talkspace grows, it is increasing access to virtual behavioral health services for seniors, teens and members of the U.S. military, exectives said.
    • “This past quarter marks Talkspace’s third consecutive quarter of adjusted EBITDA profitability. Adjusted EBITDA came in at $2.4 million in Q3, an improvement from a loss of $2.8 million a year ago and beating Wall Street analysts’ consensus estimate of $1.4 million.”
  • Beckers Payer Issues identifies “the investments 18 payer executives are most excited about.” Check it out.

Weekend update

David Ermer–Congress, Medical / Rx research, No Surprises Act, U.S. Healthcare–
Photo by Dane Deaner on Unsplash

Happy Labor Day!

From Washington, DC,

  • The Hill reminds us that Congress will return to Capitol Hill for on September 9 for “a three-week sprint, during which lawmakers will face key legislative deadlines and work to push their political messages before departing again for campaign season.”
  • Federal New Network points out,
    • “OMB issued its annual Circular A-11 update in late July and the 1,079-page tome is filled with dates and instructions for how agencies should put the final touches on their 2026 budget requests.
    • “Digging deeper into the primer, agencies will find an extensive treatise on everything from improving customer experience to managing federal real property to updated requirements for using evidence and evaluation in programs. * * *
    • OMB told agencies to prepare for a 3% civilian pay raise as part of their 2026 budget planning.
  • September is the month that OPM announces the next year’s FEHB maximum government contribution and FEHB plans can start sharing their premium news publicly. Back in the day, the announcement was known as the Labor Day press release. However, the announcement has slipped over the past 40 years to the end of the month. With the big Postal Service Health Benefits Program launch set for January 1, OPM may make the announcement earlier in September 2024. It will be interesting to see how FEHB and PSHB premiums compare to one another.
  • Bloomberg has an article about an 11th Circuit No Surprises Act case worth noting.  This air ambulance claim dispute case involves a situation where the IDR arbitrator ruled in favor of the insurer, Kaiser Permanente, and the provider has challenged the arbitration award in federal court. The provider lost at the district court level and has appealed to the 11th Circuit. Here are links to KP’s appellee brief and AHIP’s amicus brief. 

From the public health and medical research front,

  • Per a National Institutes of Health press release,
    • “Research supported by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) has found that measuring two types of fat in the bloodstream along with C-reactive protein (CRP), a marker of inflammation, can predict a woman’s risk for cardiovascular disease decades later. These findings, presented as late-breaking research at the European Society of Cardiology Congress 2024, were published in the New England Journal of Medicine.
    • “We can’t treat what we don’t measure, and we hope these findings move the field closer to identifying even earlier ways to detect and prevent heart disease,” said Paul M. Ridker, M.D., M.P.H., a study author and the director of the Center for Cardiovascular Disease Prevention at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Boston.”
  • The American Medical Association offers advice on how to encourage communities to control hypertension.
  • Fierce Pharma lets us know,
    • “With the heart failure (HF) patient population rapidly expanding, the timing is right for Bayer’s Kerendia (finerenone). The non-steroidal mineralocorticoid receptor antagonist (MRA) was approved three years ago for chronic kidney disease (CKD) associated with Type 2 diabetes but the bulk of its market potential lies with its ability to treat HF.
    • “Four weeks ago, the company revealed that it had scored a victory in the 3 FINEARTS-HF trial. Now Bayer is putting numbers to the claim, unveiling data from the trial that showed Kerendia reduced the risk of cardiovascular death, as well as well as first and recurrent HF events by 16% compared to placebo in patients with mildly reduced (HFmrEF) or preserved ejection fraction (HFpEF).
    • “Kerendia is the first non-steroidal MRA to meet a primary composite cardiovascular endpoint in a phase 3 trial investigating HF patients with a left ventricle ejection fraction (LVEF) of more than 40%, the company said.
    • “Bayer presented the data at the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) event, Sunday in London. The results also were published Sunday in the New England Journal of Medicine.
    • “It is important to remember that there have been very few medications that have demonstrated a definitive therapeutic benefit for patients with HFmrEF and HFpEF, so we believe these results provide new insights for health care teams and patients alike, especially given the reduction in clinical endpoints like death and hospitalization and improvements in patient-reported symptoms,” Alanna Morris, Bayer’s senior medical director of US Medical Affairs, explained in an email.”
  • The Washington Post and Consumer Reports suggest treatments for sleep apnea other than the CPAP machine.
  • The New York Times reports,
    • “[While] dialysis can prolong the lives of patients with kidney failure, * * * a new study published in the journal Annals of Internal Medicine analyzed data from a simulated trial involving records from more than 20,000 older patients (average age: about 78) in the Veterans Health Administration system. It found that their survival gains were “modest.”
    • How modest? Over three years, older patients with kidney failure who started dialysis right away lived for an average of 770 days — just 77 days longer than those who never started it.
    • “I think people would find that surprising,” said Dr. Manjula Tamura, a nephrologist and researcher at Stanford and a senior author of the study. “They would have expected a greater difference.”
  • The Wall Street Journal notes,
    • “A Sanofi experimental drug for multiple sclerosis delayed disability progression in a late-stage trial, but failed to reduce episodes of new or worsening symptoms compared to an existing treatment in other clinical studies.
    • “The French pharmaceutical company said Monday that results of the clinical trials for tolebrutinib, a drug candidate taken orally and being evaluated as a treatment of various forms of multiple sclerosis, will pave the way for discussions with regulators about potentially bringing the drug to market.
    • “Sanofi’s multiple sclerosis drug Aubagio lost patent protection in key markets last year and the company has been working on a new class of drugs to treat the neurodegenerative disease, which results in accumulation of irreversible disabilities over time. Sanofi sees disability accumulation as a significant unmet medical need for patients with the disease. * * *
    • “The company said the drug met the primary goal of a phase 3 trial by delaying disability progression in patients with non-relapsing secondary progressive multiple sclerosis, a type of the disease in which patients have stopped experiencing confirmed relapses—episodes of new or worsening symptoms—but their disability continues to increase over time.”

Tuesday’s Tidbits

David Ermer–AHRQ, CDC, CMS, FDA, Medical / Rx research, No Surprises Act, Rx coverage, U.S. Healthcare, Uncategorized–
Photo by Patrick Fore on Unsplash

From Washington, DC

  • Bloomberg reports,
    • “A federal judge ruled the US Federal Trade Commission can’t enforce its near-total ban on noncompete agreements that was set to go into effect next month, blocking an effort by the agency to make labor markets more competitive. 
    • “In a ruling Tuesday, US District Judge Ada Brown in Dallas sided with the US Chamber of Commerce and a Texas-based tax firm that sued to block the measure. The judge said the FTC lacked the authority to enact the ban, which she said was “unreasonably overbroad without a reasonable explanation.” 
    • “The ruling represents a significant blow for the FTC and further divides the judiciary over the regulator’s powers. A federal judge in Pennsylvania had previously sided with the FTC. The rule is likely to be headed for appellate review. Brown had previously delayed implementation of the ban, which was scheduled to take effect on Sept. 4.” 
  • The American Hospital Association News lets us know,
    • “The Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services Aug. 20 released a report presenting data on complaints and enforcement efforts by the agency concerning title XXVII of the Public Health Service Act, which includes both the surprise billing and price transparency provisions of the No Surprises Act. As of June 30, 2024, CMS received more than 16,000 complaints and closed 12,700 with 400 complaints with PHS violations. In total the agency reported over $4 million in restitution for closed cases. Top complaints against plan issuers include non-compliance with Quality Payment Amount requirements, late payment after independent resolution determination, and non-compliance with 30-day initial payment or notice of denial payment requirements. Top complaints against providers relate to surprise bills and good faith estimates.”
  • Per an HHS press release,
    • “Today, the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), announced more than $1.4 billion in Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program funding for the HRSA AIDS Drug Assistance Program and related awards. This HRSA funding ensures that individuals with HIV who have low incomes receive lifesaving medication, quality HIV health care and essential support services. This announcement supports and advances the Biden-Harris Administration’s National HIV/AIDS Strategy.
    • “HRSA-supported AIDS Drug Assistance Programs pay for HIV medication, co-pays and co-insurance for HIV medication, and premiums for health insurance that covers HIV medication. This critical support helps individuals with HIV receive antiretroviral therapies, which help people reach viral suppression, meaning they cannot sexually transmit HIV and can live longer and healthier lives. Without access to lifesaving HIV medication provided by HRSA-supported AIDS Drug Assistance Programs, HIV medication could cost an individual more than $40,000 per year, putting it otherwise out of reach. HRSA supports critical HIV care and medication in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and six U.S. Pacific territories.”
  • Federal News Network tells us,
    • “The Postal Service is facing a potential “retirement wave,” its inspector general’s office warns, with nearly one in five of its employees now retirement-eligible, and more than half its workforce eligible to retire within a decade.
    • “The USPS OIG, in its latest report, found USPS experienced no significant shortage of career employees last year, despite a tight labor market in the U.S. and record-low unemployment rates.
    • “Between fiscal years 2019 and 2023, USPS grew its workforce by more than 8,000 employees — a more than 1% growth rate. The agency employs about 637,000 total workers.
    • “The agency, however, may also need to prepare for a large contingent of its workforce to retire.”

From the public health and medical research front,

  • ABC News reports,
    • “The number of births declined in the United States in 2023, ending two years of upticks during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a new federal report.
    • “A report published early Tuesday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Health Statistics showed there were 3,596,017 babies born in 2023.
    • “This is a decrease of 2% from the 3,667,758 babies born in 2022 and the 3,664,292 babies born in 2021.”
  • The AP informs us,
    • “Public health experts from some of the nation’s leading research institutions have deployed a massive medical trailer to rural parts of the South to test and survey thousands of local residents. The goal: to understand why the rates of heart and lung disease are dramatically higher there than in other parts of the U.S. 
    • “This rural health disadvantage, it doesn’t matter whether you’re white or Black, it hurts you,” said Dr. Vasan Ramachandran, a leader of the project who used to oversee the Framingham Heart Study — the nation’s longest-running study of heart disease. “No race is spared, although people of color fare worse.
    • “The researchers aim to test the heart and lung function of roughly 4,600 residents of 10 counties and parishes in Alabama, Kentucky, Louisiana and Mississippi while collecting information about their environments, health history and lifestyles. They are also giving participants a fitness tracker and plan to survey them repeatedly for years to check for any major medical events.”
  • The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force made the following final recommendation today:
    • For asymptomatic pregnant adolescents and adults:
      The current evidence is insufficient to assess the balance of benefits and harms of screening for iron deficiency and iron deficiency anemia in pregnant persons.
      Grade: I statement
    • This recommendation aligns with the prior 2015 recommendation.
  • MedPage Today notes
    • “Researchers Challenge USPSTF’s Lung Cancer Screening Criteria — Alternate criteria based on years of smoking has higher sensitivity and specificity, study says.
  • Per Healio,
    • Messaging strategies led to higher support for breast cancer screening cessation [among older women].
    • Messages from multiple vs. one or no source led to higher intentions of screening cessation.
    • “One important contributor to overscreening is that patients have received pro-screening messages for many years from the media, the broader social environment and health care professionals. In contrast, there has been little messaging about the harms of overscreening, or that stopping screening may be appropriate for some women,” Eli Lilly’s LLY 3.05%increase; green up pointing triangle anti-obesity drug Zepbound significantly reduced the risk of Type 2 diabetes among people with excess weight and elevated blood-sugar levels in a new study.
    • The finding widens the list of additional health benefits beyond weight loss for a hot new crop of anti-obesity drugs. Prior studies have found that Novo Nordisk’s Wegovy reduces the risk of heart attacks and strokes, and Lilly’s Zepbound eases the severity of obstructive sleep apnea.  associate professor in the division of geriatric medicine and gerontology in the department of medicine at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, and colleagues wrote in JAMA Network Open. “Messaging strategies have been used successfully to reduce other unwanted health behaviors such as smoking but are an understudied approach to reduce overscreening.”
  • To top things off, the Wall Street Journal reports,
    • “Eli Lilly’s anti-obesity drug Zepbound significantly reduced the risk of Type 2 diabetes among people with excess weight and elevated blood-sugar levels in a new study.
    • The finding widens the list of additional health benefits beyond weight loss for a hot new crop of anti-obesity drugs. Prior studies have found that Novo Nordisk’s Wegovy reduces the risk of heart attacks and strokes, and Lilly’s Zepbound eases the severity of obstructive sleep apnea.  * * *
    • “In the study, weekly injections of Zepbound for more than three years reduced the risk of progression to Type 2 diabetes by 94%, compared with a placebo, among people with excess weight and prediabetes, Lilly said Tuesday.
    • “The drug also led to significant weight reduction at an average of between 15% and nearly 23%, depending on the dosage, compared with the 2.1% reduction in patients who received a placebo.
    • “Some of the benefits appeared to last, however, only as long as patients were taking the drug. During a 17-week off-treatment follow-up period, patients who discontinued Zepbound began to regain weight and had some increase in the progression to Type 2 diabetes. Including the 17-week off-treatment period, patients who took Zepbound in the study had an 88% reduction in the risk of progression to Type 2 diabetes compared with the placebo.”
  • Fierce Pharma adds,
    • “Regulators in both the U.S. and Europe have looked into the potential link between suicidal thoughts and Novo Nordisk’s blockbuster semaglutide franchise after reports sounded the alarm last year. While the agencies found no increased risk for the popular diabetes and obesity drug, a new study could fuel the debate.
    • “In a study recently published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), researchers found a “significant disproportionality” for semaglutide-associated suicidal ideation compared with other medicines, particularly among patients who also use antidepressants. 
    • “No such link was found for Novo’s earlier-generation GLP-1 med, liraglutide, according to the team. The study was based on the World Health Organization’s (WHO’s) database of suspected suicidal and self-injurious adverse drug reactions.
    • “Branded as Wegovy, Ozempic and Rybelsus, Novo’s semaglutide medicines—and their liraglutide counterparts Victoza and Saxenda—all fall under the GLP-1 umbrella.”

From the U.S. healthcare business front,

  • Modern Healthcare reports,
    • “Epic is planning to deepen its relationships with health insurance companies, the electronic health record giant said at its annual user group meeting Tuesday.
    • “The EHR company is working with health systems and large insurers such as CVS Health subsidiary Aetna, Elevance Health and multiple Blue Cross and Blue Shield plans to streamline prior authorization requests and ease provider appeals to payers, Epic founder and CEO Judy Faulkner said during a keynote address. The event was held at Epic’s headquarters in Verona, Wisconsin.
  • The Business Group on Health announced,
    • “Projected health care cost trend jumped to almost 8% for 2025, the highest amount in more than a decade, according to Business Group on Health’s 2025 Employer Health Care Strategy Survey.
    • “The predicted surge in employer health care spending – actual health care costs have grown a cumulative 50% since 2017 – comes against a backdrop of inflation, heightened demand for expensive drugs such as GLP-1s, potentially curative but high-cost cell and gene therapies, and the ongoing burden of treating cancer and other chronic conditions.
    • “Employers are steadfast in their desire to provide comprehensive offerings to their workforces,” said Ellen Kelsay, president and CEO of Business Group on Health. “They continue to absorb much of the upticks in cost and remain keenly focused on lowering spending and improving outcomes and experiences for employees. However, the foreboding cost landscape has accelerated the need for bold transformation, and employers seek partners who will make that happen.”
    • “The Business Group survey, released today in Washington, D.C., also showed that pharmacy spending was largely responsible for the increased health care trend in 2023; that GLP-1s have created challenges for employers; and that while cancer and musculoskeletal conditions remained the top two cost drivers, this year saw more employers reporting cardiovascular conditions as the third costliest.
    • “The survey gathered data on a range of critical topics related to employer-sponsored health care for the coming year. A total of 125 large employers across varied industries, who together cover 17.1 million people in the United States, completed the survey between June 3, 2024, and July 12, 2024.”
  • Per Fierce Healthcare,
    • “Mass General Brigham’s operating income slipped to $47 million for the quarter ended June 30 despite a 7% year-over-year increase in total operating revenue, the major nonprofit system reported last week.
    • “The fiscal third-quarter numbers, which reflect a 0.9% operating margin, follow the prior year’s $69 million operating income and 1.4% operating margin.
    • “When including nonoperating items such as investment income, Mass General Brigham logged a net income of $277.5 million, also down from the third quarter of 2023.
    • “The Massachusetts system is showing a slight year-over-year improvement across the first months of its 2024 fiscal year, having turned the prior year’s $5 million loss into a $41 million operating income (0.3% operating margin, not inclusive of $118 million of onetime revenue tied to prior year healthcare provider activity).”
  • Per BioPharma Dive,
    • “The Food and Drug Administration has approved a new combination drug regimen from Johnson & Johnson to treat a common type of advanced lung cancer with certain genetic mutations.
    • “J&J’s Rybrevant is now cleared for use with another drug called Lazcluze in people with previously untreated non-small cell lung cancer that’s metastasized or advanced locally. Only people with specific mutations in a gene known as EGFR are eligible for treatment.
    • “The approval is based on results from a study that compared the combination to AstraZeneca’s lung cancer drug Tagrisso. In a statement, J&J described the new treatment as the first chemotherapy-free regimen that’s demonstrated superiority to Tagrisso in this setting.”
  • Per MedTech Dive,
    • “Johnson & Johnson has agreed to acquire V-Wave, the maker of an implantable device to treat heart failure, in a deal worth up to $1.7 billion.
    • “J&J will pay $600 million upfront, plus potential additional payments up to about $1.1 billion if regulatory and commercial milestones are met, the company said Tuesday. J&J expects the acquisition to close before the end of the year.
    • “V-Wave’s device, known as the Ventura Interatrial Shunt, is designed to reduce elevated left atrial pressure in people with congestive heart failure by creating a shunt between the left and right atrium. It received the Food and Drug Administration’s breakthrough device designation in 2019 and Europe’s CE mark in 2020. J&J said the device could be the first of its kind to reach the market.”

Happy Flag Day!

David Ermer–CDC, CMS, Congress, COVID-19, FDA, Medical / Rx research, Medicare, No Surprises Act, Telehealth, U.S. Healthcare–

From Washington, DC,

  • The Wall Street Journal confirms,
    • “The federal government plans to redo this year’s quality ratings of private Medicare plans, a move that will deliver hundreds of millions in additional bonus payments to insurers next year.
    • “The decision by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services was announced late Thursday, after The Wall Street Journal reported the agency’s plans. It comes in the wake of two court rulings that faulted the agency’s ratings, in cases filed by insurers SCAN Health Plan and Elevance Health.
    • “The agency said it would recalculate all of the 2024 quality ratings, but only apply the results if a plan’s ratings go up under the new methodology. If a plan’s ratings go down, the change won’t be implemented, CMS said in a guidance document.”
  • STAT News reports,
    • “Novo Nordisk CEO Lars Fruergaard Jørgensen will testify before the Senate after Sen. Bernie Sanders threatened to subpoena the company over its pricing of the popular diabetes drug Ozempic and the obesity drug Wegovy, the Senate health committee announced Friday.
    • “The agreement is a finale to a farcical public back-and-forth over apparent difficulties between the Senate health committee and Novo in scheduling a hearing. Sanders’ team claimed that Novo was uncooperative with his requests, but the company said they had told the senator’s team that the company was willing to testify.”
  • The American Hospital Association News lets us know,
    • “The Departments of Health and Human Services, Labor and the Treasury today announced a 120-day extension for parties impacted by the cyberattack on Change Healthcare to open disputes under the No Surprises Act independent dispute resolution process. Parties have until Oct. 12 to file disputes and must attest that their ability to open a dispute was impacted by the incident, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services said. The departments published an attestation that parties must submit along with the standard IDR form during the extension period. The AHA previously advocated for the departments to create the extension.”
  • Bloomberg News adds,
    • “Medical providers continue to beat out insurers in most surprise billing arbitration disputes, often pocketing awards of at least double the in-network rate for a given service, according to new federal agency data.
    • “Providers were the prevailing party in about 82% of payment determinations made in No Surprises Act arbitration in the second half of 2023, according to a data report released Thursday by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. A total of 125,478 disputes resulted in award decisions in that period, the report showed, a 50% increase from the first half of 2023.”
  • Per a Department of Health and Human Services press release,
    • “Today, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), through the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), announced notices of funding opportunities aimed at improving behavioral health for racial and ethnic minorities, and other underserved populations, providing training and technical assistance to programs serving these populations, and integrating primary and behavioral health care. The funding totals $31.4 million and supports the Biden-Harris Administration’s efforts to address the mental health and overdose crises, two key pillars of the President’s Unity Agenda for the nation, as well as continuing efforts to advance heath equity and address the consistent and disproportionate impact of HIV on racial and ethnic minorities.  
    • “These grant programs additionally support HHS’ Overdose Prevention Strategy, the HHS Roadmap for Behavioral Health Integration, and SAMHSA’s strategic priorities: preventing substance use and overdose; enhancing access to suicide prevention and mental health services; promoting resilience and emotional health for children, youth, and families; integrating behavioral and physical health care; and strengthening the behavioral health workforce. ”   
  • The Labor Department’s Assistant Secretary for Employee Benefit Security, Lisa Gomez, writes in her blog about “avoiding elder financial abuse.”

From the public health and medical research front,

  • The Centers for Disease Control tells us today,
    • “Summary
      • “Seasonal influenza, COVID-19, and RSV activity is low nationally.
    • “COVID-19
      • “Most key indicators are showing low levels of activity nationally. However, COVID-19 test positivity has increased to 5.4% from 4.6% in the previous week. Wastewater viral activity is showing increases in some states. We also estimate that COVID-19 infections are growing or likely growing in 34 states and territories, declining or likely declining in 1 state or territory, and are stable or uncertain in 14 states and territories, based on CDC modeled estimates of epidemic growth. An increasing proportion of the variants that cause COVID-19 are projected to be KP.3 and LB.1 (CDC COVID Data Tracker: Variant Proportions).
    • “Influenza
    • “RSV
      • “Nationally, RSV activity remains low.
    • “Vaccination
  • Radiology Business informs us,
    • “Gen X is experiencing larger cancer incidence increases than generations before it, according to a new analysis published Monday in JAMA Network Open.
    • “Increases among this group (born between 1965 to 1980) are “substantial” when compared to the baby boomers who came before them (1936 to 1960). For instance, Gen X Hispanic women have seen a nearly 35% increase in cancer incidence while Latino men have recorded a 14% uptick.
    • “The findings are based on an analysis of data from 3.8 million individuals with invasive cancer.”
    • “The substantial increases we identified in Generation X versus both the baby boomers and their proxy parents surprised us,” lead author Philip S. Rosenberg, PhD, principal investigator at the National Cancer Institute, wrote June 10. “Numerous preventable causes of cancer have been identified. Cancer control initiatives have led to substantial declines in tobacco consumption. Screening is well accepted for precancerous lesions of the colon, rectum, cervix, uterus and breast. However, other suspected carcinogenic exposures are increasing.”
    • “For the study, Rosenberg and the NCI’s Adalberto Miranda-Filho, PhD, gathered data from the institute’s Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results (SEER) Program spanning 1992-2018. They used a tool called the age-period-cohort model to project cancer incidence among the varying generations.”
  • Health Day notes,
    • “The death rate for type 1 diabetes has fallen 25% over the past few decades, and there are more seniors than ever with the illness
    • “Uncontrolled blood sugar was the prime driver behind poor outcomes with type 1.”

From the U.S. healthcare business front,

  • The Wall Street Journal reports,
    • “Lilly’s Weight-Loss Drug Is a Huge Hit. Its CEO Wants to Replace It ASAP.
    • “Dave Ricks is pushing his scientists to find an even more potent anti-obesity treatment. ‘Lilly’s got a lead, and we plan to exploit that lead.’”
  • Beckers Hospital Review explains how “Kaiser Permanente’s phone and video visit rates remain significantly higher than pre-pandemic levels.” Check it out.
  • mHealth Intelligence relates,
    • “Most Americans said they would be willing to participate in hospital-at-home programs to return home sooner, according to a new survey.
    • “The survey, conducted by remote patient monitoring (RPM) technology developer Vivalink, polled 1,025 United States adults over 40.
    • “An overwhelming majority of US adults are likely to participate in a hospital-at-home monitoring program to get back home more quickly, with 39.15 percent saying they are very likely and 45.27 percent saying they are somewhat likely to participate in these programs. Only 15.58 percent said they are not likely to participate in a hospital-at-home program to return home sooner.”
  • Per BioPharma Dive,
    • “AbbVie is securing its place in an emerging gastrointestinal disease drug field, paying China-based FutureGen Biopharmaceutical $150 million in immediate and near-term fees for rights to an antibody drug targeting TL1A, a molecule linked to heightened immune responses in inflammatory bowel disease.
    • “The Illinois-based drugmaker is following rivals like Merck, Roche, Teva and Sanofi, which have piled billions of dollars into acquisitions to gain ownership of TL1A-targeting drugs.
    • “Per terms of the deal announced Thursday, AbbVie will gain global rights to the drug, called FG-M701, and will be responsible for its development, manufacturing and commercialization. FutureGen could receive up to $1.56 billion in additional fees based on hitting development, regulatory and sales milestones.”
  • and
    • “The failure of a Pfizer medicine for Duchenne muscular dystrophy adds new uncertainty around the effectiveness of gene therapy for the muscle-wasting condition, days before the Food and Drug Administration is expected to decide on expanding use of a similar treatment from Sarepta Therapeutics.
    • “On Wednesday, Pfizer said the treatment missed its mark in a definitive Phase 3 study of boys between 4 and 7 years of age with Duchenne. Pfizer didn’t disclose specifics, but said the therapy didn’t lead to a significant difference versus placebo on a measure of motor function, or on key secondary measures such as timed tests for how quickly study participants could stand or walk. The results will be presented at future medical and patient advocacy meetings.”
    • “The study’s failure makes it much less likely there will soon be a second gene therapy option for people with Duchenne, a progressive and deadly condition with no cure and limited treatment options. Pfizer had previously expected to file for a regulatory approval of its medicine if study results were positive. Now the company says it is “evaluating appropriate next steps” for the program. Multiple Wall Street analysts expect Pfizer to discontinue research.
    • “The results are “a discouraging blow to our community, particularly devastating to those who participated in the study,” said Parent Project Muscular Dystrophy, a patient advocacy group, in a statement.”

Midweek Update

David Ermer–AHRQ, CDC, CMS, Congress, COVID-19 vaccine, Electronic health records, FDA, Medical / Rx research, NIH, No Surprises Act, Obesity, OPM, U.S. Healthcare–
Photo by Manasvita S on Unsplash

From Washington, DC,

  • The House Appropriations Committee tells us, “Today, the House Appropriations Financial Services and General Government Subcommittee met to consider its Fiscal Year 2025 bill. The measure was approved by the Subcommittee.”
  • This bill provides appropriations for OPM and the FEHBP. The Committee summary of the bill describes its OPM appropriations as follows —
    • “Provides $477 million for the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), which is $31.4 million below the FY25 Budget Request and $29.1 million above the FY24 enacted level.”
  • Govexec informs us,
    • “Senate Democrats have vowed to move quickly on legislation protecting Americans’ access to in vitro fertilization and other forms of assistive reproductive technology, including a provision expanding federal workers’ access to those treatments as part of the government’s employer-sponsored health insurance program.
    • “On Monday, Sens. Tammy Duckworth, D-Ill., Patty Murray, D-Wash., and Cory Booker, D-N.J., introduced the Right to IVF Act, a repackaging of three separate previously introduced bills on reproductive health services.
    • “Included is the Family Building FEHB Fairness Act, first introduced last year by Duckworth, which would require the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program to cover additional costs associated with IVF, and would expand coverage to all types of assisted reproductive technology, such as gamete and zygote intrafallopian transfer.”
  • Govexec also pointed out this OPM Inspector General brief that summarizes OPM OIG recommendations that have been open for more than six months as of March 31, 2024. The FEHBlog understands why the FEHB open recommendations remain outstanding
  • Healthcare Dive lets us know,
    • “Congress appears to be inching toward injecting more transparency into a controversial program that forces drugmakers to give safety-net hospitals steep discounts on drugs.
    • “It would be a win for pharmaceutical manufacturers, which have long lobbied that hospitals be required to account for their savings in the 340B program — or that it be overhauled entirely.
    • “The latter appears unlikely, after lawmakers on both sides of the aisle expressed blanket support for 340B during a House Oversight and Investigations subcommittee hearing on Tuesday. However, members said they approved of more oversight to try and stop financial gaming in the program.
    • “Though “we’re all in support of 340B … I think nearly all of us agree that the status quo is not acceptable,” said Rep. Larry Bucshon, R-Ind.”
  • Yesterday, the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force released a final recommendation concerning “Falls Prevention in Community-Dwelling Older Adults: Interventions.” Its recommendations align with the recommendations currently in force.
  • Thompson Reuters Practical Law relates,
    • “In litigation under the No Surprises Act (NSA), a district court concluded that there is no cause of action for health providers to enforce awards involving surprise billing disputes under the NSA’s independent dispute resolution (IDR) process (Guardian Flight LLC & Med-Trans Corp. v. Health Care Serv. Corp., (N.D. Tex. May 30, 2024)).”
  • The American Hospital Association News shares the organization’s “comments [submitted’ June 5 on the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ inpatient prospective payment system proposed rule for fiscal year 2025, expressing support for several provisions, including certain policies supporting low-volume and Medicare-dependent hospitals, and several aspects of CMS’ quality-related proposals. However, AHA raised concerns about the rule’s proposed payment updates.”

From the public health and medical research front,

  • CNN reports,
    • “About 61% of US adults will have cardiovascular disease by 2050, new research from the American Heart Association predicts. The biggest driver of this trend will be the large number of people who have or will develop high blood pressure, which makes them much more likely to develop dangerous problems like a heart attack or stroke.
    • “Other cardiovascular problems include heart attacks, arrhythmias like atrial fibrillation or a-fib, heart failure and congenital heart disease. * * *
    • In the research published Tuesday, the association predicts that 45 million adults will have some form of cardiovascular disease – excluding high blood pressure – or will have a stroke in 2050, up from 28 million in 2020.
  • The New York Times reports,
    • One of the nation’s premier medical advisory organizations has weighed in on long Covid with a 265-page report that recognizes the seriousness and persistence of the condition for millions of Americans.
    • More than four years since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, long Covid continues to damage many people’s ability to function, according to the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, a nongovernmental institution that advises federal agencies on science and medicine.
  • and
    • “A committee of advisers to the Food and Drug Administration voted on Wednesday to update the formula for the Covid vaccine ahead of an anticipated fall immunization campaign, now an annual step to try to offer better protection against versions of the virus in circulation.
    • “The unanimous vote by the 16 advisers recommends a formula aimed at combating the variant JN.1, which dominated infections in the United States in February, or a version of it. In recent weeks, JN.1 has been overtaken by descendants known as KP.2 and KP.3.
    • “In the coming weeks, the F.D.A. is expected to formally recommend a variant target for vaccine makers for the next round of shots in the late summer or early fall. Any decision involves some educated guesswork, given that any new vaccine formula won’t be available until months after a variant becomes dominant.
    • “It’s becoming clear that the ideal timing for a vaccine composition decision remains elusive,” said Jerry Weir, an official with the F.D.A.’s vaccine division.”
  • Per Biopharma Dive,
    • “A saliva test may improve screening for prostate cancer by identifying people at higher risk based on genotype, researchers said Friday.”A saliva test may improve screening for prostate cancer by identifying people at higher risk based on genotype, researchers said Friday.
    • “Data presented at the American Society of Clinical Oncology annual meeting suggest the test can support prostate cancer diagnosis in people who are missed by other screening methods.
    • “The researchers are now comparing the saliva test to several screening methods such as fast MRI scans and prostate-specific antigen (PSA) blood tests to determine the best approach.”
  • and
    • “Eli Lilly’s drug tirzepatide — sold as Zepbound for obesity — continues to show promise in the liver disease MASH. Clinical trial data disclosed in an abstract ahead of a European medical conference indicates that, after one year, the shot helped improve liver fibrosis without worsening MASH in just over half of treated participants, compared with 30% of those given placebo. Lilly had hinted at the study’s success earlier this year, but the full data will provide a more complete view of tirzepatide’s potential. The abstract’s release comes one day after Viking Therapeutics released trial data for its MASH pill VK2809 and less than two months after Madrigal Pharmaceuticals won U.S. approval of the first MASH drug.”
  • The Institute for Clinical and Economic Research “today posted a Protocol outlining how it will conduct the fourth annual assessment of how well major insurers’ prescription drug coverage policies align with a set of fair access standards. These standards were developed by ICER with expert input from patient advocates, clinician specialty societies, payers, pharmacy benefit managers, and life science companies.”
  • Per MedPage Today,
    • “The CDC finalized new guidelines that recommend doxycycline post-exposure prophylaxis (doxy PEP) for at-risk gay, bisexual, and other men who have sex with men (MSM) and transgender women (TGW) to prevent bacterial sexually transmitted infections (STIs).”The CDC finalized new guidelines that recommend doxycycline post-exposure prophylaxis (doxy PEP) for at-risk gay, bisexual, and other men who have sex with men (MSM) and transgender women (TGW) to prevent bacterial sexually transmitted infections (STIs).
    • “Healthcare providers should discuss and offer doxy PEP to people in these populations with a history of at least one bacterial STI — specifically syphilis, chlamydia, gonorrhea — in the last 12 months, Lindley Barbee, MD, of the CDC’s National Center for HIV, Viral Hepatitis, STD, and TB Prevention, and colleagues wrote in Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.”
    • “Doxy PEP represents the first new STI prevention tool in decades, at a time when innovation in the nation’s fight against STIs is desperately needed,” said Barbee in a CDC statement.
  • The National Institutes of Health announced,
    • “The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health, has released its plan for advancing H5N1 influenza basic research and translating those findings into strategies and interventions that can benefit people. The research agenda focuses on four key objectives: increasing understanding of the biology of H5N1 viruses and the factors that influence their ability to transmit and cause disease; developing and evaluating prevention strategies, such as vaccines; advancing existing and novel treatments, including antivirals and monoclonal antibodies; and supporting strategies for detecting H5N1 virus. The NIAID Research Agenda for 2024 H5N1 Influenza – May 2024 aligns with the NIAID role in the federal public health response to the U.S. outbreak of H5N1 influenza in people, dairy cows and other animals.”The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health, has released its plan for advancing H5N1 influenza basic research and translating those findings into strategies and interventions that can benefit people. The research agenda focuses on four key objectives: increasing understanding of the biology of H5N1 viruses and the factors that influence their ability to transmit and cause disease; developing and evaluating prevention strategies, such as vaccines; advancing existing and novel treatments, including antivirals and monoclonal antibodies; and supporting strategies for detecting H5N1 virus. The NIAID Research Agenda for 2024 H5N1 Influenza – May 2024 aligns with the NIAID role in the federal public health response to the U.S. outbreak of H5N1 influenza in people, dairy cows and other animals.”
  • The Washington Post reports, “Male birth control gel shows promise in early-stage clinical trials. “A National Institutes of Health official said the findings marked a milestone, even if the product is probably years away.”

From the U.S. healthcare business front,

  • KFF informs us,
    • The Medical Loss Ratio (MLR) provision of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) limits the amount of premium income that insurers can keep for administration, marketing, and profits. Insurers that fail to meet the applicable MLR threshold are required to pay back excess profits or margins in the form of rebates to individuals and employers that purchased coverage.
    • In the individual and small group markets, insurers must spend at least 80% of their premium income on health care claims and quality improvement efforts, leaving the remaining 20% for administration, marketing expenses, and profit. The MLR threshold is higher for large group insurers, which must spend at least 85% of their premium income on health care claims and quality improvement efforts. MLR rebates are based on a 3-year average, meaning that rebates issued in 2024 will be calculated using insurers’ financial data in 2021, 2022 and 2023 and will go to people and businesses who bought health coverage in 2023.
    • This analysis, using preliminary data reported by insurers to state regulators and compiled by Mark Farrah Associates, finds that insurers estimate they will issue a total of about $1.1 billion in MLR rebates across all commercial markets in 2024. Since the ACA began requiring insurers to issue these rebates in 2012, a total of $11.8 billion in rebates have already been issued to individuals and employers, and this analysis suggests the 2012-2024 total will rise to about $13 billion when rebates are issued later this year.
  • TechTarget calls our attention to the fact that “As providers seek to advance patient-centered care, many behavioral health organizations are turning to their EHR vendors to support integrated care models, according to a KLAS report.” Yippee.
  • Beckers Hospital Review lets us know,
    • “U.S. bankruptcy Judge Chris Lopez authorized the sale dates for Dallas-based Steward Health Care’s 31 hospitals during a June 3 hearing. “U.S. bankruptcy Judge Chris Lopez authorized the sale dates for Dallas-based Steward Health Care’s 31 hospitals during a June 3 hearing. 
    • “The sales will be conducted in two rounds. The first round, which includes the health system’s physician group, Stewardship Health, and all Steward hospitals excluding its Florida facilities and some of the Texas hospitals, will have a bid deadline of June 24 and a first sale hearing July 11.
    • “The second round includes Steward’s Florida hospitals and four of its Texas facilities, with a bid deadline of Aug. 12 and a sale hearing of Aug. 22.”
  • Beckers Payer Issues tells us about the payers that landed on the 2024 Fortune 500.

Friday Factoids

David Ermer–AHRQ, CDC, COVID-19, FDA, Medicare, Mental health care, NCQA, No Surprises Act, Obesity, U.S. Healthcare–
Photo by Sincerely Media on Unsplash

From Washington, DC,

  • Bloomberg News reports,
    • “Federal agencies are aiming to issue final regulations this year that aim to make the arbitration process more efficient for No Surprises Act health care payment disputes, an IRS official said.
    • “The regulations are a priority for the Treasury, Labor, and Health and Human Services departments, said IRS Office of Chief Counsel Senior Technician Reviewer Kevin Knopf during a Thursday panel at the Federal Bar Association’s Insurance Tax Seminar.
    • “The proposed rules aim to reduce certain administrative fees tied to participating in an independent dispute resolution system that arbitrates clashes between medical providers and health insurers over payments. They also aim to clarify requirements to prove that a dispute is eligible for the dispute resolution process.” 
  • The Department of Health and Human Services (“HHS”) announced,
    • “Today, on National Heat Awareness Day, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is launching a new tool to help communities prepare for extreme heat and prevent heat-related illness, especially among those most at risk. The Heat and Health Index (HHI) is the first nationwide tool to provide heat-health outcome information at the ZIP code level. The HHI will help state and local officials identify communities, at the zip code level, most likely to experience negative health outcomes from heat, ensure that outreach and medical aid reach the people who need it most, and help decision-makers prioritize community resilience investments.”
  • The National Committee for Quality Assurance released a fact sheet about Mental Health Awareness Month, which ended today.
  • HHS’s Agency for Health Research and Quality tells us,
    • “As we round out Older Americans Month, it is crucial that we continue to recognize the significant contributions of older adults and the urgent need to transform and improve their healthcare. Our current system is ill-equipped to meet the complex needs of older adults, who often contend with multiple chronic conditions. This inadequacy leads to fragmented and sub-optimal care, resulting in poor health outcomes, avoidable adverse events, hospitalizations, institutionalization, and increased costs. 
    • “To meet these challenges, AHRQ remains committed to using its research capabilities to build the evidence base and identify solutions ready for action. To do so, the agency has released a Special Emphasis Notice to announce its strong interest in funding health services research to improve care quality for older adults.  Research proposals for enhancing service access, delivery, organization, and equitable distribution are welcome. In particular, AHRQ seeks research to address critical questions related to the development, implementation, evaluation, and scalability of person-centered models of care to optimize older adults’ physical and mental health, functional status, and overall well-being.” 
  • BioPharma Dive informs us,
    • The Food and Drug Administration on Friday approved a third vaccine for respiratory syncytial virus, clearing a shot from biotechnology company Moderna one year after granting a green light to vaccines from GSK and Pfizer.
    • The vaccine, dubbed mResvia, is for the prevention of disease caused by respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV, in adults 60 years of age and older. Experts from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are expected to meet next month to provide recommendations on the shot’s use. Moderna had said it expects the vaccine to be available in time for the fall immunization season in the U.S.
  • The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) adds,
    • “The RSV vaccine is not currently an annual vaccine, meaning people do not need to get a dose every RSV season. Currently, CDC recommends only a single dose of RSV vaccine for adults ages 60 and older, using shared clinical decision-making. Additional surveillance and evaluation activities are ongoing to determine whether older adults might benefit from receiving additional RSV vaccines in the future. So far, RSV vaccines appear to provide some protection for at least two RSV seasons.”

From the public health and medical research front,

  • HHS posted a “Fact Sheet: In Response to H5N1, HHS and USDA Focus on Protecting Farmworkers.” For more information on the ongoing response, please visit FDA, CDC, and USDA’s ongoing H5N1 update pages.
  • STAT News reports,
    • “There are a lot of reasons why updated data on Pfizer’s Lorbrena, a treatment for non-small cell lung cancer, might not seem to be a big deal. The results are an update on the clinical trial that resulted in the Food and Drug Administration granting Lorbrena full approval in 2021, so in a sense they are not even that new. For Pfizer investors, Lorbrena isn’t that big a deal, either. The medicine, for patients whose lung tumors have particular genetic mutations, generated only $575 million last year — an amount that is up 57% from the year prior, but that still constitutes only 1% of the drug giant’s annual sales.
    • “But there is one number that makes the Lorbrena data quite eye-catching: In the updated data, the daily pill decreased the risk that cancer would progress or that a patient would die by 81% over five years.
    • “That’s a stunning number, especially when one considers that Lorbrena was not being compared to an inert placebo but to Xalkori, another Pfizer targeted cancer drug.
    • “Put a different way, 60% of the patients who received Lorbrena were alive and had not seen their tumors progress in the five years of the study, compared to 8% who received Xalkori.
    • “The data are being presented at the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology and published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.“
  • BioPharma Dive informs us,
    • “People with chronic myeloid leukemia, a simmering cancer of the bone marrow, are often treated with one of several targeted drugs that, over the past two decades, have helped to substantially prolong survival from the disease.
    • “Study results revealed Friday suggest that Scemblix, the newest of those therapies, can be both safer and more effective, potentially supporting wider use of it as an initial treatment. The results are from a late-stage clinical trial run by Scemblix’s maker, Novartis, and will be presented at the American Society of Clinical Oncology’s annual meeting.
    • “In the trial, dubbed ASC4FIRST, Scemblix led to treatment responses in significantly more participants than did other targeted drugs, which included the mainstay therapy Gleevec as well as more recently introduced medicines. Additionally, more people given Novartis’ drug experienced what’s called a “deep molecular response,” which over time can be considered a remission and allow treatment to be stopped.
    • “Study researchers also reported “markedly favorable safety and tolerability” for Scemblix, compared to Gleevec and the other so-called kinase inhibitors it was tested against.”
  • Medscape notes,
    • A personalized diet, created by integrating microbiome analysis with artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms, is a promising approach to the management of irritable bowel syndrome(IBS) symptoms, leading to enhanced symptom relief and greater gut microbiome diversity than a standard low–fermentable oligosaccharides, disaccharides, monosaccharides, and polyols (FODMAP) diet, new research suggests.
  • and
    • “About 9 out of 10 people will have a genetic difference in their DNA that can impact how they respond to common medications,” said Emily J. Cicali, PharmD, a clinical associate at the University of Florida College of Pharmacy, Gainesville, Florida.
    • “Cicali is the clinical director of UF Health’s MyRx, a virtual program that gives Florida and New Jersey residents access to pharmacogenetic (PGx) tests plus expert interpretation by the health system’s pharmacists. Genetic factors are thought to contribute to about 25% or more of inappropriate drug responses or adverse events, said Kristin Wiisanen, PharmD, dean of the College of Pharmacy at Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science in North Chicago, Illinois.
    • “Pharmacogenetics helps consumers avoid drugs that may not work well for them or could cause serious adverse events. It’s personalized medicine,” Cicali said.
    • “Through a cheek swab or blood sample, the MyRx program — and a growing number of health system programs, doctors’ offices, and home tests available across the United States — gives consumers a window on inherited gene variants that can affect how their body activates, metabolizes, and clears away medications from a long list of widely used drugs.”
  • The Wall Street Journal recounts the experiences of readers months after stopping GLP-1 drug treatment.

From the U.S. healthcare business front,

  • The Employee Benefit Research Institute relates.
    • According to findings of the Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI)/Greenwald Research Consumer Engagement in Health Care Survey, most plan enrollees are satisfied with their health plan, but high-deductible health plan (HDHP) enrollees are less likely to be extremely or very satisfied than traditional plan enrollees.
    • HDHP and traditional plan enrollees are both satisfied with the quality of care received and choice of doctors.
    • Differences in overall satisfaction may be driven by cost sharing. HDHP enrollees are less likely than traditional plan enrollees to be extremely/very satisfied with out-of-pocket expenses for prescription drugs and other health care services.
  • Beckers Hospital Review reports,
    • “The Justice Department has rejected bankrupt Dallas-based Steward Health Care’s suggested auction timeline for its physician group Stewardship Health to be sold to UnitedHealth Group’s subsidiary Optum. 
    • “In a May 28 bankruptcy court filing, obtained by Becker’s, Brian Boynton, principal deputy attorney general for the justice department, detailed how the debtor-in-possession financial deal between Steward and its landlord Medical Properties Trust interferes with the health system’s “obligation to comply with the United States’ antitrust review” of the Stewardship Health, Optum deal and should not be approved.”
  • and calls attention to an American Hospital Association report identifying the inpatient and outpatient services that are biggest money losers for hospitals.
  • Healthcare Dive points out,
    • “Most of the nation’s leading nonprofit healthcare providers reported progress toward financial recovery during earnings for the quarter ended March 31.
    • “However, improvements varied widely by health system, and the industry at large has a long way to go before it is back to profitability levels enjoyed pre-pandemic — if it fully rebounds at all, analysts told Healthcare Dive.
    • “Nonprofits struggled with cost challenges, confirming reports from analysts at credit rating agencies Moody’s Ratings and Fitch Ratings that predicted expenses, particularly labor costs, would continue to vex providers in 2024.
    • “Analysts also expected this year to bring a bifurcated financial recovery for the sector, where health systems that could successfully contain costs would recover more quickly.
    • “With early financial data now in for 2024, that expectation appears to be playing out.”

Midweek Update

David Ermer–CDC, Congress, Medical / Rx research, NIH, No Surprises Act, OPM, U.S. Healthcare–
Photo by Michele Orallo on Unsplash

From Washington DC,

  • The House Oversight and Accountability Committee held a hearing this morning titled “Oversight of Our Nation’s Largest Employer: Reviewing the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, Pt. II”. The witness was OPM acting Director Rob Shriver.
  • Here are links to the opening statements from the Chairman James Comer (R KY) and Mr. Shriver.
  • Here are links to articles about the hearing from Govexec and Federal News Network.
  • The FEHBlog attended the hearing and he heard Mr. Shriver mention a discussion with a member of Congress about a pending OPM legislative proposal. Here is a link to OPM’s March 24 publication on its FY 2025 legislative proposals. Here is a blurb on the discussed proposal (see p. 36):
    • Beginning in FY 2026, this proposal would allow OPM to access a capped amount of mandatory funding annually from the Employees Health Benefits Fund to develop and maintain eligibility and enrollment systems for PSHB and FEHB. The cap would start at $37 million in 2026 and gradually increase, for a 10-year cost of $474 million. This proposal would provide consistent, stable funding for continued operation of the PSHB eligibility and enrollment system and potential expansion to FEHB.
  • MedPage Today lets us know,
    • “Providing nutritious meals to vulnerable populations can save lives and curb healthcare costs, experts said during a hearingopens in a new tab or window of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Subcommittee on Primary Health and Retirement Security on Tuesday.”Providing nutritious meals to vulnerable populations can save lives and curb healthcare costs, experts said during a hearingopens in a new tab or window of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Subcommittee on Primary Health and Retirement Security on Tuesday.
    • “Poor nutrition is the top cause of death and disability in the United States … causing more harm than tobacco use, alcohol, physical inactivity, and air pollution,” said Dariush Mozaffarian, MD, DrPH, director of the Food is Medicine Institute at Tufts University in Boston.
    • “What that means, in reality, is that the inability to access healthy food is “literally lethal,” Mozaffarian said. And while thousands of Americans know their diets are making them sick, many feel powerless to fix the problem.
    • “Witnesses argued that food is medicine, which is why produce prescriptions, medically tailored meals, and counseling programs have been shown to substantially benefit patients with diabetes, depression, pain, and other chronic issues.'”
  • Health Affairs Forefront brings us up to date on No Surprises Act developments. Of note,
    • “On April 23, 2024, the Administration released a status update on implementation of the [Advanced Explanation of Benefits] AEOB requirement. The update included a summary of a September 2022 Request for Information (RFI), through which the Administration had sought recommendations on how to exchange data between payers and providers. The Administration received feedback on patient privacy concerns, how surprise billing protections should be represented in the AEOB, exemptions for small and rural providers, and support for underserved and marginalized populations. Most comments also advocated the testing of data standards in real-world settings prior to a national rollout of standards for the data exchange. 
    • “In addition to the RFI, HHS explained that it had studied the needs and capabilities of providers, payers, and third-party vendors such as electronic health records vendors, clearinghouses, and standards development organizations. HHS investigated different kinds of providers and payers to understand existing claims processes, communications channels, and potential financial and operational constraints. Digital service researchers recommended that the Administration propose a single data exchange standard for the receipt of [Good Faith Estimates] GFEs by payers and the transmission of AEOBs from payers to patients to implement those provisions efficiently. * * *
    • “Lastly, the Administration reported that it is “exploring opportunities to promote real-world testing of the implementation guide” being developed by a cost transparency workgroup. HHS emphasized the importance of working with industry partners “to implement an efficient process for creating meaningful protections for patients from unexpected medical bills.”

From the public health and medical research front,

  • MedPage Today tells us,
    • “A Michigan farmworker has been diagnosed with bird flu — the second human case associated with an outbreak in U.S. dairy cows.
    • “The patient had mild symptoms, Michigan health officials said in announcing the case Wednesday. The person had been in contact with cows presumed to be infected, and the risk to the public remains low, officials said.
    • “In a statement, the CDC noted that an initial nasal swab turned up negative for influenza, but an eye swab sent to the agency tested positive for influenza A(H5) virus. Similar to the other U.S. case reported earlier this year [in Texas], the Michigan patient only had eye symptoms.”
  • The Hill reports,
    • “HIV infections in men decreased by an estimated 12 percent in 2022 compared to 2018, according to the latest data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), with the largest notable decline observed among the youngest age group.
    • “The data published in the CDC’s HIV Surveillance Supplemental Report found there was a 12 percent decrease in HIV incidence between 2018 and 2022 among boys and men aged 13 and older. Among those between the ages of 13 and 24, the drop was 30 percent. * * *
    • “HIV+Hepatitis Policy Institute lamented that while rates of new cases are dropping, they still remain high. The organization noted this current pace keeps the U.S. from reaching its goal of ending the HIV epidemic by 2030 and called for increased investment into this endeavor.”
  • The American Hospital Association News reports,
    • “The AHA May 22 released a new infographic and blog highlighting how increasing drug prices and shortages are jeopardizing patient access to hospital care and exacerbating challenges hospitals are experiencing. The documents show that in 2023 drug companies continued to introduce new drugs at record prices while existing drug prices skyrocketed and consistently outpaced general inflation. The median annual price for new drugs was $300,000, an increase of 35% from the prior year. In addition, the documents highlight how drug shortages were the highest in a decade, and managing drug shortages adds as much as 20% to hospitals’ drug expenses. 
    • “Though the problem of high drug prices is not a new issue for hospitals and health systems, the rate at which drug prices are increasing combined with the problem of drug shortages is becoming unsustainable for the field and having a direct impact on patient outcomes,” the blog notes. “Higher drug prices and increasing drug shortages mean more costs for hospitals and health systems to bear, further stretching their limited resources and ultimately jeopardizing patients’ access to needed care.”
  • The New York Times points out “Despite Setback, Neuralink’s First Brain-Implant Patient Stays Upbeat; Elon Musk’s first human experiment with a computerized brain device developed significant flaws, but the subject, who is paralyzed, has few regrets.”
  • Here’s a link to the National Cancer Institute’s latest Cancer Information Highlights.
  • Per MedTech Dive,
    • “Boston Scientific’s modular cardiac rhythm management system met pre-specified safety and efficacy endpoints in a pivotal clinical trial, the company said Saturday at the Heart Rhythm Society annual meeting.
    • “The company designed the system, which consists of an implantable defibrillator and leadless pacemaker, for people who are at risk of sudden cardiac death from ventricular arrhythmias that existing subcutaneous implantable cardioverter-defibrillators (ICDs) are unable to treat.
    • “J.P. Morgan analysts said Boston Scientific reported “good results” and “solid” safety data, with the trial beating the performance goals for communication success and pacing thresholds.”

From the U.S. healthcare business front,

  • Per Biopharma Dive
    • “Biogen is scooping up a closely held immunology startup to bring more diversity to a pipeline best known for neurology products.
    • “Per deal terms, Biogen will pay $1.15 billion in cash up front to acquire Human Immunology Biosciences, or HI-Bio, and as much as $650 million more if the startup’s lead drug achieves certain milestones. The medicine, felzartamab, has completed Phase 2 trials for two kidney conditions, with a third study ongoing.
    • “The acquisition won’t affect Biogen’s 2024 financial guidance, the company said Wednesday. It plans to finance the purchase with cash and possibly draw on a revolving credit agreement. Biogen expects the transaction to close in the third quarter.”
  • and
    • “Pfizer, already in the midst of an aggressive effort to trim spending, on Wednesday disclosed new plans to cut at least $1.5 billion in additional costs over the next several years. 
    • “The program is meant to reduce what Pfizer spends on producing its medicines and will include “operational efficiencies, network structure changes and product portfolio enhancements,” the company said in a securities filing. 
    • “Given the complexity in manufacturing and longer lead times required to make changes, this program will be a multi-phased effort,” Pfizer added. The $1.5 billion target, which Pfizer expects to be realized by the end of 2027, is associated with the program’s first phase.”
  • Beckers Payer Issues lists seven providers being acquired by payers in 2024.
  • Fierce Healthcare informs us,
    • “Mayo Clinic is partnering with Zipline to provide drone delivery service for medications and supplies directly to patients’ homes as part of its advanced hospital-at-home program.
    • “The health system will integrate Zipline’s Platform 2 drone system into its campuses in Jacksonville, Florida, and Rochester, Minnesota. Mayo Clinic will use Zipline’s zero-emission, autonomous drones for quick deliveries, the organizations announced Wednesday.
    • “Through the drone service, if a caregiver notices a need for an acute medical intervention, Zipline can deliver medications and supplies from the hospital to a person’s home within minutes.
    • “Mayo Clinic’s Advanced Care at Home model has since seen 2,600 patients to date.”
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