Overnight Health Care — Presented by American Health Care Association — California monitoring 8,400 people for coronavirus | Pence taps career official to coordinate response | Dems insist on guardrails for funding
Welcome to Thursday’s Overnight Health Care.
The health care news today was dominated by the latest on the coronavirus, including a whistleblower complaint about HHS and more details on the White House team leading the response. Let’s jump right in.
California monitoring over 8,400 people for coronavirus
California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) announced Thursday that 33 people in California have tested positive for coronavirus, with officials monitoring more than 8,400 people for the virus.
Newsom said during a press conference that five people who tested positive have since moved out of the state as officials deal with the spreading virus.
One of those people is from an unknown source, raising the concern that the virus is spreading among the general public for the first time in the U.S.
“We knew this was inevitable,” Newsom said.
Whistleblower claims HHS did not train workers caring for coronavirus patients: report
A whistleblower claims the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) sent workers to receive the first Americans evacuated from China during the coronavirus outbreak without proper training or protective gear, The Washington Post reported Thursday.
The complaint was reportedly filed Wednesday with the Office of the Special Counsel.
The whistleblower is a senior HHS official based in Washington seeking federal protection after alleging they were unfairly reassigned after raising concerns about the safety of these workers, according to the Post.
The workers did not show symptoms and were not tested for the virus, the Post reported citing the whistleblower’s lawyers.
CDC declined to test new coronavirus patient for days, California hospital says
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) initially declined to test a California patient for coronavirus because of narrow testing criteria, delaying the identification of a new possibly pivotal case, according to officials at the hospital treating the patient.
UC Davis Medical Center wrote in a memo to staff that the patient was transferred from another hospital on Feb. 19 with a suspected viral infection. The hospital requested coronavirus testing, but the CDC initially declined because the patient, who had not recently traveled to countries with outbreaks or been in contact with someone with the virus, did not meet the testing criteria.
It was not until Sunday that the CDC agreed to do a test, and the results then came back on Wednesday as positive.
In a statement on Thursday afternoon, the CDC said it is concerned by the reports but said their records showed the CDC only learned of the case on Sunday, and requested specimens for testing that same day.
Pelosi, Schumer insist on guardrails for coronavirus funds
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said lawmakers are close to a bipartisan agreement on emergency funding for the coronavirus response, but Democrats are insisting on specific guardrails.
In a joint statement, Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) said they are insisting that any emergency funding supplemental must be entirely new funding, “not stolen from other accounts.”
Pelosi and Schumer said they want to ensure President Trump “cannot transfer these new funds to anything other than the coronavirus and fighting infectious diseases.”
Also, they said the eventual vaccine must be made affordable.
In a press conference, Pelosi went after HHS Secretary Alex Azar for suggesting that the price of a vaccine was out of his control.
Pence taps career official to manage response
Vice President Pence on Thursday tapped longtime health official and ambassador-at-large Debbie Birx to serve as the White House coronavirus response coordinator.
Birx has worked for decades in the medical field, largely focusing on combating and preventing the spread of HIV/AIDS. The staffing move is likely intended to appease calls from many lawmakers for the Trump administration to appoint a “czar” to oversee the federal response to the coronavirus.
“She has deep experience in coordinating across agencies,” Pence’s office said in announcing Birx’s new role. “She has worked from the research bench to the clinic, but understands the primary focus must always be to reach the individuals most in need. She will bring her infectious disease, immunologic, vaccine research and interagency coordinating capacity to this position.
Birx currently serves as the ambassador-at-large for the State Department coordinating the U.S. efforts to combat HIV/AIDS. An Obama-era appointee, she has held that role since 2014.
And there was some big non-virus news in the House…
Bill banning menthol in cigarettes divides Democrats, with some seeing racial bias
A bill that would ban menthol flavoring in cigarettes is dividing House Democrats, with some arguing it unfairly targets African Americans and could lead police to target communities of color.
The measure, which the House will vote on Friday, is opposed by some members of the Congressional Black Caucus. House Majority Whip Rep. Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.), a prominent CBC member, also has concerns with the bill, he told reporters Thursday.
The bill, sponsored by Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Frank Pallone Jr. (D-N.J.) and Rep. Donna Shalala (D-Fla.), a former health secretary, is meant to reduce youth vaping rates by banning flavors like mint and mango in e-cigarettes. But it also bans flavors in all tobacco products, including menthol in cigarettes.
Congress shouldn’t “tell full-grown adults, those over 21, what they can and cannot do with a legal product,” said Rep. A. Donald McEachin (D-Va.), a member of the Congressional Black Caucus, who also cited concerns about policing communities of color.
“I’m not a smoker, so I would never smoke. But you know, for those who do, they ought to be able to smoke what they want to smoke,” he said.
Why it matters: Research shows tobacco companies targeted African Americans in their advertising of menthol cigarettes, leading to higher rates of use compared to white people. But that’s exactly why other members of the CBC support a ban.
“Our work to end the smoking epidemic is not simply a matter of public health,” said Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.), a member of the CBC, at a hearing in December.
“This is and always has been an issue of racial justice.”
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Top Trump advisers discuss GOP need to act on health care at retreat with senators
Two top advisers to President Trump on Wednesday discussed with GOP senators the need for Republicans to lower drug prices and act on health care costs ahead of the election, according to people familiar with the meeting.
The discussion came at a retreat for GOP senators on Wednesday, where Trump’s campaign manager Brad Parscale and adviser Jared Kushner spoke.
Kushner made a favorable mention of Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and his work on drug prices, according to a source familiar with the meeting. The White House is supporting a bill from Grassley and Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) to lower drug prices, but many GOP senators have pushed back on that measure as well, warning it comes too close to “price controls.”
Much of the discussion was more general and focused on the need to act from an electoral perspective, the sources said.
“Read the polls, for the American people it’s drug costs and price of health care overall,” Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) told The Hill when asked about the meeting.
What we’re reading
Most Coronavirus cases are mild. That’s good and bad news. (New York Times)
A single coronavirus case exposes a bigger problem: The scope of undetected U.S. spread is unknown (Stat News)
1 in 3 Americans worry about being able to afford health care, NBC News/Commonwealth Fund survey says (NBC News)
GoodRx saves money on meds–it also shares data with Google, Facebook, and others (Consumer Reports)
State by state
Anti-Medicare for All ad campaign launches in South Carolina (Politico)
A 13-year-old’s death highlights Puerto Rico’s post-Maria health care crisis (Vox.com)
Abbott says the homeless need mental health care. Advocates say Medicaid expansion would help (Texas Tribune)
The Hill op-eds
Xi Jinping, coronavirus and the new cold war
5 ways we can prepare for coronavirus
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