From Washington, DC,

• Per a Congressional press release,
  • “Today, House Budget Committee Chairman Jodey Arrington (R-TX) and Senate Budget Committee Ranking Member Chuck Grassley (R-IA) spearheaded a letter to Congressional Budget Office (CBO) Director Phillip Swagel asking the CBO to analyze a new Medicare Part D Premium Stabilization Demonstration program that invites an unchecked taxpayer-funded bailout to paper over the flaws in the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA). 
  • Chairman Arrington and Ranking Member Grassley were joined by Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Mike Crapo (R-ID), House Energy and Commerce Committee Chair Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-WA), and House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith (R-MO).

• Kevin Moss, now writing in Federal News Network, provides advice on whether to pay an IRMAA tax to obtain Medicare Part B coverage when you are retired with FEHB coverage. He notes that “The only question is whether you expect to be at this high IRMAA level throughout retirement.” The IRMAA tax, which for 2024 is based on your 2022 adjusted gross income, can disappear following retirement. In contrast, the hefty Medicare Part B late enrollment penalty is forever. Planning is important.

• STAT News reports,
  • Covid caught the world flat-footed. No antiviral drugs were immediately available, and nearly two years would pass and over 800,000 Americans would die before the first pill, Paxlovid, was authorized. The Biden administration was determined not to be caught off guard again. In June 2021, it announced the Antiviral Program for Pandemics, or APP, for which $3.2 billion was to be spread across several government divisions and dozens of academic labs.  * * *
  • “That structure, STAT has learned, was never built. Just five months after the APP was announced, Omicron broke out, sending a seemingly waning pandemic into overdrive. When Congress refused to appropriate more funds to purchase variant-specific vaccines, the White House diverted money from the APP.”
  • The article goes onto to explain in depth why the APP is fizzling out.

• Per an HHS press release,
  • “The Biden-Harris Administration today continued its historic investment in health care coverage and the Affordable Care Act (ACA) by awarding a new round of $100 million to organizations vital to helping underserved communities, consumers, and small businesses find and enroll in quality, affordable health coverage through HealthCare.gov, the Health Insurance Marketplace®. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) is awarding the grants, in advance of this year’s Marketplace Open Enrollment (which begins November 1, 2024) to 44 Navigator grantees in states using HealthCare.gov. The grants are part of a commitment of up to $500 million over five years – the longest grant period and financial commitment to date, and a critical boost for recruiting trusted local organizations to better connect with those who often face barriers to obtaining health care coverage.”
  • That’s a lot of boxes of ziti as they would say on the Sopranos.
    
• Per MedTech Dive,
  • “Insulet received Food and Drug Administration clearance on Monday for its newest insulin pump to be used by people with Type 2 diabetes.
  • “The regulatory decision will bring to market the first automated insulin delivery (AID) system, also known as an “artificial pancreas,” for both Type 1 and Type 2 patients. By pairing Insulet’s Omnipod 5 pump with a continuous glucose monitor, the device will automatically adjust insulin delivery based on a person’s blood glucose levels. 
  • “Insulet’s new indication comes as other diabetes device makers target the Type 2 market. Tandem Diabetes Care is running a randomized controlled trial of its Control IQ AID system in people with Type 2 diabetes, which could lead to an expanded indication for its t:slim X2 and Mobi pumps. Meanwhile, Medtronic struck a partnership with Abbott to make a sensor that would pair with Medtronic’s insulin pumps, with the goal of expanding access to its AID algorithms.” 

From the public health and medical research front,

• The Wall Street Journal reports,
  • “Among Covid’s superlatives is the blow it dealt to people’s career plans en masse. 
  • “Never before have so many Americans redrawn their relationships with work as a result of one public-health crisis. More than four years after the pandemic began, some are still reckoning with how to balance their livelihoods and life with long Covid, the chronic condition doctors are still trying to understand. People at the height of careers in finance, technology and healthcare are operating without clarity on when, or if, they can resume the paths they once laid out.
  • “Covid just kicked me off the train while it was still moving,” said Amie Pascal, 47, who spent years climbing the ladder at a digital-marketing agency in Oregon before getting long Covid.
  • “Long Covid has pushed around one million Americans out of the labor force, economists estimate. More than 5% of adults in the U.S. have long Covid, and it is most prevalent among Americans in their prime working years. About 3.6 million people reported significantly modifying their activities because of the illness in a recent survey by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.”

• KFF offers expert observations on the newly approved Covid booster, while MedPage Today tells us that COVID Vaccine Myocarditis stays mild with a good prognosis over a year later as the evolution of postvaccine myocarditis was tracked for 18 months in a cohort study.

• The Washington Post alerts us,
  • “A rare but deadly disease spread by mosquitoes has nearly a dozen Massachusetts communities on alert, prompting some towns to close parks after dusk, restrict outdoor activities and reschedule public events.
  • “Massachusetts health officials this month confirmed the state’s first human case of the eastern equine encephalitis virus this year — a man in his 80s exposed in Worcester County, west of Boston. Ten communities are now designated at high or critical risk for the virus, health officials said Saturday. Plymouth, about 40 miles south of Boston, closed all public parks and fields from dusk until dawn, when mosquitoes are most active. Nearby, Oxford banned all outdoor activities on town property after 6 p.m.
  • “We have not seen an outbreak of EEE for four years in Massachusetts,” Robbie Goldstein, the state’s department of public health commissioner, said in a statement. “We need to use all our available tools to reduce risk and protect our communities. We are asking everyone to do their part.” * * *
  • “Residents are urged to use mosquito repellents, drain standing water around their homes, wear clothing that covers skin, and reschedule outdoor activities to avoid the hours between dusk and dawn.”

• STAT News points out,
  • “The U.N. health agency on Monday launched a six-month plan to help stanch outbreaks of mpox transmission, including ramping up staffing in affected countries and boosting surveillance, prevention and response strategies.
  • “The World Health Organization said it expects the plan from September through February next year will require $135 million in funding and aims to improve fair access to vaccines, notably in African countries hardest hit by the outbreak.

• MedTech Dive adds,
  • “Roche said it is working with partners to increase laboratory capacity for mpox testing worldwide.
  • “The push to support diagnosis of mpox comes days after the World Health Organization declared an outbreak of the viral disease a public health emergency of international concern. 
  • “A new strain of mpox is spreading rapidly in parts of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), the WHO said in a statement, and a coordinated international response is needed to stop outbreaks.”

• The Washington Post notes,
  • “For years, Amanda Smith and her husband were jolted awake at night by a buzz-buzz-beep — an alarm warning that her blood sugar was too high or too low. She would reach for juice boxes stored in her nightstand or fiddle with her pump to release a bolus of insulin.
  • “Smith, a 35-year-old nurse from London, Ontario, has Type 1 diabetes, which wipes out critical islet cells within the pancreas that produce insulin. Without them, Smith relied on vials of insulin from a pharmacy and constant vigilance to stay alive. “You have to pay attention to your diabetes, or you die.”
  • “On Valentine’s Day 2023, doctors transplanted replacement islet cells, grown in a lab from embryonic stem cells, into a blood vessel that feeds Smith’s liver. By August, she no longer needed insulin. Her new cells were churning it out.
  • “I just feel normal again,” Smith said. “You didn’t realize how much of your life it took up — until it’s taking up none, now.”
  • “Smith is at the forefront of a medical experiment that seeks to treat the root cause of diabetes by replacing the cells the disease destroys. It’s a key step forward in the long quest to develop a cure for diabetes and a front-runner to finally deliver the sci-fi promise that has enveloped the stem cell field for more than two decades.”

From the U.S. healthcare business front,

• Per Fierce Healthcare,
  • “McKesson plans to grow its oncology platform by investing nearly $2.5 billion into a community oncology clinic operator’s business and administrative services arm.
  • “Announced Monday, the deal sees Irving, Texas-based McKesson picking up a 70% stake in Community Oncology Revitalization Enterprise Ventures (Core Ventures), which was launched earlier this year by Florida Cancer Specialists & Research Institute (FCS).
  • “The Fort Myers, Florida-based institute is a group practice of over 250 physicians, 280 advanced practice providers and almost 100 Florida locations that will remain independent following the deal’s close. Its physician owners will retain their minority interest in Core Ventures.
  • “Pending closing conditions and regulatory clearances, Core Ventures would become part of McKesson’s oncology platform.”

• Per FiercePharma,
  • “When CVS Caremark removed AbbVie’s Humira from its national commercial formularies back in April, biosimilar prescriptions picked up at a whirlwind pace. Now, Cigna’s Express Scripts is following suit in a move that could further chip away at Humira’s market share.
  • “Express Scripts, which is Cigna’s pharmacy benefit unit, is removing branded Humira from its largest commercial formularies come 2025 in favor of biosimilar options from Teva, Sandoz and Boehringer Ingelheim.
  • “We’ve been thoughtful in developing a comprehensive approach that considers not just the formulary placement of biosimilars, but also each product’s clinical efficacy, interchangeability, available supply, dose, and concentration that will provide a seamless patient experience with these more affordable products,” Express Scripts president Adam Kautzner said in a release, adding that the company is “prepared to embrace the savings biosimilars offer.”
    
• STAT News discusses the impending launch of the over-the-counter glucose monitors.
  • “By the end of the summer, both Dexcom and Abbott will begin selling CGMs over the counter, without a prescription. Dexcom will start selling its CGM, called Stelo, on Monday. Abbott previously said it planned to release its version, called Lingo, before the end of the summer. The company told STAT it plans to launch and provide pricing details “soon.”
  • “The devices are being targeted at a huge swath of potential users: The nearly 100 million Americans with prediabetes (including the majority who don’t know it), people with type 2 diabetes who don’t use insulin, and even healthy people who want to keep an eye on their blood sugar levels. It’s a giant market for Abbott and Dexcom to tackle, and one especially welcomed by Dexcom, as it recently lowered sales guidance for its prescription CGMs. The companies are also betting that the frenzy over new weight loss drugs, GLP-1s, might generate more consumer interest in tracking glucose. 
  • “But the overall impact of the devices will depend a lot on how both clinicians and consumers decide to use them. “You’re looking at questions like affordability, how often patients are going to use this, whether they’re actually going to change their behavior and keep using it,” said Marie Thibault, a medical technology and digital health analyst at finance firm BTIG.” 

• TechTarget informs us that “New research shows that telehealth use varied widely by specialty type after the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, with telehealth utilization remaining high within mental healthcare and waning within cardiology.”

• The Society for Human Resource Management relates,
  • “Despite the importance of open enrollment, employees aren’t exactly thrilled about reviewing forms for health insurance and other benefits every fall.
  • “Nearly 7 in 10 benefits-eligible employees (67%) spend just 30 minutes or less reviewing their options during open enrollment, while 42% spend 20 minutes or less, according to a 2023 Voya Financial survey. And the overwhelming majority of employees (roughly 90%) choose the same options as they did the previous year, a report by insurance firm Aflac found.
  • “Choosing benefits is “extremely overwhelming for people,” said Christin Kuretich, vice president of supplemental products at Voya, a New York City-based financial and insurance firm. “It’s not something that people generally want to think about or take the time to focus on.” * * *
  • “It’s not that employees don’t care about benefits—they mostly feel overwhelmed, confused, and now cost-conscious, industry experts said. That’s where employers come in, as many have been falling short with their important task of communication.
  • “Educating employees on the importance of open enrollment is always a challenge,” said Jess Gillespie, head of product and underwriting at Prudential Group Insurance. “HR departments can be stretched thin and will sometimes lack the time and resources to communicate about all workplace benefits available, let alone noncore products such as supplemental health.”
  • “In short, Gillespie said, employers “need to ensure employees see the value” of benefits.”