Month: February 2022
California became the first state to formally shift to an “endemic” approach to the coronavirus with Gov. Gavin Newsom’s announcement Thursday of a plan that emphasizes prevention and quick reaction to outbreaks over mandated masking and business shutdowns.
Just 3% of white collar workers want to return to the office five days a week, according to a poll by management consultancy Advanced Workplace Associates, which warned employees will quit if bosses force them back full-time.
The board of Covered California has agreed to hire Jessica Altman — the Pennsylvania insurance commissioner — to succeed Peter Lee as CEO. Lee, the outgoing Covered California CEO, has been leading the public health insurance exchange for more than 10 years and helped oversee the launch of its website in late 2013. Lee announced plans ...
With prospects dim for the U.S. to adopt a single-payer “Medicare for All” program, health care reform advocates turned instead to an insurance plan designed by the government that could compete with private insurance plans sold on the health care exchanges. The idea behind this “public option” is that it could ultimately expand health care ...
Medi-Cal, the state’s safety net health program, isn’t free for everyone. More than half a million of California’s lowest-income children, pregnant individuals and working disabled adults are required to pay health insurance premiums, ranging from $13 a month to as much as $350. That may change this year under two proposals being floated in Sacramento. ...
As some of the biggest U.S. employers lift mask mandates for vaccinated workers, other companies are going even further and discarding requirements that employees get their COVID-19 shots. Germany’s Adidas told its U.S. workers on Monday that it would no longer require they get vaccinated against the virus. “Though no longer required, we strongly encourage all employees to ...
Lawmakers aren’t eager to spend big — again — on a pandemic many would just as soon declare over. President Joe Biden’s cabinet members and public health experts say they are running out of money to battle Covid-19 and need tens of billions more dollars to continue vaccination, testing and medicine distribution efforts at home ...
Average daily COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations are continuing to fall in the U.S., an indicator that the omicron variant’s hold is weakening across the country. Total confirmed cases reported Saturday barely exceeded 100,000, a sharp downturn from around 800,850 five weeks ago on Jan. 16, according to Johns Hopkins University data. In New York, the ...
The number of kids covered by Medicaid or the Children’s Health Insurance Program has soared to a record 40 million during the pandemic, aided by a congressional provision that bars states from disenrolling them during the public health emergency. However, at least 6.7 million children are at risk of losing that coverage and going uninsured for a period ...
Several major payer groups and Medicaid advocates are pressing Congress for a 120-day heads up when the COVID-19 public health emergency ends, arguing they need as much time as possible to make Medicaid enrollees aware they could lose coverage. A collection of payer and Medicaid state advocacy groups wrote to congressional leadership on Thursday asking ...