California Watch
News stories in this section spotlight activities in California, including actions by the state Assembly and state Senate; proposed legislation; regulators like the Department of Managed Health Care and Department of Insurance; and the state ACA exchange, Covered California.
The aim is aspirational: Hospital executives shouldn’t make more than the president of the United States. Next spring, Los Angeles city voters will have a chance to put the brake on runaway salaries by capping hospital executives’ pay at $450,000 a year. The measure, proposed by a local union and approved by the City Council in June, ...
California’s largest public hospital plans to start notifying 43,000 former patients Monday that they may be eligible for refunds or billing corrections, part of what advocates called a major legal settlement that will help force the hospital to fulfill its charity care obligations. Santa Clara Valley Medical Center, along with other units of county-owned Santa ...
Two major San Jose hospitals may have been impacted by a wide-ranging cyber attack that exposed patient names, ZIP codes, phone numbers and other private information from one of America’s largest healthcare providers. The list of affected facilities includes Good Samaritan Hospital and Regional Medical Center, which are both owned by the Tenessee-based HCA Healthcare. ...
A monthslong investigation into a rural California warehouse uncovered an illegal laboratory filled with infectious agents, medical waste and hundreds of mice bioengineered “to catch and carry the COVID-19 virus,” according to Fresno County authorities. Health and licensing said Monday that Prestige Biotech, a Chinese medical company registered in Nevada, was operating the unlicensed facility ...
California has one of the highest rates of Alzheimer’s disease in the country, according to a new study. Why it matters: It’s critical for public health officials, policymakers and others to have a clear look at the number of Alzheimer’s cases in a given area, the authors say — in part because caring for those with ...
California’s highest court has revived a high-profile lawsuit that could have a major impact on whether insurers can punish physicians who refer patients to out-of-network providers. The case, which has bounced around courts in the Golden State since 2012, pits the nearly 50,000-member California Medical Association (CMA) against Aetna, one of the nation’s largest health ...
About 225,0000 Californians lost their free or low-cost health coverage as of July 1, in the first round of a Medi-Cal renewal process that had been suspended since early in the COVID-19 pandemic. That’s approximately 21% of the over 1 million people who were due to reapply for coverage in June, according to preliminary numbers ...
Republican members of California’s congressional delegation, this week sent a letter to Gov. Gavin Newsom, urging him to end the state tax on health savings accounts. Dubbed HSAs, these accounts allow someone to set aside money on a pre-tax basis to pay for qualified medical expenses.
A major proposal from Gov. Gavin Newsom to overhaul the state’s behavioral and mental health system is likely to take nearly $720 million away from services provided by county governments annually, according to a new analysis from the Legislative Analyst’s Office. Although that money would be reallocated within the system, in part to house homeless individuals with severe ...
As the state verifies eligibility for its Medicaid program after a pandemic pause, up to 2.8 million Californians could be kicked off the rolls, officials say.