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 sprawling Alera Group, which has been rapidly expanding its employee benefits business through a series of acquisitions, has added four more brokerages. The deals, which were closed May 1st, expanding the company’s presence in California, the Midwest and the eastern U.S., giving it offices in more than 65 U.S. locations.
Gov. Jerry Brown opted not to include major long-term investments in public health insurance programs in his budget revision on Friday, citing a preference for one-time spending measures.
A new research letter reports that doctors who received free meals and other kinds of payments from pharmaceutical companies tended to prescribe more opioid painkillers to their patients over the course of a year. Meanwhile, doctors who didn't get such freebies cut back on their opioid prescriptions.
More than 100,000 undocumented adult immigrants in California would be eligible for state-subsidized health coverage under a major budget push announced by Assembly Democrats on Monday.
Health insurers are seeking lofty rate hikes for 2019 individual coverage as they grapple with new obstacles in the Affordable Care Act marketplace, including the zeroed-out mandate penalty and the potential influx of skimpy insurance policies.
Anger over rising health care prices is boiling over in California. But good long term results rarely emerge from a red-hot pot.
The city of Los Angeles accused top drugmakers and distributors Thursday of fueling the nation's opioid epidemic by engaging in deceptive marketing aimed at boosting sales of powerful, addictive painkillers such as OxyContin, methadone and fentanyl.
California’s leading gubernatorial candidates agree that health care should work better for Golden State residents: Insurance should be more affordable, costs are unreasonably high, and robust competition among hospitals, doctors and other providers could help lower prices, they told California Healthline.
California health regulators have allowed poor care to proliferate at nursing homes around the state, and the number of incidents that could cause serious injury or death has increased significantly in recent years, according to a stinging state audit released this week.
A California Democrat has introduced a proposal for Obamacare that Senate Republicans backed during their repeal and replace efforts last year. The legislation from Rep. Ami Bera would allow states to set up programs that automatically enroll people in Obamacare plans or in Medicaid, depending on which programs they qualify for. People would have 60 days to opt out of the health insurance.