The judge overseeing two U.S. cases challenging mergers among four of the biggest health insurers gave up one, improving the odds for rulings on both tie-ups by the end of the year and reducing the chance they fall apart beforehand.

Last fall, a bladder condition forced Carmen Anguiano to leave her job at a packing shed in Salinas, a farming community off California’s Central Coast.

Tens of thousands more immigrant children in California are receiving full Medi-Cal benefits just a few months after a state law took effect that expanded their access to the government-subsidized health program.

Covered California, the state’s health insurance exchange, has released a draft of a waiver under Obamacare that must be approved by the federal government before the exchange can begin selling health plans to undocumented immigrants.

Even as the Affordable Care Act remains a political flash point, new research shows it is dramatically improving poor patients’ access to medical care in states that have used the law to expand their Medicaid safety net.

Big employers expect health costs to continue rising by about 6 percent in 2017, a moderate increase compared with historical trends that nevertheless far outpaces growth in the economy, two new surveys show.