The White House quickly named a new leader of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) after Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. pushed out Director Susan Monarez this week. Jim O’Neill, a senior Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) official with deep ties to President Trump donor Peter Thiel, will take over the agency amid ...

Prior authorization is similar to how private insurers operate, often resulting in a delay or denial of treatments

GLP-1 agonists — including semaglutides like Ozempic and Wegovy and tirzepatides like Mounjaro and Zepbound — were originally intended to treat type 2 diabetes and obesity. But in recent months, studies have shown that these popular medications can have numerous other health benefits. Some have even claimed that GLP-1s could eventually become the new “everything drug.” Dr. ...

Accountable care organizations saved Medicare $2.4 billion last year, according to new federal data. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services released (PDF) the latest results from the Medicare Shared Savings Program, which shows that 75% of the 476 participating ACOs earned $4.1 billion in performance payments. These organizations represent 80% of the 10.3 million beneficiaries assigned ...

This year’s updated Covid-19 vaccines have been approved by the US Food and Drug Administration for adults 65 and older and younger people with certain medical conditions that put them at a higher risk of a severe Covid-19 infection. Although federal officials have emphasized that people who want a Covid-19 vaccine can get one after ...

Benefits advisors and self-funded clients are entering a challenging renewal season. “Stop-loss premium increases in 2026 are likely to be the biggest in recent memory, and it’s because of increasingly frequent and severe high-dollar claims,” Richard Fleder, a longtime investor and executive in the self-funded space, recently told me. The stop-loss market grew to $35.4 ...