Under a new law, employees in California are guaranteed five paid sick days a year, two days more than previously. Worker advocacy groups say the benefit is needed, but business groups warn of additional costs.

Specialty drug costs keep going up for plan sponsors Here are a few considerations employers and their brokers and consultants need to take into account in the coming years.

Drugmakers including Pfizer (PFE.N), Sanofi (SASY.PA) and Takeda Pharmaceutical (4502.T) plan to raise prices in the United States on more than 500 drugs in early January, according to data analyzed by healthcare research firm 3 Axis Advisors. Excluding different doses and formulations, more than 140 brands of drugs will have their prices raised next month, the data showed. The expected ...

Although there’s been lower utilization of prescription medications, Medicaid spending on prescription drugs has increased, a recent report shows. The KFF report relied on 2016 to 2022 State Drug Utilization Data, as well as CMS-64 Financial Management Reports from fiscal year 2017 to fiscal year 2022. It comes as states unwind the continuous enrollment provision, which prevented ...

Nearly 20% of U.S. hospitals have been warned that they violated the federal price transparency rules that went into effect in 2021, according to a Dec. 20 report from Bloomberg.  Government regulators evaluated 1,750 hospitals as of early December, and about 1,300 have received warnings of rule violations, according to the report. Most corrected errors after ...

California’s hospitals are getting busier with more COVID-19 and flu patients, some of whom are suffering from both viruses at the same time. The simultaneous sickness is another wrinkle in an already hectic respiratory virus season. Although hospitals are not nearly as crowded as during the emergency phase of the pandemic, they are becoming increasingly ...