The hospital lobby pushed back against the president’s executive order. The American Hospital Association said hospital mergers already are subject to an “enormous amount of rigorous scrutiny” from federal and state regulators. The lobby pointed the finger at the insurance industry, and urged the administration to focus its efforts there instead. The Federation of American ...

Dive Brief: * Telehealth claim lines as a percentage of all medical claims dropped 13% in April, marking the third straight month of declines, according to new data from nonprofit Fair Health. * The dip was greater than the drop of 5.1% in March, but not as large as the decrease of almost 16% in February. However, overall ...

A new study has found that COVID-19 vaccines may be somewhat vulnerable to the California “Epsilon” strain of virus. The variant has three spike protein mutations it uses to weaken current vaccines by up to 70 percent, according to researchers from University of Washington and the San Fransisco-based lab Vir Biotechnology. The strain’s mutations break down ...

The coronavirus has reliably disregarded all hopes that it would observe human holidays, deadlines or elections. Across California, evidence is once again accumulating that it responds only to caution and consistency. Despite high vaccination rates and low case numbers, the Bay Area saw infections rise quickly enough in recent weeks to rank on a federal ...

If you don’t spend your days on TikTok or Reddit, you may be blissfully unaware of a growing movement urging people to quit their jobs en masse this fall. It’s called “The Great Resignation of 2021,” and for businesses already struggling to attract workers back to the office it could spell very bad news. The social media ...

One hour after a 6.0-magnitude earthquake struck Northern California on Thursday, the California Hospital Assn. tweeted that it’s “time to update seismic standards — to focus on all the services people need after a disaster of any kind.” But the association’s tweet omitted that its proposal circulating in the state Capitol would actually weaken existing standards, ...