Last week, the House passed the bipartisan HR 7666, the Restoring Hope for Mental Health and Well-Being Act of 2022. The bill contains a five-year extension, from 2022 to 2027, of Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA) coverage for Health Center Volunteer Health Professionals. HR 7666 now moves to the Senate for consideration.

Legislation aimed at curbing several pharmacy benefit manager (PBM) practices such as spread pricing cleared a key obstacle to passage in the Senate last week. The Senate Committee on Commerce advanced 19-9 the Pharmacy Benefit Manager Transparency Act on Wednesday to the full Senate. The package is the latest bid by Congress and the federal government to ramp up scrutiny of the industry. “Pharmacy benefit managers [are] a middleman in the drug pricing supply chain,” said Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Washington, the lead sponsor of the legislation alongside Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa. “Today, three PBMs control 80% of the prescription drug market, operating out of the view of regulators and consumers.” The legislation would prohibit several PBM practices such as reducing or clawing back reimbursement payments to pharmacies and charging pharmacies more to offset federal reimbursements. It would also prohibit the use of spread pricing, wherein a PBM will reimburse pharmacies at one price for a product and the health plan for another.

Drug overdose deaths have risen sharply in Pennsylvania in recent years, and the General Assembly is taking harm-reduction efforts more seriously than in the past. Last week, the House unanimously passed a bill, HB1393, that would legalize fentanyl test strips for personal use so drug users could know the purity of their substances. The strips are currently classified as drug paraphernalia and illegal. Pennsylvania is third in the nation for overdose drug deaths, with 5,360 people dying in 2021. A report from the attorney general’s office blames the increase in overdose death rates on fentanyl displacing heroin in the commonwealth’s drug supply. The report called for legalizing test strips as well as more treatment programs. The bill awaits further action in the Senate.

 A recent ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court changes federal protections for reproductive health care services to a decision made at the state level.  To help patients and providers better understand quickly changing policies, the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services created a site to explain access to care for those with and without insurance coverage.  Research has shown rural-urban disparities in unintended pregnancies as well as an ongoing decline in obstetric services in rural areas.

  Investment in rural maternal care is a featured priority of the new all-of-government approach to high rates of maternal mortality across the United States.  The plan announced last week stresses more staff and capabilities for rural obstetrics and increased funding of the HRSA/FORHP-supported Rural Maternity and Obstetrics Management Strategies Program.  A 2019 study from the Rural Health Research Gateway found a greater number of potentially life-threatening complications with childbirth in rural areas.

A recent article in the Patient Safety and Quality Insider newsletter highlights a health system model developed as a result of a national study of women aged 18 to 44 showing that complicated pregnancies are growing more prevalent in the United States, rising by 16.4% from 2014 to 2018. The same study, which looked at 1.8 million pregnancies, revealed that childbirth complications increased by about 14% from 2014 to 2018.

The Public Health Communications Collaborative has updated its Toolkit on Children and COVID-19 Vaccination to include a new chart to help parents understand the dose and timing of both the Pfizer and Moderna vaccine for children 6 months to 17 years of age.

In 2021, only 12% of physicians practiced in rural areas yet 20% of the U.S. population resides in rural areas. Listen to a podcast discussion about the rural health workforce with Tom Morris, Associate Administrator of HRSA’s Federal Office of Rural Health Policy, and Jessica Nicholson, senior economist at The Conference Board’s Committee for Economic Development. Learn about the unique challenges rural residents face in accessing quality health care and HRSA programs that are working to increase health equity and access in rural communities. Listen for free through The Conference Board.

The nation’s largest physician group—the American Medical Association—is joining calls by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and others for the FDA to make birth control pills accessible over the counter. With abortion rights in flux, physicians are joining reproductive health advocates in urging increased access to oral contraceptives, which could join already approved emergency contraceptives, like Plan B, on pharmacy shelves. Read more.

Earlier this month, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) issued its first fines against hospitals for failure to comply with the price transparency regulation. While the rule went into effect on January 1, 2021, it is widely believed that compliance is low. This month’s fines are the first sign that CMS is getting serious about enforcement.