Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Viewpoints: Price Transparency Will Restore Trust In Health Care; Extreme Heat Is Killing Outdoor Workers
Reducing America’s outrageous health care costs is a top bipartisan priority of this Congress. The Patients Deserve Price Tags Act, a new bipartisan bill I introduced with Sen. John Hickenlooper (D-Colo.), can reverse runaway health expenditures that are burdening Americans of all backgrounds by requiring actual prices throughout the health care system. (Republican Kansas Sen. Roger Marshall, 8/20)
In the hottest regions of the country, such as Texas, where I live, the climate crisis is not only changing our world; it is also dividing it. When the heat spikes during the summer, we morph into a two-party state: the cooled and the cooked. (Jeff Goodell, 8/20)
Mental health treatment is expensive and hard to find, so it’s no surprise that people looking for empathy and care are turning to large language models like ChatGPT and Claude. Researchers are exploring and validating tailored artificial intelligence solutions to deliver evidence-based psychotherapies. Just recently, Slingshot AI, an a16z-backed company, launched “Ash,” marketing it as the first public AI-powered therapy service. (Tanzeem Choudhury and Dan Adler, 8/20)
America has moved from ignoring mental health to openly embracing it. That’s progress. But a new Illinois law, which makes schools — not parents — the gatekeepers of children’s mental health screenings, crosses a line into new territory, and the details on what exactly happens next are shockingly light. (8/19)