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Dr. Anthony S. Fauci refused on Wednesday to answer questions from a Senate committee, repeatedly invoking his constitutional right not to incriminate himself before a panel dominated by hostile Republicans who accused him of causing the coronavirus pandemic and insinuated that he enriched himself while Americans died. “On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer based upon my rights under the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution,” Dr. Fauci repeated more than 100 times during a nearly three-hour hearing before the Senate Homeland Security Committee. (Stolberg, 7/29)

A Senate committee plans to vote next week on whether to recommend holding Anthony Fauci, MD, in contempt following a hearing on Wednesday that centered on how the infectious disease expert handled the COVID-19 pandemic as well as the origins of the deadly coronavirus. (Frieden, 7/29)

Besides the illness and death, the disruption and the loneliness, Americans remember the pandemic for its vitriol. The handling of Covid divided the parties, the states, families and neighbors and it’s taken years, in many cases, to repair the damage. Former Covid czar Anthony Fauci’s appearance on Capitol Hill Wednesday brought it all back. Rather than an evaluation of what went wrong and right, or how to do better next time, the rage stood out. (Paun, Levien and King, 7/29)

Dr. Anthony Fauci faced dozens of questions and theatrics Wednesday before the Senate's Homeland Security Committee. (Scribner, 7/29)

Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio) lobbed an expletive at Dr. Anthony Fauci during a Senate hearing Wednesday on the origins of and government response to the COVID-19 pandemic, in which the former White House chief medical adviser invoked his Fifth Amendment right. Moreno said he decided to run for office soon after learning that a woman was arrested at an Ohio middle school football game in 2020 for refusing to wear a mask, which was reportedly against the school’s policy at the time. (Davis, 7/29)

Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier said Wednesday he is launching a probe into Dr. Anthony Fauci after the longtime health official invoked the Fifth Amendment more than 100 times during a Senate hearing about the COVID-19 pandemic. “Fauci’s lack of candor to Congress is unbelievable,” Uthmeier wrote on social media. “My office is launching an investigation into Dr. Fauci. It’s past time we get the truth of what happened during COVID.” (Rego, 7/29)

Four Democratic lawmakers have questioned whether HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s family will profit from a sizeable settlement involving Merck's human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine (Gardasil). In a letter dated July 28, Democratic Sens. Elizabeth Warren (Mass.), Angela Alsobrooks (Md.), Richard Blumenthal (Conn.) and Andy Kim (N.J.) wrote, "We are seeking clarity on whether this settlement may have resulted in a significant financial award to one of your sons, raising fresh concerns about conflicts of interest you may possess" as HHS Secretary. (Firth, 7/29)

Sens. Jim Banks (R-Ind.) and Andy Kim (D-N.J.) on Wednesday introduced legislation that attempts to improve identification and treatment for children who stutter, with an assist from former NBA player Michael Kidd-Gilchrist. The legislation, titled the Kidd’s Stuttering Act, proposes directing the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) to add stuttering and fluency screening measures to its core set of pediatric health quality measures by 2028. (Rego, 7/29)

Two leading Democrats on the U.S. Senate committee that oversees transportation safety pressed the nation’s regulator of buses on Wednesday to provide proof it can detect troubled private companies that provide services to schools and municipalities. (Sanders and Mariano, 7/29)

One year after the Republican-led Congress imposed new work requirements for adults receiving food stamps, the number of low-income Missourians who use the program has dropped by nearly 50,000. (Erickson, 7/29)

Starting next week, Nebraskans on Medicaid will be at risk of losing their health coverage unless the state can verify that they work, volunteer, or attend school for 80 hours per month. Come January, millions of other low-income Americans will face the same cliff. (Cueto, 7/30)

Here’s a costly pop quiz: If you’re delivering a baby at, let’s say, HCA HealthONE Rose Medical Center in Denver, how much is it going to cost? If you answered “It depends” or, ultimately, “I don’t know,” you win the game but also understand one way consumers lose in the healthcare system. (Ingold, 7/29)

By the end of 2020, Kentucky’s newly elected Gov. Andy Beshear had one goal above all others: Keep people alive. The state was battling two merciless threats. COVID-19 was killing hundreds of people each month, and deadly drug overdoses were among the highest in the nation. Calling addiction a disease that breeds in isolation, Beshear worried people would stop seeking treatment for fear of contracting COVID-19. (Acquisto and Six, 7/30)

���ϳԹ��� News: Medicaid Insurers’ Contracts On The Line In Tight Governor’s Race

One of America’s most competitive gubernatorial races could settle a heated argument over whether private insurance companies should run Medicaid. The race is in Iowa, whose Medicaid program has been plagued with controversy since 2016, when the state hired national insurance companies to manage billions of dollars’ worth of benefits. That shift was made by then-Gov. Terry Branstad, a Republican. With his executive order, Iowa joined most other states in privatizing the management of Medicaid, which covers healthcare for more than 67 million Americans with low incomes or disabilities. (Leys, 7/30)

The Federal Trade Commission, along with Utah and California authorities, sued telehealth company Hims & Hers, alleging it misled consumers about privacy, billing and subscription practices. The FTC alleges that Hims & Hers shared consumers’ sensitive health information, including medical conditions, with third-party advertising platforms, despite claiming that its services maintain consumers’ privacy. The case was joined by officials in Utah and Los Angeles County. (Landi, 7/29)

Young life scientists have been increasingly abandoning academia, a seismic shift that has fueled calls for rethinking graduate education. On Wednesday, the Trump administration announced that it’s funding a pilot program to test a new strategy: Giving Ph.D. students industry experience — and dollars — as part of their training. (Wosen, 7/29)

Chelsea Adolphus had been bleeding for a week. She told Danny Gyal, her best friend, that it was like a period that wouldn’t end. It was getting worse, and she felt so weak she couldn’t stand. Adolphus’ mother eventually convinced her to call 911, and early on the morning of January 22, 2025, an ambulance took her to the only emergency room in town: Vista Medical Center East. After so much blood loss, the 28-year-old was disoriented and anemic. Staff at the Waukegan, Illinois, hospital examined her and noted symptoms of alcohol withdrawal. They gave her Ativan and had her settle in for monitoring. (Levintova and Cleek, 07/29)

A first-of-its-kind U.S. study suggests invasive mold infections may be an underappreciated — and potentially deadly — threat. The researchers detected about 450 cases in Atlanta-area hospitals over five years. About a third of the patients died in the hospital. The findings, published this week by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, come from an attempt to better gauge how common these kinds of illnesses are. The government does not require doctors to report the illnesses. (Stobbe, 7/29)

CMS issued its fiscal year 2027 final payment rules for skilled nursing facilities and inpatient psychiatric facilities July 29. The rules update Medicare payment rates and revise quality reporting, value-based purchasing and patient assessment policies. (Condon, 7/29)

Medicare reimbursements to skilled nursing facilities will rise 2.4% in fiscal 2027 under a final rule the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services published Wednesday. The agency finalized the same payment update it proposed in April. Nursing homes got a 3.2% payment hike this year.The reimbursement update reflects a 3.3% gross increase based on expenses from the skilled nursing facility market basket, minus a 0.9 percentage point productivity adjustment. The fiscal year begins Oct. 1. (Early, 7/29)

GE HealthCare reported double-digit revenue growth in the second quarter of 2026 on the strength of record growth in orders, products and services, despite poor performance in its patient care services segment, which faces an uncertain future with the company. Organic revenue growth for the Chicago-based medical imaging company was up 3.5%, with record organic orders growth of 11.1%, book-to-bill ratio of 1.15 and backlog of $23.9 billion. (Asplund, 7/29)

A rise in uninsured patients and challenges in specialized care are increasing the financial pressure on large for-profit health systems. A growing number of patients are dropping their insurance coverage under the Affordable Care Act, and a greater-than-expected portion of those patients are staying uninsured. The shift in payer mix is leading to lost revenue and higher levels of uncompensated care. Weaker surgical volumes and higher expenses tied to specialized physicians are adding to the obstacles. (Hudson, 7/29)

The major health insurance company most reliant on Medicare Advantage is changing course and pulling back from the program, Humana Chief Financial Officer Celeste Mellet said Wednesday. Humana will exit underperforming geographic markets next year and shed 600,000 beneficiaries as it confronts high costs and tightened profit margins, Mellet said during a call with investor analysts to announce the company’s second-quarter earnings. (Tepper, 7/29)

Employers are chewing on strategies to avoid costly lawsuits over their employee wellness programs. Dozens of corporations including JPMorgan Chase and Walmart have been sued due to their health plans’ execution of tobacco cessation programs. A former Comcast employee sued the cable and internet company this month, for instance. Health plans can charge employees that use tobacco products up to 50% more in premiums in some states to encourage healthier behavior. But companies must offer a reasonable alternative workers can utilize to receive lower-cost insurance, and plaintiffs allege the programs fail to meet key criteria. (Tong, 7/29)

���ϳԹ��� News: Listen To The Latest ‘���ϳԹ��� News Minute’

Zach Dyer reads this week’s news: Health insurance companies promised to make it easier to get doctor-ordered care, but patients are still waiting. Plus, a common surgery might not be the best way to solve knee pain. (7/30)

For decades, efforts to develop non-opioid pain drugs were marked by failure. But what was once a graveyard of drug discovery is quickly turning into a race for a multibillion-dollar market, with Latigo Biotherapeutics publishing positive data on Wednesday for a therapy meant to rival a Vertex medicine already on the market. (Wosen, 7/29)

An FDA panel said that trial data did not provide substantial evidence showing that investigational deramiocel was effective in treating cardiomyopathy among patients with Duchenne muscular dystrophy. In a 9-3 vote, the FDA's Cellular, Tissue, and Gene Therapies Advisory Committee said deramiocel did not meet the cardiac endpoint, though the primary outcome of the drug's phase III HOPE-3 trial was change in upper limb function. (George, 7/29)

Antihistamines hold only a slight benefit for atopic dermatitis (eczema) and shouldn't be routinely used in management, a network meta-analysis concluded. For moderate to severe atopic dermatitis, adding a first-generation H1 antihistamine had no significant impact on severity of the condition or itch severity compared with placebo, found Derek K. Chu, MD, PhD, of McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, and colleagues. (Phend, 7/29)

Artificial intelligence primary care platform Doctronic has acquired Summer Health. The deal allows Doctronic to expand into pediatric primary care. Summer Health’s virtual care platform offers on-demand access to pediatricians via text messages. Doctronic’s platform uses chatbots for health-related questions and intake, and offers consultations with human physicians. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed. (Famakinwa, 7/29)

While the recent artificial intelligence boom in healthcare may belie a much shorter history for the technology, scientists and computer programmers paved the way for today’s frenzied pace of development beginning in the 1950s. Several academic institutions began developing AI systems for diagnostic purposes in the early 1970s. Some of the early experiments fizzled. The last several years have seen massive financial investments into AI-focused healthcare companies, and widespread adoption of ambient AI scribes and other tools throughout the industry. (Famakinwa, 7/29)

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is failing to provide adequate healthcare at a new detention center in California City, according to a report from an independent monitor at the facility, where detainees complained of missing medications and months-long delays to cancer treatment. The findings appear in a report by Dr. Muthusamy Anandkumar, a court-appointed monitor of the California City Immigration Processing Center, which is about 75 miles east of Bakersfield and run by the private prison company CoreCivic. The federal government purchased the facility earlier this month but CoreCivic continues to operate it. (Duara, 7/29)

A veterans' hospital has launched a new treatment to help veterans who have overactive bladders and urinary incontinence. VA Augusta Health Care System has become the first hospital in Georgia and the second VA Medical Center in the nation to offer the Altaviva implant, a device that changes how the brain and bladder communicate. (Plummer, 7/30)

Baltimore City plans to expand its street-based overdose response efforts and provide more information about how millions of dollars from its Opioid Restitution Fund are being spent. (Pryce, 7/29)

A man who gave his son the gun used to kill two students and two teachers at Appalachee High School in Georgia is set to be sentenced Thursday after he was convicted of second-degree murder and involuntary manslaughter. Colin Gray’s sentencing comes just days after his 16-year-old son, Colt Gray, pleaded guilty to murder and other charges and was sentenced to serve life in prison without the possibility of parole for the Sept. 4, 2024, shooting at the school about 45 miles (73 kilometers) northeast of Atlanta. (Brumback, 7/30)

For more than two decades, Vincent McFadden has been sitting on Missouri’s death row. He’s watched a steady stream of his friends get marched off to their executions — and he’s waiting for his own as he fights in court to spare his life. (Moore, 7/29)

Maryland has recorded 38 heat-related deaths so far this summer, already surpassing last year’s total of 36, according to data from the Maryland Department of Health. It is the highest number since 2012, when the state recorded 46 heat-related deaths, largely tied to a windstorm event. (Pilsbury, 7/29)

As North Carolina weathers one of its worst droughts in more than 18 years, farmers are seeing the results in withering yields of corn, fruits and other crops. This has affected their bottom line, to be sure, but the effects are more widespread. Hunger relief programs that rely on local produce can’t buy as much at the slightly higher prices that small farmers are having to charge to stay afloat. (Lopez, 7/30)

Everybody Counts will be launching a survey and community forums to create a Northwest Indiana report card for accessibility for people with disabilities and senior citizens. Indiana state officials are in the process of writing a plan for what people with disabilities and senior citizens need for independent living, said Teresa Torres, the director of Everybody Counts. (Kukulka, 7/29)

For a long time, reaching out for help felt insurmountable. Through her job, Monica Paz had seen firsthand the discrimination faced by trans women survivors at mainstream domestic violence service organizations. (Mithani, 7/29)

Longtime obstetrician Susan Sheridan understands well that on-call coverage is part of her vocation. But with the number of OB-GYNs who serve Wyoming’s second-largest city plunging from an average of six to just two, the schedule has become overwhelming. “When there’s five of us, every fifth day you’re responsible for ER coverage and consults, in addition to whatever you have scheduled in your day,” Sheridan said. “At this point, it’s now every other day for my partner and I to cover that.” (Klingsporn, 7/29)

���ϳԹ��� News: Abortion Drug Law In Louisiana Heightens Hemorrhage Risk For Pregnant Patients

Over the past decade, Louisiana hospitals began stocking specialized carts designed to treat hemorrhages, one of the most common pregnancy complications in the state. The plug-in cart can be wheeled from room to room and holds surgical tools and lifesaving medications to stem blood loss. A state law passed in 2024 forced hospitals to remove a key drug — misoprostol — from the medical cart and keep it locked in a secure room designated for controlled substances. (Parker, 7/30)

Rates of high blood pressure during pregnancy have soared across the country, according to new CDC data. High blood pressure is associated with serious complications for mom and baby. (Mallenbaum, 7/29)

So far, pregnancies among the first women treated with chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy for autoimmune rheumatologic diseases have proceeded without any concerns, researchers reported. (Gever, 7/29)

Periurethral application of a smaller amount of estradiol cream with a finger was noninferior to standard intravaginal application with an applicator among postmenopausal patients with recurrent urinary tract infections (UTIs), the TAPER randomized trial found. (Robertson, 7/29)

Screening for human papillomavirus (HPV) remains an effective way to find high-risk strains of HPV early. With self-sample HPV testing kits, women can collect their own swab instead of having a doctor or nurse conduct the test. Two studies examine how women respond to HPV self-sampling testing and find that, when it’s offered, women prefer it. The self-collecting tests could encourage more HPV screening in populations missed in annual screenings. (Holohan, 7/29)

Attorneys for Lindsay Clancy, the Massachusetts woman on trial for strangling her three young children in 2023, argued before a jury Tuesday that Clancy should not be held criminally responsible for their deaths. The 35-year-old former labor and delivery nurse, they said, had been experiencing postpartum psychosis, a rare and dangerous medical condition that alters a person’s perception of reality after childbirth. (Migdon, 7/29)

Cases of cyclosporiasis, an intestinal illness caused by a parasite, have topped 18,000 in 45 states, according to updated data Wednesday from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Since May 1, at least 6,707 cases have been laboratory-confirmed, including 423 hospitalizations, the CDC noted. (Benadjaoud, 7/29)

It’s been a choppy year for restaurants that lean into lettuce. Lettuce prices rose sharply in the first half of 2026 due to hot weather in Arizona, where about one-third of America’s lettuce is grown. Now, restaurants are dealing with the fallout from a cyclospora outbreak linked to shredded lettuce that has sickened thousands of Americans. (Durbin, 7/30)

This year has the potential to be the worst in the U.S. in two decades for West Nile virus, a pathogen that mostly lives and breeds among birds and mosquitoes but can cause a deadly neurological disease in humans. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has reported 113 cases of West Nile virus in humans as of last Friday — the highest midyear count in more than two decades, noted Dr. Matt Willis, a former Marin County health officer who now writes a Substack on public health statewide called Your Local Epidemiologist. (Allday, 7/29)

Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said Wednesday her department will invest $25 million towards opening a new sterile fly dispersal facility in Arizona to combat New World Screwworm (NWS). During a visit to the Grand Canyon State, Rollins joined Arizona GOP Reps. Andy Biggs, Juan Ciscomani and Eli Crane to tout the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) containment work ahead of the reopening of the southern cattle port in Douglas, Arizona. (Rego, 7/29)

Long COVID affected roughly 3% to 5% of healthcare workers at three Spanish hospitals from 2020 to 2023, with prevalence increasing with age and in some occupational groups, according to a new study published in BMC Public Health. For the study, a team led by researchers at the Center for Research in Occupational Health at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona and the Center for Biomedical Research Network of Epidemiology and Public Health in Madrid analyzed occupational health registry data from 8,441 healthcare workers diagnosed as having COVID-19 at three public hospitals from 2020 through 2023. (Bergeson, 7/29)

The fastest growing Ebola outbreak ever recorded is leaving thousands more people hungry in eastern Congo, a region engulfed in conflicts and a fight over precious minerals, the head of the U.N. food agency warned on Wednesday. The World Food Program’s acting executive director, Carl Skau, told The Associated Press during a visit to the hard-hit Ituri province that the outbreak is a “crisis on top of a crisis” that has compounded a catastrophic situation with over 5 million Congolese already experiencing emergency-level food insecurity. (Same Bagalwa, Ngorora and Lederer, 7/29)

About 12,000 pounds of smoked bacon imported from Canada were recalled because of lack of proper reinspection before entering the country, the Agriculture Department’s Food Safety and Inspection Service said. The bacon from Maple Leaf Foods was shipped to grocery distributors and retailers in Idaho, Oregon and Washington state. FSIS inspects imported products for packaging, documentation, condition and contamination. (Canino-Quiñones, 7/29)

Marijuana may help you unwind — but using it too often could have the opposite effect on your stress response. Researchers say adults who use pot frequently wake up with higher levels of cortisol, also known as the "stress hormone." (7/24)

Results should spark practice change in centers that still use standard fractionation. (Bassett, 7/27)

St. Jude Children's Research Hospital scientists have uncovered a regulatory mechanism for signaling of Sonic Hedgehog (SHH), a pathway essential for embryonic development. The findings, published in Nature Communications, provide insight into how this pathway may be modulated in diseases such as cancer. (7/28)

Microglia are the most common immune cells in the brain, where they defend against intruders and engulf damaged neurons. Now, scientists at Columbia's Zuckerman Institute have discovered for the first time that, just like human neurons, human microglia mature especially slowly compared with microglia in other animals. "This slow development may help human microglia influence the human brain in ways that enable our powerful cognitive abilities," said Carlos Diaz-Salazar, Ph.D., the lead author of a new Neuron study on the subject, who took part in this research while at the lab of Franck Polleux, Ph.D. (7/27)

In a recent study, scientists devised a way of reversing the buildup of compounds that lead to some age-related diseases. (Callaway, 7/24)

Care will be in shorter supply, travel distances will stretch farther, and high-risk situations will more likely result in tragedy. (Keith Humphreys, 7/29)

Bailing out insurance companies in response to a policy error is no way to run a health care system. (7/30)

As Lindsay Clancy’s murder trial unfolds in Massachusetts, postpartum psychosis remains dangerously misunderstood and undertreated. (Nadia Ghent, 7/30)

Despite a lead in AI, America is falling behind in the biotech race. (Alina Polyakova and Kiana Aran, 7/29)

When I met Tesfaye at Boru Meda General Hospital, he vaguely remembered the thorn. He was 15 when it pricked his foot, out in the fields somewhere in Mekdela, in north-central Ethiopia. He had noticed it in passing, then forgot about it. Seventeen years later, that prick had severely damaged his foot, destroying its bones. (Borna Nyaoke-Anoke, 7/30)