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Bills to tighten abortion regulations advance in Texas, La.

As Texas senators gave final approval Tuesday to a bill requiring doctors to conduct sonograms before performing abortions, moving it closer to the governor's desk, a new fight is ramping up over another abortion-related bill.

6 May 2011

Colo. legislature close to final consideration of health exchange bill

Colorado's health insurance exchange bill is sailing toward final approval with backers hailing the measure as the only successful bipartisan exchange legislation in the country.

6 May 2011

Savings projected from 'emerging' generic drugs

But the Federal Trade Commission found an "unprecedented" increase in drug industry deals to delay the availability of these cheaper drugs.

6 May 2011

Viewpoints: Gov. Daniels's reversal?; IPAB's Medicare fix; Texas Medicaid cuts

Centrist Republicans loved it when began urging the party to keep its eye on the deficit-reduction prize and stop obsessing about social issues. ... He then went home and announced that he would sign a bill to strip Planned Parenthood of Medicaid financing. ... Daniels's moderate fans thought abortion was precisely the issue he was calling on Republicans to set aside. Right now, the new Republican majority in the House of Representatives can barely talk about anything else.

6 May 2011

Roundup: Vt. House vote on universal health care could come today; Calif. group warns of rising costs of retiree health care and pensions

The House is slated Thursday to take up a conference committee report on a bill designed to put the state on the path to universal health care by 2017 if not sooner. The bill sets up a new Green Mountain Care Board to design a system to provide health insurance to every Vermont resident.

6 May 2011

A new round of deficit talks begins amidst roadblocks, debt-ceiling concerns

How to handle entitlement spending issues including Medicare will be central to the discourse. Meanwhile, AARP launches a campaign to protect Medicare in the midst of it all.

5 May 2011

First Edition: May 5, 2011

Kaiser Health News staff writer Jessica Marcy recently spoke with Dan Hawkins, the association's senior vice president, about the future and finances of community health centers and their evolving budgets.

5 May 2011

Conrad views $4T budget savings blueprint as counterpoint to House-passed GOP plan

The plan is said to contain "modest" Medicare savings. Meanwhile, Politico reports that the "window" of opportunity for the so-called "gang of six," which is working on a separate track to craft budget solutions and also includes Conrad, is getting smaller.

5 May 2011

Headache disorders prevalent but under-treated and cause financial burden, WHO report says

Approximately half to three quarters of adults ages 18 to 65 experienced headache last year, making headache disorders one of the most prevalent but under-treated health problems in the world, according to a report released Tuesday by the WHO, Xinhua reports.

5 May 2011

States are battlegrounds for Planned Parenthood funding, abortion issues

Speaker John Boehner has thus far refused to make social issues central in his agenda, focusing instead on spending and the debt. But the House today will briefly wade into the social wars of the 1990s, bringing up a controversial anti-abortion bill. The measure, which is expected to pass, would prohibit federal funding for abortions and create new controls on private companies that offer insurance plans that cover abortions.

5 May 2011

Congressional Republicans advance legislation to repeal Medicaid maintenance-of-effort provisions

The measure's supporters say it would lead to savings for the federal government of nearly $3 billion over the next five years.

5 May 2011

U.N. report forecasts global population increases through 2100

The world's population "is expected to grow from nearly 6.9 billion currently to 9.3 billion by 2050 and 10.1 billion by 2100," the U.N. said in a report on Tuesday, the Associated Press reports, noting that the U.N. uses the projections "to devise and fund programs for problems ranging from climate change to maternal mortality".

5 May 2011

Rural Doc becomes federally certified to use electronic health records

Kansas Health Institute News: Rural Kansas Doc Becomes Perhaps Nation's First Certified EHR User.

5 May 2011

AARP launches campaign to preserve health and retirement security of older Americans

With the national debate heating up on raising the debt ceiling, AARP announced a new campaign today to fight against proposals with arbitrary limits, caps or triggers that would result in harmful cuts to critical Social Security and Medicare benefits that millions of Americans have earned through a lifetime of hard work.

5 May 2011

Study explores impact of environmental toxins on health care costs and childhood morbidity

In three new studies published in the May issue of the journal Health Affairs, Mount Sinai School of Medicine researchers reveal the staggering economic impact of toxic chemicals and air pollutants in the environment, and propose new legislation to mandate testing of new chemicals and also those already on the market.

5 May 2011

Group of foundations launches food, agriculture policy research initiative

A group of foundations on Tuesday in Washington launched AGree, a food and agriculture research initiative, Bloomberg reports.

5 May 2011

Desmond Tutu calls on youth to lead next generation in HIV/AIDS fight

Nobel laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu on Tuesday at a meeting on Robben Island, South Africa, that "was meant to be a symbolic passing of the torch from an older generation of activists to younger people," called on youth to lead the next generation in the fight against HIV/AIDS, Agence France-Presse reports.

5 May 2011