Thursday, February 18, 2021 | Kaiser Health Information

The Washington Submit:
Interior Report Cites HUD For Guide Poisoning In East Chicago, Ind., Little ones

The Office of Housing and City Development has for years neglected to enforce its personal environmental laws, resulting in direct poisoning of kids in at the very least 1 public housing advancement and potentially jeopardizing residents’ overall health in hundreds of other federally backed apartments in close proximity to contaminated internet sites, according to an inspector common report acquired by The Washington Publish. The agency’s watchdog reviewed HUD’s attempts to discover and mitigate wellness pitfalls to residents of general public housing close to toxic squander dumps soon after the East Chicago, Ind., condominium sophisticated, exactly where tenants experienced been residing with guide contamination for additional than 4 decades, was considered uninhabitable in 2016. (Jan, 2/17)

In news about overall health insurance protection in New Mexico and Kentucky —

Albuquerque Journal:
Open up Enrollment Underway For Insurance policy Trade

By means of May possibly 15, New Mexico’s Health and fitness Insurance policy Exchange, beWellnm, is providing an open enrollment time period for uninsured New Mexicans. The a few-month reopening of the Very affordable Treatment Act, or ACA, is also an prospect for all those who have missing occupation-based mostly insurance throughout the pandemic to enroll in the marketplace and come across economical protection. “BeWellnm encourages all uninsured New Mexicans to get started the enrollment procedure as before long as probable because of the minimal quantity of time to find in depth, economical health insurance coverage solutions,” claimed Maureen Manring, spokeswoman for beWellnm. More than 56,000 New Mexicans qualify for major quality reductions, she said. (Nathanson, 2/17)

AP:
Beshear Urges Kentuckians To Signal Up For Overall health Coverage

Gov. Andy Beshear has joined in urging Kentuckians who lack wellbeing insurance plan to choose edge of new chances now offered to indicator up for protection. The indication-up window for govt insurance policies markets operates by means of May perhaps 15. President Joe Biden purchased these markets that finished their annual enrollment durations in December to reopen. Beshear, who phone calls health treatment a standard human ideal, said the coronavirus pandemic has underscored how “expanded well being care in Kentucky has assisted us to have less fatalities than most states.” (2/18)

In other news from Utah, New Mexico and California —

Salt Lake Tribune:
Utah Dwelling Passes Proposal To Exclude Transgender Girls From Female Athletics In Community Faculties

An effort to bar transgender girls from competing in woman K-12 sports activities ongoing to make headway in the Utah Legislature, attaining passage by means of the Home on a mostly party-line vote. Opponents of the monthly bill — titled “preserving athletics for feminine students” — warned that it would more stigmatize youth who are by now susceptible and at better danger for suicide. They explained it would draw a authorized challenge that Utah would possible shed. And they stated it could undermine Utah’s prospects for hosting foreseeable future athletics tournaments and even the Olympics, provided the likelihood that celebration organizers would select to boycott the condition. (Rodgers, 2/17)

Albuquerque Journal:
Lawmakers Take into consideration Close-Of-Existence Solutions Bill

Saturday, as the chill of a polar vortex descended outdoors, the point out Property Judiciary Committee took testimony via Zoom on a monthly bill that if passed could make it possible for terminally ill individuals to die in a way much less cold, considerably less cruel. When it was in excess of, the committee voted 7-3 to ship Household Bill 47 to the ground. Then it’s the Senate’s switch to do what it will with the Elizabeth Whitefield Conclude of Everyday living Possibilities Act, which Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham has signaled she will sign. It is the 3rd time the bill, modeled after very similar rules in other states, has arrive in advance of the Legislature, which includes 2017 when Whitefield, her voice raspy among gasps from a trach tube, testified about the dire will need to give those people like her struggling with a distressing, selected demise from a terminal ailment the legal, health practitioner-accepted choice to stop their life in peace, with a modicum of dignity and at a time of their deciding on. (Gutierrez Krueger, 2/17)

KHN:
California Aims To Tackle The ‘Urgent’ Requires Of Older People. But Will Its Strategy Get the job done?

Even as the pandemic derailed some of Gov. Gavin Newsom’s greatest health treatment proposals, these types of as lowering prescription drug prices, it crystallized another: the pressing want to handle California’s rapidly getting old populace. Currently 9 months into their perform when Newsom issued the nation’s initial statewide continue to be-at-household order past March, customers of a point out undertaking drive on ageing watched as the coronavirus disproportionately sickened and killed older individuals, and left lots of isolated in nursing households, assisted living facilities and their have homes. (Young, 2/18)

In news from West Virginia, Washington, D.C., and Vermont —

Charleston Gazette-Mail:
Irrespective of CDC Get in touch with For Urgent Action, Charleston Town Council Mum On Expanding HIV Risk

Meeting in person for the to start with time in months, Charleston City Council voted Tuesday to move forward in surveying town very first responders on their viewpoints of hurt reduction in the neighborhood. The resolution passed with an amendment getting rid of language that asked for organizations uncertified by the condition to pause needle distributions in Charleston even though the council ongoing deliberating laws that could outright ban this sort of packages. The Town Council conference came five times after officials from the federal Centers for Disorder Manage and Avoidance presented to the Kanawha-Charleston Well being Department’s HIV undertaking drive, contacting the county’s HIV crisis “the most concerning” in the nation. (Coyne, 2/17)

The Washington Write-up:
D.C. Mayor Declares Gun Violence A ‘Public Well being Disaster,’ Proposes New Solutions

After an primarily bloody calendar year of shootings in the District, Mayor Muriel E. Bowser on Wednesday formally declared gun violence to be a public overall health crisis in the town and introduced a new “whole-government” approach to combating the scourge, emphasizing additional than just police operate and prosecutions. With an first expense of $15 million and more income to arrive, claimed Bowser (D), the city is setting up a “gun violence prevention emergency functions centre,” to be staffed by the D.C. government’s “best and brightest” in the fields of education and learning, career instruction, psychological wellbeing counseling, housing and other solutions. (Duggan, 2/17)

AP:
Scott Will make Wednesday Restoration Working day In Vermont

Gov. Phil Scott signed a proclamation on Wednesday naming it “Recovery Day” in Vermont, which he named 1 compact way to aid minimize the stigma associated with psychological ailment and substance use problem. “More importantly, highlighting this working day also sends a message to those people who are struggling that there is hope,” Scott reported in a created assertion. “To these who need help, remember to know that assistance and expert services are readily available, and there are quite a few of us who treatment about you. Recovery is attainable, and we want to do all we can to enable you get there.” (2/17)