In a shift from previous guidance, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Tuesday recommended that all Americans wear a face covering when in public indoor settings in areas of substantial or high COVID-19 transmission, regardless of vaccination status. The CDC’s masking update comes as sharp increases in B.1.617.2 (Delta) variant cases…
Read More »This week, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) awarded $117 million to state and local health departments to help rebuild and begin to expand HIV prevention and treatment efforts as the U.S. continues its response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The awarded funds are part of the federal Ending the HIV Epidemic in…
Read More »The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) this week jointly issued guidance on how “long COVID” can be a disability under specified provisions of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), the Rehabilitation Act, and the Affordable Care Act (ACA). HHS notes that people continue to experience…
Read More »On Monday, the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO), the federal government’s watchdog agency, issued a nearly 500-page report on the federal government’s ongoing response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The GAO report outlines a series of recommendations intended to bring an end to the pandemic and strengthen national preparedness for future health emergencies. The report emphasizes…
Read More »This week, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), through the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), issued an informational bulletin to states’ Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) agencies reaffirming that the 2019 Public Charge Rule “Inadmissibility on Public Charge Grounds” is no longer in effect. CMS directs states…
Read More »This week, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued a provisional report of life expectancy in the U.S., finding overall life expectancy dropped by more than a year and one half from 78.8 years of age in 2019 to 77.3 years of age in 2020. The decline in life expectancy is the…
Read More »This week, the U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) confirmed receipt and completion of California’s Section 1115 Demonstration Waiver, referred to as California Advancing and Innovating Medi-Cal (CalAIM). CMS today opened a 30-day federal public comment period, allowing individuals to provide input on California’s request for a five-year Medicaid demonstration extension. The federal…
Read More »This week, U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy issued the Biden-Harris Administration’s first health advisory, warning the American public about the urgent threat of health misinformation. As indicated by the U.S. Health and Human Services, health misinformation and disinformation have threated the U.S. response to the COVID-19 pandemic and continue to prevent Americans from receiving a…
Read More »Today, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued updated guidance for COVID-19 prevention in K-12 schools nationwide. The long-anticipated guidance will inform education planning activities ahead of this coming fall, and the CDC’s updated guidance prioritizes returning students to in-person instruction. Under the updated guidance, the CDC encourages a multi-layer strategy for…
Read More »This week, COVID-19 vaccine manufacturer Pfizer and BioNTech released an update on the firms’ COVID-19 booster vaccine strategy, indicating continued booster trials have provided additional protection against the COVID-19 virus, particularly amid increased presence of virus variants. Pfizer and BioNTech point to recent studies regarding vaccine efficacy six- and 12-months post-vaccination and suggest a third…
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