Shalina Chatlani

At least 17 states have taken steps to ensure broader access to the COVID-19 vaccine since last month, when the federal government significantly restricted eligibility for the shot. Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maine, Massachusetts, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Virginia, Washington and Wisconsin have issued orders that aim to make it easier for people to get the COVID-19 vaccine. All but Virginia have Democratic governors.

Several states, including Colorado, Massachusetts, New Mexico, New York and Pennsylvania, announced this week that they would be breaking with restrictive eligibility policies unveiled last week by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration on the newly approved COVID-19 vaccines for the fall season. In New York, Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul signed an executive order Friday morning to authorize pharmacists to provide the shot to anyone who desires it for the next 30 days, which can be renewed.

B. said he left Cameroon nine years ago because he was scared for his life. Authorities in the West African nation threw him in prison because of his sexual orientation, he said. After his release, he feared that if he stayed in the country, he would be killed.

Between 2016 and 2022, as congenital syphilis cases rose nationally and especially in the South, Mississippi saw a one thousand percent increase — from 10 to 110 — in the number of newborn babies who were hospitalized after contracting the disease, known to cause developmental issues, intellectual disabilities, and even death.

Twenty-eight-year-old Michaela Bonner has been working 12-hour shifts as an emergency medical technician in Norfolk, Virginia, for the past four years, while attending and paying for college to finish her prerequisites for medical school. But now that President Donald Trump’s signature tax and spending law bars students from borrowing more than $50,000 annually in unsubsidized federal loans for medical school, Bonner is worried her dream of becoming a doctor is financially out of reach.

As the federal government and states move to cut about $1 trillion over the next decade from Medicaid, researchers estimate annual impacts by 2034 of hundreds of thousands of jobs lost and billions less in state and local tax revenue.

States must begin verifying millions of Medicaid enrollees’ monthly work status by the end of next year — a task some critics say states will have a hard time carrying out. A provision in the tax and spending bill President Donald Trump signed into law July 4 will require the 40 states plus Washington, D.C., that have expanded Medicaid to check paperwork at least twice a year to ensure those enrollees are volunteering or working at least 80 hours a month or attending school at least half time.

The tax and spending bill the U.S. House approved last week targets a strategy states have used to boost the Medicaid dollars they get from the federal government. The measure would cap or freeze the taxes states levy on medical providers, potentially leaving states with major holes in their Medicaid budgets.

The Trump administration this month scrapped a Biden-era proposal that would have required state Medicaid programs and allowed federal Medicare to pay for some GLP-1s for obesity treatment. Instead, state Medicaid programs will retain the choice of whether to cover the high-priced medications for their residents. The drugs, which have historically been prescribed to diabetic patients, also help patients lose weight and have grown in popularity among doctors and patients. But they are generally too expensive for most people to afford without insurance.

As Republicans in Congress consider cutting the federal share of Medicaid funding, states are weighing numerous options to scale back their programs. But voters in three states have significantly limited those options by enshrining Medicaid expansion in their constitutions — creating a potential budget disaster and a political challenge for the GOP.