HELENA, Mont. — The 2021 Montana legislative session will be remembered as one of the state’s most consequential as a Republican-led legislature and governor’s office passed new laws restricting abortions, lowering taxes and regulating marijuana. But the debate over those and other highly publicized issues may have caused other meaningful legislation related to health care […]

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — California Gov. Gavin Newsom has embraced Silicon Valley tech companies and health care industry titans in response to the covid-19 pandemic like no other governor in America — routinely outsourcing life-or-death public health duties to his allies in the private sector. At least 30 tech and health care companies have received lucrative, […]

On a sloppy spring day in mid-March, hundreds of Kurdish Americans gathered in a field outside Nashville, Tennessee, under a sea of black umbrellas. Some of the men carried a stretcher to an open grave, where a yellow backhoe waited. In accordance with Muslim tradition, the body of Imad Doski — a prominent community leader […]

Can’t see the audio player? Click here to listen on PRX. The Biden administration — keeping a campaign promise — announced it would back a temporary waiver of patent protections for the covid-19 vaccines, arousing the ire of the drug industry. The administration is also picking a fight with tobacco companies, as the Food and Drug […]

Biolyse Pharma Corp., which makes injectable cancer drugs, was gearing up to start making generic biologic drugs, made from living organisms. Then the pandemic hit. Watching the covid death toll climb, the company decided its new production lines and equipment could be converted to making vaccines for poorer countries without the means to do so. […]

SACRAMENTO — Treating patients has become more expensive during the pandemic, and doctors and dentists don’t want to be on the hook for all the new costs. For instance, the box of 100 gloves that cost $2.39 in February 2020 costs $30 now, said Dr. Judee Tippett-Whyte, president of the California Dental Association, who has […]

Tobin’s pharmacy and department store had already stocked its shelves with Easter and Mother’s Day items last spring, and the staff had just placed the Christmas orders. The shop in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin, had been operating on a razor’s edge as retail sales moved online and mail-order pharmacies siphoned off its patients. It was losing money […]