“After years of rampant expansion into nearly every corner of the health care system, the biggest insurance conglomerates are confronting new efforts to break up their businesses,” the New York Times reports.

“Arguing that the companies have become too dominant, Arkansas and Tennessee passed laws that aim to prevent the companies from managing prescription benefits and running retail and mail-order pharmacies. Lawmakers in other states and in Washington have proposed similar restrictions.”

“In response, the three companies — UnitedHealth Group, CVS Health and Cigna — are fiercely fighting back. They and their allies have filed lawsuits, deployed lobbyists, pestered customers with texts and blanketed the airwaves with advertisements.”

“Rates for many Affordable Care Act plans rose by double digits this year. Insurers want to do the same next year,” the Wall Street Journal reports.

“Some of the biggest Obamacare companies are seeking hefty premium increases for 2027, often for the second year in a row.”

NOTUS: Health insurers are proposing to increase premiums again.

“There was a national reckoning after the 2024 presidential campaign about federal officials — Joe Biden and his White House, specifically — hiding important health information from the public,” CNN reports.

“But the hiding hasn’t stopped. If anything, it appears to be getting worse.”

“Increasingly, some very high-profile public officials seem to have concluded that constituents and the broader public simply aren’t entitled to basic information explaining lengthy absences from their jobs. And their staffs are enabling them.”

Rolling Stone: So… What’s going on with Mitch McConnell? 

“Democratic socialist and progressives’ success in this year’s primaries is evidence of new enthusiasm for Medicare for All plans that many centrists have long dismissed as costly pipe dreams,” Axios reports.

“The health affordability crisis and widespread frustration with the medical system are fueling a new appetite for big-government solutions to address drug prices, insurance premiums and long-term care costs.”

“Tensions over pesticide use erupted in an Oval Office meeting last week, as a top agriculture lobbyist warned President Trump that an executive order calling for pest-killing alternatives would cost Trump support from farming interests,” Axios reports.

“The confrontation, which one attendee called ‘shocking,’ exposed a sharp fault line in Trump’s coalition — the push by Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s MAHA movement to reduce conventional pesticides vs. farming interests determined to preserve them.”

“A slew of Trump health nominees are awaiting Senate confirmation hearings — and most have to go through a committee chaired by a senator who recently clashed with President Trump,” Axios reports.

“While the administration tries to staff up some health agencies after last year’s DOGE cuts, top leadership roles remain unfilled.”

“There are no full-time political leaders at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Food and Drug Administration. The surgeon general’s post is vacant.”

“Half of the states are suing the Trump administration over its directives for implementing Medicaid work requirements, arguing that exemptions for sick people are too narrow and violate administrative law,” Axios reports.

“Democrats contend the administration’s rules will jeopardize care for some of the frailest Americans and cause more upheaval in states that already are rushing to implement the requirements by Jan. 1.”

“Prominent activists with the ‘Make America Healthy Again’ movement are raging and saying they feel betrayed after the Supreme Court sided with pesticide maker Monsanto on Thursday and said it did not need to put a warning label about a potential cancer risk associated with its Roundup weedkiller,” NewsNation reports.

“The backlash could test the movement’s ties with the Republican Party, especially after the Trump administration backed Monsanto in the case.”

“Sen. Bill Cassidy strongly criticized Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. over his vaccine skepticism and handling of the nation’s public health, despite having delivered the key vote to advance Kennedy’s nomination last year,” CBS News reports.

Said Cassidy: “If you build public health upon a foundation of lies, then you’re going to have the absence of adequate public health.”

“Nearly four million people who signed up for Affordable Care Act plans this year have already dropped their coverage after the loss of subsidies resulted in sharply higher costs,” the Wall Street Journal reports.

“The Department of Health and Human Services released figures Friday that offered the first definitive view of enrollment after the withdrawal of enhanced government support for ACA plans, which ended at the start of this year. The shift boosted many ACA policyholders’ premium bills, in some cases by 100% or more.”

“Thirty federal health service workers gathered last month at Joint Base Andrews in suburban Maryland to prepare for a trip to Africa, the first wave set to care for Americans exposed to a deadly Ebola outbreak ravaging communities across the continent,” Bloomberg reports.

“But participants quickly grew alarmed by what they described as a shambolic and hurried effort under intense pressure from Washington.”

Semafor: Democrats push Trump to coordinate with WHO on Ebola.

New evidence has emerged that Robert F Kennedy Jr was on a vaccine-related “mission” when he visited Samoa ahead of a deadly measles outbreak in 2019, raising further questions about whether the US health secretary lied to the US Senate when he said the trip had “nothing to do with vaccines,” The Guardian reports.

“All branches of the U.S. military began once again requiring their recruits to get flu vaccines earlier this month, an exception to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s decision to lift the military’s vaccine mandate,” CBS News reports.

“The news comes as Lackland Air Force Base in Texas — home to the Air Force’s Basic Military Training program — grapples with a flu outbreak that has infected 275 people in recent weeks.”

“A flu outbreak at the Air Force’s basic training hub in San Antonio is worsening, according to two sources familiar with the situation,” ABC News reports.

“The outbreak is unfolding just two months after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth made the annual flu shot optional for troops, scrapping the military’s requirement for it, which dates to 1945, a move breaking with longstanding public health directives.”

“The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Wednesday is expected to formally wind down its hantavirus response, nearly two months after an outbreak aboard a cruise ship in the Atlantic triggered an international effort to contain a rare strain that left three people dead and infected several others,” the Wall Street Journal reports.

“Millions of Americans with obesity are eagerly awaiting a powerful new drug from Eli Lilly called retatrutide, which has demonstrated bariatric-surgery levels of weight loss. Some aren’t even waiting for approval from the Food and Drug Administration, instead racing to acquire it through sketchy means,” STAT reports.

“But STAT has learned that Eli Lilly and the FDA have allowed one person to gain access to the drug through the FDA’s ‘compassionate use’ program, a pathway that gives patients with serious and immediately life-threatening medical issues access to experimental treatments.”

“This person was a 79-year-old man at the time the request was made in April, according to three sources familiar with the matter. Those sources, who requested anonymity due to fear of reprisals, said it drew the interest of top health officials, suggesting the person receiving this drug was well connected.”