| | | | | | | Presented By UnitedHealth Group | | | | Axios Vitals | | By Tina Reed · Sep 14, 2022 | | Good morning, Vitals readers. Today's newsletter is 976 words or a 4-minute read. Join me tomorrow at 12:30pm ET for a virtual event looking at how combating antimicrobial resistance is vital to strengthening our health care system and preparing for the next pandemic. Register here. | | | | | | 1 big thing: Republicans' rocky attempt to change the abortion narrative |  | | | Illustration: Shoshana Gordon/Axios | | | | Sen. Lindsey Graham's 15-week abortion ban appears to be a political gift to Democrats less than two months before the midterm elections, but it syncs with nearly half of Americans' views on when the procedure should be legal, Axios' Oriana Gonzalez writes. The big picture: Elections aren't won on nuance, and most nationally-elected Republicans have gone silent on the subject in the final stretch of the campaign. In the long run, however, abortion politics will likely pivot around which party can most successfully brand the other side as extreme. Driving the news: Graham on Tuesday introduced a federal ban on abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy that would allow for exemptions in cases of rape or if the mother's life is in danger. - On the House side, Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.) has a companion bill that's drawn more than 80 co-sponsors.
- Neither has a chance of passage in a Democratic-controlled Congress. But Graham said a 15-week ban "would put us in line with the science in the civilized world," adding, "If we take back the House and the Senate, I can assure you we'll have a vote on our bill."
State of play: Republicans are desperate to stop talking about whether rape victims or cancer patients should be able to get abortions, and are well aware that the Supreme Court's decision to overrule the federal right to abortion is not playing well for them heading into the midterms. - If you squint your eyes, Graham's bill can be read as a more moderate alternative to the blanket bans currently in effect in red states across the country, though it would allow those state laws to stand.
- It's certainly a contrast to what Democrats have proposed — a prohibition on states banning abortion before viability — which Graham said the bill is a response to.
- "Should we look like Iran and North Korea when it comes to national abortion policy or maybe France, Belgium, Spain, Denmark and Norway?" he said, noting the 15-week criteria is in line with those in Europe and other developed nations. "If you vote with the Democrats, we'll look more like Syria and North Korea and Iran."
Yes, but: If Graham's intent was to cast a 15-week federal ban as a moderate abortion policy, the rollout didn't quite as planned. Democrats quickly blasted out statements condemning the legislation and many prominent Republicans distanced themselves from it. Go deeper. |     | | | | | | 2. The uninsured rate of Americans |  Data: U.S. Census; Chart: Axios Visuals. Footnote: An updated data processing system was implemented beginning with data year 2018 estimates. This system introduced demographic edit changes, revised procedures for editing and added new income and health insurance variables. The number of Americans without health insurance fell by a million people in 2021, Axios' Victoria Knight writes, according to U.S. Census Bureau data published yesterday. Why it matters: Despite COVID-19 and the economic uncertainty it spawned, the uninsured rate remained stable due to enhanced Affordable Care Act subsidies and the Medicaid continuous coverage provisions Congress enacted in response to the pandemic. By the numbers: 8.3% or 27.2 million Americans lacked health insurance at some point in 2021. That compared to an uninsured rate of 8.6% or 28.3 million in 2020. - It's also a drop from the 8.5% uninsured reported in 2018, before the COVID pandemic.
- The child poverty rate fell to a record low of 5.2% in 2021, down more than 80% since 1993, Axios' Erica Pandey writes.
"It's certainly among the lowest," uninsured rates the U.S. has seen, said Sharon Stern, an assistant division chief at the Census Bureau, told reporters during a Sept. 13 press call. But, but, but: The gains could be erased at the end of the public health emergency when states will have to redetermine the eligibility of their Medicaid populations, said Larry Levitt, Kaiser Family Foundation executive vice president for health policy. What we're watching: How many people affected by Medicaid determinations will move to ACA markets — or not — next year. | | | | | | | | 3. U.S. on WHO's list of countries with circulating polio | | The World Health Organization added the U.S. to the list of countries where vaccine-derived poliovirus is circulating, Axios' Arielle Dreher writes about a CDC announcement. Why it matters: The U.S. joins a list of about 30 other countries, including Israel and the U.K., where circulating vaccine-derived polioviruses have been identified, the CDC said. Be smart: Vaccine-derived poliovirus spreads from a person who takes the oral polio vaccine, which is no longer used in the U.S. but is in other parts of the world, who then sheds some of that weakened virus from the vaccine. - Among the unvaccinated, it can be spread through means including person-to-person contact or droplets from a sneeze or cough, per the CDC.
"We cannot emphasize enough that polio is a dangerous disease for which there is no cure," José Romero, CDC director at the National Center for immunization and Respiratory Diseases, said in a news release. | | | | | | | | A message from UnitedHealth Group | | Helping lower out-of-pocket costs for consumers | | |  | | | | Starting in 2023, eligible UnitedHealthcare members will pay $0 out of pocket on critical medications: - Insulin for diabetes.
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Learn more. | | | | | | 4. Data du jour: Mental health spending rises |  Data: EBRI; Chart: Kavya Beheraj/Axios Average annual spending on mental health services by individuals enrolled in employer-sponsored health plans covered reached $2,380 per enrollee in 2020, up 20% since 2013, according to a report from the Employer Benefit Research Institute. Between the lines: While spending on mental health rose on average of 3% a year, the increase wasn't evenly distributed. - For example, spending on outpatient mental health services jumped by 37% in that time between 2013 and 2020 while spending on prescription drugs dropped by 15%.
- Overall spending on mental health care services as a percentage of total spending increased from 6.8% in 2013 to 8.2% in 2020.
| | | | | | | | 5. Catch up quick | | 🚨 Senate Dems hope to build a case for more funding to fight monkeypox with a Senate health committee hearing today, but several Republicans say public health funding Congress has already provided should be enough. (Axios) 👉 Despite rising rates of pediatric type 2 diabetes, the U.S. Preventative Services Task Force said there is still insufficient evidence to weigh the benefits and harms of screening kids for the disease, per a statement published in JAMA. (MedPage Today) 👀 More and more kids need glasses these days, eye doctors report, and it's spurring an industry to fix it. (The Atlantic) | | | | | | | | A message from UnitedHealth Group | | Helping drive affordability and combat high drug costs | | |  | | | | Beginning in 2023, eligible UnitedHealthcare members will pay $0 out of pocket on five critical medications, including insulin and epinephrine. Learn how we're working to make prescription drugs more affordable for the patients who rely on them most. | | | | ⭐️ A big thank you, as always, to our all-star team including Adriel Bettelheim for editing the newsletter and Bryan McBournie for his copy edits. |  | | Why stop here? Let's go Pro. | | | | | | Axios thanks our partners for supporting our newsletters. If you're interested in advertising, learn more here.
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