Cost Control Takes Center Stage as Hospitals Prepare to Navigate 2026

Hospitals faced significant financial pressures in 2025, driven largely by rising labor costs, revenue cycle challenges and increasing supply expenses, according to new data from Kaufman Hall. Health systems are responding with staffing optimization, outsourcing non-core services and tighter cost controls. The post Cost Control Takes Center Stage as Hospitals Prepare to Navigate 2026 appeared…

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Abortion Trends Before and After Dobbs

This brief reviews the different sources of abortion data in the United States, the factors that have affected abortion rates across the U.S, before and after Roe v. Wade, and what we may see as the Trump administration, Republican majorities in the House and Senate, and a conservative federal judiciary shape policy in the coming…

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Direct and Indirect Effects of COVID-19 Vaccine

Clinical trials focus in-sample (direct) effect of vaccines on health outcomes (e.g., decrease in illness, hospitalization, emergency department use, and death). Typically, however, clinical trials do not test whether the vaccines reduce transmission. FDA do not require this as it would be logistically challenging and costly to estimate indirect effects of vaccination within a clinical…

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Let’s get moving on AI-discovered treatments

By STEVEN ZECOLA Recursion Pharmaceuticals announced results today for one its AI-discovered treatments. I was pleased to see the large, sustained reduction in polyps attributable to its treatment for Familial Adenomatous Polyposis.  Recursions’ oral medication will be viewed by the traditional scientific and regulatory community as “promising”. On the other hand, I was disappointed not…

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Global Health Funding in the FY 2026 National Security, Department of State and Related Programs (NSRP) Conference Bill & Explanatory Statement

On January 11, 2026, the Appropriations Committee released the FY 2026 National Security, Department of State and Related Programs (NSRP) (formerly State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs [SFOPs]) appropriations bill and accompanying explanatory statement. The bill and explanatory statement include funding for U.S. global health programs at the State Department.

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