Healthcare’s employment anomaly | ACA tax credits pass House | FDA recall on organ transplant kits | Walmart Health returns?

The latest federal jobs report brings good news to healthcare and social assistance, bad news to most other sectors.  

Seventeen Republicans joined Democrats to pass a three-year extension to the tax credits that made medical plans sold through HealthCare.gov cheaper for millions of Americans. However, the GOP passed a competing measure in December that would see the federal government focus on association health plans. It’s unclear if either will find traction in the Senate.

The recall has been designated a Class I, the most serious type. Certain "convenience kits" manufactured by AVID Medical contain non–medical-grade bags that could expose organs to toxins, increasing the odds of a transplant recipient's body rejecting them.

Less than two years after closing its patient care clinics and selling its telehealth services, Walmart is re-entering healthcare with a new platform to match patients with virtual providers.

AI is an icy landslide sweeping through healthcare. Even surgeons must choose between two stark options: Ride the crest of the powder cloud now or dig yourselves out of a deep runout zone later. 

The U.S. Department of Justice alleges that 52-year-old Ritesh Kalra, MD, wrote 50 prescriptions a day for addictive painkillers and billed New Jersey Medicaid for patient visits that never occurred. The alleged incidents occurred between 2019 and 2025.

Numerous “alternative funding programs” are named as defendants in what is a larger challenge of the right of these third-party organizations to import drugs from overseas, bypassing FDA regulations. 

Philadelphia-based Jefferson Health has accused the three biggest PBMs—Caremark, Express Scripts and Optum Rx—of a de facto collusion scheme involving the primary makers of insulin, Eli Lilly, Novo Nordisk and Sanofi. The lawsuit alleges rebates offered by the manufacturers unfairly burden self-insured and public health plans, like the one the health system uses for its employees.

In a new data analysis from nine states, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that the protective effect tapers off as juveniles age, with 5-17 year olds seeing fewer trips to urgent care or the emergency room at a rate of 56%. Overall, the agency said evidence shows that COVID-19 vaccines are still effective.

Paxton says the “woke” EHR giant is intentionally making it harder for patients and families to access historical medical data, violating state law. Epic denies the allegation.

The FTC argued that the $945M deal, first announced in 2024, was "anticompetitive." A federal judge agreed. 

The new policy applies to all health plans across Pennsylvania, New York, West Virginia and Delaware, “removing financial barriers for essential breast cancer diagnostics.”