#hhs-declaration

#hhs-declaration

I was devastated. I had been able to get Zepbound for a $30 monthly copay and had lost 50 pounds in a year. The drug helped me focus on being a new mom and gaining strength at the gym, not just counting calories burned.

NMAC as an organization...we continue to deliver. Nothing that I have done has been unethical or illegal, and [I am] really working to strengthen our organization.

Congress has kept key drug assistance funding at $900.3 million annually since 2014. New enrollments for state programs jumped 30% from 2022 to 2024, in part because states cut off pandemic-era Medicaid assistance. As of January, at least 18 states have pulled back their Ryan White AIDS Drug Assistance Programs, known as ADAPs, in some way.

The 340B program allows hospitals to buy outpatient drugs at steep discounts, with the purported purpose of helping them fund care for low-income and uninsured patients. The now-axed rebate model would have invited drugmakers to participate voluntarily in a rebate-based discount system. Basically, instead of the provider receiving a discount upfront at purchase, the 340B discount would be applied after purchase via rebate - and subject to tedious data submission requirements.

In light of the systemic dismantling of America's public health agencies, these moves essentially create a shadow infrastructure to maintain some of what is being lost. While this is a promising development, it does nothing to stop a troubling trend that has been emerging for some time: The country is quickly becoming fragmented along partisan lines when it comes to public health.

Because of budget cuts, the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health has ended clinical services at seven of its public health clinic sites. As of Feb. 27, the county is no longer providing services such as vaccinations, sexually transmitted infection testing and treatment, or tuberculosis diagnosis and specialty TB care at the affected locations, according to county officials and a department fact sheet.