President Trump is scheduled to deliver his State of the Union address on Tuesday, Feb. 4, at a time when most Americans have been focused on impeachment, the 2020 election and the coronavirus outbreak.

The Medical Imaging and Technology Alliance, among other agencies, hosted a briefing in D.C. Jan. 29, aimed at shining a spotlight on this issue. 

The Trump administration has released its Medicaid block grant program under a new name that allows states to designate funding and put a cap on Medicaid spending. The program, dubbed Healthy Adults Opportunity, is an optional intervention initiative that fundamentally changes the way part of Medicaid is funded.

CVS Health recently launched an insulin program for employers and health plan sponsors to offer diabetes medications with zero out-of-pocket costs for members. The program could help alleviate the rising costs of insulin for people managing diabetes.

CMS will now cover Next Generation Sequencing through FDA-approved or cleared lab diagnostic tests for patients with inherited ovarian or breast cancer.

A new analysis estimates that the price tag for radiologists and other specialties to manually generate a prior authorization increased 60% between 2018 and 2019. 

The “Coalition Against Rate-Setting,” launched in January, wants to bury bipartisan legislation proposed to address this issue. 

The pharmaceutical industry upped its lobbying efforts in 2019, with a record-high of $29 million spent lobbying Congress.