Policy & Compliance
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June 09, 2025
RFK Jr. Fires CDC's Entire 17-Member Vaccine Advisory Panel
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced Monday that Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. removed every member of the committee that provides advice and guidance on the use of vaccines to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, pledging to replace them with his preferred picks.
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June 09, 2025
Trump Orders Targeting DEI, LGBTQ+ Funding Partly Blocked
A California federal judge Monday blocked portions of President Donald Trump's executive orders targeting diversity and inclusion policies and programs serving the LGBTQ+ community, saying a group of nonprofits is likely to succeed in showing that stripping their federal funding violates their constitutional rights.
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June 09, 2025
Gov't Seeks $706M Penalty In FCA Case Against Omnicare, CVS
The government asked a New York federal judge to impose a collective $706 million in civil penalties on Omnicare Inc. and its parent, CVS Health Corp., after a jury found that they submitted millions of false billing claims for healthcare programs.
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June 09, 2025
2nd Circ. Nixes Doc's Power Of Atty Deal In Patient ERISA Suit
The Second Circuit ruled Monday that a doctor couldn't use a power-of-attorney arrangement to sue on behalf of a patient who said their union's health plan illegally stuck them with a $150,000 medical bill, but directed a trial court to determine if the patient can pursue the case.
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June 09, 2025
5th Amendment Can't Shield Ex-Exec, Drugmakers Argue
Generic-drug makers urged a Pennsylvania court to compel a former executive to sit for a deposition in ongoing price-fixing litigation despite his invocation of the Fifth Amendment, arguing his testimony is crucial to their defense.
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June 09, 2025
Sheppard Mullin Adds Perkins Coie IP Trio In DC, Chicago
Three Perkins Coie LLP intellectual property partners with deep experience representing clients in the pharmaceutical, biotechnology and related industries have jumped to Sheppard Mullin Richter & Hampton LLP.
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June 09, 2025
HI Gov. Eyes Veto Of Medical Pot Bill Over Privacy Concerns
Hawaii Gov. Josh Green has signaled that he intends to veto a bill modifying the state's medical marijuana program, saying that it would impinge the privacy rights of the Aloha State's medical cannabis patients.
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June 09, 2025
Worker Says NYC Hospital Network, Co. Skimped On Wages
NYC Health and Hospitals and a staffing company failed to pay the entirety of wages to employees who worked at emergency response and relief centers where asylum seekers would stay, a former operational site lead said in a suit in New York federal court.
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June 06, 2025
J&J Unit's $147M Catheter Antitrust Loss Tripled To $442M
Johnson & Johnson health tech unit Biosense Webster's bill in an antitrust trial was upped from $147 million to $442 million after a California federal jury found it stifled competition by conditioning the provision of cardiac mapping services on purchases of cardiac catheters.
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June 06, 2025
Texas AG Says Trans Care Investigation Is Lawful
The Texas Attorney General's Office told the state's Supreme Court that a lower court went too far by blocking an investigation into an LGBTQ+ advocacy organization that allegedly had knowledge about outside parties performing gender-affirming care on minors, saying the court undermined the AG's investigative authority.
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June 06, 2025
Fla. Medical Billing Co. Accused Of Filing False Genetic Tests
The U.S. government has filed a False Claims Act suit against a Florida medical billing and compliance services company for allegedly filing claims to Medicare for more than $15 million in medically unnecessary genetic laboratory tests.
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June 05, 2025
Red States Double Down On Bid To Stymie Trans Health Rule
More than a dozen Republican attorneys general challenging a Biden-era rule that protected gender-affirming care under the Affordable Care Act said the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services can't keep the rule on the books just because the new administration is unlikely to enforce it.
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June 05, 2025
Sens. Float Automatic Biosimilar Interchangeable Label
A bipartisan group of U.S. senators has reintroduced legislation that would reduce what the lawmakers called barriers to accessing lower-cost versions of biologic drugs, making an adjustment to how biosimilars are deemed interchangeable with their name-brand equivalents.
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June 05, 2025
$1.36B Home Healthcare Deal Dropped Amid FTC Scrutiny
Healthcare solutions company Owens & Minor said Thursday that it's abandoning its $1.36 billion plan to buy home-based care business Rotech Healthcare Holdings after the Federal Trade Commission's scrutiny proved too much to bear.
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June 05, 2025
4 AGs Urge FDA To Lift Abortion Pill Restrictions
Attorneys general from California, Massachusetts, New York and New Jersey on Thursday urged the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to lift restrictions on the abortion drug mifepristone, saying they aren't necessary under statutory requirements for an FDA drug safety program.
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June 05, 2025
Mich. AG Asks Judge To Block Abortion Coercion Screening
Michigan's attorney general has asked a judge to strike down a state-law requirement that abortion patients be evaluated for coercion, after the judge upheld the screening while permanently blocking other abortion regulations last month.
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June 05, 2025
Ex-Bush Admin Atty To Lead HHS Civil Rights Office
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has appointed an attorney to lead its civil rights office who brings more than 30 years of experience across the public sector and private practice, including as counsel for HHS during the George W. Bush administration.
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June 04, 2025
Calif. Won't Get Insulin Pricing Case Sent Back To State Court
The New Jersey federal judge overseeing multidistrict litigation accusing Express Scripts, CVS Caremark and other pharmacy benefit managers of conspiring to fix the prices of insulin on Wednesday refused to ship a case brought by the state of California back to state court.
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June 04, 2025
States Take Aim At Healthcare REITs
State lawmakers seeking to curb healthcare investment models they see as harmful to patients have sharpened their focus on real estate investment trusts, putting forth bills to restrict their ownership of healthcare real estate or increase oversight of such transactions.
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June 04, 2025
DC Judge Weighs Harm In Teen Program Funding Fight
A D.C. federal judge on Wednesday seemed unconvinced by Planned Parenthood's assertion that new federal grant requirements for a public health initiative aimed at preventing teen pregnancy are harmful enough to warrant a preliminary injunction.
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June 04, 2025
Apple Can Shield Info In NJ TikTok Addiction Suit
A New Jersey state court will allow Apple Inc. to inject itself into the state attorney general's high-profile lawsuit accusing TikTok of designing features that harm and cause addiction in children, allowing the manufacturer of the iPhone to argue, away from public view, that certain content in the lawsuit should be redacted.
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June 04, 2025
Ohio Nonprofit, Nursing Homes To Pay $3.6M To End FCA Suit
An Ohio-based nursing home operator has agreed to pay $3.61 million to settle False Claims Act allegations brought against it by the government over purportedly substandard and in some cases nonexistent care, according to a new announcement from the U.S. Department of Justice.
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June 03, 2025
Trump Admin. Nixes Guidance Protecting ER Abortion Care
The Trump administration said Tuesday that it is rescinding post-Dobbs guidance from 2022 that emphasized medical providers' abortion care obligations under federal law and that assured federal law protected providers' clinical judgment, regardless of conflicting state laws or mandates.
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June 03, 2025
MAHA Report's Fake Citations A Red Flag For Experts
Fake and misinterpreted citations in a recent federal report focused on chronic disease in the U.S. are raising alarm bells that federal health officials may be trading in scientific rigor for cherry-picked evidence.
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June 03, 2025
6th Circ. Denies PBMs' Privilege Claim In Opioid MDL
A Sixth Circuit panel on Tuesday denied a petition from Cigna's Express Scripts and UnitedHealth's Optum seeking to reverse discovery orders allowing certain personnel files and internal communications into the multidistrict opioid litigation, finding that the two pharmacy benefit managers failed to show extraordinary abuses justifying relief.
Expert Analysis
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What To Expect From 'Make America Healthy Again' Actions
The Make America Healthy Again Commission recently established by President Donald Trump and chaired by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. will potentially bring energy and attention to important public health topics, and stakeholders should be aware of pathways for sharing their input and proactively informing proceedings, says Nicholas Manetto at Faegre Drinker.
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How Citizen Petitions Have Affected Drug Competition
In light of recent citizen petitions and proposed legislation regulating such petitions, Omar Robles at Managing Health analyzes the statistics of the extent to which citizen petitions have been filed, and to what extent they have delayed competition in prescription pharmaceuticals.
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Drug Kickback Ruling Will Make FCA Liability Harder To Prove
The First Circuit's ruling in U.S. v. Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, requiring the government to prove but-for causation to establish False Claims Act liability based on violations of the Anti-Kickback Statute, raises the bar for FCA enforcement and deepens a circuit split that the U.S. Supreme Court may need to resolve, say attorneys at Baker Donelson.
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Assessing PE Risk After Mass. False Claims Act Amendments
A law recently passed in Massachusetts amends the commonwealth's False Claims Act by dramatically expanding potential liability for private equity firms and investors, underscoring the importance of robust diligence and risk assessments for private equity firms conducting transactions in the commonwealth, say attorneys at Gibson Dunn.
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What Trump Actions Mean For Federal Research Funding
New guidance from the National Institutes of Health represents a massive policy shift regarding federal funding for researchers at institutions of higher education, contributing to a perfect storm of significant resource shortfalls in upcoming years, say attorneys at Arnold & Porter.
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A Look At Healthcare Transaction Oversight In Oregon
Understanding Oregon's enforcement authority and its impact on proposed transactions last year provides a road map to the state's plans to strengthen its processes this year, though enforcement could be challenged by ongoing litigation, say attorneys at Ropes & Gray.
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Rethinking 'No Comment' For Clients Facing Public Crises
“No comment†is no longer a cost-free or even a viable public communications strategy for companies in crisis, and counsel must tailor their guidance based on a variety of competing factors to help clients emerge successfully, says Robert Bowers at Moore & Van Allen.
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High Court Must Acknowledge US History Of Anti-Trans Laws
Despite Justice Amy Coney Barrett's claim to the contrary during oral arguments in U.S. v. Skrmetti, U.S. governments at every level have systematically discriminated against transgender people, and the U.S. Supreme Court must consider this historical context in upcoming cases about transgender issues, says Paisley Currah at the City University of New York.
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The Fate Of Biden-Era Clinical Study Guidance Under Trump
Draft guidance about the study of sex and gender differences in medical product development issued by the outgoing Biden administration currently faces significant uncertainty and litigation potential due to the Trump administration's executive orders and other actions, say attorneys at Arnold & Porter.
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10 Issues To Watch In Aerospace And Defense Contracting
This year, in addition to evergreen developments driven by national security priorities, disruptive new technologies and competition with rival powers, federal contractors will see significant disruptions driven by the new administration’s efforts to reduce government spending, regulation and the size of the federal workforce, say attorneys at Thompson Hine.
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Dispelling 10 Myths About Health Provider-Based Compliance
Congress appears intent on requiring hospitals to submit provider-based attestations for all off-campus outpatient hospital locations, so now is the time for hospitals to prepare for this change by understanding common misconceptions about provider-based status and proactively correct noncompliance, say attorneys at McDermott.
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A Look At HHS' New Opinion On Patient Assistance Programs
A recent advisory opinion from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Office of Inspector General follows a recent trend of blessing patient assistance program arrangements that implicate the Anti-Kickback Statute, as long as they are structured with appropriate safeguards to minimize the risk of fraud and abuse, say attorneys at Sheppard Mullin.
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2 Anti-Kickback Developments Hold Lessons For Biopharma
The U.S. Department of Justice's Anti-Kickback Statute settlement with QOL Medical and a favorable advisory opinion from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services provide a study in contrasts, but there are tips for biopharma manufacturers trying to navigate the vast compliance space between them, says Mary Kohler at Kohler Health Law.