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Policy & Compliance

  • December 02, 2025

    5th Circ. Wary Of FDA Process Behind Rule For New Vapes

    A Fifth Circuit panel appeared skeptical Tuesday that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration properly accounted for how a new rule for premarket authorization of new tobacco products would affect small businesses in the industry.

  • December 02, 2025

    Breast Pump Co. To Pay $1M For Alleged Tricare Overbilling

    The U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania reached a $1 million settlement with a breast pump company and its owner, resolving allegations that they submitted false claims for reimbursement for service members and their families.

  • December 02, 2025

    Plan Members Assert Standing In Cigna Data Breach Fight

    A group of Cigna health plan participants who claimed that the company failed to protect their data when it tracked their website activities asked a Pennsylvania federal judge not to throw out the suit, arguing that the proposed class had standing to sue over the alleged violations of state and federal privacy laws.

  • December 02, 2025

    Under New Chair, Fed. Vax Panel To Redo Hep B Vote

    The new chair of an influential federal vaccine advisory panel is set to lead a vote this week on whether to roll back federal recommendations that newborns get vaccinated against hepatitis B.

  • December 02, 2025

    Justices Skeptical Of NJ Subpoena For Anti-Abortion Donors

    Several U.S. Supreme Court justices appeared sympathetic Tuesday to an anti-abortion pregnancy-center network's bid to challenge a subpoena from the New Jersey attorney general, pressing the state on whether its demand for donor identities and internal documents risked unconstitutionally chilling First Amendment associational rights.

  • December 02, 2025

    Safe-Injection Site Ignites New Religious Liberty Debate

    Law360 Healthcare Authority talks to Benjamin A. Barsky of the University of California College of the Law, San Francisco about safe injection sites, religious liberty arguments in healthcare, and a Third Circuit ruling with possible ramifications for both.

  • December 02, 2025

    Conflict Looms Over State Medical Debt Credit-Report Bans

    An about-face by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau on medical debt and credit reports is animating a legal debate over preemption and state-level prohibitions meant to protect consumers.

  • December 02, 2025

    Hospital Says EEOC Neglected Presuit Conciliation Obligation

    The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission failed to satisfy its conciliation obligations before filing an age discrimination lawsuit against a Colorado hospital, the facility told a federal court, arguing that the case should be paused for the parties to try to work out a deal.

  • December 02, 2025

    $4.6M Garnet Health Deal Over Retirement Plan Gets Initial OK

    A New York federal judge granted initial approval Tuesday to a $4.6 million class action settlement between Garnet Health Medical Center and workers who challenged their employee retirement plan's fees and investments, which comes after parties reported a deal to end the case in September.

  • December 01, 2025

    Hospitals Slam HHS' Move From Drug Discounts To Rebates

    The American Hospital Association is leading litigation challenging the Trump administration's abrupt changes to a decades-old program governing the distribution of discounted prescriptions to low-income patients, telling a Maine federal court Monday that the government is unlawfully ignoring the costly impacts a rebate system will have on hospitals.

  • December 01, 2025

    1st Circ. Tosses Omni's Medicare Fraud Suit Over UTI Tests

    A First Circuit panel declined to revive Omni Healthcare's False Claims Act suit accusing MD Labs of billing Medicare for unnecessary urinary tract infection tests, explaining in a published opinion Monday that Omni Healthcare's own staff ordered each test — sometimes even replacing doctors' orders for cheaper tests with the pricier ones.

  • December 01, 2025

    2nd Circ. Backs Anti-Abortion Groups' Free Speech Rights

    New York Attorney General Letitia James can't sue faith-based groups promoting a so-called treatment to reverse medication-induced abortions, finding the groups are likely to succeed on the merits of their First Amendment challenge, the Second Circuit said Monday.

  • December 01, 2025

    J&J Narrows Ex-Employees' Prescription Benefits Suit

    Johnson & Johnson narrowed a proposed class action claiming it unlawfully overcharged employees through a prescription drug benefits program, with a New Jersey federal judge ruling workers leading the suit failed to show how allegedly excessive fees the company paid to a benefits manager caused participants' costs to rise.

  • December 01, 2025

    Judge Upholds Mich. MedMal Cap, Cuts $8.5M Verdict

    A Michigan federal judge has slashed the $8.5 million a jury awarded to the estate of a cancer patient suing over his doctor's treatment decisions to about $615,000, ruling that a state law limiting noneconomic damages in medical malpractice cases is constitutional. 

  • November 26, 2025

    Up Next At High Court: ISP Liability & State Subpoena Suits

    The U.S. Supreme Court will return Monday for the first week of its December oral argument session, during which the justices will consider whether internet service providers can be held liable for contributing to their customers' infringing activity online and whether the subjects of state subpoenas are required to first challenge them in state court. 

  • November 26, 2025

    Nurse For App-Based Health Co. Can't Revive Retaliation Suit

    A Washington appeals court refused to revive a nurse's suit claiming she was fired from an app-based medical provider for complaining that it underpaid and overworked independent contractors, ruling she failed to show her termination was because of her concerns rather than reports that she was unprofessional.

  • November 25, 2025

    UnitedHealth Gets OptumRx Antitrust Suit Sent To Arbitration

    A group of independent pharmacies must arbitrate their proposed class claims that UnitedHealth-owned OptumRx gatekeeps its network of Medicare prescription patients by imposing unfair fees, a Washington federal judge said Tuesday, concluding the pharmacies haven't shown the arbitration clauses in question are unenforceable.

  • November 25, 2025

    Mich. Pharmacist Gets 46 Months For $4M Fraud Scheme

    A former Michigan pharmacist who pled guilty to orchestrating a $4 million Medicare scam was sentenced by a federal judge to 46 months in prison and ordered to pay restitution and forfeit property as part of a plea deal, the U.S. Department of Justice announced.

  • November 24, 2025

    9th Circ. Clarifies FTC's Sanction Power In Backing $7M Win

    The Ninth Circuit affirmed Monday a $7.3 million compensatory sanction and asset-freeze injunction against executives behind the "Success By Health" pyramid scheme, rejecting their argument, among others, that the justices' AMG v. FTC ruling requires the Federal Trade Commission to hold administrative proceedings before suing over rule violations.

  • November 24, 2025

    Teamsters Health Plan Wants Data Breach Suit Tossed

    A Massachusetts federal judge should toss a proposed class action accusing a Teamsters healthcare plan of failing to protect plan participants' personal information, the plan argued, seeking dismissal of a suit that seeks to hold the plan liable for an August data breach.

  • November 24, 2025

    Mass. Judge Says States Can Fight Planned Parenthood Cuts

    A Massachusetts federal judge on Monday chided a Trump administration lawyer for continuing to argue that a coalition of states lacks standing to seek to block what it says is the effective defunding of Planned Parenthood, even as it only just received a lengthy list of new requirements for Medicaid reimbursement.

  • November 24, 2025

    Mich. Christian Health Group Claims Right To Deny Trans Care

    A Christian health system urged a federal court to permanently prohibit Michigan from enforcing a state civil rights law barring discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, arguing the statute unconstitutionally hampers its ability to make faith-based hiring and policy decisions.

  • November 24, 2025

    Wash. Hits Regence BlueShield With Transparency Fine

    Washington's insurance commissioner slapped Regence BlueShield with a $550,000 fine, the state announced Monday, for purportedly violating reporting requirements under a federal law that says health insurers must provide the same level of coverage for mental health care as general medical care.

  • November 24, 2025

    ND Justices Reverse Ruling That Struck Down Abortion Ban

    North Dakota's near-total ban on abortion is back in effect after the state's top court narrowly reversed a lower court decision by failing to reach the supermajority required to declare the law unconstitutional.

  • November 24, 2025

    Hi-Tech Pharma CEO Beats Most Of Feds' Fraud Case

    A Georgia federal jury acquitted Hi-Tech Pharmaceuticals' chief executive on the bulk of the conspiracy, fraud and money laundering charges leveled against him, rejecting allegations that he cheated his customers by drawing up bogus quality certificates.

Expert Analysis

  • How The Healthline Privacy Settlement Redefines Ad Tech Use

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    The Healthline settlement is the first time California has drawn a clear line in the sand around how website tracking must function in practice, so if your site uses tracking technologies, especially around sensitive content like health or finance, regulators are inspecting your website's back end, not just its banner, say attorneys at Baker Donelson.

  • How Sweeping Budget Bill Shakes Up Health Industry

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    With the recently passed One Big Beautiful Bill Act marking one of the most significant overhauls of federal health policy since the passage of the Affordable Care Act, providers, managed care organizations and life sciences companies must now shift focus from policy review to implementation planning, say advisers at Holland & Knight.

  • New DOJ Penalty Policy Could Spell Trouble For Cos.

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    In light of the U.S. Department of Justice’s recently published guidance making victim relief a core condition of coordinated resolution crediting, companies facing parallel investigations must carefully calibrate their negotiation strategies to minimize the risk of duplicative penalties, say attorneys at Debevoise.

  • A Look At Key 5th Circ. White Collar Rulings So Far This Year

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    In the first half of 2025, the Fifth Circuit has decided numerous cases of particular import to white collar practitioners, which collectively underscore the critical importance of meticulous recordbuilding, procedural compliance and strategic litigation choices at every stage of a case, says Joe Magliolo at Jackson Walker.

  • What US Medicine Onshoring Means For Indian Life Sciences

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    Despite the Trump administration's latest moves to onshore essential medicine manufacturing, India will likely remain an indispensable component of the U.S. drug supply chain, but Indian manufacturers should prepare for stricter compliance checks, says Jashaswi Ghosh at Holon Law Partners.

  • FCA Working Group Reboot Signals EHR Compliance Risk

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    The revival of the False Claims Act working group is an aggressive expansion of enforcement efforts by the Justice Department and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services targeted toward technology-enabled fraud involving electronic health records and other data, say attorneys at ArentFox Schiff.

  • FDA's Hasty Policymaking Approach Faces APA Challenges

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    Though the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has abandoned its usual notice-and-comment process for implementing new regulatory initiatives, two recent district court decisions make clear that these programs are still susceptible to Administrative Procedure Act challenges, says Rachel Turow at Skadden.

  • The Metamorphosis Of The Major Questions Doctrine

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    The so-called major questions doctrine arose as a counterweight to Chevron deference over the past few decades, but invocations of the doctrine have persisted in the year since Chevron was overturned, suggesting it still has a role to play in reining in agency overreach, say attorneys at Crowell & Moring.

  • A Rapidly Evolving Landscape For Noncompetes In Healthcare

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    A wave of new state laws regulating noncompete agreements in the healthcare sector, varying in scope, approach and enforceability, are shaped by several factors unique to the industry and are likely to distort the market, say attorneys at Seyfarth.

  • Arguing The 8th Amendment For Reduction In FCA Penalties

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    While False Claims Act decisions lack consistency in how high the judgment-to-damages ratio in such cases can be before it becomes unconstitutional, defense counsel should cite the Eighth Amendment's excessive fines clause in pre-trial settlement negotiations, and seek penalty decreases in post-judgment motions and on appeal, says Scott Grubman at Chilivis Grubman.

  • $95M Caremark Verdict Should Put PBMs On Notice

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    A Pennsylvania federal judge’s recent ruling that pharmacy benefits manager CVS Caremark owes the government $95 million for overbilling Medicare Part D-sponsored drugs highlights the effectiveness of the False Claims Act, as scrutiny of PBMs’ outsized role in setting drug prices continues to increase, say attorneys at Duane Morris.

  • DOJ Actions Signal Rising Enforcement Risk For Health Cos.

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    The U.S. Department of Justice's announcement of a new False Claims Act working group, together with the largest healthcare fraud takedown in history, underscore the importance of sophisticated compliance programs that align with the DOJ's data-driven approach, say attorneys at Debevoise.

  • Spotlight On Medicare Marketing Practices Enforcement Trend

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    Recent U.S. Department of Justice actions, including its recent Medicare kickback allegations in Shea v. eHealth, demonstrate increasing enforcement scrutiny on Medicare Advantage marketing practices, say Ellen London at London & Naor, Li Yu at Bernstein Litowitz and Erica Hitchings at the Whistleblower Law Collaborative.