In a lawsuit last year, Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey argued in favor of restricting access to abortion-inducing drugs. If they aren’t restricted, he said, the state could lose federal dollars due to a lack of teen pregnancies, leading to a decline in the state’s population. Now, amid funding cuts, executive orders and layoffs for […]
Health
Posted inState Government
Transgender Kansas Citians face growing restrictions and mounting fear
Suzanne Wheeler and her wife don’t want to leave the Kansas City area, their eight adult children and their seven grandchildren. They don’t want to walk away from their friends, their community and their support system. But they are making plans nonetheless. The middle-aged transgender couple already bought property in Portugal, where transgender rights are […]
Posted inHealth
Hospital mergers come with one inevitable: Bigger executive paychecks
Bigger bonuses, higher executive salaries and a few eye-popping retirement payouts. That’s how St. Luke’s Health System closed the books on its final year as a nonprofit independent hospital chain, according to recent tax filings. The $2.5 billion hospital system, which merged with St. Louis-based nonprofit BJC Healthcare at the start of 2024, paid one-third […]
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Missouri’s grocery shelves feel impact of bird flu
For some people in rural Missouri, soaring egg prices have little impact on their shopping habits. They have backyard chickens that save them the trouble of dealing with a nationwide shortage. But for those who don’t have access to a homegrown grocery store in their backyard, rising prices mean changes to their weekly shopping list. […]
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Cigarettes, alcohol use dropping among Missouri teens
Missouri teens were less interested in cigarettes, alcohol and marijuana in 2024 than in previous years. Vapes were the most reported among teens when asked what they had used in the last 30 days, with 9.1% of respondents saying they used one. The results of the state Department of Mental Health’s Missouri Student Survey were […]
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Threat of federal funding freeze panics KC’s nonprofit health care community
For Wil Franklin, chief executive of KC CARE Health Clinic, Tuesday began with a blizzard of texts and emails. A sweeping plan to freeze federal grants and loans affected $5 million that his community safety-net clinic relies on. The online portal that community health clinics across the country use to access federal money was suddenly […]
Posted inState Government
How could Trump’s second term affect reproductive health care in Missouri?
As President Donald Trump begins his second term, the landscape around reproductive health in the United States is dramatically different from when he first took office in 2017. Trump appointed three U.S. Supreme Court justices during his first term, paving the way for the overturn of Roe v. Wade in 2022. Now, as he takes […]
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In some Missouri counties, 911 doesn’t exist. Upgrades to emergency dispatching will change that
The average caller would never know, but dialing 911 during an emergency isn’t possible in several Missouri counties. While the call will go through, in parts of southeast Missouri, the number is instead rerouted to a traditional 10-digit landline. But that won’t be the case for long. Thanks to federal funds, 911 dispatchers and call […]
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Regulators warn Blue Springs hospital that lab’s ‘deficient practices’ could put patients at risk
Regulators recently warned officials at St. Mary’s Medical Center in Blue Springs that “deficient practices” at its laboratory, including lax testing procedures and insufficient training, could endanger patients. The Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services informed hospital officials that they had found the lab to be in “immediate jeopardy,” the most severe level of […]
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New Missouri rule tries to protect mail-order medications from extreme cold and heat
If your mail-order prescription landed in a pile of snow on your doorstep last week, you may want to proceed with caution. Pharmacists warn that extreme temperatures — cold or hot — can change the chemical makeup of medicine, often making it less effective. But medicine coming through the mail in overheated UPS trucks or […]