Colorado’s reinsurance program will save people who buy their health insurance on the individual market an estimated $493 million next year, compared to how much premiums would have risen without it, according to the Polis administration.
Statewide, premiums on the individual market will rise by an average of 5.6%, while they will increase about 7.1% for small-group plans.
Reinsurance is a backstop that limits how much insurance companies have to pay out for the relatively small number of people who have highly expensive medical needs each year. Since they aren’t on the hook to pay out as much, the companies charge lower premiums, which in turn means the federal government doesn’t have to spend as much on tax credits to people buying insurance on the marketplace. Colorado got permission from the federal government to use those federal savings to further lower monthly premiums.
A news release from Gov. Jared Polis’ office estimated that premiums in 2025 will be about 24% lower than they would have been without a reinsurance program. The amount any customer would save depends on where they live, their age and how many people in their family need coverage.
A 40-year-old buying individual coverage would have an average savings of $1,500 over the course of a year. People living on the Western Slope would save more, while the change was smaller near the Front Range.
Open enrollment on the marketplace begins Nov. 1 and runs through Jan. 15.
For the first time, Coloradans have a clear picture of where they can go for sometimes-controversial health services such as abortion, gender-affirming care or medical aid-in-dying.
In much of the state, though, the answer is “nowhere close.”
Hospitals are required to disclose data about restrictions on 66 services related to reproductive, gender-affirming and end-of-life care to the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment under a law passed in 2023. Starting this month, they also must provide copies of their disclosure forms to patients ahead of their appointments.
Only three Colorado counties — Denver, Douglas and Weld — have unrestricted access in at least one hospital to three services from the list that The Denver Post sampled.
Access to gender-affirming surgery was especially limited; only 13 of Colorado’s 64 counties have a hospital without non-medical restrictions on a double mastectomy, also known as “top surgery,” for gender affirmation. (Eighteen counties have no hospital within their borders, and the rest either don’t offer mastectomies to anyone or restricted who could receive one.)
Nor was access to the other sampled services much broader.
Thirteen Colorado counties have a hospital that would assist with a request for medical aid-in-dying without religious or other non-medical limitations, and 15 have one that would provide comprehensive treatment for a miscarriage, which can include drugs and procedures used in induced abortions.
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Facilities that restrict the services they offer aren’t likely to make changes because of the law — particularly since many of the restrictions stem from religious beliefs — but at least patients will know what to expect when they go for care, said Dr. Patricia Gabow, a former CEO of Denver Health who has written about the intersection of religion and health care.
Of course, transparency only does so much for people who live in a county where the only hospitals are Catholic-owned, Gabow said. Catholic hospitals, which include those owned by CommonSpirit Health and some belonging to Intermountain Health, generally don’t offer contraception, sterilization, gender-affirming care, medical aid-in-dying or abortion.
“People who live in Durango, I don’t know what they’re supposed to do,” she said.
Mercy Hospital in that city follows Catholic ethical and religious directives for health care, and the closest hospital that offers comprehensive reproductive services or assistance with medical aid-in-dying is in Del Norte, about two and a half hours away.
Catholic doctrine requires health care providers to “respect all stages of life,” and not participate in procedures such as medical aid-in-dying or sterilization without a medical reason, said Lindsay Radford, spokeswoman for CommonSpirit Health, which owns Mercy.
The system’s hospitals work with patients and their families to provide appropriate pain and symptom relief as they near death, she said.
“We respect and honor the physician-patient relationship, and medical decisions are made by a patient and their doctor. Patients who seek care at a CommonSpirit Health hospital or clinic are fully informed of all treatment options, including those we do not perform,” she said in a statement.
Geographic and political differences
Generally, access to potentially controversial services was greater in more areas with larger populations, though with significant exceptions.
Both of Jefferson County’s hospitals, St. Anthony Hospital in Lakewood and Lutheran Hospital in Wheat Ridge, won’t allow measures to end a pregnancy if a fetus still has a heartbeat.
The state’s form conflates “threatened” and “completed” miscarriages, said Sara Quale, spokeswoman for Intermountain Health, which owns Lutheran Hospital. The hospital doesn’t restrict care once a fetus has died, but if it still has a heartbeat, doctors attempt to treat whatever is causing the miscarriage, she said. The most common cause of miscarriages is a problem with a fetus’s chromosomes, which doesn’t allow it to survive and has no treatment.
In contrast, people in rural Prowers County on the Eastern Plains can get comprehensive miscarriage treatment without driving elsewhere. So can residents of Rio Grande County.
Local politics also don’t necessarily match up with access.
The three counties that had at least one hospital offering unrestricted access to the three sampled services were deep-blue Denver and thoroughly red Weld and Douglas.
While their residents might differ on many issues, Weld and Douglas counties shared one common characteristic with Denver: They’re home to at least one hospital owned by a secular system, such as UCHealth, Denver Health or HCA HealthOne.
At least 22 hospitals in Colorado have religious restrictions on care options: 17 owned or formerly owned by Catholic organizations, and five affiliated with the Adventist faith. In some cases, when a hospital changes hands, provisions of the deal require the new owner to honor the seller’s religious and ethical rules, even if the buyer is secular.
Some secular organizations also listed certain services as restricted.
UCHealth generally doesn’t serve patients under 15, while Denver Health doesn’t provide abortions under certain circumstances because of concerns about losing federal funding, spokesman Dane Roper said.
The seven HealthOne hospitals also had non-religious restrictions, but didn’t specify their nature. Banner Health didn’t respond to inquiries about service limitations at its five Colorado hospitals.
Informed decision-making
So far, Colorado is the only state that requires hospitals to directly tell patients when they don’t offer services for religious or other non-medical reasons, said Alison Gill, vice president of legal and policy with American Atheists, which supported the law as it went through the legislature.
That provision will be important not only for Coloradans seeking care, but for people traveling to the state because of its welcoming policies around reproductive and gender-affirming care, she said.
“We are encouraging other states to enact similar provisions because it is essential to provide patients with information about service availability so that they can make informed decisions about their health care,” she said.
The law has some limitations, said Gabow, formerly of Denver Health. For example, an outpatient gynecology office owned by a religious health system doesn’t have to give patients the disclosure form, and insurers don’t have to include hospitals offering care without limitations in their networks, she said.
Colorado’s law won’t inherently increase access to health care, but it may prevent surprises for patients who don’t know to look up the closest hospital’s religious affiliation or don’t realize it could affect them, said Dr. Sam Doernberg, a physician researcher at Brigham & Women’s Hospital in Boston.
Doernberg wrote a study that found 132 counties nationwide had “religious monopolies” in their hospital markets as of 2020. The vast majority involved Catholic hospitals, and 11 involved Adventist hospitals. The study didn’t include counties that don’t have a hospital and are adjacent to a monopoly county, so the actual number where people don’t have the full range of choices may be higher, he said.
While no states have tried them yet, researchers do have a few ideas to more directly increase access to care while still respecting the religious rights of organizations that own hospitals, Doernberg said.
For example, they could directly fund public health departments so they can provide more reproductive services in areas where the dominant health system limits options, or they could require that insurance companies don’t charge patients an out-of-network rate if none of the in-network hospitals offer gender-affirming care, for example, he said.
“There are other possible solutions that are not currently being pursued,” he said.
City officials did not say when or where the beetles were found or how many trees were impacted and could not immediately be reached for comment.
Ash trees infested by the beetles can be identified through “D-shaped” exit holes, splitting bark and “S-shaped” tunnels under the bark, city Forestry Supervisor Luke Killoran said in a statement.
Other signs include thinning tree canopy, abnormal shoots of growth, smaller leaves and lots of woodpecker activity.
In Colorado, the bugs were first found in Boulder County in 2013 and have since been confirmed in Adams, Arapahoe, Broomfield and Larimer counties. Arvada’s first beetle was discovered in 2020.
Residents may be able to protect healthy trees through preventative insecticide treatments but should make sure to use a certified arborist licensed by the Colorado Department of Agriculture as a commercial pesticide applicator.
Wisconsin health officials initiated a recall of eggs following an outbreak of salmonella infections among 65 people in nine states — including Colorado — that originated on a Wisconsin farm.
The Wisconsin Department of Health Services said in a statement Friday that among those infected by salmonella are 42 people in Wisconsin, where the eggs are believed to have been sold.
“The eggs were distributed in Wisconsin, Illinois and Michigan through retail stores and food service distributors,” the department said. “The recall includes all egg types such as conventional cage-free, organic, and non-GMO, carton sizes, and expiration dates in containers labeled with ‘Milo’s Poultry Farms’ or ‘Tony’s Fresh Market.’”
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirmed in a statement on its website that 65 people in nine states were infected by a strain of salmonella, with 24 hospitalizations and no deaths as of Friday. The states include Wisconsin, Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota, Iowa, Virginia, Colorado, Utah and California, the agency said.
One case has been reported in Colorado to date, according to the CDC.
The egg recall was undertaken by Milo’s Poultry Farms LLC of Bonduel, Wisconsin, the CDC said.
“Anyone who purchased the recalled eggs is advised to not eat them or cook with them and to throw them away. Restaurants should not sell or serve recalled eggs,” the Wisconsin health department said.
The department advised anyone who ate the eggs and is experiencing symptoms to contact a health care provider. Symptoms include diarrhea, abdominal pain, fever and vomiting lasting for several days, the statement said.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture in July announced new measures to limit salmonella in poultry products. The proposed directive included requiring poultry companies to keep salmonella levels under a certain threshold and test for the presence of six particularly sickening forms of the bacteria, three found in turkey and three in chicken.
Bacteria exceeding the proposed standard and identification of any of the strains would prevent poultry sales and leave the products subject to recall.
The CDC estimates salmonella causes 1.35 million infections annually, most through food, and about 420 deaths. The Agriculture Department estimates there are 125,000 infections from chicken and 43,000 from turkey each year.
As Colorado’s universal preschool program moves into its second school year this month, officials are hoping to leave its rocky rollout in the rearview mirror.
By the end of July, more than 31,000 4-year-olds matched with state-funded preschool providers for the coming year, according to the most recent data for the core program from the Colorado Department of Early Childhood. Most will receive up to 15 hours of free classtime per week, though about 11,100 of them — about 3,000 more than last year — are expected to qualify for 30 hours each week, after state officials expanded eligibility criteria for the extra class time.
The number of providers participating in the program — in-home day cares, private practices, religious schools and public schools — has grown by about 150, to more than 2,000 statewide for this school year, Universal Preschool Program Director Dawn Odean said.
Taken together, that data points to the year-two stabilization of a program whose inaugural year, hiccups and all, was akin to “building the plane as we were flying it,” Odean said.
Colorado’s program was officially born in April 2022, when Gov. Jared Polis signed the bill to create it and the new Colorado Department of Early Childhood. The program was set for a fall 2023 launch. That left about 16 months to stand up the department, bring about 1,800 participating providers into the new system and sign up tens of thousands of families.
But entering year two of the $344 million program, Odean and local coordinating organizations are hopeful the initial struggles were growing pains associated with its launch. Department officials expect to meet or surpass last year’s sign-up numbers soon, and they hope to see enrollment increase by up to 5%.
“In a nutshell, I’ll tell you things are much better,” said Elsa Holguín, president and CEO of the Denver Preschool Program. It’s one of the local coordinating organizations, or LCOs, that act as a link between the state department and on-the-ground providers. “Things have gotten better for the families, things have improved for the child care providers and things have improved for the LCOs.”
But, she added, there’s always room for refinement.
“Are we where we need to be? No. We still have some work to do across the spectrum,” Holguín said.
The rollout of year two is still underway, with parents now able to walk through local providers’ doors to sign up for free preschool, space permitting, rather than being required to apply online. The full enrollment figures for this year won’t be available until the fall.
Aleia Medina, 5, second from right, and classmates attend a morning class with Rosario Ortiz at the Early Excellence Program of Denver on Tuesday, Aug. 6, 2024. (Photo by Hyoung Chang/The Denver Post)
Adapting to last year’s high enrollment
Ahead of last year’s launch, expectations for the first year began shifting about as soon as public planning for it began.
A promise of 10 hours a week of free classtime for all preschoolers turned into 15, with some students qualifying for double that time — considered full-day schooling — based on family circumstances. But months later, officials raised the threshold to qualify for 30 hours as overall enrollment rates shot up about 20% higher than expected, leaving some families feeling like the rug was yanked out from under them.
Initially, the state had planned to offer extra time to children deemed at risk if they qualified under an eligibility category — by having an individualized education plan, being a dual-language learner, coming from a low-income family or being in foster care.
When demand outpaced expectations, state officials changed the criteria to add base household income limits, at a middle-class level, as an additional qualification. Students still had to qualify under at least one other factor.
Meanwhile, providers and families were chafing at a confusing enrollment process that drew critical attention from state lawmakers.
But officials point to a number of under-the-hood changes since then to smooth out operations.
Voters in November approved a ballot measure last fall that allowed the state to keep $23.7 million in excess tobacco tax proceeds that help pay for the program. Officials expanded the criteria for 30 hours of free classtime to include all families who are at or below the federal poverty line, expanding access to some 3,000 more children. And the state streamlined enrollment processes to smooth out some of those first-year wrinkles.
“We’re ecstatic with year one as far as the number of children served and the number of providers participating — but (we) certainly knew that we stood up the program, and the process to enroll and register, in a fairly compressed timeline, which created some challenges,” said Odean, the state’s preschool program director, in an interview this week.
She also acknowledged the legal battles that played out in the first year.
A group of school districts had sued over the rollout, claiming that it hurt students with special needs and left school districts in a lurch. A judge ruled in July that the districts lacked standing to sue, while also acknowledging the “headaches” they faced, according to Chalkbeat.
In a separate January lawsuit, two Catholic schools sued over a nondiscrimination clause for preschool providers. That suit was largely rejected, but not before the state removed the nondiscrimination clause. About 40 religious schools are registered as universal preschool providers in the state this school year.
Odean said she couldn’t comment on the particulars of the lawsuits, but she appreciated the conversations they spurred about how to make sure families get the preschool they want — even if she wished they didn’t take the form of litigation.
Hunter Fridley, 4, counts the number of classmates during a morning class with Rosario Ortiz at the Early Excellence Program of Denver on Tuesday, Aug. 6, 2024. (Photo by Hyoung Chang/The Denver Post)
Private providers’ low enrollments “concerning”
When it came to preparing for school this year, Holguín, the Denver Preschool Program’s CEO, said preregistration for families and other changes to enrollment, in particular, “changed our world” by making it easier to connect them with preschool providers.
Diane Smith, director of the Douglas County Early Childhood Council, another LCO, likewise said the state’s program is better positioned this year “in many ways” — though it’s still too early to make a definitive call.
She still identified a number of focus areas for the future, including a desire for more lead time between announced changes to the program and when they’re implemented, along with more predictable, consistent funding for providers. And, of course, the unending work of making sure every family that wants to participate knows about the program and how to enroll in it.
In short, the first-year growing pains haven’t quite waned, Smith said, even as she excitedly reports that more providers have signed up to provide universal preschool in her area.
“Some people are bigger worriers than I am,” Smith said. “I’m the type who says ‘Yes, this is a little bit of a challenge, but I think intentions are always good.’ We’re looking to move forward and we have.”
Dawn Alexander, executive director of the Early Childhood Education Association of Colorado, which advocates for private preschool providers, warned that some of her members were starting to fret about “concerning” lowearly enrollment numbers — though she, too, cautioned that it was too early to raise a red flag.
Many families seem to be choosing school districts’ programs for their 4-year-olds, Alexander said, meaning that private preschools lose out on those enrollments. The older, less care-intensive preschool children help round out the rosters of many facilities that also provide day care for infants and toddlers, she said. Losing those populations can put their entire business at risk.
That, coupled with other strains associated with tight margins and fluctuating enrollment, add up for providers, she said. Many staffed up based on expected enrollment — and corresponding state funding — that’s so far not materialized, she said. She and other private providers raised similar concerns last year.
“You get too many frustrations and you go, ‘I’m out,’ ” Alexander said. “And you don’t want private providers to opt out of the system. It’s critical they be a significant part of it.”
Odean said there was still work being done around funding, including how to make it easier for families to qualify for — and providers to benefit from — the myriad state and federal preschool assistance programs.
There’s also a balance to strike between stable, predictable funding and ways to allow it to fluctuate so it meets current needs, she said. A smoother year two will make it easier for officials to be intentional about steps forward, she said.
“Things change, communities change — and so we have to continue to be responsive,” Odean said. “We just want to have some clear processes in place where we’re continuing to hear from families and providers, and we have a stable system and environment … so we can continue to improve.”
Colorado has three years to lower ground-level ozone pollution to meet federal standards, and this summer’s hazy skies — caused by oil and gas drilling, heavy vehicle traffic and wildfire smoke — are putting the state in a hole as it’s already logged more dirty air days than in all of 2023.
“Our state has taken a lot of steps to improve air quality, but you can see it in the skies, you can see it in the air, that we still have work to do,” said Kirsten Schatz, clean air advocate for the Colorado Public Interest Research Group.
Two months into the 2024 summer ozone season, the Front Range already has recorded more high ozone days than the entire summer of 2023. As of Monday, which is the most recent data available, ozone levels had exceeded federal air quality standards on 28 days. At the same point in 2023, there had been 27 high-ozone days.
The summer ozone season runs from June 1 to Aug. 31. However, the region encompassing metro Denver and the northern Front Range this year recorded its first high ozone day in May, and in some years ozone pollution exceeds federal standards into mid-September.
The first benchmark is to lower average ozone pollution to a 2008 standard of 75 parts per billion. The northern Front Range is in what’s called “severe non-attainment” for that number, meaning motorists must use a more expensive blend of gasoline during the summer and more businesses must apply for federal permits that regulate how much pollution they spill into the air.
The second benchmark requires the region to lower its average ozone pollution to a 2015 standard of 70 parts per billion, considered the most acceptable level of air pollution for human health. In July, the EPA downgraded the northern Front Range to be in serious violation of that standard as the region’s ozone level now sits at 81 parts per billion. The state must now submit to the EPA a new plan for lowering emissions.
Colorado needs to meet both EPA benchmarks by 2027, or it will be downgraded again and face more federal regulation.
Of the 28 days the state has recorded high ozone pollution levels, 17 exceeded the 2008 standard of 70 parts per billion, according to data compiled by the Regional Air Quality Council, an organization that advises the state on how to reduce air pollution.
That’s bad news for the region after state air regulators predicted Colorado would be able to meet that standard by the 2027 deadline. The EPA calculates average ozone pollution levels on a three-year average, so this summer’s bad numbers will drag down the final grade.
“It’s not a good first year to have,” said Mike Silverstein, the air quality council’s executive director.
Smoke from wildfires near and far
Ground-level ozone pollution forms on hot summer days when volatile organic compounds and nitrogen oxides react in the sunlight. Those compounds and gases are released by oil and gas wells and refineries, automobiles on the road, fumes from paint and other industrial chemicals, and gas-powered lawn and garden equipment.
It forms a smog that can cause the skies to become brown or hazy, and it is harmful to people, especially those with lung and heart disease, the elderly and children. Ground-level ozone is different than the ozone in the atmosphere that protects Earth from the sun’s powerful rays.
Wildfire smoke blowing from Canada and the Pacific Northwest did not help Colorado’s pollution levels in July, and then multiple fires erupted along the Front Range over the past week, creating homegrown pollution from fine particulate matter such as smoke, soot and ash. Ultimately, though, the heavy smoke days could be wiped from the calculations from 2024, but that decision will be made at a later date.
Still, June also saw multiple high ozone days, and air quality experts say much of the pollution originates at home in Colorado and cannot be blamed on outside influences.
The out-of-state wildfire smoke sent ozone levels skyrocketing the week of July 21 to 27, Silverstein said, but it’s not the reason the numbers are high. The week prior saw ozone levels above federal standards, too, and wildfire smoke had not drifted into the region.
“Pull the wildfires out and we would probably still have had high ozone,” he said.
Jeremy Nichols, senior advocate for the Center for Biological Diversity, also warned that wildfires should not be used as an excuse for the region’s air pollution.
“While the wildfires are out of our control, there is a whole bunch of air pollution we can control,” he said. “I don’t want to let that cover up the ugliness that existed here in the first place.”
Nichols blames oil and gas drilling for the region’s smog. The state is not doing enough to regulate the industry, he said.
“We actually need to recognize we are at a point where oil and gas needs to stop drilling on high ozone days,” Nichols said. “Just like we’re told to stay home on high ozone days, business as usual needs to stop. I don’t think we’ve clamped down on them and in many respects they are getting a free pass to pollute.”
One proposal would require drilling companies to eliminate emissions from pneumatic actuating devices, equipment driven by pressurized gas to open and close valves in pipelines, Silverstein said. Oil companies already are required to make 50% of those devices emission-free, and the federal government also is requiring them to be 100% emission-free by 2035. But Colorado’s proposal would accelerate the timeline, he said.
The second proposal would tell companies to stop performing blowdowns, which is when workers vent fumes from pipelines before beginning maintenance to clear explosive gases, when an ozone alert is issued, Silverstein said.
“There are thousands of these very small events, but these small events add up to significant activity,” he said.
Gabby Richmond, a spokeswoman for the Colorado Oil and Gas Association, said the industry supports the new regulations. She said operators also were electrifying operations where possible and voluntarily delaying operational activities on high ozone days.
“Our industry values clean air, and we are committed to pioneering innovative solutions that protect our environment and make Colorado a great place to live,” Richmond said in a statement. “As a part of this commitment, we have significantly reduced ozone-causing emissions by over 50% through technology, regulatory initiatives and voluntary measures — all in the spirit of being good neighbors in the communities where we live and work.”
“Knock down emissions where we can”
Meanwhile, people who live in metro Denver and the northern Front Range are asked to do their part, too.
When the state health department issues an ozone action alert — which is a forecast for high pollution levels — people are asked to limit driving as much as possible. They also are asked to avoid using gas-powered lawn and garden equipment until later in the day when the sun starts dropping behind the mountains and temperatures fall.
It would be easy to blame Colorado’s ozone pollution on its geography, global climate change that is raising temperatures, and pollution blowing from other countries and states, Silverstein said. But Colorado has a responsibility to do its part.
“We have 4 million people and a big oil and gas field and lots of industrial activity and all of the things related to human activity all in one concentrated location with a great mountain backdrop, but it comes with a bit of a price,” he said. “So it’s up to us to find the strategies to knock down emissions where we can.”
The Washington tribes that agreed to provide wolves to Colorado’s reintroduction program have rescinded their offer, forcing state wildlife officials to seek a different source — a search that has proved difficult in the past.
The Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation said they would no longer provide the wolves after speaking with the Southern Ute Indian Tribe, which has reservation land in Colorado. The Washington tribes — which had been expected to be a major source for the next round of the reintroduction effort — withdrew their agreement in a June 6 letter to Colorado Parks and Wildlife.
“It has come to our attention that necessary and meaningful consultation was not completed with the potentially impacted tribes,” wrote Jarred-Michael Erickson, chairman of the Colville business council, in the letter. “Out of respect for the sovereignty, cultures and memberships of Indian Tribes in Colorado and neighboring states, who may be impacted by this project, the Colville Tribes cannot assist with this project at this time.”
Colorado voters in 2020 narrowly decided to reintroduce gray wolves and mandated that state wildlife officials do so by Dec. 31, 2023.
The plan detailing how CPW will execute the reintroduction effort states that the agency should release a total of 30 to 50 wolves within the next few years, a target it plans to reach by relocating 10 to 15 wolves every winter.
The controversial vote has caused deep frustration in Colorado’s ranching communities, where people say the wolves will negatively impact their businesses and ways of life. Support for the reintroduction primarily came from urban Front Range communities, while the rural areas where wolves would live opposed the measure.
The Southern Ute Indian Tribe has concerns about the wolves potential impact on livestock, deer and elk herds and their use of the Brunot Area hunting rights reserved for tribal members, tribal leadership said Thursday in a statement. Tribal leaders said they would continue to work with Colorado Parks and Wildlife “to establish a framework for working together that enables the state to implement its reintroduction program while simultaneously recognizing the sovereign authority of the Tribe on tribal lands and the interest shared by the Tribe and the State in the Brunot Area.”
So far, CPW’s monthly maps showing where the wolves have roamed have indicated activity in the central and northern mountains, far from the Southern Utes’ southwestern Colorado reservation. But plans call for the next round of releases to occur farther south.
Colorado wildlife officials struggled last year to find a state or tribe willing to provide wolves for reintroduction here. The three states identified as ideal for sourcing wolves — Idaho, Montana and Wyoming — all rejected Colorado’s request for wolves.
CPW spokesman Joey Livingston on Thursday declined to discuss source negotiations and said the agency would issue a statement when it finds a source.
“We continue speaking with other potential sources of wolves,” he wrote in an email, “and will take great care in implementing the plan to create a self-sustaining wolf population while minimizing impacts on our landowners, rural communities, agricultural industries and partners.”
In October, Oregon agreed to provide up to 10 wolves over the coming winter. Ten wolves captured in Oregon were released in Colorado in December.
Colorado wildlife officials have also talked with Washington state officials about potentially capturing wolves there. While Washington officials previously said they could not provide wolves for the first release, they indicated they were open to further conversations.
Colorado’s senators and a congressman are demanding answers from U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs leadership over a series of troubling reports about its Aurora hospital.
Sens. Michael Bennet and John Hickenlooper, both Democrats, and Rep. Jason Crow, an Aurora Democrat, sent a letter to VA leadership on Monday requesting an accounting of patient safety issues, further explanation over its current pause in surgeries due to a mysterious residue on its medical equipment, and steps the hospital has taken to address pervasive cultural problems among its staff.
“As problems persist within the (Eastern Colorado hospital system), we are increasingly concerned about the quality of care Colorado veterans receive, a lack of adherence to the required medical and employee procedures, and how recent leadership changes have impeded the system’s effectiveness,” the lawmakers wrote.
The letter comes on the heels of two scathing reports from the VA’s Office of Inspector General, which investigates departmental waste, fraud and abuse.
The probes, released June 24, found Aurora’s Rocky Mountain Regional VA Medical Center paused surgeries for more than a year in 2022 and 2023 because the hospital didn’t have the staff to care for those patients after their procedures. They never told the federal VA as required, the investigation found.
The second inspector general report said the Aurora VA suffered from poor organizational health, citing widespread fear among staff that promoted disenfranchisement. Doctors stopped performing high-risk procedures, one staffer said, for fear of punishment if something went wrong.
The investigation mirrored The Denver Post’s reporting since last fall, which found the toxic workplace and culture of fear had permeated a wide swath of departments, leading to high turnover, especially among senior leadership positions. The Post also found that the head of the hospital’s prosthetics department was instructing employees to cancel veterans’ orders to clear a large backlog. The VA later confirmed The Post’s reporting.
Bennet, Hickenlooper and Crow, in their letter, asked the VA to respond to a series of questions, including detailed queries about the mysterious residue that has halted hundreds of surgeries since April. The Post first reported in May that the hospital was rescheduling or referring to community hospitals all surgeries that rely on reusable equipment.
The elected officials also asked the VA about staffing shortages at the hospital network, along with reports that many veterans in the system have been waiting months for their first face-to-face appointment with a provider.
“We share the goal of providing veterans across the country with timely, quality and consistent health care,” the letter states. “The continuous appointment delays and ongoing quality issues at (the hospital) undermine this objective.”
Denver voters will be asked in November to consider increasing the city’s sales tax to raise $70 million a year to help stabilize Denver Health, the region’s financially ailing safety-net hospital.
The Denver City Council voted 12-1 without discussion Monday to send the .34% sales-tax increase — which would add 34 cents to a $100 purchase — to the ballot. The city’s current sales tax is 8.81% and, if this measure is approved by voters, it will increase to 9.15%.
Councilman Kevin Flynn, who represents District 2, cast the only dissenting vote. He previously had expressed concern about “burdening Denver taxpayers” with tax increases.
Mayor Mike Johnston is considering asking the council to place a second sales-tax increase — one that would raise money for affordable housing — on the November ballot, administration officials told The Denver Post earlier this month.
If voters OK the Denver Health tax increase, the health system could only use the money to expand or maintain medical care in the following categories:
Emergency and trauma care
Primary care
Mental health care
Addiction treatment and recovery services
Pediatric care
There would be a cap on the administrative costs that could be drawn from the fund, as well.
The system lost about $35 million in 2022, CEO Donna Lynne told a council subcommittee at a meeting earlier this month. The hospital earned a $17 million profit in 2023, though that wasn’t enough to tackle the maintenance that it deferred in recent years, officials said.
Lynne also told council members that Denver Health could make it through the first quarter of 2025, but if it doesn’t receive additional revenue by then, it would have to make significant cuts. She didn’t specify what services those cuts might affect, but said the system has already instituted a hiring freeze, deferred maintenance, cut travel expenses and limited the circumstances where its insurance will cover anti-obesity drugs such as Wegovy.
Denver Health provided about $140 million in uncompensated care in 2023, and the hospital’s projections show it expects to spend $124 million in 2025, according to the bill approved by the council.
The city contributed about $31 million toward offsetting those costs, and the state legislature voted to make one-time payments of $5 million to assist the system last year and again in the most recent session.
The ballot question would forbid the city from reducing its contribution in response to the sales tax.
Colorado Parks and Wildlife officials started gathering evidence a gray wolf pair was denning in early April, when a collared female gray wolf stopped showing up on GPS tracking for part of the month before reappearing.
Her disappearance matched with the expected breeding season, and state biologists confirmed one wolf pup in Grand County on Tuesday, the agency said in a news release.
Parks and Wildlife worked to confirm the pup during routine wolf monitoring efforts, which include observations by air and ground, remote cameras and public sightings.
It’s possible there are more pups, because wolf litters often consist of four to six pups, state officials said Thursday.
Parks and Wildlife workers will continue to monitor the wolves to determine how many were born.
The new pup marks the wolves are officially considered a pack, which Parks and Wildlife named the Copper Creek Pack.
“We are continuing to actively monitor this area while exercising extreme caution to avoid inadvertently disturbing the adult wolves, this pup, or other pups,” state wildlife biologist Brenna Cassidy said in a statement.
Colorado is experiencing an alarming spike in syphilis among newborns, leading the state to issue a public health order Thursday aimed at curbing the disease’s spread through wider testing.
In 2023, 50 infants in Colorado were born with syphilis, up from only seven in 2018. So far this year, the state is halfway to last year’s total, with five infected babies who were stillborn and two who died in their first months of life, state epidemiologist Dr. Rachel Herlihy said.
“We’ve already had 25 cases so far this year, putting us on track to have maybe 100 cases,” she said at a news conference, addressing what Gov. Jared Polis’s office called a “growing epidemic.”
Syphilis is a sexually transmitted infection that sometimes causes no symptoms in adults, though the bacteria can eventually damage the heart and brain if a person doesn’t receive treatment. But roughly two out of five babies born to infected mothers will be stillborn or die in infancy, and those who survive are at risk of intellectual disability, bone deformities and other lifelong health problems, Herlihy said.
The new public health order from the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment requires all health care providers to offer syphilis testing at least three times to pregnant patients: in the first trimester, in the third trimester and at birth.
Nearly all insurance plans cover the testing, and people without insurance can receive it for free at public health clinics or by ordering a home test kit.
“We hope to save many babies from death and suffering,” Polis said at the news conference.
On Thursday, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists issued a recommendation that all pregnant patients receive testing three times. Previously, it only recommended more than one test if a patient had certain risk factors for getting infected while pregnant.
“The cases of congenital syphilis are definitely climbing, and they’ve been climbing over the last 10 years. And it’s completely preventable… It’s unacceptable,” said Dr. Laura Riley, who chairs the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Weill Cornell Medicine and helped with the guidance. “We need to be able to do better diagnostics and treatment.”
The Colorado order also requires offering tests to prisoners who are pregnant, and to people who have experienced a stillbirth after 20 weeks of pregnancy, when spontaneous miscarriages are rare. While it would be too late for that particular fetus after a stillbirth, antibiotic treatment would protect the mother, her sex partners and any future pregnancies.
Patients and prisoners aren’t required to undergo testing if they don’t want to, but their providers have to give them the option, said Jill Hunsaker Ryan, executive director of the state health department. State law already required that providers offer everyone syphilis testing in the first trimester.
Last year, 3,266 people in Colorado received a syphilis diagnosis, which was a 5% increase over the previous year and more than three times the number diagnosed in 2018. Most of the diagnoses are still in men, because the bacteria became entrenched in the community of gay and bisexual men. About one-third are in women, though, and diagnoses have risen faster among women than among men.
Nationwide, syphilis diagnoses reached their highest rate since at least 1950 in 2022, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Cases peaked in the 1940s, before antibiotics became widely available, and fell throughout the 20th century.
People of color and those who lack access to reliable health care, such as the homeless population, have been hit disproportionately hard in the resurgence over the last few years.
Earlier this year, the state health department asked for $8 million over four years to fund an opt-out syphilis screening program at two hospital emergency departments in Denver and Pueblo County, which both have a significant share of new infections.
The department also proposed to distribute rapid tests to organizations that work with at-risk people; to fund delivering treatment to some people in their homes; and to build up a stockpile of the antibiotics used to treat syphilis. Most antibiotics are cheap, but the best option for syphilis, Bicillin, is relatively expensive and in short supply, so providers don’t always opt to stock it.
The state and the Pueblo Department of Public Health and Environment already run a small pilot program to bring treatment to people in their homes. Jails in Pueblo, El Paso and Jefferson counties also have started screening female prisoners and offering treatment to anyone who tests positive.
Pueblo County Sheriff David Lucero said about one-quarter of the 634 people his department has screened so far tested positive, and seven were pregnant at the time of their positive test. The Pueblo County jail has a partnership with the local health department to follow up if someone returns to the community before completing treatment, he said.
“Without a doubt, this program saves lives,” Lucero said.
The biggest driver of the increase in congenital syphilis seems to be that mothers aren’t getting early prenatal care, which could identify and cure the infection, Herlihy said. The mothers of babies born affected this year have higher rates of previous incarceration, untreated addiction and homelessness than the general population, she said.
“The risk factors we’re seeing are really driving the actions we’re taking,” she said.
By DEVI SHASTRI and MIKE STOBBE (Associated Press)
Measles outbreaks in the U.S. and abroad are raising health experts’ concern about the preventable, once-common childhood virus.
One of the world’s most contagious diseases, measles can lead to potentially serious complications. The best defense, according to experts? Get vaccinated.
Here’s what to know about the year — so far — in measles.
How many measles cases has the U.S. seen this year?
Nationwide, measles cases already are nearly double the total for all of last year.
The U.S. Centers of Disease Control and Prevention documented 113 cases as of April 5. There have been seven outbreaks and most of U.S. cases — 73% — are linked to those flare-ups.
Still, the count is lower than some recent years: 2014 saw 667 cases and 2019 had 1,274.
Why is this a big deal?
The 2019 measles epidemic was the worst in almost three decades, and threatened the United States’ status as a country that has eliminated measles by stopping the continual spread of the measles virus.
The CDC on Thursday released a report on recent measles case trends, noting that cases in the first three months of this year were 17 times higher than the average number seen in the first three months of the previous three years.
While health officials seem to be doing a good job detecting and responding to outbreaks, “the rapid increase in the number of reported measles cases during the first quarter of 2024 represents a renewed threat to elimination,” the report’s authors said.
Where is measles coming from?
The disease is still common in many parts of the world, and measles reaches the U.S. through unvaccinated travelers.
According to Thursday’s report, most of the recent importations involved unvaccinated Americans who got infected in the Middle East and Africa and brought measles back to the U.S.
Where were this year’s U.S. measles outbreaks?
Health officials confirmed measles cases in 17 states so far this year, including cases in New York City, Philadelphia and Chicago.
More than half of this year’s cases come from the Chicago outbreak, where 61 people have contracted the virus as of Thursday, largely among people who lived in a migrant shelter.
The city health department said Thursday that cases are on the decline after health officials administered 14,000 vaccines in just over a month.
How does measles spread?
Measles is highly contagious. It spreads when people who have it breathe, cough or sneeze and through contaminated surfaces. It also can linger in the air for two hours.
Up to 9 out of 10 people who are susceptible will get the virus if exposed, according to the CDC.
Measles used to be common among kids. How bad was it?
Before a vaccine became available in 1963, there were some 3 million to 4 million cases per year, which meant nearly all American kids had it sometime during childhood, according to the CDC. Most recovered.
But measles can be much more than an uncomfortable rash, said Susan Hassig, an infectious disease researcher at Tulane University.
“I think that people need to remember that this is a preventable disease,” Hassig said. “It is a potentially dangerous disease for their children.”
In the decade before the vaccine was available, 48,000 people were hospitalized per year. About 1,000 people developed dangerous brain inflammation from measles each year, and 400 to 500 died, according to the CDC.
Is the measles vaccine safe? Where do vaccination rates stand?
The measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine is safe and effective. It is a routine and recommended childhood vaccine that is split into two doses.
Research shows it takes a very high vaccination rate to prevent measles from spreading: 95% of the population should have immunity against the virus.
The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
The Biden administration on Wednesday finalized strict limits on certain so-called “forever chemicals” in drinking water that will require utilities to reduce them to the lowest level they can be reliably measured. Officials say this will reduce exposure for 100 million people and help prevent thousands of illnesses, including cancers.
The rule is the first national drinking water limit on toxic PFAS, or perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances, which are widespread and long-lasting in the environment.
Health advocates praised the Environmental Protection Agency for not backing away from tough limits the agency proposed last year. But water utilities took issue with the rule, saying treatment systems are expensive to install and that customers will end up paying more for water.
Water providers are entering a new era with significant additional health standards that the EPA says will make tap water safer for millions of consumers — a Biden administration priority. The agency has also proposed forcing utilities to remove dangerous lead pipes.
EPA Administrator Michael Regan says the rule is the most important action the EPA has ever taken on PFAS.
“The result is a comprehensive and life-changing rule, one that will improve the health and vitality of so many communities across our country,” said Regan.
PFAS chemicals are hazardous because they don’t degrade in the environment and are linked to health issues such as low birth weight and liver disease, along with certain cancers. The EPA estimates the rule will cost about $1.5 billion to implement each year, but doing so will prevent nearly 10,000 deaths over decades and significantly reduce serious illnesses.
They’ve been used in everyday products including nonstick pans, firefighting foam and waterproof clothing. Although some of the most common types are phased out in the U.S., others remain. Water providers will now be forced to remove contamination put in the environment by other industries.
“It’s that accumulation that’s the problem,” said Scott Belcher, a North Carolina State University professor who researches PFAS toxicity. “Even tiny, tiny, tiny amounts each time you take a drink of water over your lifetime is going to keep adding up, leading to the health effects.”
PFAS is a broad family of chemical substances, and the new rule sets strict limits on two common types — called PFOA and PFOS — at 4 parts per trillion. Three other types that include GenEx Chemicals that are a major problem in North Carolina are limited to 10 parts per trillion. Water providers will have to test for these PFAS chemicals and tell the public when levels are too high. Combinations of some PFAS types will be limited, too.
Regan will announce the rule in Fayetteville, North Carolina, on Wednesday.
Environmental and health advocates praised the rule, but said PFAS manufacturers knew decades ago the substances were dangerous yet hid or downplayed the evidence. Limits should have come sooner, they argue.
“Reducing PFAS in our drinking water is the most cost effective way to reduce our exposure,” said Scott Faber, a food and water expert at Environmental Working Group. “It’s much more challenging to reduce other exposures such as PFAS in food or clothing or carpets.”
Over the last year, EPA has periodically released batches of utility test results for PFAS in drinking water. Roughly 16% of utilities found at least one of the two strictly limited PFAS chemicals at or above the new limits. These utilities serve tens of millions of people. The Biden administration, however, expects about 6-10% of water systems to exceed the new limits.
Water providers will generally have three years to do testing. If those test exceed the limits, they’ll have two more years to install treatment systems, according to EPA officials.
Some funds are available to help utilities. Manufacturer 3M recently agreed to pay more than $10 billion to drinking water providers to settle PFAS litigation. And the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law includes billions to combat the substance. But utilities say more will be needed.
For some communities, tests results were a surprise. Last June, a utility outside Philadelphia that serves nearly 9,000 people learned that one of its wells had a PFOA level of 235 parts per trillion, among the highest results in the country at the time.
“I mean, obviously, it was a shock,” said Joseph Hastings, director of the joint public works department for the Collegeville and Trappe boroughs, whose job includes solving problems presented by new regulations.
The well was quickly yanked offline, but Hastings still doesn’t know the contamination source. Several other wells were above the EPA’s new limits, but lower than those the state of Pennsylvania set earlier. Now, Hastings says installing treatment systems could be a multi-million dollar endeavor, a major expense for a small customer base.
The new regulation is “going to throw public confidence in drinking water into chaos,” said Mike McGill, president of WaterPIO, a water industry communications firm.
The American Water Works Association, an industry group, says it supports the development of PFAS limits in drinking water, but argues the EPA’s rule has big problems.
The agency underestimated its high cost, which can’t be justified for communities with low levels of PFAS, and it’ll raise customer water bills, the association said. Plus, there aren’t enough experts and workers — and supplies of filtration material are limited.
Work in some places has started. The company Veolia operates utilities serving about 2.3 million people across six eastern states and manages water systems for millions more. Veolia built PFAS treatment for small water systems that serve about 150,000 people. The company expects, however, that roughly 50 more sites will need treatment — and it’s working to scale up efforts to reduce PFAS in larger communities it serves.
Such efforts followed dramatic shifts in EPA’s health guidance for PFAS in recent years as more research into its health harms emerged. Less than a decade ago, EPA issued a health advisory that PFOA and PFOS levels combined shouldn’t exceed 70 parts per trillion. Now, the agency says no amount is safe.
Public alarm has increased, too. In Minnesota, for example, Amara’s Law aims to stop avoidable PFAS use. It’s been nearly a year since the law’s namesake, Amara Strande, died from a rare cancer her family blames on PFAS contamination by 3M near her high school in Oakdale, although a connection between PFAS and her cancer can’t be proven. Biden administration officials say communities shouldn’t suffer like Oakdale. 3M says it extends its deepest condolences to Amara’s friends and family.
Losing Amara pushed the family towards activism. They’ve testified multiple times in favor of PFAS restrictions.
“Four parts per trillion, we couldn’t ask for a better standard,” Amara’s sister Nora said. “It’s a very ambitious goal, but anything higher than that is endangering lives.”
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Associated Press data journalist Camille Fassett in San Francisco and reporter Matthew Daly in Washington, D.C., contributed to this story.
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The Associated Press receives support from the Walton Family Foundation for coverage of water and environmental policy. The AP is solely responsible for all content. For all of AP’s environmental coverage, visit apnews.com/hub/climate-and-environment
A center that provides free food, clothing, mental health support, workforce training, and more to students and families at six public schools in Denver will close in less than three months.
The middle and high schools served by the resource center are known as “pathways schools” and work with students who have struggled at traditional schools or are at risk of not graduating. Three years ago, the resource center — called The Village — opened at Contemporary Learning Academy, one of the pathways schools.
The Village was launched with grant funding and is now paid for by federal pandemic relief known as ESSER earmarked for schools, DPS spokesperson Scott Pribble said. The Village cost $771,690 to run this school year, he said.
But with that money expiring, Denver Public Schools must commit the last of its pandemic relief dollars by Sept. 30. Pribble said The Village is slated to close June 30.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Colorado alleges Children’s Hospital Colorado is discriminating against transgender patients by refusing to perform surgeries it offers to cisgender patients with other conditions.
The lawsuit, filed Wednesday in Denver District Court, also states the hospital is discriminating on the basis of disability, because gender dysphoria — distress when a person’s sense of their gender doesn’t align with physical characteristics — is a medical condition.
The ACLU filed it on behalf of an 18-year-old Denver patient who was on track to receive gender-affirming surgery before the hospital discontinued that service.
The patient, who is identified in the lawsuit by the pseudonym Caden Kent, started receiving care at Children’s for mental health concerns when he was 16. He was diagnosed with gender dysphoria a few months later and had undergone about eight months of assessment before determining he was a candidate for surgery once he turned 18.
The hospital stated it had received an unusual number of referrals for gender-affirming surgery as programs shut down in other states, and that it didn’t shut down the program because of threats. It came at a time when children’s hospitals were scrubbing references to transgender care from their websites, though, with at least 21 removing information in 2022. A search on the hospital’s website for its TRUE Center for Gender Diversity no longer turns up any results.
According to the lawsuit, Kent chose to undergo surgery at Children’s because he received other care there, and hoped to recover from the surgery before leaving for college in the fall. Other surgical providers who accept his family’s insurance are booked up, meaning his parents will have to pay out-of-pocket for him to undergo the surgery in that time frame. Kent had resorted to chest-binding to ease his dysphoria, but found himself withdrawing from others when binding became too painful and he couldn’t otherwise hide the breast tissue, it said.
“(Children’s Hospital Colorado’s) abrupt cancellation of all gender-affirming surgeries for its trans patients was devastating to Caden, other impacted patients, and Colorado’s transgender community,” ACLU of Colorado legal director Tim Macdonald said in a news release. “Refusal to provide medically necessary care based on the identity of the person seeking it, and the condition for which they are seeking it, is discriminatory and illegal under the Colorado Anti-Discrimination Act.”
