BOSTON — Foreshadowing a legal challenge, Massachusetts Attorney General Campbell is joining a chorus of criticism over the Trump administration’s move to effectively ban gender-affirming care for minors at hospitals that depend on federal funding.
On Thursday, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services issued new regulations that would once finalized, restrict the use of puberty blockers, hormone therapy and surgical interventions for transgender children.
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There were some highs amid a lot of lows in a roller coaster year for clean energy as President Donald Trump worked to boost polluting fuels while blocking wind and solar, according to dozens of energy developers, experts and politicians.
Surveyed by The Associated Press, many described 2025 as turbulent and challenging for clean energy, though there was progress as projects connected to the electric grid. They said clean energy must continue to grow to meet skyrocketing demand for electricity to power data centers and to lower Americans’ utility bills.
“There was a cooldown effect this year,” said Vargas, cofounder and CEO of Aspen Power. “Having said that, we are a resilient industry.”
Plug Power president Jose Luis Crespo said the developments — both policy recalibration and technological progress — will shape clean energy’s trajectory for years to come.
Much of clean energy’s fate in 2025 was driven by booster Joe Biden’s exit from the White House.
The year began with ample federal subsidies for clean energy technologies, a growing number of U.S.-based companies making parts and materials for projects and a lot of demand from states and corporations, said Tom Harper, partner at global consultant Baringa.
It ends with subsidies stripped back, a weakened supply chain, higher costs from tariffs and some customers questioning their commitment to clean energy, Harper said. He described the year as “paradigm shifting.”
Trump called wind and solar power “the scam of the century” and vowed not to approve new projects. The federal government canceled grants for hundreds of projects.
Many energy executives said this was the most consequential policy shift. The bill reshaped the economics of clean energy projects, drove a rush to start construction before incentives expire and forced developers to reassess their strategies for acquiring parts and materials, Lennart Hinrichs said. He leads the expansion of TWAICE in the Americas, providing analytics software for battery energy storage systems.
Companies can’t make billion-dollar investments with so much policy uncertainty, said American Clean Power Association CEO Jason Grumet.
Consequently, greenhouse gas emissions will fall at a much lower rate than previously projected in the U.S., said Brian Murray, director of the Nicholas Institute for Energy, Environment and Sustainability at Duke University.
Solar and storage accounted for 85% of the new power added to the grid in the first nine months of the Trump administration, according to Wood Mackenzie research.
That’s because the economics remain strong, demand is high and the technologies can be deployed quickly, said Mike Hall, CEO of Anza Renewables.
Solar energy company Sol Systems said it had a record year as it brought its largest utility-scale project online and grew its business. The energy storage systems company CMBlu Energy said storage clearly stands out as a winner this year too, moving from optional to essential.
“Trump’s effort to manipulate government regulation to harm clean energy just isn’t enough to offset the natural advantages that clean energy has,” Democratic U.S. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse said. “The direction is still all good.”
The Solar Energy Industries Association said that no matter the policies in Washington, solar and storage will grow as the backbone of the nation’s energy future.
Democrats and Republicans have supported investing to keep nuclear reactors online, restart previously closed reactors and deploy new, advanced reactor designs. Nuclear power is a carbon-free source of electricity, though not typically labeled as green energy like other renewables.
“Who had ‘restart Three Mile Island’ on their 2025 Bingo card?” questioned Baringa partner David Shepheard. The Pennsylvania plant was the site of the nation’s worst commercial nuclear power accident, in 1979. The Energy Department is loaning $1 billion to help finance a restart.
Everyone loves nuclear, said Darrin Kayser, executive vice president at Edelman. It helps that the technology for small, modular reactors is starting to come to fruition, Kayser added.
Benton Arnett, a senior director at the Nuclear Energy Institute, said that as the need for clean, reliable power intensifies, “we will look back on the actions being taken now as laying the foundation.”
The Trump administration also supports geothermal energy, and the tax bill largely preserved geothermal tax credits. The Geothermal Rising association said technologies continue to mature and produce, making 2025 a breakthrough year.
Momentum for offshore wind in the United States came to a grinding halt just as the industry was starting to gain traction, said Joey Lange, a senior managing director at Trio, a global sustainability and energy advisory company.
That has decimated the projects, developers and tech innovators, and no one in wind is raising or spending capital, said Eric Fischgrund, founder and CEO at FischTank PR. Still, Fischgrund said he remains optimistic because the world is transitioning to cleaner energy.
An energy strategy with a diverse mix of sources is the only way forward as demand grows from data centers and other sources, and as people demand affordable, reliable electricity, said former Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu. Landrieu, now with Natural Allies for a Clean Energy Future, said promoting or punishing specific energy technologies on ideological grounds is unsustainable.
Experts expect solar and battery storage to continue growing in 2026 to add a lot of power to the grid quickly and cheaply. The market will continue to ensure that most new electricity is renewable, said Amanda Levin, policy analysis director at the Natural Resources Defense Council.
Hillary Bright, executive director of Turn Forward, thinks offshore wind will still play an important role too. It is both ready and needed to help address the demand for electricity in the new year, which will become increasingly clear “to all audiences,” she said. Turn Forward advocates for offshore wind.
That skyrocketing demand “is shaking up the political calculus that drove the administration’s early policy decisions around renewables,” she said.
BlueWave CEO Sean Finnerty thinks that states, feeling the pressure to deliver affordable, reliable electricity, will increasingly drive clean energy momentum in 2026 by streamlining permitting and the process of connecting to the grid, and by reducing costs for things like permits and fees.
Ed Gunn, Lunar Energy’s vice president for revenue, said the industry has weathered tough years before.
“The fundamentals are unchanged,” Gunn said, “there is massive value in clean energy.”
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The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.
A new study found a link between cheese consumption and a decrease in dementia risk. Specifically, it finds that eating at least 50 grams of high-fat cheese a day, including brie, gouda, cheddar, parmesan, gruyere, and mozzarella, is correlated to a reduced risk, as reported by Science Alert.
It’s estimated that 57 million people lived with dementia in 2021, and there are around 10 million new diagnoses every year. According to a 2019 analysis from the Global Burden of Disease, by 2050 the number of cases could reach 153 million.
Because of a lack of treatments, researchers guide their research toward things that will lower the risk of developing dementia. Diets are a key factor, but cheese has always been tricky to figure out.
Researchers, led by nutrition epidemiologist at Lund University Yufeng Du, used data from the Malmö Diet and Cancer cohort, which tracked nearly 28,000 adults in Sweden across 25 years. The participants’ gave an interview about food habits and filled out a 7-day food diary at the beginning of the study, and results were taken at the end.
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They found that those who ate high-fat cheese demonstrated a statistically detectable lower risk for dementia. Roughly 10 percent of participants who ate at least 50 grams of high-fat cheese daily developed dementia, versus the 13 percent who ate less than 15 grams each day. More research is required to learn why.
“For decades, the debate over high-fat versus low-fat diets has shaped health advice, sometimes even categorizing cheese as an unhealthy food to limit,” said Emily Sonestedt, an epidemiologist at Sweden’s Lund University. “Our study found that some high-fat dairy products may actually lower the risk of dementia, challenging some long-held assumptions about fat and brain health.”
Still, the study doesn’t mean that cheese will save you from dementia. (Unfortunately.)
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — Strength training, if done right, shouldn’t be easy.
What You Need To Know
Asher Crouse, 12, lives with cerebral palsy
For six months, Crouse has been trying blood flow restriction therapy, a form of physical therapy
Blood flow restriction therapy is a rehabilitation modality where a blood restriction cuff is used to reduce arterial inflow and occlude venous outflow in the setting of resistance training or exercise
For years, this type of therapy was not used with children. But recently, with certain patients there has been great success
Asher Crouse has one word for the burn he feels as he pushes a sled across a 25-yard space.
“Intense,” he said, trying to catch his breath.
He is 12 and is pushing himself hard. The reason partly comes from a self-given nickname.
“I call myself ‘Crasher,’” said Crouse.
He came up with the name because at one time in his life, he would fall and crash a lot. He lives with cerebral palsy.
“There are kids with this diagnosis who never walk by themselves at all,” said Allie Benson, a pediatric physical therapist at Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital.
Crouse walks independently, though his gait has changed over the years.
“It was not what you would call a safe or pretty walk, but he could get from place to place. It was more like he was falling quickly, but would catch himself,” said Benson.
Benson has worked with Crouse for more than half of his life. He has spent hundreds of hours doing rehabilitation therapy sessions to improve his walking and mobility.
While Crouse has found success in those sessions over the years, the last six months have produced some of his biggest gains.
“He is one of the first kids here that we have really focused on it with the pediatric neuro,” said Benson.
Crouse is trying a therapy only recently introduced to kids — blood flow restriction therapy.
A large blood pressure cuff is placed around his leg as part of this therapy.
“It is occluding a certain percentage of his blood flow depending on the exercises that we are doing, to basically make an easier exercise harder with less work,” said Benson. “So, we can do like 10 reps of something, instead of a 100 reps of something and get the same effect.”
Crouse began doing blood flow restriction therapy in the summer of 2025, and after an intensive three weeks, he saw clear results.
“His right was almost equal to his left,” said Benson.
She is talking about his feet, which turn in and hinder his gait.
The blood flow restriction therapy has created a big change.
“My foot almost went 90 degrees that way,” said Crouse, pointing left. “And now I can easily put my foot straight.”
While it has shown great results, it is not for everyone. The therapy comes with some pain.
That is a big reason why up until recently, it was not deemed appropriate for kids.
“But really, I think kids like Asher, who have gone through so much in their lives, have just a different pain tolerance than everybody else. And really, they can tolerate so much more than anyone gives them credit for,” said Benson.
“I know I can do more than people say I can do it,” said Crouse.
Nowadays, he does not use the name “Crasher.”
“I am just Asher,” said Crouse.
Fully embracing himself and his new confidence with walking.
Blood flow restriction therapy has been used for several years with athletes.
Research continues with its use with children, but Johns Hopkins Children’s Hospital says it has shown great success among patients so far.
Nancy Hunt arrived at an emergency room from a Genesis HealthCare nursing home in Pennsylvania in such dreadful shape, including maggots infesting her gangrened foot, that the hospital called an elder abuse hotline and then the police, her son alleged in a lawsuit.
Hunt died five days later. Her death certificate said the foot injury was a “significant” factor. Genesis denied wrongdoing but agreed to pay $3.5 million in a settlement Hunt’s son signed in August 2024.
Yet Genesis hasn’t paid most of that debt, court records show. It may never have to.
Once the nation’s largest nursing home chain, Genesis says it was spending $8 million a month defending and settling lawsuits over resident injuries and deaths in recent years. But the company is now poised to wipe the liability slate clean by seeking refuge in the most protective corner of the legal system for the nursing home industry: bankruptcy court.
The Genesis case, one of 11 large senior care bankruptcies this year, illustrates how health care companies can dodge public and financial accountability for alleged negligence through delays, confidentiality clauses, and bankruptcy maneuvers, a KFF Health News investigation found.
When it filed for bankruptcy in Dallas in July, Genesis estimated its total liability for nearly a thousand settled and pending lawsuits at $259 million. A KFF Health News review of the terms of 155 settlement agreements and corporate financial statements shows Genesis officials knew insolvency was possible yet included provisions in its settlement agreements allowing it to defer payment, often for a year or more.
As a result, Genesis paid nothing in 85 cases and only a portion in the other 70, according to civil court records and bankruptcy claims made available through people with access to them. It still owes $41 million of the $58 million it had agreed to pay in those cases, the records show.
“It just feels like they killed my mom and got away with it,” said Vanessa Betancourt, whose mother, Nellie Betancourt, a retired nurse, fractured her hip at a Genesis home in Albuquerque, New Mexico — an injury the medical examiner’s report said led to her death. Genesis agreed to a $650,000 settlement with Betancourt’s family in April under the condition it would not need to pay the first of seven installments for another year, according to the settlement document.
Gabe Betancourt holds an old photograph of his wife, Nellie, that he keeps in his wallet. (Adria Malcolm/KFF Health News/TNS)
Genesis HealthCare reached a $650,000 settlement with Nellie Betancourt’ s widower, Gabe Betancourt, and their daughter, Vanessa, in April after medical examiners said an injury Nellie sustained at a Genesis home in New Mexico led to her death. (Adria Malcolm/KFF Health News/TNS)
Genesis HealthCare reached a $650,000 settlement with Nellie Betancourt’s widower, Gabe Betancourt, and their daughter, Vanessa, in April after medical examiners said an injury Nellie sustained at a Genesis home in New Mexico led to her death. (Adria Malcolm/KFF Health News/TNS)
Nellie Betancourt, shown in a photo with her husband, Gabe, had planned a trip to Las Vegas before she fractured her hip at a Genesis HealthCare rehabilitation center— an injury the medical examiner’s report said led to her death.“ When she went into that place, I said,’ Well, she’ s going to be taken care of for a few more days and I’ ll take her home,’ “Gabe says. (Adria Malcolm/KFF Health News/TNS)
“It’ s almost two years now, ” Gabe Betancourt says of the death of his wife, Nellie.“ When you sleep with somebody for 67 years and you stretch your arm, she’s there. (Adria Malcolm/KFF Health News/TNS)
Nellie Betancourt, shown in a photo with her husband, Gabe, had planned a trip to Las Vegas before she fractured her hip at a Genesis HealthCare rehabilitation center— an injury the medical examiner’ s report said led to her death.“ When she went into that place, I said,‘ Well, she’ s going to be taken care of for a few more days and I’ll take her home,’ “Gabe says. (Adria Malcolm/KFF Health News/TNS)
Photographs of Nellie Betancourt and her family are displayed at Gabe Betancourt’s home in Albuquerque, New Mexico. (Adria Malcolm/KFF Health News/TNS)
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Gabe Betancourt holds an old photograph of his wife, Nellie, that he keeps in his wallet. (Adria Malcolm/KFF Health News/TNS)
Genesis denied wrongdoing in all lawsuits and settlements. In a written statement, the company did not answer questions about individual personal injury cases. The statement said Genesis remained “focused on delivering high-quality, compassionate care to our patients and residents without disruption” during bankruptcy.
One lawsuit Genesis settled for nearly $1 million alleged nursing home managers ignored repeated warnings about a male resident’s behavior before he sexually assaulted a female Alzheimer’s patient, according to court records. In a case the company resolved for $500,000, a Genesis nursing home was accused of delaying the hospitalization of a resident who had vomited brown mucus. He died of a bowel obstruction. Genesis has paid nothing for either settlement, according to bankruptcy claims.
Creditors, including families of the deceased, are expected to salvage a fraction of what they were promised, if anything. On Dec. 10, the company’s owners were scheduled to seek approval by the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Northern District of Texas to sell its nursing homes and other assets to its largest investor, a private equity firm. In court papers, lawyers for residents and other creditors say the complex plan will prevent them from pursuing Genesis’ new ownership and other companies they blame for the company’s collapse.
John Anthony, a bankruptcy attorney representing 340 personal injury claims against Genesis, said, “They never had any intention to honor these deals.”
Low Ratings and Fines
During years of financial turmoil, Genesis has frequently struggled to provide top-notch care, federal records show. Using its five-star system, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services rated 58% of homes affiliated with Genesis as below average or much below average. CMS has fined Genesis homes $10 million for violating federal health standards over the past three years.
In its Chapter 11 filing, Genesis said it cared for about 15,000 residents in 165 nursing homes and 10 assisted living facilities in 18 states. They are centered in Pennsylvania, West Virginia, New Mexico, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Maine, Alabama, Maryland, and North Carolina, according to the bankruptcy filing.
The company said it owed $709 million in secured debt to lenders and the IRS. Under bankruptcy rules, those debts, backed by Genesis collateral, take precedence over the $1.6 billion in unsecured debt Genesis said it owes. Unsecured creditors include a pension fund; contractors that provided health services and equipment; Pennsylvania, New Mexico, and West Virginia for unpaid provider taxes; and former residents and their families who sued.
Dangers in Memory Care
Sandia Ridge Center, a Genesis home in Albuquerque, was repeatedly faulted by health regulators for not preventing sexual misbehavior in its memory care unit. In November 2021, CMS cited the home for lacking enough nurses to prevent sexual abuse among residents. An inspection report the following August identified more inappropriate sexual contact. Police were called to investigate sexual assault allegations in February and March of 2023, police reports show; neither resulted in criminal charges.
Then in April 2023, a 61-year-old male resident with alcohol-related dementia sexually assaulted a female resident with Alzheimer’s in the dining room, according to a police report and an inspection report. When the resident screamed for him to stop and that he was hurting her, he responded “shut up bitch I know you like this,” according to a lawsuit brought on behalf of the woman, identified in court papers as R.S.
Sandia Ridge management had been aware of the male resident’s behavioral issues for months, according to employee depositions in the case. Police had investigated a prior sexual assault allegation against him the previous year without bringing charges. In one deposition, a former activities assistant testified he hit her and twice pushed her into a bathroom while announcing, “I want to have sex with you.” When she reported him to a senior Genesis manager, she said in the deposition, the manager put his finger over his lips and said, “Shhh.”
The activities worker testified that R.S. used to happily sing along with Elvis Presley songs. After the assault, the worker said, R.S. “don’t sing anymore.”
Inspectors cited the home for failing to protect R.S. The same report said the home didn’t provide a therapist for another female resident who was being sexually harassed. Medicare fined Sandia Ridge Center $91,247. Genesis denied liability but settled R.S.’ lawsuit for $925,000 in May, according to the bankruptcy claim.
“We just felt we have to hold them accountable,” R.S.’ daughter said in an interview, speaking on the condition that she and her mother not be identified, because of the nature of the assault. “Maybe I’m wrong, maybe I’m naive, but the only way to do that is to sue someone, right?”
Genesis has not paid any of the settlement, according to the family’s claim filing.
Growth and Debt
Genesis’ downfall can be traced to 2007, when affiliates of two private equity firms acquired the company in a $1.5 billion leveraged buyout, taking on substantial debt, according to its bankruptcy filing. Private equity also has been involved in other health care bankruptcies, including those of the HCR ManorCare nursing home chain, the prison health care contractor Corizon Health, and two for-profit hospital systems, Steward Health Care and Prospect Medical Holdings.
In 2011, Genesis raised $2.4 billion by transferring substantially all its nursing home buildings and other real estate to Welltower, a publicly traded real estate investment trust, according to Genesis’ bankruptcy filing. Genesis then rented the buildings back from Welltower, which made leasing costs a significant expense.
Genesis went on a nationwide buying spree. At its peak in 2016, it had grown to more than 500 nursing homes. In a court declaration, Louis Robichaux IV, a consultant overseeing Genesis’ bankruptcy restructuring, wrote that as the company expanded, it became harder to manage and “mired in corporate inefficiencies.” Robichaux wrote that Genesis’ financial woes were exacerbated by rapidly increasing labor costs and lawsuits, including some predating the covid pandemic.
But Genesis continued to teeter on the edge of insolvency. In audited financial statements for 2022 and 2023 submitted to a California oversight agency, management and auditors said rent and debt obligations raised “substantial doubt about the company’s ability to continue as a going concern.”
In a court filing, a committee appointed by the U.S. Trustee’s Office to represent the unsecured creditors in the bankruptcy accused Landau and Welltower of orchestrating a covert plan that allowed Welltower to keep getting its rents while Landau could run the company and “siphon value to himself.” The committee alleged their efforts forced the company into insolvency while “staffing levels and patient care declined precipitously.” Landau and Welltower did not respond to requests for comment.
Staff at a Genesis HealthCare nursing home delayed hospitalizing James Sanderson, seen here with daughter Erin Pearson, for a week after he showed symptoms of a bowel obstruction, according to a lawsuit. (Courtesy Erin S. Pearson/KFF Health News/TNS)
Drawn-Out Lawsuits
Erin Pearson sued Genesis over the death of her father, James Sanderson, a retired mining company executive who died in 2018 after spending less than a month at Bear Canyon Rehabilitation Center in Albuquerque. In the memory care unit, Sanderson fell repeatedly, suffered medication errors made by nursing home staff, and developed a bowel obstruction and sepsis, according to the lawsuit, filed in 2019. Pearson’s lawyers said he was not hospitalized until eight days after nurses noticed he was vomiting brown mucus.
After the judge rejected Genesis’ request to force Pearson into arbitration, Genesis appealed. It took 2½ years before an appeals court affirmed the original decision to let the case go forward in court, records show.
This past May, more than five years after suing, Pearson reached a $500,000 settlement, with the first payment required by November, according to a copy of the agreement. Nothing was paid, according to the bankruptcy claim.
“It was so drawn out and for so long,” Pearson said in an interview, calling Genesis’ bankruptcy “despicable.”
Genesis HealthCare settlements included periodic payment plans, like this one from a $600,000 settlement in February 2025, included in a court record, that allowed the company to delay paying for a year or more. (Jordan Rau/KFF Health News/TNS)
Payouts Postponed
Jennifer Foote, an Albuquerque attorney who represents clients in multiple lawsuits against Genesis, including Pearson’s, said the company frequently filed appeals. “They did not usually win them on these issues,” she said, “and our sense was that they were doing it as a delay tactic.”
Genesis started using installment payments around 2018, said Dusti Harvey, Foote’s law partner. “The payments wouldn’t start for several months out,” Harvey said. Foote said Genesis’ lawyers often wanted to time the payments to start the month the trial in the case was scheduled to occur.
Families had to wait even when comparatively small amounts of money were involved, settlement agreements show. Genesis’ settlement agreements also included a confidentiality clause prohibiting discussion of the incidents.
Genesis agreed to pay $42,000 in a November 2024 settlement, but the first payment was not due until nine months later. It was not paid, according to the bankruptcy claim.
A $250,000 settlement signed in October 2023 did not start paying out until the following September. When Genesis declared bankruptcy — 21 months after the case was resolved — it still owed $100,000, according to the family’s claim.
Genesis HealthCare still owes $112,500 from a $950,000 settlement over the death of Margarett Johnson after an accident in a Maryland nursing home, according to a bankruptcy claim. (Angela Swann/KFF Health News/TNS)
‘We Never Found Out the Truth’
Settling cases allowed Genesis to avoid the expense and publicity of a trial, at which details of how its nursing homes functioned might have been revealed. In October 2020, Margarett Johnson, a retired school bus driver, fell out of her wheelchair at a Genesis nursing home in Waldorf, Maryland, fracturing her jawbone, nose, and neck, according to a lawsuit brought by her family. Johnson was sent to a trauma center and placed on a ventilator. She died three months later, at age 76, from ventilator-associated pneumonia, the lawsuit said.
“It looked like she was hit by a truck,” Angelina Harley, one of her daughters, said in an interview. “I knew my mom was not going to come home. I knew the Lord was not going to punish her more.”
The company denied negligence and blamed the accident on Johnson’s jacket getting tangled in the wheel of her wheelchair, according to the lawsuit. Harley and her sister Angela Swann were dubious.
“We never found out the truth,” Harley said. “They wanted to settle out of court.”
The company denied liability but agreed to a $950,000 settlement in October 2024. It never paid the final $112,500 installment, according to a letter Johnson’s five children sent to the bankruptcy judge.
“If you settle out of court, you know doggone well you did something wrong,” Harley said.
Maddening Judges
By summer 2025, judges in some civil cases had run out of patience.
Alma Brown, a retired day care manager and accordion teacher living in a Genesis nursing home in Clovis, New Mexico, suffered falls, infections, bedsores, and other neglect that hastened her death in 2023, according to her estate’s lawsuit. In Santa Fe District Court, Judge Kathleen McGarry Ellenwood castigated Genesis after it failed to pay $2 million of the $3 million settlement to Brown’s estate or explain the delay.
Genesis “obviously benefited by not having to go to trial,” McGarry Ellenwood said in one hearing, according to a court transcript. “They assure me that they’re not trying to renege on their contract, but it certainly seems like they haven’t lived up to what the bargain was.”
Genesis declared bankruptcy the day McGarry Ellenwood announced she would impose more than $100,000 in fines, plus $10,000 more each day until the settlement was paid.
In Pennsylvania, Greg Hunt petitioned a judge to punish Genesis after it stopped payments of the $3.5 million settlement after the death of his mother, Nancy, the resident with the gangrenous foot. She had spent eight months in 2019 at Brandywine Hall, a Genesis facility in West Chester that was later sold and renamed.
In a filing with the Common Pleas Court of Montgomery County, Genesis admitted it was in arrears but asked the judge for more time, citing “unforeseen and exigent financial challenges.” Genesis said care for patients at its nursing homes would suffer if it had to pay immediately.
Unswayed, Judge Richard Haaz in June ordered Genesis to pay up, along with punitive interest. But the bankruptcy court stayed that order. Genesis still owes $1.4 million of the $2 million it was supposed to pay, according to Hunt’s claim. (The rest of the $3.5 million settlement is supposed to be paid by an insurer in January 2026.) Ian Norris, Hunt’s lawyer, declined to comment, citing confidentiality provisions in the settlement.
Court records indicate Genesis lawyers never disclosed in either case that it was preparing to declare bankruptcy.
Uptown Rehabilitation Center in Albuquerque, New Mexico, is one of 165 nursing homes Genesis HealthCare owns in the U.S.. (Adria Malcolm/KFF Health News/TNS)
‘Bankruptcy as a Tool’
In the first nine months of 2025, 10 other senior living companies with liabilities over $10 million entered Chapter 11 bankruptcy, according to Gibbins Advisors, a consulting firm.
Hamid Rafatjoo, a bankruptcy lawyer representing nursing homes who is not involved in the Genesis bankruptcy case, said filings may increase as the industry has become costlier to run and class action lawsuits have become a fixture.
“Nursing homes get sued all the time for everything,” Rafatjoo said. “A lot of operators wait too long to use bankruptcy as a tool.”
On Dec. 1, Genesis announced the results of its auction, saying it had elected to sell its assets to a private equity firm controlled by Landau. In a court filing, Anthony, the attorney for the personal injury claimants, alleged the auction was stacked in Landau’s favor despite an “objectively better and higher competing bid” from another private equity investor that would have provided more money to creditors. Genesis said in its statement that Landau’s group had increased its bid during the auction.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and two other senators last month asked the U.S. Trustee’s Office to intervene in the case, out of concern that “individuals who already own or control Genesis are trying to sell it to themselves, wiping away legal and other creditor debts in the process.” Lawyers representing those in charge of the auction did not respond to a request for comment.
Families of former Genesis residents said they fear the capacity to purge lawsuits through bankruptcy emboldens nursing home owners who provide deficient care.
“They can file bankruptcy again,” said Gabe Betancourt, whose wife, Nellie, died after her stay at Uptown Rehabilitation Center in Albuquerque. “And we’re the ones that will pay for it, with our memories, our lives.”
U.S. President Donald Trump announced Friday that nine drugmakers have agreed to lower the cost of their prescription drugs in the U.S.
Pharmaceutical companies Amgen, Bristol Myers Squibb, Boehringer Ingelheim, Genentech, Gilead Sciences, GSK, Merck, Novartis and Sanofi will now rein in Medicaid drug prices to match what they charged in other developed countries.
As part of the deal, new drugs made by those companies will also be charged at the so-called “most-favored-nation” pricing across the country on any newly launched medications for all, including commercial and cash pay markets as well as Medicare and Medicaid.
Drug prices for patients in the U.S. can depend on a number of factors, including the competition a treatment faces and insurance coverage. Most people have coverage through work, the individual insurance market or government programs like Medicaid and Medicare, which shield them from much of the cost.
Patients in Medicaid, the state and federally funded program for people with low incomes, already pay a nominal co-payment of a few dollars to fill their prescriptions, but lower prices could help state budgets that fund the programs.
Lower drug prices also will help patients who have no insurance coverage and little leverage to negotiate better deals on what they pay. But even steep discounts of 50% found through the administration’s website could still leave patients paying hundreds of dollars a month for some prescriptions.
William Padula, a pharmaceutical and health economics professor at USC, said Medicaid already has the most favorable drug rates which in some cases will be close to what the “most-favored-nation” price is so it remains to be seen what other impacts it could have, such as more research and development.
“It can’t be bad. I don’t see much downside but it’s hard to judge what the upside is,” Padula said.
And while it is significant that Trump was able to get big drugmakers to the table to negotiate lower prices, it will take years to gage how effective this initiative is in terms of more people obtaining more of the medicines they need.
“It’s good for their stock and it’s good for their future” research and development, Padula said of the pharmaceutical companies. “It’s clearly influential but will all this add up to a major effect? Nothing really matters here unless our health gets better as a country.”
Trump administration officials said the drugmakers will also sell pharmacy-ready medicines on the TrumpRx platform, which is set to launch in January and will allow people to buy drugs directly from manufacturers.
Companies such as Merck, GSK and Bristol Myers Squibb also agreed to donate significant supplies of active pharmaceutical ingredients to a national reserve and to formulate and distribute them into medications such as antibiotics, rescue inhalers and blood thinners as needed in an emergency.
The New Jersey-based Bristol Myers Squibb further announced that it will be giving for free to the Medicaid program its signature blood thinner prescribed to reduce the risk of blood clots and stroke. Known as Eliquis, it is the company’s top prescribed drug as well as being one of Medicaid’s most widely-used medicines.
Padula said the donations — which encompass some of the world’s most critical medicines — are a significant step toward health equity and an acknowledgement that the drugmakers can afford to seek profits elsewhere in their operations. Eliquis already has been one of the most profitable drugs ever made.
“It’s a thoughtful health equity move that they can afford given that it’s been such a blockbuster,” Padula said of the Eliquis donation.
Other major drugmakers including Pfizer, AstraZeneca, EMD Serono, Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly struck similar deals with the Trump administration earlier this year.
Though individual terms were not disclosed, the administration has now negotiated lower drug prices with 14 companies since Trump publicly sent letters to executives at 17 pharmaceutical companies about the issue, noting that U.S. prices for brand-name drugs can be up to three times higher than averages elsewhere.
Trump said he effectively threatened the pharmaceutical companies with 10% tariffs to get them to “do the right thing.”
Trump announces agreements with 9 major drugmakers to lower prices – CBS News
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President Trump announced new agreements on Friday with nine pharmaceutical companies aimed at making certain prescription drugs cheaper. CBS News reporter Karen Hua has the details.
Millions of Americans are bracing for higher health costs in 2026, as subsidies that help them pay for health insurance under the Affordable Care Act are set to expire on December 31.
Experts warn that a failure in Congress to extend the tax credits could be financially devastating for individual policyholders, while also raising health care costs as a whole. Roughly 22 million Americans receive the ACA subsidies, which were created in 2021 to lower households’ monthly premiums.
New data from investment adviser SmartAsset projects how much people around the U.S. with an ACA plan would have paid on average for coverage in 2025 if they hadn’t received the enhanced subsidies. As the analysis shows, monthly premiums for the government health insurance would’ve been hundreds of dollars higher.
In Mississippi, where around 11% of residents are enrolled in an ACA plan, participants would have seen their average monthly premiums jump from $41 to $605, a 1,376% increase, SmartAsset found. In West Virginia, enrollees’ premiums would have risen an average of 1,058%.
A spokesperson for SmartAsset said the analysis captures 2025 costs, but noted the data amounts to a “close approximation” of how much more people with ACA coverage could expect to pay next year without the tax credits.
SmartAsset used public records from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services’ 2025 Marketplace Open Enrollment Period to calculate the average cost of ACA plans.
The exact price hikes people could see next will depend on a range of factors, including their insurance plan, age, household income, health status and where they live, according to a spokesperson from KFF. The health policy group estimates that annual out-of-pocket premium costs will increase 114% on average for the 22 million ACA enrollees who rely on the subsidies.
What is the status of the ACA tax credits?
The tax credits are set to lapse at the end of the year. Democratic lawmakers have pushed for an extension but lack enough support in the Republican-led Congress. And while the House passed a health care bill this week that includes several policies favored by Republicans, it excludes an extension of the tax credits and faces hurdles in the Senate.
Both chambers of Congress have left Washington until early next year, making it all but certain that the tax credits will expire on December 31. But four GOP members this week signed a Democratic measure to force a vote on extending the subsidies for three years, teeing up a final vote early next year.
If Congress fails to solve the tax credit issue, some enrollees will qualify for a smaller subsidy, while others could lose eligibility completely, according to KFF.
With sharply higher ACA costs on the horizon, the Congressional Budget Office estimates that about 4 million people could drop their health insurance altogether. Experts say that could lead to higher costs for people with other types of health insurance because hospitals will have to provide more uncompensated care for those lacking coverage.
“Hospitals can only reconcile that by raising their prices for everybody,” Emma Wager, a senior policy analyst at KFF, told CBS News last week.
Every animal with a brain needs sleep — and even a few without a brain do, too. Humans sleep, birds sleep, whales sleep and even jellyfish sleep.
Sleep is universal “even though it’s actually very risky,” said Paul-Antoine Libourel, a researcher at the Neuroscience Research Center of Lyon in France.
When animals nod off, they’re most vulnerable to sneaky predators. But despite the risks, the need for sleep is so strong that no creature can skip it altogether, even when it’s highly inconvenient.
Animals that navigate extreme conditions and environments have evolved to sleep in extreme ways — for example, stealing seconds at a time during around-the-clock parenting, getting winks on the wing during long migrations and even dozing while swimming.
For a long time, scientists could only make educated guesses about when wild animals were sleeping, observing when they lay still and closed their eyes. But in recent years, tiny trackers and helmets that measure brain waves — miniaturized versions of equipment in human sleep labs — have allowed researchers to glimpse for the first time the varied and sometimes spectacular ways that wild animals snooze.
“We’re finding that sleep is really flexible in response to ecological demands,” said Niels Rattenborg, an animal sleep research specialist at the Max Planck Institute for Biological Intelligence in Germany.
These penguins mate for life and share parenting duties — with one bird babysitting the egg or tiny gray fluffy chick to keep it warm and safe while the other swims off to fish for a family meal. Then they switch roles — keeping up this nonstop labor for weeks.
Penguin parents face a common challenge: getting enough sleep while keeping a close eye on their newborns.
They survive by taking thousands of catnaps a day — each averaging just 4 seconds long.
These short “microsleeps,” as Korea Polar Research Institute biologist Won Young Lee calls them, appear to be enough to allow penguin parents to carry out their caregiving duties for weeks within their crowded, noisy colonies.
When a clumsy neighbor passes by or predatory seabirds are near, the penguin parent blinks to alert attention and soon dozes off again, its chin nodding against its chest, like a drowsy driver.
The naps add up. Each penguin sleeps for a total of 11 hours per day, as scientists found by measuring the brain activity of 14 adults over 11 days on Antarctica’s King George Island.
To remain mostly alert, yet also sneak in sufficient winks, the penguins have evolved an enviable ability to function on extremely fractured sleep — at least during the breeding season.
Researchers can now see when either hemisphere of the brain — or both at once — are asleep.
Poets, sailors and birdwatchers have long wondered whether birds that fly for months at a time actually get any winks on the wing.
In some cases, the answer is yes — as scientists discovered when they attached devices that measure brain-wave activity to the heads of large seabirds nesting in the Galapagos Islands called great frigatebirds.
While flying, frigatebirds can sleep with one half of the brain at a time. The other half remains semialert so that one eye is still watching for obstacles in their flight path.
This allows the birds to soar for weeks at a time, without touching land or water, which would damage their delicate, non-water repellent feathers.
Frigatebirds can’t do tricky maneuvers — flapping, foraging or diving — with just one half of their brain. When they dive for prey, they must be fully awake. But in flight, they have evolved to sleep when gliding and circling upward on massive drafts of warm rising air that keep them aloft with minimal effort.
Back at the nest in trees or bushes, frigatebirds change up their nap routine — they are more likely to sleep with their whole brain at once and for much longer bouts. This suggests their in-flight sleeping is a specific adaptation for extended flying, Rattenborg said.
A few other animals have similar sleeping hacks. Dolphins can sleep with one half of the brain at a time while swimming. Some other birds, including swifts and albatrosses, can sleep in flight, scientists say.
Frigatebirds can fly 255 miles (410 kilometers) a day for more than 40 days, before touching land, other researchers found — a feat that wouldn’t be possible without being able to sleep on the wing.
On land, life is easy for a 5,000-pound (2,268-kilogram) northern elephant seal. But at sea, sleep is dangerous — sharks and killer whales that prey on seals are lurking.
These seals go on extended foraging trips, for up to eight months, repeatedly diving to depths of several hundred feet (meters) to catch fish, squid, rays and other sea snacks.
Each deep dive may last around 30 minutes. And for around a third of that time, the seals may be asleep, as research led by Jessica Kendall-Bar of Scripps Institution of Oceanography revealed.
Kendall-Bar’s team devised a neoprene headcap similar to a swimming cap with equipment to detect motion and seal brain activity during dives, and retrieved the caps with logged data when seals returned to beaches in Northern California.
The 13 female seals studied tended to sleep during the deepest portions of their dives, when they were below the depths that predators usually patrol.
That sleep consisted of both slow-wave sleep and REM sleep. During REM, or rapid eye movement sleep, the seals were temporarily paralyzed — just like humans during this deep-sleep stage — and their dive motion changed. Instead of a controlled downward glide motion, they sometimes turned upside down and spun in what the researchers called a “sleep spiral” during REM sleep.
In the span of 24 hours, the seals at sea slept for around two hours total. (Back on the beach, they averaged around 10 hours.)
Scientists are still learning about all the reasons we sleep — and just how much we really need.
It’s unlikely that any tired human can try these extreme animal sleep hacks. But learning more about how varied napping may be in the wild shows the flexibility of some species. Nature has evolved to make shut-eye possible in even the most precarious situations.
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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
A Pennsylvania woman goes viral for her November wedding photos. However, she shares how devastating news about her fiancé’s health led the couple to celebrate months earlier than their planned spring 2026 wedding.
In a video with over 4.3 million views, TikToker Grace (@dacedenn) acknowledges many “older women” in the comments of her wedding photos, which she posted throughout December following her November ceremony.
“I don’t know how to break the news. They had such sweet comments,” she says. “But I am so sorry to say that, unfortunately, Evan died on Tuesday.”
The couple’s last-minute wedding reschedule
Grace consistently posted her and her fiancé’s journey following his glioblastoma, an aggressive form of brain cancer, diagnosis in 2022. According to the Glioblastoma Research Organization, the five-year survival rate for the disease is just 6.8 percent.
Viewers praised the couple for their sense of humor and for sharing a candid look into life as an engaged couple navigating a serious diagnosis. The couple also advocated for further research into glioblastoma.
In a prior post, Grace shared that the couple initially planned to hold their wedding in May 2026, but moved up the ceremony at the suggestion of Evan’s healthcare team.
Grace writes that she had only 3 months to plan for their new wedding date, joking about the ordeal: “Luckily, I’m a genius.”
Other widows share their stories
In the comments of Grace’s video, other young widows share their own stories of having a spouse with a terminal illness. Many offer encouragement to Grace, pushing back against comments that questioned her use of dark humor in the grieving process.
“Some of these comments are wild. My husband died 33 hours after we got married in his ICU room. If I didn’t make jokes, I’d never get through it in one piece. I’m sorry for your loss. You two looked very happy together,” one offers.
Another shares, “My husband died 8 weeks after our wedding. Your emotions are all over the place. I laughed, changing my last name at the dmv. it was 3 dollars for the driving test. I laughed hysterically for 10 minutes over that 3-dollar charge.”
“Folks who have never experienced a loss like the loss of a partner will never understand. Go ahead and laugh. Sometimes you have to. It’s been 3 years for me, dark humor has gotten me this far,” a third writes.
“Dark humor is how I’ve survived! I’m so sorry for such a huge loss!” another viewer comments.
While there’s no right way to handle a change of wedding plans due to a serious health issue, brides on Reddit share how they approached similar situations.
One bride, whose fiancé was diagnosed with lung cancer, asks others for advice on informing guests about rescheduling in the subreddit r/weddingplanning.
“Some good friends of mine changed their wedding date due to some family circumstances that they wanted to keep private. We received a ‘Changed the date!’ in the mail—thought it was a cute play on words!” one suggests.
Another tells brides to lean into their humor and genuine feelings, writing, “My husband is 33, and they found a cancerous tumor in his bladder 3 months before our wedding. ‘We’re both pretty f— up about this’ really resonated with me lol.”
The Mary Sue reached out to Grace via TikTok direct message for further comment.
The Christmas holiday season is a time to step back from the busy pace of modern life and connect with our nearest and dearest instead of screens, apps and chatbots.
Here are some suggestions on how to unplug from the online world for the next few weeks as you sit down for a festive meal, exchange gifts or take time out for some self-reflection.
Your phone already has built-in features that can help you stop getting distracted.
To temporarily silence all those attention-seeking notifications, use the Focus setting on your iPhone or Android device. This mode is designed to stop interruptions when you want to concentrate. You can customize it by blocking specific apps or muting only when you’re doing certain things, like sleeping or reading.
Android and iOS also have related screen time controls to manage overall device usage. Too much Instagram scrolling? Limit yourself to a daily total of 20 minutes.
There are other tricks you could try, like turning the screen gray to make it less appealing. On iPhones or Android devices, tweak the color filter or adjustment settings. On Android, activating Bedtime Mode also turns the screen gray.
If you need to be more strict with yourself, then delete any or apps you’re addicted to. An effective way to stop looking at your phone is by removing those apps that you spend the most time scrolling through, even if temporarily. You can always reinstall them again if the withdrawal symptoms become too much.
When the temperature drops, it’s tempting to hunker down inside and stay cozy. But don’t sit on the couch all day. Head outdoors, away from Wi-Fi signals. If it’s been snowing where you are, have a snowball fight or go sledding. To keep your hands warm, don’t forget to put on bulky mittens — which your phone’s touch screen won’t respond to.
Even if there’s no snow, take a walk in the woods, a park or along some tree-lined streets. Time spent outdoors, and away from screens, can benefit your mental health and physical well-being. There’s even a term for it: forest bathing.
There’s an app you can use to force yourself to — literally — get back in touch with nature. Touch Grass takes its name from a viral catchphrase for when someone has lost their connection to the real world because they’re consumed by what’s on their screens.
It’s similar to other apps designed to restrict screen time by forcing users to take a timeout from scrolling. The difference is that Touch Grass requires users to go outside and take a picture of themselves physically touching some grass.
Touch Grass has a free service level that allows you to block two apps. I found it was quite effective at stopping me from opening two of my favorite time-wasters, Reddit and Instagram, though I ended up spending more time on other apps like Facebook. To block all apps, you’ll have to shell out for a subscription — $6 a month or $50 annually.
If you can’t find grass because it’s winter, there’s also the option to touch snow or sand. It’s only available for iPhones so far, but there are copycat versions for both iOS and Android, though we haven’t tested them.
When was the last time you sent a Christmas card? Most digital natives find it easier to type out holiday greetings or send digital cards over chat apps, than to put pen to paper.
The consequence of all the time that we spend tapping, typing or swiping on our devices is that handwriting is becoming something of a dying art. But there are neurological and cognitive benefits of handwriting, research suggests. For example, taking notes by hand is a better way for students to learn and to remember information.
So use this time of year to write a thoughtful message to someone special, a letter to a long-lost friend, or thank you notes for presents received.
If you still don’t know what you want for Christmas, why not ask for a book? It’s easy to find inspiration and ideas at this time of year, when many people like to share the books they’ve read over the past 12 months, and outlets including The Associated Press compile their list of the year’s best books.
Reading long-form literature or non-fiction has many benefits that can’t be gained from glancing at short-form bursts of text on your device, including a deeper understanding of a topic, developing empathy, increasing your focus and concentration and more.
If you’re looking for a last-minute gift, how about a time-lock vault to put your devices out of reach for, say, 15 minutes, a few hours or even weeks?
There are plenty of versions for sale online. For about $30, I bought a battery-powered gray plastic model that can hold several smartphones. The instruction leaflet says it’s intended to “enhance self-discipline.”
Punch in the amount of time — up to 30 days — and a digital display will count down until it unlocks. The lid has portholes so you can thread in cables for charging while you wait.
One evening, I locked my phone up for an hour and then grabbed my laptop to do some online Christmas shopping. But my plans were foiled because I forgot that authentication requests for my credit card and Amazon went to my phone.
For another gift idea, consider putting a brick phone under the tree. Also known as a feature phone, these devices cater to those who want a back-to-basics phone without all the digital stimulation that comes with a smartphone.
Retro devices from Nokia evoke the early days of the cellphone era — no touch screens, numeric keypads and throwback video games like Snake. Most can only make voice calls and send text messages.
If that sounds too primitive, there are so-called digital minimalist phones that serve a similar market niche. Devices from Light, Punkt and Balance offer sleek, modern designs but with a stripped-down experience.
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Is there a tech topic that you think needs explaining? Write to us at onetechtip@ap.org with your suggestions for future editions of One Tech Tip.
LAND O LAKES, Fla. — Pasco County Fire Rescue launched its prehospital blood transfusion program on Dec. 17. The department said its emergency medical service is among the first in Tampa Bay to carry equipment on its ambulances that will allow paramedics to perform transfusions on trauma patients. Chief Ryan Guynn said medical calls make up 83% of incidents PCFR crews respond to, and he expects the kits to be used regularly.
What You Need To Know
Pasco County Fire Rescue’s prehospital blood transfusion program launched Dec. 17
The program will allow paramedics to give transfusions to trauma patients before they get to the hospital
Chief Ryan Guynn said the program can increase survival rates for patients in need
One set of transfusion equipment will be on hand in each of the county’s four zones
“If you think of any traumatic injury where there’s a significant blood loss, whether it’s a penetrating wound, a car accident, lacerations or medically induced bleeding incidences,” Guynn said of situations where the equipment will be useful. “So, we anticipate using the program quite frequently.”
EMS Supervisor Justin Crook said it’s been a long time coming.
“It sounds like kind of a nerdy thing to say, but we were definitely so stoked to hear about it, and we cannot wait to actually help our citizens with it,” said Crook.
That’s why Crook said he got into EMS nearly 30 years ago — to help people. He’s now one of those trained to give transfusions through the new program.
“Blood goes through the life gun,” Crook said, referring to a device that resembles a water pistol with tubing connected to it. “It will actually go from the bag into the life gun and into the warmer. That warmer will actually bring that cold blood closer to a body temperature so that the blood is actually readily absorbed.”
Pasco County Fire Rescue launched its prehospital blood transfusion program. (Spectrum News/Sarah Blazonis)
Crook said one kit will be on hand in each of the county’s four zones.
“It’s something that we, as field medics, have always wanted to see to get and increase that survival time for our patients, especially the injured, until we can get them to a surgeon,” said Crook.
A study published this year in the journal “Transfusion” says that getting blood before getting to the hospital significantly lowered mortality risk for patients in hemorrhagic shock. It found the procedure could’ve potentially saved more than 21,000 lives nationwide from 2020 to 2023 if it was widely available. According to the study, about one percent of EMS services around the country have prehospital blood programs. The Prehospital Blood Transfusion Coalition lists reimbursement limitations and local regulations that vary from state to state as some of the barriers to making the initiative more widespread. Guynn said the costs for Pasco’s program fits within its operating budget. In Tampa Bay, Manatee County EMS and the Sarasota County Fire Department have similar programs.
“It’s life-saving,” said Guynn. “So, with our new medical direction and with our new EMS team, we’ve realized that we need to be on the forefront of new technology and new resources that are available to us.”
Guynn said PCFR will be supplied with blood through a partnership with Tampa General Hospital’s AeroMed.
The House passed a bill on Wednesday that would criminalize gender transition treatment for minors.
The measure, sponsored by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., passed by a 216-211 vote with some bipartisan support.
Reps. Henry Cuellar, D-Texas, Vicente Gonzalez, D-Texas, and Don Davis, D-N.C., voted with most Republicans for the bill, while Reps. Mike Lawler, R-N.Y., Brian Fitzpatrick, R-Pa., Gabe Evans, R-Colo., and Mike Kennedy, R-Utah, voted with most Democrats against the measure.
“Children are NOT experiments. No more drugs. No more surgeries. No more permanent harm. We need to let kids grow up without manipulation from adults to make life-altering decisions! Congress must protect America’s children!!!” Greene wrote on X ahead of the vote.
The measure, sponsored by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, passed by a 216-211 vote.(Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
Greene had reached a deal with House leadership to bring her bill to the floor in exchange for her backing a rule last week to advance the National Defense Authorization Act.
The bill faces a significant hurdle to pass the Senate, as Republicans would need Democrat support to approve the legislation in the Upper Chamber.
The American Civil Liberties Union criticized the House passage, saying the measure “would have immediate and devastating effects on the lives and transgender youth and their families across the country.”
“Politicians should never prohibit parents from doing what is best for their transgender children,” Mike Zamore, National Director of Policy & Government Affairs at the ACLU, said in a statement. “These families often spend years considering how best to support their children, only to have ill-equipped politicians interfere by attempting to criminalize the health care that they, their children, and their doctors believe is necessary to allow their children to thrive.”
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene had reached a deal with House leadership to bring her bill to the floor in exchange for her backing a rule last week to advance the National Defense Authorization Act.(Photo by Kent Nishimura/Getty Images)
“But this bill also creates an incredibly dangerous precedent far beyond the specific care at issue, criminalizing care based on ideology and placing Washington politicians between families and their doctors,” he continued. “We strongly condemn the passage of this measure and urge members of the Senate to do everything in their power to prevent it from ever becoming law.”
Greene and Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, butted heads over the bill before its passage. The Georgia congresswoman, set to resign next month, had criticized Roy, who sits on the House Rules Committee, for introducing an amendment she argued would “gut the commerce clause.”
Roy’s amendment attempted to modify the bill to limit federal criminal liability under certain circumstances “by defining when prohibited conduct falls within federal jurisdiction,” according to the Rules Committee.
The ACLU criticized the House passage, saying the measure “would have immediate and devastating effects on the lives and transgender youth and their families across the country.”(Stefani Reynolds/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
But Greene contended that her bill “criminalizes ALL pediatric gender affirming care (transgender surgeries, puberty blockers, and hormones) NOT just those receiving federal funds and protects ALL children allowing them to grow up before they make permanent changes to their body that they can never undo!!!”
“WTF is Chip Roy doing????? And this guy wants to be attorney general of Texas but refuses to protect children??!!!” she wrote on X.
Roy responded that “the constitution matters & we should not bastardize it to use ‘interstate commerce’ to empower federal authorities.”
The Texas Republican, however, said in a statement on Wednesday that he would not offer the amendment “to avoid any confusion about how united Republicans are in protecting children from these grotesque procedures.”
President Donald Trump said in a White House speech Wednesday night that he was sending a $1,776 bonus check to U.S. troops for Christmas, indicating that tariffs were funding the payments as he tried to reassure a worried public about the health of the economy.Trump said 1.45 million military service members would get the “warrior dividend before Christmas.“The checks are already on the way,” he added.He seemed to imply that the checks were being funded from tariff revenues.“We made a lot more money than anybody thought because of tariffs, and the bill helped us along,” Trump said, referring to the GOP’s major tax cuts legislation it passed earlier this year. “Nobody deserves it more than our military, and I say congratulations.”This is a developing story. Check back for updates.
President Donald Trump said in a White House speech Wednesday night that he was sending a $1,776 bonus check to U.S. troops for Christmas, indicating that tariffs were funding the payments as he tried to reassure a worried public about the health of the economy.
Trump said 1.45 million military service members would get the “warrior dividend before Christmas.
“The checks are already on the way,” he added.
He seemed to imply that the checks were being funded from tariff revenues.
“We made a lot more money than anybody thought because of tariffs, and the bill helped us along,” Trump said, referring to the GOP’s major tax cuts legislation it passed earlier this year. “Nobody deserves it more than our military, and I say congratulations.”
This is a developing story. Check back for updates.
HARRISBURG, Pa. — Fernando Moreno has been on dialysis for about two years, enduring an “unbearable” wait for a new kidney to save his life. His limited world of social contacts has meant that his hopes have hinged on inching up the national waiting list for a transplant.
That was until earlier this year, when the Philadelphia hospital where he receives treatment connected him with a promising pilot project that has paired him with “angel advocates” — Good Samaritan strangers scattered around the country who leverage their own social media contacts to share his story.
So far, the Great Social Experiment, as it was named by its founder, Los Angeles filmmaker David Krissman, hasn’t found the Vineland, New Jersey, truck driver a living kidney donor. But there are encouraging early signs the angel advocate approach is working, and there’s no question it has given Moreno new optimism.
“This process is great,” said Moreno, 50, whose own father died of kidney failure at 65. “I’m just hoping there will be somebody out there that’s willing to take a chance.”
Moreno is part of a pilot program with 15 patients that began in May at three Pennsylvania hospitals. It’s testing whether motivated, volunteer strangers can help improve the chances of finding a life-saving match for a new kidney — particularly for people with limited social networks.
“We know how this has always been done, and we’re trying to put that on steroids and really get them the help that they need,” Krissman said. “Most patients are too sick to do this on their own — many don’t have the skills to do it on their own.”
The Gift of Life Donor Program, which serves as the organ procurement network for eastern Pennsylvania, southern New Jersey and Delaware, is supporting the pilot program with a grant of more than $100,000 from its foundation.
So far, two of the five patients in the program through Temple University Hospital have found kidney donors, and one is preparing for surgery, according to Ryan Ihlenfeldt, the hospital’s director of clinical transplant services. One of the five patients at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center in Harrisburg has also undergone a transplant.
The approach Krissman has developed is something new, said Richard Hasz Jr., Gift of Life’s chief executive, and may help identify the types of messages that attract and motivate potential live kidney donors.
“This is the first of its kind that I’m aware of,” Hasz said. “That’s why, I think, the foundation was so interested in doing it — studying it and hopefully publishing it — so we can create that blueprint, if you will, for the future.”
Gift of Life agreed to fund a broader test and helped Krissman identify five patients each at Temple, UPMC-Harrisburg and Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia.
Hasz said the pilot program’s approach combines social media outreach with Krissman’s storytelling talents and aggressive efforts to mobilize the patients’ own connections.
“We know that patients who are waiting don’t always have the energy or the resources to do this themselves,” Hasz said.
There have been other ways for patients to set up “ microsites ” where they can tell their stories and seek a donor match. But the pilot program currently underway in Pennsylvania aims to connect patients with a wide universe of potential donors and produce videos and other ways to spread their message.
Krissman’s bout with an illness about two decades ago inspired him to tackle the sticky challenge of increasing live kidney donations. He was debilitated for more than a year before medication helped him recover, explaining, “It gave me my life back. And I never forgot what it’s like to be chronically sick.”
After producing a podcast on kidney transplantation, Krissman recruited four patients through Facebook who were waiting for kidneys. He was able to help two of them. A second effort, a pilot program with three patients in North Carolina that ended last year, helped match all three with living donors.
Becca Brown, director of transplant services at UPMC-Harrisburg, thinks it might be a game changer.
“There’s potential for this to really snowball,” Brown said. “I’m anxious to see what happens and if we can roll it out to other patients.”
Some 90,000 people in the United States are on a list for a kidney transplant, and most of the roughly 28,000 kidneys that were transplanted last year came from deceased donors. Living kidney donations are hard to come by — about 6,400 were transplanted last year. Thousands die each year waiting for an organ transplant in the United States.
Living kidney donations can be a better match, reducing the risk of organ rejection. They allow for surgery to be planned for a time that is optimal for the donor, the recipient and the transplant team. And, the foundation says, living donor kidneys, on average, last longer than kidneys from deceased donors.
The National Kidney Foundation says living donors must be at least 18 years old, although some transplant centers set the minimum age at 21. Potential donors get screened for health problems and can be ruled out if they have uncontrolled high blood pressure, diabetes or cancer, or if they are smokers.
Many living donors make “directed donations” to specify who will get their kidney. Nondirected donations are made anonymously to a patient.
Francis Beaumier, a 38-year-old information technology worker from Green Bay, Wisconsin, came into contact with the angel advocate program after being a double living donor — a kidney and part of his liver.
He sees the program as “a great little way for everyone to make a small difference.”
Another angel advocate, Holly Armstrong, was also a living donor. She hopes her efforts will plant a seed.
“Some people might just keep scrolling,” said Armstrong, who lives in Lake Wiley, South Carolina. “But there might be someone like me, where they stop scrolling and say, ‘This boy needs a kidney.’”
A study released last year found that people who volunteer to donate a kidney are at a lower risk of death from the operation than doctors had previously thought. Tracking 30 years of living kidney donations, researchers found fewer than 1 in every 10,000 donors died within three months of the surgery. Newer and safer surgical techniques were credited for dropping the risk from 3 deaths per 10,000 living donors.
Temple serves a large cohort of poorer patients who can have difficulty understanding health issues and who suffer from uncontrolled hypertension and diabetes, Ihlenfeldt, who works there, said.
“What David’s trying to do is coalesce a network of support around these patients who are sharing the story for them,” Ihlenfeldt said.
At a kickoff event in a Harrisburg meeting room for kidney patient Ahmad Collins, a couple dozen friends and family listened with rapt attention as Krissman went over the game plan, answering questions and describing the transplant process.
Collins, a 50-year-old city government worker and former Penn State linebacker, has needed 10 hours a night of dialysis since a medical procedure left him with damaged kidneys late last year.
His mind was on the strangers who might decide to pitch in.
“They can be a superhero, so to speak,” Collins said. “They can have the opportunity to save somebody’s life, and not too many times in life do you have that opportunity.”
Northfield-based Medline has raised more than $6.2 billion in its intial public offering, making it one of the largest initial public offerings of the year.
Medline sold about 216 million shares at $29 a piece — a larger offering than the company had initially outlined. The company said earlier this month that it planned to sell 179 million shares for between $26 and $30 a share. Shares of the massive medical supply company will begin trading publicly Wednesday on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the symbol MDLN.
Medline sells hundreds of thousands of products, including medical supplies and instruments, patient gowns, personal protective equipment, Curad bandages and the iconic blue-and–pink-stripled blankets hospitals wrap around newborns.
Nearly 6,100 of the company’s more than 43,000 employees worldwide work in Cook and Lake counties, including about 850 who work at the company’s flagship distribution center in Grayslake. Medline has eight facilities across the Chicago area
“Becoming a public company is a responsibility that we take seriously,” wrote CEO Jim Boyle in a note with Medline’s registration statement filed publicly with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission in October. “We will create value for our shareholders through our relentless customer focus, stellar execution, and commitment to long-term success.”
Medline’s efforts to go public have been building for some time, after decades of family ownership.
Brothers Jim and Jon Mills founded the company in 1966, building on the legacy of their grandfather A.L. Mills, who made surgeons’ gowns and uniforms during World War I at his company Mills Hospital Supply.
Medline had sales of $20.6 billion for the nine months that ended Sept. 27, according to a previous filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
The company’s strong initial public offering could partly reflect investor sentiment that it’s a recession-proof business because it sells medical supplies, said Pankit Bhalodia, a partner in life sciences at consulting firm West Monroe. The company has also been owned by private equity for several years and has presumably already gone through changes to make it operate more efficiently. Plus, investors may like that Medline is not just a distributor but also sells many of its own products, allowing it to capture more revenue, he said.
Challenges, however, include that Medline will continue to carry a large amount of debt moving forward, despite the fact that it’s using proceeds from the initial public offering to help pay down debt, Bhalodia said. Also, it will face pressure due to tariffs, Bhalodia said. Medline has said it estimates tariffs will cost it $325 million to $375 million in 2025, before taxes from tariffs, and $150 million to $200 million in 2026.
Before Medline’s initial public offering, the largest listing this year was for Chinese battery maker Contemporary Amperex Technology Co. Ltd. at $5.26 billion, according to Bloomberg.
Medline was previously a public company for five years in the 1970s, before it returned to private ownership.
Ahead of the holidays, cases in the U.S. are already increasing in most states, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“Seasonal influenza activity continues to increase in most areas of the country,” the agency said in a weekly update. “Some indicators are elevated, but severity indicators remain low, and flu season is just starting.”
While the timing of the increased flu activity is similar to previous years, there is something unique about the season: a new variant.
The variant, called subclade K, has increased rapidly in Europe and several countries in East Asia, according to the Pan American Health Organization, or PAHO. The organization issued a call to strengthen surveillance and promote vaccination – particularly among older adults and people with risk factors.
“PAHO also urges countries to ensure timely clinical management of cases and prepare health services for the possibility of early, or more intense, respiratory disease activity,” it said.
Here is what to know about the flu season and new variant:
What’s Going on with Flu Season and How Does It Compare to Previous Ones?
Five jurisdictions are experiencing high or very high levels of influenza-like illness that includes fever plus a cough or sore throat: New York City, New York state, Louisiana, Colorado and New Jersey, the CDC reports.
Nearly 3 million people have caught the flu already this season, according to agency estimates. An estimated 30,000 people have been hospitalized, and 1,200 died from flu so far this season.
Lab-confirmed flu hospitalization rates are higher now than they were at this time last year.
“It’s very difficult to predict a flu season, but right now we’re at the beginning of what we probably are going to see as a pretty severe influenza season driven primarily by this clade K virus,” Andrew Pekosz, a microbiology and immunology professor at Johns Hopkins University, told reporters during a briefing Tuesday.
The CDC recently reported the first death of a child from the flu this season.
Less than 40% of children have gotten a flu shot this year, according to CDC data. That’s lower than this time during the previous six seasons. Last flu season was the deadliest flu season for U.S. children in more than a decade, with 280 fatalities.
What to Know About the Subclade K
The new variant, subclade K, “is part of the natural variation process of seasonal influenza viruses,” according to PAHO.
In positive news, health authorities in the countries seeing the variant’s spread have not reported any increases in the severity of influenza cases.
But more people might be susceptible to infection because the variant “has mutations that are making it less able to be recognized by your body’s immune response,” according to Pekosz.
This year’s flu shot is a mismatch for the variant, as the shot was created before the strain was identified by researchers. But officials still recommend getting the shot since it appears to protect against severe infections.
“Although evidence on vaccine effectiveness for the current season remains limited, preliminary data from Europe indicate that vaccination continues to provide protection comparable to previous years against severe disease, including hospitalization,” PAHO said.
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How to Protect Yourself from the Flu
The CDC “recommends that everyone 6 months and older who has not yet been vaccinated this season get an annual influenza (flu) vaccine.”
Early estimates from the flu season in England found that hospitalizations remained in the expected ranges for children and adults, “suggesting that influenza vaccination remains an effective tool in preventing influenza-related hospitalizations this season,” according to the agency.
When the vaccine is a mismatch with the circulating strains, “vaccine effectiveness may be reduced but influenza vaccination continues to provide benefits, including: 1) protection against severe influenza illness, hospitalization, and death; 2) protection against other circulating influenza viruses represented in the influenza vaccines; and 3) help to reduce the overall community spread of influenza,” the CDC said.
The agency also recommends avoiding close contact with sick people, covering coughs and sneezes, washing hands and avoiding touching eyes, nose and mouth.
BAYAHIBE, Dominican Republic — Oxygen tank strapped to his back, Michael del Rosario moves his fins delicately as he glides along an underwater nursery just off the Dominican Republic coast, proudly showing off the “coral babies” growing on metal structures that look like large spiders. The conservationist enthusiastically points a finger to trace around the largest corals, just starting to reveal their vibrant colors.
Del Rosario helped plant these tiny animals in the nursery after they were conceived in an assisted reproduction laboratory run by the marine conservation organization Fundemar. In a process something like in vitro fertilization, coral egg and sperm are joined to form a new individual.
It’s a technique that’s gaining momentum in the Caribbean to counter the drastic loss of corals due to climate change, which is killing them by heating up oceans and making it more difficult for those that survive to reproduce naturally.
“We live on an island. We depend entirely on coral reefs, and seeing them all disappear is really depressing,” del Rosario said once back on the surface, his words flowing like bubbles underwater. “But seeing our coral babies growing, alive, in the sea gives us hope, which is what we were losing.”
The state of corals around the Dominican Republic, as in the rest of the world, is not encouraging. Fundemar’s latest monitoring last year found that 70% of the Dominican Republic’s reefs have less than 5% coral coverage. Healthy colonies are so far apart that the probability of one coral’s eggs meeting another’s sperm during the spawning season is decreasing.
“That’s why assisted reproduction programs are so important now, because what used to be normal in coral reefs is probably no longer possible for many species,” biologist Andreina Valdez, operations manager at Fundemar, said at the organization’s new marine research center. “So that’s where we come in to help a little bit.”
Though many people may think corals are plants, they are animals. They spawn once a year, a few days after the full moon and at dusk, when they release millions of eggs and sperm in a spectacle that turns the sea around them into a kind of Milky Way. Fundemar monitors spawning periods, collects eggs and sperm, performs assisted fertilization in the laboratory, and cares for the larvae until they are strong enough to be taken to the reef.
In the laboratory, Ariel Álvarez examines one of the star-shaped pieces on which the corals are growing through a microscope. They’re so tiny they can hardly be seen with the naked eye. Álvarez switches off the lights, turns on an ultraviolet light, and the coral’s rounded, fractal shapes appear through a camera on the microscope projected onto a screen.
One research center room holds dozens of fish tanks, each with hundreds of tiny corals awaiting return to the reef. Del Rosario said the lab produces more than 2.5 million coral embryos per year. Only 1% will survive in the ocean, yet that figure is better than the rate with natural fertilization on these degraded reefs now, he said.
In the past, Fundemar and other conservation organizations focused on asexual reproduction. That meant cutting a small piece of healthy coral and transplanting it to another location so that a new one would grow. The method can produce corals faster than assisted fertilization.
The problem, Andreina Valdez said, is that it clones the same individual, meaning all those coral share the same disease vulnerabilities. In contrast, assisted sexual reproduction creates genetically different individuals, reducing the chance that a single illness could strike them all down.
Australia pioneered assisted coral fertilization. It’s expanding in the Caribbean, with leading projects at the National Autonomous University of Mexico and the Carmabi Foundation in Curaçao, and it’s being adopted in Puerto Rico, Cuba and Jamaica, Valdez said.
“You can’t conserve something if you don’t have it. So (these programs) are helping to expand the population that’s out there,” said Mark Eakin, corresponding secretary for the International Coral Reef Society and retired chief of the Coral Reef Watch program of the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
But the world must still tackle “the 800-pound gorilla of climate change,” Eakin said, or a lot of the restoration work “is just going to be wiped out.”
Burning fossil fuels such as oil, gas, and coal produces greenhouse gases that trap heat in the atmosphere, driving up temperatures both on Earth’s surface and in its seas. Oceans are warming at twice the rate of 20 years ago, according to UNESCO’s most recent State of the Ocean Report last year.
And that’s devastating for corals. Rising heat causes them to feel sick and expel the algae that live in their tissue and provide them both their striking colors and their food. The process is known as bleaching because it exposes the coral’s white skeleton. The corals may survive, but they are weakened and vulnerable to disease and death if temperatures don’t drop.
Half the world’s reefs have been lost since 1950, according to research by the University of British Columbia published in the journal One Earth.
For countries such as the Dominican Republic, in the so-called “hurricane corridor,” preserving reefs is particularly important. Coral skeletons help absorb wave energy, creating a natural barrier against stronger waves.
“What do we sell in the Dominican Republic? Beaches,” del Rosario said. “If we don’t have corals, we lose coastal protection, we lose the sand on our beaches, and we lose tourism.”
Corals also are home to more than 25% of marine life, making them crucial for the millions of people around the world who make a living from fishing.
Alido Luis Báez knows this well.
It’s not yet dawn in Bayahibe when he climbs into a boat to fish with his father, who at 65 still goes to sea every week. The engine roars as they travel mile after mile until the coastline fades into the horizon. To catch tuna, dorado, or marlin, Luis Báez sails up to 50 miles offshore.
“We didn’t have to go so far before,” he said. “But because of overfishing, habitat loss, and climate change, now you have to go a little further every day.”
Things were very different when his father, also named Alido Luis, started fishing in the 1970s. Back then, they went out in a sailboat, and the coral reefs were so healthy they found plenty of fish close to the coast.
“I used to be a diver, and I caught a lot of lobster and queen conch,” he said in a voice weakened by the passage of time. “In a short time, I would catch 50 or 60 pounds of fish. But now, to catch two or three fish, they spend the whole day out there.”
Del Rosario said there’s still time to halt the decline of the reefs.
“More needs to be done, of course … but we are investing a lot of effort and time to preserve what we love so much,” he said. “And we trust and believe that many people around the world are doing the same.”
The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.
A Manatee County mother who lost her daughter to an accidental overdose believes this decision could prevent more deaths.
What You Need To Know
A mother in Bradenton supports President Trump’s decision to classify fentanyl as a weapon of mass destruction
Nanette Cobb lost her daughter to fentanyl poisoning three years ago
The Manatee County Sheriff’s Office seized a significant amount of fentanyl this year, but add there has actually been a downward trend in fentanyl use
“It’s heartbreaking because my life, and our family’s life, are never going to be the same without her,” Nanette Cobb said about her daughter Nicolette, who she lost three years ago.
She was just 24 years old when she died of fentanyl poisoning.
“She took one pill one time, and it killed her instantly,” Cobb said. “Nicolette was mourning the death of my mother. She had just died a couple days before. And talking with a friend online, said, ‘Oh, I have something that will help you with your mourning.’”
Cobb says that one pill contained seven nanograms of fentanyl per liter. She says two nanograms is enough to kill an adult man.
“I wish I could tell people that in time you feel better. It doesn’t. It gets worse,” Cobb said. “I miss her more and more each passing year that she doesn’t age, and I can’t share my life with her and her life with me,” she said.
She says she believes President Trump classifying fentanyl as a weapon of mass destruction, along with increased emphasis on border security, will help keep fentanyl out of the U.S. and protect families.
“Well, I felt relief because I hope that other mothers won’t endure what I have to endure,” Cobb said. “That we get this off the streets and stop killing our children.”
The Manatee County Sheriff’s Office is also fighting the opioid epidemic, with its largest fentanyl bust this year in March, when deputies seized $1.4 million worth of the drug.
“That bust alone, in terms of fentanyl, that’s enough to kill, I want to say, five or six million people,” said Louis Licata, captain of the Special Investigations Division for the Manatee County Sheriff’s Office.
Licata says there has actually been a downward trend in fentanyl use in the county.
According to MCSO data, so far in 2025 there is a 41% decrease in all overdoses and a 29% decrease in deaths from last year. The sheriff’s office also says fentanyl contributes to the majority of overdose deaths.
“One reason is the security of the borders that’s making it harder for the drug traffickers and the cartels to get it in,” Licata said. “Doesn’t mean that they’re not going to or (are) moving to other traditional ways to get it into the U.S., or into our state, for that matter,” he said
For now, Cobb is waiting for justice for her daughter. The suspect who gave Nicolette the pill is behind bars, and the case is with the prosecutor.
“It would make me feel relieved,” she said. “I, of course, will forgive the person because that’s what my faith calls me to do. But it will be a final point for me to see that justice is served.”
Cobb hopes that sharing her daughter’s story can help other families avoid the same tragedy.
