News Releases

KFF Health News won the 2023 George Polk Award for Medical Journalism for its year-long investigation with CBS News into the failure of FDA-approved medical devices that were suspected of contributing to thousands of injuries and patient deaths. The George Polk Awards were established in 1949 by Long Island University…

Fewer nursing facility residents and staff are getting COVID-19 vaccines, according to a new KFF analysis of federal data. Only 38% of residents and 15% of staff have received the latest vaccine. In comparison, 50% of residents and 22% of staff received updated vaccines in 2022 and 87% of residents…

People with medical debt are much more likely than those without such debt to show other signs of financial vulnerability, like having no “rainy day” fund, overdrawing a checking account, or relying on costly loans, according to a new KFF analysis of national survey data. Medical debt remains a significant…

A KFF analysis shows that a new out-of-pocket spending cap in Medicare Part D could translate into savings for well over 1 million beneficiaries when it takes effect next year, including more than 100,000 people each in California, Florida and Texas, based on analyses of drug spending in 2021. The…

This post was updated to clarify that less than 10% of the nation’s total health spending is spent on retail prescription drugs and does not include spending on drugs administrated by physicians or in hospitals.Prescription drug costs are a top concern for the American public. While retail prescription drugs represent…

About 1 in 5 adolescents report symptoms of anxiety or depression, according to a KFF analysis of a new federal survey of teen health. While some teens are getting mental health care, a significant share say they are not receiving the therapy they need due to costs, fear of what…

A new KFF analysis shows that most Medicare beneficiaries live on relatively low incomes and have modest financial resources for retirement – posing a risk to their economic well-being, particularly if they were to have a major, unanticipated expense, such as a need for long-term nursing home care. The financial…

Under the Inflation Reduction Act, the federal government for the first time will negotiate directly with drug companies to determine the prices that Medicare will pay for certain high expenditure drugs covered under Medicare Part D (starting in 2026) and Part B (starting in 2028). Part D covers retail prescription…

A new KFF resource tracks dozens of state laws and policies that restrict access to gender-affirming care among young people. Gender-affirming care supports and affirms gender identity through social, psychological, behavioral, or medical interventions.   As state laws and policies restricting youth access to gender-affirming care proliferate, KFF’s new tracker assesses…

Ten months into the unwinding of the Medicaid continuous enrollment provision, states have reported renewal outcomes for half of all enrollees whose eligibility needs to be reviewed during the unwinding period, including 34% (32.1 million) who have had their coverage renewed, and 17% (16.2 million) who have been disenrolled, according…