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Facebook ‘enabling’ illegal opioid sales, lawmaker charges. Rep. David McKinley, R-W.Va., charged Wednesday that Facebook is making the nation’s opioid addiction worse by allowing online pharmacies to sell drugs illegally on the social media site. At a House committee hearing, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said “of course” it should be illegal for online pharmacies to sell opioids without a prescription. But McKinley said it happens all the time on Facebook. “Opioids are still available on your site … without a prescription on your site,” McKinley said. “It contradicts what you just said just a minute ago. Your platform is still being used to circumvent the law, and allow people to buy highly addictive drugs without a prescription,” he added. “Zuckerberg replied that Facebook needs to do a “better job” policing the content that goes up on the social media site.

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Republicans lose top entitlement reform cheerleader in Paul Ryan. Republican lawmakers on Wednesday praised retiring House Speaker Paul Ryan’s leadership on entitlement reform despite falling short of major legislation on the issue. Ryan has called out Medicaid, Medicare, and Social Security as major drivers of debt, and he gained notoriety for touting budgets that slashed the popular programs. Republican lawmakers said Ryan did much to advance the issue in his 20 years in Congress. “He’s been the only one who has truly been the torchbearer and the person out there raising the issue on entitlement reform,” said Rep. Mark Meadows, R-N.C., chairman of the House Freedom Caucus. Ryan shepherded through an Obamacare repeal bill in May that would have overhauled Medicaid and slowed its growth. However, that effort collapsed in the Senate because some Republican senators opposed major cuts to the program, which provides health insurance to low-income people.

Pallone worries House panel moving too fast on opioid bills. Rep. Frank Pallone, D-N.J., questioned the blistering pace of the House Energy and Commerce Committee’s consideration of more than 50 opioid bills Wednesday. “I am concerned that the sheer quantity of bills and the chairman’s ambitious timeframe will not give us enough time to get these policies right,” said Pallone, the committee’s top Democrat. Pallone spoke before the third legislative hearing on Wednesday of the health subcommittee on opioid legislation. The hearing, which continued into Thursday, focused on more than 30 bills aimed at reforming Medicare and Medicaid to combat the opioid epidemic.

Medicaid politics roil hearing on opioid bills. While the hearing was about the opioid epidemic, political clashes over proposed GOP cuts to entitlements were the subject of intense scrutiny from Democrats on the panel. Rep. Anna Eshoo, D-Fla., said the Trump administration proposed a $1.4 trillion cut to Medicaid in its latest budget proposal. “Money provides access to fill in the blank,” Eshoo said during Wednesday’s hearing. “There is a direct correlation between dollars and services.” She asked Kimberly Brandt, an official at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, if the agency has analyzed how the massive cut would affect the response to the opioid crisis. “Maybe you haven’t done an analysis, but it’s important to put this on the table,” she said. Rep. Jan Schakowsky, D-Ill., spoke Thursday about the effects of the balanced budget amendment that the House is expected to vote on Thursday. “If enacted, the balanced budget amendment would undercut the structure of Medicare and Medicaid by opening both to dramatic reductions in funding,” she said.

ACLU sues Kentucky to halt 11-week abortion ban. The American Civil Liberties Union filed a federal lawsuit Wednesday to halt an 11-week abortion ban enacted in Kentucky. The law signed Tuesday by Republican Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin would ban the common abortion method called dilation and evacuation after 11 weeks of pregnancy. The lawsuit, filed on behalf of Kentucky abortion providers, said the law imposes serious harm for women’s health. “For many patients, the procedure being banned is the safest and most appropriate,” ACLU of Kentucky said. “The law is forcing doctors to stop providing it and forcing patients either to leave the state to obtain it or to forego the care altogether.” The lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Kentucky.

Insurer-backed study finds short-term plan rule would destabilize Obamacare exchanges. The Trump administration’s push to extend short-term plan durations from 90 days to nearly 12 months would reduce enrollment on Obamacare’s insurance exchanges by up to 826,000 people, a new study found. The study released Thursday from Wakely Consulting Group is funded by the Association for Community Health Plans, whose membership includes Obamacare insurers. Critics of the proposal to extend short-term plans say the effort will destabilize exchanges because healthy people will flock to the short-term plans, which are cheaper than Obamacare plans. They’re cheaper because they don’t have to abide by Obamacare requirements such as not charging people with pre-existing conditions more money. The study estimated that next year, the regulation would increase premiums on Obamacare’s exchanges by up to 1.7 percent. It also would reduce enrollment between 396,000 to 826,000, between 2.7 percent and 6.4 percent.

FDA chief: Cancer treatment comes with “financial toxicity.” The head of the Food and Drug Administration said far too many patients find themselves in “a financial no-man’s land” because of the costs of cancer medications. The comments are the latest attack from FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb on drug prices and insurers. “Rising co-pays and co-insurance are pushing far too many patients into a financial no man’s land where sometimes they must literally choose between exhausting their bank accounts, or going without access to potentially effective treatments,” Gottlieb said in prepared remarks for a speech at the 2018 Community Oncology Conference Thursday outside Washington.

RUNDOWN

Kaiser Health News FDA launches criminal investigation into unauthorized herpes vaccine research

STAT News A giant gorilla and a winged wolf: Does ‘Rampage’ get the science of CRISPR right?

Cleveland.com Cleveland, Cuyahoga County’s opioid lawsuits set as first cases to go to trial, judge says

Axios Making opioids harder to abuse led to spike in heroin overdoses, study says

New York Times Republicans couldn’t knock down Obamacare, so they are finding ways around it.

Associated Press Insurers look to pass drug price breaks straight to consumers

Bloomberg Boehner says lawmakers will ‘see the light’ on marijuana