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Election results will have wide-ranging effect on healthcare policies. Whichever party wins the House and Senate today will be able to dictate healthcare priorities. Republican leaders have said they will take another shot at Obamacare repeal should voters rule in their favor. Democrats have signaled that they will holding hearings on drug prices, pour funding into fighting the opioid crisis, and work to fix Obamacare. This election season Democrats campaigned unapologetically on the law, finding that voters were concerned about the threat of Republicans undoing the law’s protections for people with pre-existing illnesses. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., urged members to keep pushing their healthcare message, saying that it was “the key factor in voters’ decision.” House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., said the Republican Party believes it has a “good shot” at maintaining a majority in the House, although historically the executive branch’s party tends to perform poorly in congressional races during midterm elections. The executive branch’s party has, on average, lost 25 House seats in every midterm election since 1946, according to Gallup.

Welcome to Philip Klein’s Daily on Healthcare, compiled by Washington Examiner Managing Editor Philip Klein (@philipaklein), Senior Healthcare Writer Kimberly Leonard (@LeonardKL) and Healthcare Reporter Robert King (@rking_19).  Email [email protected] for tips, suggestions, calendar items and anything else. If a friend sent this to you and you’d like to sign up, click here. If signing up doesn’t work, shoot us an email and we’ll add you to our list.

Trump adopts argument Hillary Clinton used to argue against Bernie Sanders’ socialized healthcare plan. In his final rally before Election Day, President Trump attacked Democrats on healthcare by channeling an argument from a surprising source: former rival Hillary Clinton.

Key players in Obamacare repeal effort face tough races. Reps. Tom MacArthur of New Jersey and Fred Upton of Michigan both had instrumental roles in getting an Obamacare repeal bill through the House last May, and now both are in tight races Tuesday. MacArthur was the author of a compromise that allowed states to waive protections for pre-existing conditions. Upton, the former chairman of the House Energy & Commerce Committee, worked at the last-minute to add $8 billion to the bill to fund high-risk pools in states that did get a waiver to allow insurers to ignore the protections. Healthcare has played a big role in both of the races. MacArthur is facing challenger Andy Kim, a former Obama administration official. Upton is also up against Democrat Matt Longjohn, a doctor who has made Upton’s work on Obamacare repeal a key plank of his campaign.

The most expensive ballot measure goes to … California’s Prop. 8. By Election Day the group opposing California’s “Fair Pricing for Dialysis Act” spent nearly $111 million convincing voters to check of “no” on the ballot. This amount of spending, mostly by dialysis firms, is believed to be an all-time record. The group raised more than any one side of a U.S. ballot issue since at least 2001. Before that, data on ballot spending weren’t tracked online. The measure would place spending caps on dialysis treatment in California. Here is the Washington Examiner guide to other major ballot measures, and our coverage of the 2018 elections.

States prepare for end of Roe v. Wade. West Virginia and Alabama will vote on Tuesday on whether to add language to their states’ constitution to outlaw abortion. The votes are in response to a potential ruling from the Supreme Court to strike down Roe v. Wade, the 1973 ruling that made abortion a constitutional right. Anti-abortion advocates are bullish on the chances of Roe being struck down after the confirmation of conservative Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh earlier this fall. If Roe is struck down, it will be up to states to decide whether to outlaw abortion. Alabama and West Virginia both still have a state law on the books that was passed before the Roe decision that bans abortion. They are among nine states that still have laws pre-Roe that ban abortion that remain, according to the abortion rights research think tank Guttmacher Institute.

Support for Obamacare’s pre-existing condition protections plummets after voters learn of tradeoffs. Voters are much less likely to support Obamacare’s protections for sick people when they find out they could personally face trade-offs as a result, according to the results of a survey released Monday by the libertarian Cato Institute. Yet those same trade-offs appear to bother people less than the last time Cato did the survey, a year-and-a-half ago. The poll published Monday found that 65 percent of voters support prohibiting health insurance companies from refusing to cover sick people or charging them more. But support dropped to 49 percent when people were asked whether they would still want the protections if their insurance costs were to go up, to 44 percent if it meant worse healthcare, and to 44 percent if it meant less access to medical tests and treatments. But opposition in the face of trade-offs was higher when Cato conducted the survey in February 2017, a time when Republicans were working to repeal the healthcare law.

Number of polio-like illnesses increase to 80. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has tracked as many as 219 cases of acute flaccid myelitis and confirmed 80 of them. The illness, which causes paralysis in the arms and legs, has now spread across 25 states and officials don’t know what’s causing it.

Prescription drug boom fuels CVS growth in run-up to Aetna merger. Increasing prescription drug sales fueled third-quarter profit growth at CVS Health as executives worked to complete a $69 billion merger with Aetna. Revenue at the Woonsocket, R.I.-based pharmacy chain grew 2.4 percent to $47.3 billion, supported by a nearly 10 percent increase in same-store prescription treatment sales. Profit rose 8.2 percent to $1.4 billion, or $1.36 per share, higher than analyst’s expected. CVS and Aetna obtained federal approval for their merger in October. The firms are still awaiting sign-offs from five states and expect the transaction to close before the end of November. Integration teams are “making great progress,” Chief Executive Officer Larry Merlo said, and will work after the deal closes to build the “revolutionary new model that will transform the healthcare experience for consumers.” CVS’ stock rose 3.3 percent to $76.10 in pre-market trading in New York. The Trump administration is said to be weighing a rule to revamp the current drug rebate program, a system under which pharmacy benefit managers negotiate price discounts with drug companies and keep a portion of the savings. Such a move could significantly impact the operations of CVS and fellow benefit managers like Express Scripts, which is preparing for its own merger with insurer Cigna.

Profit doubles as Eli Lilly as drugmakers push Congress to fix ‘donut hole.’ Profit at Eli Lilly & Co. soared in the third quarter as strong U.S. sales of new prescription drugs helped counter slower growth overseas. Revenue at the Indianapolis-based drug maker rose 7 percent to $6 billion, buoyed by an 11 percent increase in U.S. sales. Net income grew to $1.4 billion, or $1.12 per share, higher than analyst’s expectations. After the 2018 midterm elections, the drug industry will continue to push Congress to roll back a measure passed earlier this year that increased the portion of a treatment’s price that companies must cover in the Medicare Part D program in order to close a gap in coverage known as the ‘donut hole.’ Experts say the change, which could cost the industry billions, will largely impact firms like Eli Lilly that manufacture the most popular self-administered drugs. The pharmaceutical industry will be under intense pressure in Washington, D.C., regardless of whether Democrats retake the House, the Senate or both. The Trump administration is pushing a proposal to tie reimbursement rates for drugs offered in Medicare Part B to international prices. Pfizer’s top executive previously said the plan “imports price controls from abroad into the U.S.”

FDA makes push to expand mandatory food recalls. The Food and Drug Administration put out on Tuesday a regulatory guidance document outlining it’s new push for more mandatory food recalls even if the company disagrees. The agency’s guidance is a question and answer document on when the FDA is going to use mandatory recall powers. The FDA traditionally lets the food manufacturer do a voluntary recall of tainted food, even though a 2011 law called the Food Safety Modernization Act expanded the agency’s mandatory recall powers. FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb said in a statement on Monday that the agency is going to flex its recall muscles more. “Fortunately, most companies collaborate with the FDA to rapidly initiate voluntary recalls of hazardous food products,” Gottlieb said. “On average, a recall occurs within four calendar days of the problem being discovered.” But he added there have been cases where the company doesn’t agree to recall a product even if it is likely to cause illness or even death, Gottlieb added. “To me, this is unacceptable,” he said.

RUNDOWN

STAT News In these eight midterm races, health and medicine are front and center

The Guardian Has Obamacare become a winning issue for Democrats?

Associated Press Michigan, North Dakota weigh bringing legal pot to the midwest

Texas Tribune At federal appeals court, Texas asks to enforce its ban on a common abortion procedure

Wall Street Journal Insys looks to sell opioid-related assets, including Subsys

Axios The health industry bets on Republicans for the midterms

The Hill Liberal health advocate looks to move beyond defense on Obamacare