November 6, 2025 – The Week in Health Care News
Your digest on the happenings in health care this week | November 6, 2025
Committee News
Thank you to everyone who participated in the Committee’s Oct. 29 “Physician All Call” organizing meeting with Senator Chris Murphy. If you missed it, you can check out our Affordability Agenda at CommitteetoProtect.org/agenda and hear an update from Senator Murphy on our Instagram. At the event we also introduced the Frontline Fund, a newly launched project of the Committee to Protect Health Care PAC. Learn more about the Frontline Fund HERE.
On Oct. 31, Committee Member Dr. Chris Ford joined MSNBC Ana Cabrera Reports to discuss the 2025 ACA open enrollment period beginning.
Elections 2025
Tuesday’s election results across the country were a bright spot in political news, especially in Virginia and Pennsylvania where the Committee spent considerable resources.
In Virginia, the Committee-endorsed candidates at the top of the ticket were all victorious: Abigail Spanberger for Governor, Ghazala Hashmi for Lt. Governor, and Jay Jones for Attorney General. In addition, the Democrats expanded their thin majority in the 100-seat House of Delegates from 51 to at least 64. This is a big win for abortion rights, as Jessica Valenti at ABORTION, EVERY DAY points out. Virginia is the last pro-choice state in the south and a second vote on the state’s constitutional repro rights amendment is imminent.
In Pennsylvania, voters maintained the 5-2 liberal majority on the state Supreme Court by retaining all three justices, Christine Donohue, Kevin Dougherty, and David Wecht, for another ten years.
Other important victories Tuesday include Democrat Mikie Sherrill for Governor in New Jersey and the passage of Prop 50 in California to conduct mid-term redistricting to combat the efforts of Texas to rig the upcoming Congressional elections for the Republicans. Finally, liberal Zohran Mamdani was victorious in the New York City mayoral race.
Government Shutdown News
The latest poll from Navigator shows that Americans now blame Trump and Republicans for the shutdown by 14 points, up from 10 points last week:
A bipartisan group of House members is working on a compromise to end the stalemate that has kept the government closed:
Driving the news: Reps. Don Bacon (R-Neb.), Tom Suozzi (D-N.Y.), Jeff Hurd (R-Colo.) and Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.) on Monday released a broad outline for a potential compromise extension of the ACA tax credits.
The Enhanced Premium Tax Credits would be extended for two years, with a phased-out income cap for those making between $200,000 and $400,000 a year.
The proposal also includes several reforms, including requiring ACA marketplaces to confirm that recipients haven’t died, creating a new standard for cracking down on fraud and providing more transparency on the value of recipients’ tax credits.
POLITICO has more.
House Speaker Mike Johnson says the Republicans already have a plan to solve the health care crisis in America (“we’ve been doing this for years”) but will have to “arm wrestle” with the Democrats about it. Why? “Because many of them are avowed to get us to a single-payer system,” Johnson said. “They do love socialism, my friends.”
Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene begs to differ. “I’m waiting for the plan. I haven’t seen it yet,” she told Bill Maher. “Apparently I have to go into a SCIF to find out the Republican healthcare plan!!!” she tweeted. Greene also wants the GOP to “go nuclear” and scrap the filibuster to end the stalemate.
Related from Rolling Stone: Republicans Claim They Have a Healthcare Plan. But They Won’t Tell You What’s in It
First, the USDA said it had a contingency plan to pay SNAP recipients from funds literally meant for situations where SNAP becomes unfunded. Then other Trump officials said the government would NOT pay SNAP benefits because they were not legally allowed to do so. Then a federal judge made it clear she was going to order them to pay the benefits. And now Trump claimed in a Truth Social post that he wanted to pay the benefits all along and just needed “appropriate legal direction by the Court”. However, the administration subsequently announced that they will release only enough funds to pay for a half-month’s worth of food assistance benefits in November.
Meanwhile, USDA Sec. Brooke Rollins claimed that SNAP is a “corrupt” program riddled with “massive fraud.”
MedPage Today: Patients Go Without Treatment After Government Shutdown Disrupts Telehealth
BenefitsPRO reports that most of the employees furloughed by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services during the ongoing government shutdown have temporarily returned to work to help individuals sign up for health insurance plans during open enrollment.
Around the country
KFF Health News: ACA Insurers Are Raising Premiums by an Estimated 26%, but Most Enrollees Could See Sharper Increases in What They Pay
POLITICO: New Jerseyans expected to pay nearly 175 percent more for health insurance on exchange
Chicago Tribune: Illinois residents to see 78% average cost increase for Affordable Care Act exchange plans if subsidies expire
The Colorado Sun: Health insurance prices in Colorado set for significant increases in 2026 due to congressional inaction
KJZZ Phoenix: What to expect if Obamacare premiums hit as much as $2,000 a month in Arizona
The Texas Tribune: Texas ACA insurers hike monthly premiums by 35% on average
The Michigan Independent: Michigan residents face skyrocketing health care costs if ACA tax credits expire
WUSF: Floridians face ‘impossible choices’ as ACA premiums skyrocket
Trump Administration News
CNN: Trump’s HHS Orders State Medicaid Programs To Help Find Undocumented Immigrants:
The Trump administration has ordered states to investigate certain individuals enrolled in Medicaid to determine whether they are ineligible because of their immigration status, with five states reporting they’ve together received more than 170,000 names collectively — an “unprecedented” step by the federal government that ensnares the state-federal health program in the president’s immigration crackdown.
Rural hospitals are in a Hunger Games-style fight for a share of the $50 billion set aside for rural hospitals in Trump’s big bill and some of them are worried they’ll be “outhustled, with large academic medical centers, private equity-backed providers, technology companies and startups also pitching states for ways to use the money,” AXIOS reports.
Dr. George Tidmarsh, the director of the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research (CDER), abruptly resigned this past Sunday after being placed on administrative leave:
The departure came the same day that a drugmaker connected to one of Tidmarsh’s former business associates filed a lawsuit alleging that he made “false and defamatory statements,” during his time at the FDA.
The lawsuit, brought by Aurinia Pharmaceuticals, alleges that Tidmarsh used his FDA position to pursue a “longstanding personal vendetta” against the chair of the company’s board of directors, Kevin Tang. [...]
In September, Tidmarsh drew public attention for a highly unusual post on LinkedIn stating that one of Aurinia Pharmaceutical’s products, a kidney drug, had “not been shown to provide a direct clinical benefit for patients.” It’s very unusual for an FDA regulator to single out individual companies and products in public comments online.
According to the company’s lawsuit, Aurinia’s stock dropped 20% shortly after the post, wiping out more than $350 million in shareholder value.
STAT has more:
Tensions have been high between [Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research (CBER) Director Vinay] Prasad and Tidmarsh in recent weeks, the drug regulator told STAT. Scientists under Prasad’s purview at CBER have been trying to transfer to CDER. And Prasad has repeatedly bypassed Tidmarsh to ask drug reviewers to do work for him. When Tidmarsh pushed back, Prasad threatened one of his deputies, Mike Davis, according to messages viewed by STAT.
“Let me be clear,” Prasad wrote. “If you continue to choose not to do what I tell you. I will spend all of my political capital gets [sic] you fired. Do not take people from my team. When I ask you to ask the reviewers a question you will do so.”
After raising fears that acetaminophen causes autism, The Hill reports that RFK Jr. now says there isn’t “sufficient” evidence that it definitively causes autism.
KFF Health News: Trump Team Takes Aim at State Laws Shielding Consumers’ Credit Scores From Medical Debt:
More than a dozen states, including Washington, Oregon, California, Colorado, Minnesota, Maryland, New York, and most of New England, have enacted laws in recent years to keep medical debt from affecting consumers’ credit.
And more states — including several in conservative regions of the Midwest and Mountain West — have been considering similar protections, spurred by bipartisan concerns that medical debt on a credit report can make it harder for people to get a home, a car, or a job. [...]
But in the new guidance, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau asserts that federal law bars states from restricting medical debts from credit reports, arguing that only the federal government has this authority.
One possible benefit of the shutdown is that it has delayed RFK Jr.’s revised dietary guidelines encouraging people to eat more red meat and saturated fats.
Casey Means, the health influencer, health care grifter, and RFK Jr. acolyte who is Trump’s pick for Surgeon General, was scheduled to have her HELP Committee confirmation hearing last week but it was postponed when she went into labor. The hearing was scheduled for when she was 40-weeks pregnant.
The Guardian: Threat to US vaccines as CDC staff supporting key advisory panel laid off:
The staff supporting the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) were let go earlier this month in a sweeping round of layoffs that gutted entire departments of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
Most of the committee’s working groups, which pore over data and help set the agendas, haven’t met for months, and there was little communication from the staff even before they received reduction in force (RIF) notices during the US government shutdown.
The ACIP meeting planned for 22-23 October has been indefinitely postponed.
The changes mean the US government may not make routine vaccine recommendations for more than half of children in 2026, and they will likely affect the development and recommendation of new vaccines in the pipeline.
BenefitsPro: Trump fertility order unlikely to make significant dent in IVF access gaps
During their annual performance reviews, HHS employees will now be evaluated on their fealty to Trump. “This is the most critical element for reviewing the job performance of someone who serves under the elected President,” the requirement says.
Reproductive Rights/Attacks on Medication Abortion
Some good news for repro rights: Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin has resumed providing abortion services after dropping its designation as an “essential community provider,” allowing the organization to once again receive federal Medicaid funds. It has been a month since they provided abortions.
Some MORE good news for repro rights: In Win for Reproductive Rights, Federal Court Calls for Review of Restrictions on Mifepristone
CBS News: The quiet collapse of America’s reproductive health safety net:
In late October, Maine Family Planning announced three rural clinics in northern Maine would close by month’s end. These primary care and reproductive health clinics served about 800 patients, many uninsured or on Medicaid. [...]
“When you cut [the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Population Affairs], [the Health Resources and Services Administration], and Medicaid together, you’re removing every backup we have,” said Clare Coleman, president of the National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association. “It’s like taking EMTs off the road while closing the emergency rooms.”
The New York Times: New York Judge Dismisses Texas Challenge to the State’s Abortion Shield Law
Other Health Care News
The Hill: Many voters say health care unaffordable, are open to new insurance system: Poll:
The survey found that 69 percent of voters believe that health care is not affordable today, with that figure remaining relatively consistent across parties. [...]
“This is a common ground issue that you know is resonating with people. Health care is clearly unaffordable,” Allison Sesso, president and CEO of Undue Medical Debt, told The Hill.
“What I thought was really interesting is really the focus on insurance,” Sesso added. “Seventy-four percent saying that insurance is failing to protect them from medical debt.
In early September, Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo announced the state was ending all school-age vaccination mandates saying, “every last one of them is wrong and drips with disdain and slavery.” Health officials who disagree with the move are being muzzled, reports MedPage Today.
The Texas Tribune: Texas attorney general sues Tylenol company for failing to warn consumers about the risk of taking Tylenol while pregnant.
CIDRAP reports that RFK Jr.’s efforts to increase vaccine skepticism is working:
Support among US adults for the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine has dropped from 90% to 82% in just a few months, while confusion reigns over whether Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.—the top US official spearheading prevention efforts—recommends that children be vaccinated against measles, according to the latest poll from the Annenberg Public Policy Center (APPC) at the University of Pennsylvania.
Bloomberg: Flu Vaccination Decline Raises Fears of a Deadlier US Winter:
CSL expects US vaccination rates for the 2025-2026 season to drop 12% overall and 14% among people ages 65 and older compared with last year [...]
Flu vaccines prevent millions of illnesses and doctor’s visits each year. During the 2019-2020 season — the last before the Covid-19 pandemic — flu shots were estimated to have averted about 7 million infections, 3 million medical visits, 100,000 hospitalizations and 7,000 deaths in the US, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The U.S. may be headed for a physician shortage, thanks to Trump’s big budget bill.
If you’re famous and a sycophantic and supporter of Trump, he can personally help you get expedited medical care like the cartoonist for the comic Dilbert.