| | | |   | Hey D.C. Diagnosis readers! It’s Nick Florko again, filling in for Rachel Cohrs. It was great to see some of you at last week’s in-person event. If you missed it, you can check out this great rundown from STAT’s Sharon Begley Science Reporting Fellow, Ambar Castillo. Don’t be a stranger. I’m at nicholas.florko@statnews.com. | | | Don’t expect CBD seltzers in the FDA vending machines  (Alex Hogan/STAT) The average cannabidiol-curious consumer might not see a difference between the CBD capsules they can buy at GNC and the CBD-infused seltzer sold at the health food store, but apparently the FDA can.
Over-the-counter CBD products are all technically illegal, but the FDA has shown itself particularly opposed to adding CBD to food and drinks —so much so that the agency’s hardline stance is now angering lawmakers. In a new letter to FDA commissioner Robert Califf, a bipartisan group of lawmakers called the FDA’s approach “unacceptable” and “completely insufficient.”
In a new story for STAT, I walk readers through why the CBD food debate is so contentious, and why the FDA’s ultimate decision could have much bigger business and public health implications than the debate over adding CBD to supplements. | Speaking of CBD in Washington … The cannabis company Tilray Brands has officially registered to lobby in Washington on “Commercial cannabis industry issues,” according to a new filing. That apparently includes international trade, interstate commerce, banking, security, tax, medical and adult-use, research, equal access, and “efforts to discourage illicit market activity and related social harms.” The company made waves in 2018 when it announced a now-defunct partnership with Anheuser-Busch to produce CBD and THC-infused drinks.
That’s not the only lobbying news catching our eye… -
Mindbloom, the telehealth company that connects patients to experimental ketamine treatments, has hired former congressman Greg Walden and his firm Alpine Group Partners to lobby on “telehealth legislation and regulation.” -
The drug pricing advocacy group Patients for Affordable Drugs also has a new leader, Rachel reports. | Is nearly a year of work about to go out the window? Since February, lawmakers have been haggling over which policies to tack onto an FDA funding bill that needs to pass by the end of the month. For a minute, it seemed like the agreement might include everything from a sweeping revamp of how the FDA regulates cosmetics and certain lab tests to massive new legislation preparing the U.S. for future pandemics, and to strengthen this nation’s mental health infrastructure.
Negotiations over the final deal are ongoing, but policy watchers in Washington increasingly are betting on Congress passing a “clean” user fee reauthorization — meaning all of those policies likely won’t be attached to the final FDA funding package.
That would be a seriously anticlimactic end to months of negotiations, but a major win for Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.), who demanded a “clean” user fee in July.
The biggest question for us at STAT is how any of these proposed “riders” – most of which are really important from a public health perspective – ever become law if they can’t even be attached to this must-pass funding legislation.
For now, however, it seems that congressional staff are holding out hope their months of work will pay off.
One Democratic congressional aide told STAT that congressional leaders are "continuing negotiations that include discussions on a number of policy riders in addition to reauthorizing user fees."
| Pharmacy Benefit Managers Advocate for Patients and Bring Down Prescription Drug Costs On behalf of 266 million Americans, Pharmacy Benefit Managers, PBMs, negotiate discounts on prescription drugs and improve patient outcomes. According to the GAO, 99.6% of rebates, or discounts, for certain Medicare-covered drugs pass through to health plan sponsors and lower costs for patients. Patients shouldn’t have to worry about high manufacturer drug prices. With a PBM on her side, Brittany’s monthly medication costs went from $350 to $5. Learn more about how PBMs protect patients. | Troubling new research on cancer in prison Readers of last week’s D.C. Diagnosis know I’ve been doing quite a bit of reporting on health care in prisons lately. A lot of that has been focused on the care that occurs inside the prison walls. But a new study published on Friday in the Journal PLOS One indicates that the care people receive once they get out of prison can have just as big of an impact on their lives.
That study, which looked at cancer outcomes for people in the state of Connecticut, found that people who were diagnosed with cancer within a year of being released from prison were 91% more likely to die of that condition than those who never were incarcerated. In fact, those who were diagnosed with cancer after a prison stint were more at risk of dying than even those who were diagnosed while serving time.
The authors of the study told me that the research demonstrates the need to invest in transitional medical care for formerly incarcerated people, and to consider oft-overlooked questions like whether formerly incarcerated people are getting adequate help finding doctors, getting insurance, and whether they’re being offered other potential solutions like participation in clinical trials.
While the study focuses on one of the nation’s smaller prison systems, it's part of a growing body of evidence showing that people recently released from prison are at particularly high risk for adverse health outcomes. An earlier study from one of the new paper’s co-authors found, for example, that recently incarcerated people were at higher risk of hospitalization for a variety of conditions ranging from diabetes to asthma. | What we’re reading - Meta faces mounting questions from Congress on health data privacy as hospitals remove Facebook tracker, STAT
- A rural doctor gave her all. Then her heart broke, The New York Times
- ‘I’m deeply concerned’: Francis Collins on trust in science, how Covid communications failed, and his current obsession, STAT
- Private equity sees the billions in eye care as firms target high-profit procedures, Kaiser Health News
- Medicare is using one of its biggest hammers to try to fix the dialysis system: how providers are paid, STAT
| Thanks for reading! More Thursday,  | | | |
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