nutrtition
With SNAP cuts, food-as-medicine gets trickier
Isabella Cueto/STAT
This week, the SNAP cuts included in President Trump's tax bill went into effect, reducing benefits for millions of poor Americans. STAT's Isabella Cueto went to a farmers market in southern Pennsylvania to see how its customers, many of whom live in low-income or senior housing, are faring. There's no grocery store in their part of town, so the small, seasonal market is an oasis of whole foods and produce. This is the vision that Kennedy and the Make America Healthy Again crowd tout as the future of American food.
But that future is still out of reach for some community members. Fewer low-income seniors in Pennsylvania received vouchers for buying fresh produce this summer, Isa reports. And the vouchers themselves have shrunk — to $25 from $50 for the season — due to federal funding cuts. Read Isa's dispatch from the market, where she spoke to families about the nutrition benefits they receive, and their concerns about what happens if those benefits shrink or disappear.
health
A refresher on research around Tylenol while pregnant
Far-right influencer Laura Loomer posted on X yesterday about the latest round of debate on a long-discussed theory: the potential association between taking acetaminophen (Tylenol) during pregnancy and a baby's odds of having developmental disorders like autism or ADHD. As one of few medications that hasn't been officially flagged by the FDA as risky to take during pregnancy, Tylenol is often the only option for pregnant people dealing with pain or fever. With that in mind, experts tend to caution against panic or hard-line avoidance of the drug. Here's a quick run-down of what we know:
Over the years, some research has found positive associations between exposure to acetaminophen in-utero and developmental problems in children. But confounding factors abound, including the health issues that lead people to reach for pain meds in the first place, imprecise tracking of patients' dosing and duration on the drug, as well as conflicts of interest for researchers who focus on this question.
Health economist and parenting blogger Emily Oster has written multiple times about this concern, pointing to original analysis published in JAMA in 2024. In that study, researchers found that a modest risk increase for kids whose mothers took Tylenol actually disappeared when comparing kids born to the same mother, who took the medication during one pregnancy but not the other. Oster's conclusion? "If you have a headache, please treat it."
first opinion
On the consequences of health insurance 'churn'
Across the country, it's common for people to "churn" through different health insurers, whether by choice or simply because their employment or income situation forces a change. In a new First Opinion essay, physician and bioethicist Ezekiel Emanuel and health policy professor John A. Graves argue that churn is a deadly consequence of the country's fragmented health insurance system — one that will only be exacerbated by the Medicaid cuts in President Trump's tax bill.
Because churn is so common — some 15-20% of Americans experience shifts in their coverage annually — insurance companies are disincentivized from investing in preventative care, Emanuel and Graves write. Why would one company cover a procedure that could save money down the line if a different company is likely to reap the financial reward? Read more on the harms of churn and how to change the incentives for insurance companies.
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