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Presented by Blue Cross Blue Shield Association: Delivered daily by 10 a.m., Pulse examines the latest news in health care politics and policy. | | | | | |  | | By Adam Cancryn | Presented by |  | | | With Rachel Roubein Editor’s Note: POLITICO Pulse is a free version of POLITICO Pro Health Care's morning newsletter, which is delivered to our subscribers each morning at 6 a.m. The POLITICO Pro platform combines the news you need with tools you can use to take action on the day’s biggest stories. Act on the news with POLITICO Pro.
| | | — President Joe Biden's Covid response team is holding its first press briefing, marking the start of regular updates on his administration's pandemic response. — Biden is planning to purchase an additional 200 million vaccine doses, though that won't alleviate ongoing supply shortages. — Democrats are debating whether and when to abandon negotiations with Republicans on the next Covid relief package. WELCOME TO WEDNESDAY PULSE — where if you happen to be in the market for $2 million in unproven Covid-19 drugs, has Oklahoma got a deal for you! The only cure for what PULSE has got is more tips — send them to acancryn@politico.com. | | A message from Blue Cross Blue Shield Association: Blue Cross and Blue Shield companies have committed more than $7 billion to help the nation address the COVID-19 outbreak, by providing premium relief, eliminating patient treatment costs, and enhancing access to telehealth. Learn More. | | | | | | BIDEN's COVID TEAM TAKES THE STAGE — Biden's top health officials will brief reporters today as the White House seeks to boost transparency around the pandemic — and keep a tight grip on messaging around the federal response. The 11 a.m. presser will be the first of the administration's thrice-weekly Covid briefings. Biden has vowed to be brutally honest about the state of the crisis, and has already warned it will take months — and the nation will see hundreds of thousands more deaths — before the situation improves. White House officials have pointed to the focus on public communication as a clear difference between the Biden pandemic response and the chaotic Trump administration effort that came before it. INDEED, IT'LL LIKELY BE A SEA CHANGE from the first 10 months of the Trump-managed pandemic, when press briefings could devolve into disinformation and spectacle — and often raised far more questions than they answered. Don't expect many combative back-and-forths or promises of miracle "cures" from this group, especially with infectious disease expert Anthony Fauci and new CDC Director Rochelle Walensky among those slated to lead the session. (Covid chief Jeff Zients, Health Equity Task Force Chair Marcella Nunez-Smith and new senior adviser Andy Slavitt will also be on hand.) Rather, the content is likely to be straightforward, with officials walking through the trajectory of the virus, addressing emerging concerns and touting the administration's response plans. Their answers will be no less urgent, though, especially amid the threat of new Covid-19 variants and ongoing vaccine supply shortages. Those problems will be major tests for how a Covid team that's been tightly choreographed and religiously on-message so far responds to public skepticism over their pandemic planning. Among our most pressing questions: Does the administration have a handle on how much vaccine the U.S. has? How does it expect to open schools without first vaccinating all teachers? And what's the backup plan if Congress deadlocks on another round of Covid funding? BIDEN TO BUY 200M MORE DOSES — The federal government's new tranche of vaccines would consist of 100 million doses each from Moderna and Pfizer, bringing the nation’s total capacity to 600 million, your host reports with Rachel Roubein. Yet those shots likely won’t be delivered until sometime this summer, raising the possibility that shortages could persist for months. — The White House is also upping its weekly allocations. States and other jurisdictions will receive 10 million total doses each week for the next three weeks, up from 8.6 million, Biden announced Tuesday, and the additional doses will be doled out based on population. The administration will also give supply estimates further in advance, after states complained that they need more notice to plan out their vaccine distribution. — Both Democratic and Republican governors cheered the announcement on a private call with White House officials, according to notes obtained by POLITICO. But those measures won’t fix the nation’s pressing supply problem on their own; releasing more doses as vaccine manufacturing ramps up and exercising previously agreed-on options to buy more shots from Pfizer and Moderna amount to pulling levers that were already in place.
| | | | TRACK THE FIRST 100 DAYS OF THE BIDEN ADMINISTRATION: A new president occupies the White House and he is already making changes. What are some of the key moments from Biden's first week in office? Find out in Transition Playbook, our scoop-filled newsletter tracking the appointments, people, and emerging power centers of the first 100 days of the new administration. Subscribe today. | | | | |
| | | DEMOCRATS’ COVID CROSSROADS: GO BIG OR BIPARTISAN? — Democrats are debating how to pass the next Covid relief bill , with progressives pushing to unilaterally advance a massive rescue package while moderate lawmakers insist there’s still time to make a deal, POLITICO’s Burgess Everett, Sarah Ferris and Caitlin Emma report. It’s the first major dilemma the party has faced since it won full control of Washington, and one that will shape the early months of Biden’s presidency. The White House has insisted on a nearly $2 trillion bill to jumpstart the economy and fund a full pandemic response, but it has also emphasized the need for greater bipartisan unity. Realistically, Biden will likely have to choose one or the other to get a bill done, with Republicans and even some centrist Democrats already saying he’ll need to back off his demands to win bipartisan support. — The key roadblocks: A proposal to raise the federal minimum wage to $15 has run into GOP resistance, as have plans for new cash for state and local governments. That’s prompted some Democrats to advocate muscling through an expansive bill using a budget procedure that requires only 51 Senate votes. — Democratic leaders have so far encouraged negotiations with Republicans just in case compromise is possible, though they’re also preparing to press ahead on their own. On Tuesday, Majority Leader Chuck Schumer told lawmakers that they could be voting on a budget as soon as next week, laying the groundwork for a party-line push. — One wrinkle to watch: Progressive health groups are prepping campaigns of their own if Democrats opt for the unilateral path, in hopes of convincing lawmakers to stuff all manner of ambitious policies into what would be the first major legislative vehicle of Biden's presidency. Among the possible agenda items, a person involved in the planning told PULSE, are a host of provisions aimed at expanding Obamacare and making its subsidies more generous, as well as proposals for lowering drug prices. | | | |   | | | | | Building the Biden Administration | | FIRST IN PULSE: WHITE HOUSE ADDS LIZ JURINKA — Jurinka, a veteran of Capitol Hill, has joined the White House’s legislative affairs team. She spent the last six years as chief health policy adviser for the Senate Finance Committee Democrats and Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), who in a statement called Jurinka a “tenacious fighter for affordable, accessible health care for all Americans.” | | | HEALTH GROUPS TO BECERRA: RESCIND MEDICAID WORK RULES — Over 100 health groups are urging Biden’s HHS secretary nominee, Xavier Becerra, to unwind Medicaid work requirements implemented by the Trump administration, Rachel writes. In a letter, the organizations — which include Medicaid advocates, patient groups and providers — laid out detailed steps they say the Biden team should take to get rid of the policy, arguing that the work rules create barriers to care for vulnerable populations. — The ask won’t meet much opposition. Biden is expected to sign a series of health care executive orders soon, some of which will likely address Medicaid. And Democrats have long opposed adding work requirements to the program. But undoing the policy could take time. The Trump administration's Medicaid chief, Seema Verma, asked states to sign an agreement locking in a lengthy process if the Biden administration were to try to terminate their Medicaid waivers.
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| | | CDC RESEARCHERS: OPEN SCHOOLS, CLOSE RESTAURANTS — That’s the message from a trio of CDC researchers, who argued in a new article Tuesday that in-person classes have not been a major source of Covid-19 transmission. The piece, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, instead maintains indoor dining and social gatherings are higher-risk activities, and that communities should focus restrictions on those rather than keeping kids out of the classroom. The article comes as Biden pushes to reopen schools over the next few months, citing worries about what effects nearly a year of remote learning will have on children, our Bianca Quilantan writes. The Trump administration had also previously pushed for reopening schools, though as part of a broader effort to reopen the entire economy. — But there's one big caveat: Schools still need to take a series of protective measures to minimize the threat to vulnerable students and staff, the CDC researchers wrote — including requiring face masks, de-densifyng classrooms, increasing air ventilation and using hybrid attendance models. They'd also need access to regular Covid testing, in order to quickly identify and isolate asymptomatic individuals — though such testing has not been available to most schools through the entirety of the pandemic. | | A message from Blue Cross Blue Shield Association: We believe everyone should have access to health care, no matter who you are or where you live. In every ZIP code in every state, Blue Cross and Blue Shield companies are working to improve health and expand access to quality care. Learn More. | | | | | | In a story published shortly after her death from lung cancer, Stat’s Sharon Begley investigates the growing share of lung cancer diagnoses in patients who have never smoked. National Cancer Institute Director Ned Sharpless is one of the few top Trump-era health officials who has remained in his role through the Biden administration’s early days, Bloomberg Law’s Jeannie Baumann reports. In an extensive interview with New York Times columnist Ezra Klein, Biden's Surgeon General nominee, Vivek Murthy walks through the challenges of the pandemic response and criticizes the FDA for being overly conservative toward at-home tests. | | | | Follow us on Twitter | | | | Follow us | | | | |  |
