Want to stay up to date on the science and politics driving biotech today? Sign up to receive our biotech newsletter in your inbox.
good morning. I’ll admit I didn’t finish rereading The Odyssey before seeing the movie last weekend, but it’s never too late. For now, scroll down to read related First Opinion essays and sign up for office hours with Bob Herman, STAT’s own Homeric chronicler of the business of medicine.
AHRQ-supported researchers have their funding cut off
Last week, dozens of researchers supported by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality received letters confirming what they had already suspected, but in many cases had already endured. They will no longer receive installments of ongoing research grants.
“This is the culmination of a slow disaster that has been building for over a year,” health economist Eric Roberts, who received the “no award” letter, told STAT’s Anil Oza. Many researchers have waited months for new funding and struggled to get explanations from government agencies about delays. Read Anil’s article to find out how much money we’re talking about and how the agency justified this move.
When you hate your job but love your health insurance
New survey data from Gallup reveals that nearly a quarter of all U.S. workers are in a job they would quit because they don’t want to give up the health benefits. This is up from 16% in 2021, the last time the group measured the phenomenon, fascinatingly known as “job lock.”
STAT’s Bob Herman has more on the findings. This data supports key points from his ongoing series, Out of Pocket, Out of Reach, that the costs of employer-based health insurance are crushing workers and businesses.
If you have questions or concerns about this pressing issue, you’re in luck. Bob will be hosting a virtual office hours event today at 1pm ET. Sign up here to talk to one of the brightest reporters on the planet about this complex and frustrating issue.
What does Odysseus’ testosterone test reveal?
As a urologist, Elizabeth Dray knows the value of testosterone replacement therapy, especially for people with clinically low levels of sex hormones. It can improve sexual function, strengthen bone density, treat anemia, and increase lean body mass. But when Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth announced that military personnel would undergo regular testosterone testing, he believed a myth that was not based in truth, Dray argued in a new First Opinion essay. Hormone therapy does not turn modern humans into legendary war heroes like the Odyssey.
“Both these men, the classical heroes and the optimized modern soldiers, are fantasies,” Dray writes. “But I fear that Hegseth’s vision is creating tragedy.” Read Dray’s insightful essay on what lessons from one of the oldest stories in existence can be applied to the supposed crisis of masculinity.
New rural health model in wake of Maui wildfires
Three years ago, the deadliest wildfire in U.S. history ripped through the Hawaiian island of Maui, killing more than 100 people and burning thousands of acres, including more than 2,000 buildings. Now, researchers hope to learn from this tragedy by conducting the largest study of the long-term health effects of exposure to wild and urban fires.
As STAT’s Angus Chen reports, the study includes monthly screenings of participants, making it one of the few reliable sources of information on community health recovery. “This program saved my life,” said Amy Jackson, who was nearly trapped in a fire while delivering food for Uber Eats. It wasn’t until she joined the study that clinicians identified life-threatening test results that she believed were directly related to the trauma.
While this is an encouraging example of how research can also provide services to local communities, this effort is not without its obstacles. The state’s health director has publicly downplayed the potential health effects of wildfires and privately criticized the study’s methodology and conclusions. Read the story.
4.5 million
That’s the same number of people nationwide who lost their enrollment in SNAP, the federal nutrition program, between the passage of President Trump’s One Big Beautiful Act last July and April 2026, according to an analysis by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. This includes approximately 1.5 million children per group.
The analysis concluded that, based on national and state unemployment rates, it was “very unlikely” that the decline in unemployment was caused by a decline in demand. Meanwhile, the Department of Agriculture, which runs the program, is focusing on what it classifies as fraud and “significant waste” within the program.
“Cochlear implant for vision”
European regulators have approved commercial sale of a retinal implant that improves vision in patients with age-related macular degeneration, the most common cause of vision loss in older people. Science Corporation, which makes the device, says it improves vision and allows people to read books and road signs more clearly.
STAT’s O. Rose Broderick has more details about the device and when it will be available to people in the United States.
what we are reading
-
Trump’s CDC detains Americans over Ebola response: ‘abuse’ of power, Rolling Stone
-
Why infectious diseases create anger among health care workers, The New York Times
- I’m a cardiologist. We don’t know if new cholesterol drug ensitide will be a game-changer, STAT
- The Deloitte-run system denied Medicaid benefits to disabled people in Michigan. President Trump’s law still stands, KFF Health News
- Advocates say federal funding from groups fighting HIV and STATs is being cut.
