Americans can again order four free at-home COVID tests from the federal government

(NEW YORK) — The U.S. surgeon general is calling for a “fundamental shift” in how the mental health and well-being of parents is supported and prioritized.

In a health advisory released Wednesday, Dr. Vivek Murthy, himself a father of two, said parents and caregivers are struggling amid a youth mental health crisis, financial difficulties, social media issues and more.

“Parents typically don’t talk about this all the time,” Murthy said in an interview that aired Wednesday on ABC News’ Good Morning America. “They tend to focus on their kids’ health and well-being, but there’s also this sense of shame and guilt, sometimes around struggling as a parent.”

Citing statistics that show parents are consistently more likely to report high levels of stress than other adults, Murthy wrote in the advisory there needs to be a culture shift and an all-hands-on-deck approach to supporting parents from employers, government agencies, health care providers and local communities.

According to the advisory, 48% of parents say most days, their stress is completely overwhelming, compared to 26% of other adults without kids.

“Supporting parents and caregivers will require a series of thoughtful policy changes and expanded community programs that will help ensure parents and caregivers can get time off to be with a sick child, secure affordable child care, access reliable mental health care, and benefit from places and initiatives that support social connection and community,” Murthy wrote. “It will also require us to rethink cultural norms around parenting.”

He continued, “Part of that will involve shifting how we value parenting. The work of raising a child is work, no less valuable than the work performed in a paid job and of extraordinary value when it comes to the impact on the future of society.”

According to the advisory, more than 60 million parents in the U.S. live with children under the age of 18.

The U.S. is currently one of seven countries globally that does not have any guaranteed form of universal paid leave, according to a petition to pass paid leave on a federal level in the U.S. that was delivered to all members of Congress in July.

Data released by the U.S. Census Bureau earlier this year found that, on average, families pay between 8% to 19% of their income per child on child care.

Kaitlyn Niles, a 34-year-old working mom of two, told GMA that she feels the pressure to balance her career and family and to meet the often unattainable standard of parenting set by society.

“There’s so much pressure on parents to spend all of this quality time with your kids, like sit on the ground and play pretend with your 4-year-old, you know,” Niles said. “And when you think about it logically, it’s like, there’s no way my mom was able to do that with six kids.”

Meanwhile, Eric Martinez, a father of two from Colorado, said he has had to learn new strategies in limiting his kids’ access to technology and social media.

“Navigating those conversations can be challenging because it’s new. It’s new for all of us,” he told GMA. “You know, we didn’t share this experience growing up. We didn’t have access to this technology when we were 7, 8, 9, 10 years old, so we’re kind of figuring this out as we go along.”

Murthy stated in this week’s advisory that the stressors parents are experiencing have made them vulnerable to the nationwide epidemic of loneliness and isolation.

“It also turns out that parents are struggling with loneliness at a much higher level than other adults, particularly single parents,” Murthy said, speaking with GMA.

In his advisory, Murthy noted that parents and caregivers should remember that it’s OK to set healthy boundaries and take time for themselves, which in turn will make them better supports for their family.

In addition, parents and caregivers are encouraged to “nurture connections” with other parents and caregivers and to seek professional mental health support when needed.

If you or someone you know are experiencing suicidal, substance use or other mental health crises, please call or text 988. You will reach a trained crisis counselor for free, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. You can also go to 988lifeline.org.

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(WASHINGTON) When Congress passed the Inflation Reduction Act in 2022, there was a key provision that the Biden administration fought hard for. For years, private insurance companies negotiated with drug makers over prescription prices.

However, Medicare, representing 50 million seniors, did not have the same right to negotiate prices for its Part D coverage. This meant that Medicare basically had to accept the prices offered to them.

Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra joined “Start Here,” ABC News’ flagship daily news podcast, earlier this year to announce that negotiations were starting. They had selected 10 medications to prioritize and attempt to bargain down prices.

On Thursday, during the first public event held by President Biden and Vice President Harris since the Biden dropped out of the presidential race, they revealed that they had agreed on all issues. This is being described as a significant development for anyone on Medicare, and for anyone who pays taxes to fund the expenses of Medicare.

Secretary Becerra joined “Start Here” on Friday to discuss this further.

START HERE: Mr. Secretary, last time we spoke you had just identified the drugs…they included some diabetes drugs, some arthritis medications, treatments for blood clots and blood cancer. Where are we now?

BECERRA: We are done with the negotiation, Brad. We have completed 10 drugs. Every company joined in the negotiations. We had offers, counter offers, and we hit a sweet spot with all ten. And that sweet spot will save Americans on Medicare who need these drugs lots of money. And it will save taxpayers who help fund the Medicare program lots of money, in the billions.

START HERE: Yeah. How much of a discount are we talking about here?

BECERRA: So in some cases, the discount from the list price is up to 79%. I think the lowest discount is about 38%. And I do want to caveat that a bit. Very rarely does anybody pay list price for anything. And if you do, take it back and bargain a bit. Whether it’s that car at the dealership where you look at list price, you don’t pay that. When you go to the department store, you try to find everything you can on sale or, you know at some point it’s going to go on sale.

And so everybody makes the effort to try to get the best price for whatever the product is. In this case, it’s a very important product, it’s your prescription medication. But you should still be able to get a good price, and that’s what we did. We negotiated and got a much better price than what Medicare was getting.

START HERE: But just so we can we can be clear about that caveat. You’re saying it’s 68%, say it’s like 79% less than the list price. But you guys weren’t paying the list price earlier. Can you tell us how much you were paying on these drugs beforehand, and how much the new discount you’ve gotten is?

BECERRA:  Yeah. And that’s where it gets a little dicey because there are lots of nooks and crannies in the health care system. Some of them include what are, what is considered proprietary information of the companies, the drug companies, that they don’t want disclosed. And so the net price that Medicare pays is lower than the list price, but still high.

START HERE: So there’s some contract somewhere being like “You guys, no one can disclose what you guys had originally been paying.”

BECERRA: Yeah. We can’t, we can’t take you behind the curtain unless the drug companies tell us it’s okay to do so.

START HERE: Were you able to actually push back against these drug companies, or was it kind of like “We’ll ask once and then we’ll have to take what we get. We’re not going to risk not giving Americans these, these drugs.”

BECERRA:  Well, let’s just say that when they came in with their offer or counteroffer, the final price was neither our initial offer nor their official offer. But here’s what I will tell you. The Congressional Budget Office, which is Congress’ budget estimator, they’re the ones that keep tabs of what legislation will cost — will it save money or will it cost taxpayers money? And they are very stingy when it comes to saying “Oh, taxpayers will save money.” Right?

Well, the Congressional Budget Office said with regard to the Inflation Reduction Act and prescription drug negotiation, they said, we believe in the first year of negotiation — which we just finished — in that first year, and they’re projecting because they didn’t know which drugs it would be, etc.. They said, we believe the Department of Health Human Services will save $3.7 billion. Well, we’ve saved $6 billion.

And on top of that, we’re saving people out of pocket another billion and a half. But here’s the kicker. They said over 10 years, they assume that this new law, over 10 years of negotiating, will save $100 billion. So if we’re already almost double their first estimate for their first year, I guarantee you we’re going to do better than the 100 billion, over 10 years.

START HERE: Okay. When do the new prices go into effect, then I guess?

BECERRA: Jan. 1, 2026.

START HERE: Okay, so when that kicks in, how much of a discount will average Medicare patients actually see? Because, like, if you guys scored a 68% discount on Farxiga, like the diabetes kidney medication, does that mean that the person using that drug is going to pay, it doesn’t mean they’re going to pay 68% less. I mean, how much less would it be?

BECERRA: Yeah. So remember, and that’s also a difficult question because seniors don’t typically pay very much for their prescription medication. Medicare the program, that’s the beauty of Medicare, it covers the lion’s share of the cost of those drugs. Some Americans still have to pay some out-of-pocket costs for their drugs, especially the higher cost drugs. So we’re going to save folks quite a bit of money.

Let’s put it this way: I can talk to you in total aggregate terms. We can now look at the price that we negotiated and say “Okay, if we had this price back in 2023, what would our cost have been?” And the result is we would have saved $6 billion to the health care program, and Americans will be able to save about a billion and a half dollars collectively in their out-of-pocket costs.

START HERE: The trade group that represents companies like Pfizer, Lilly, Merck, they’ve said we might not see as much innovation because we’re not getting as much money. That’s, that’s constantly been sort of a critique of this. They also say that your math makes assumptions about how many people truly save money on this. They say a very small amount of people actually get this Part D plan in the way that would actually save the money here. What is your response to to to these pharmaceutical groups?

BECERRA:  Well, remember, they’re more than 50 million Americans who have prescription coverage under Medicare, the Part D program. There are about 9 million people in the Medicare program who use one of these 10 drugs. It’s not a small universe of people. And these are very expensive drugs. When you can bring the price down of a drug that’s listed for, say, $10,000, $12,000 to $3,000. That’s a pretty good deal. It’s still $3,000, but it sure saved you a ton of money. If you were paid $12,000 or 13,000 before that.

And so this will save not just the Medicare program money, but it will save Medicare beneficiaries money. And it certainly will pay taxpayers who today, when they work, have some of their money from their paycheck taken out so they could cover their Medicare investment into the future so that when they get turned 65, they can qualify. They will get to benefit from a strengthened Medicare program that will have those new resources available, because we didn’t have to spend it at, for overcharging us for the prescription medication.

START HERE: Well, so now, I mean, the idea is that you’ll negotiate more drug prices, right? So you got these 10 out of the way. What are the next 10 or the next 20, or do you guys have a sense of what types of drugs you’re looking to target?

BECERRA:  Yeah. And here I have to be careful, because everything we say about a drug can move the price on the market. Right? And I don’t want to be accused of trying to influence the price up or down. And so what I can tell you is the statute, the new law, the Inflation Reduction Act, gave a pretty clear prescription of how to select these, set of drugs that will be negotiated. That’s a, it’s a good thing in the way, in a sense that it doesn’t let politics enter into this. It was pretty clear which drugs count. In this case, the first 10, they had to be the most expensive drugs in the Medicare system.

START HERE: All right. So then we’ll see what happens next. All right. Secretary Xavier Becerra, thank you so much.

BECERRA: Brad, good to be with you.

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(NEW YORK) — The catalyst for drinking less, or not at all, is unique for each individual but can range from physical health reasons to mental clarity. But whatever the motivation, the ‘sober curious’ movement is becoming more mainstream, especially among young adults.

The topic and trend was recently highlighted on the newest season of Emily in Paris, in which the title character explains that mostly Gen Z and millennials who adopt a wellness approach to their relationship with alcohol, though perhaps not fully sober, have started to explore not drinking.

“You might not be 100% sober, but you are interested in drinking less,” Hilary Sheinbaum, author of the Going Dry workbook and guide to drinking less, told Good Morning America.

A study published by the Journal of the American Medical Association in 2020 found that alcohol abstinence is becoming increasingly common among Gen Z, with 28% of college students reporting in 2018 that they did not drink alcohol, compared to 20% of respondents in 2002.

Alcohol-free alternatives have become even more accessible in recent years, as GMA first reported in 2022 as we emerged from the pandemic and the market was booming with new options, from nonalcoholic spiritless retail shops to more accommodating high-quality booze-free options outside of the traditional sugary mocktails.

“There are nonalcoholic beers, wines, and [non-alcoholic] spirits on restaurant and bar menus, even at hotels and resorts, and now in airplanes and even airline lounges. They are everywhere,” Sheinbaum said.

One Dallas-based content creator, Avon Nguyen, told GMA that cutting back on alcohol has also helped her financially.

“If I’m going to choose between drinking a $22 drink or paying rent, I’m probably gonna pay rent,” she explained.

Fitness influencer Kendall Toole, a former Peloton instructor turned podcast host, told GMA she’s seen positive improvements in her physical and mental health since she departed from drinking.

“The most notable shifts that I’ve seen on my health were one, the ability to get deep, restful sleep – [and two], my anxiety was not as profound and as adamant as it was previous.”

Unlike celebrities or athletes bottling tequilas, whiskey or other booze, Toole – who’s been open about her passion for wellness and mental health – opted to plant her flag in a clean energy and protein beverage, Don’t Quit, that better reflects her own journey and values.

For others looking to switch up what they sip and start dipping their toe into the sober curious journey, Sheinbaum emphasized how easy it is to do at home.

“One household item that is easy to mix with for a mocktail is orange juice,” she said. “You can make non-alcoholic mimosas with orange juice and non-alcoholic sparkling wine. It’s as easy as that.”

Check out these bartender-approved recipes to make more delicious, spirit-free sips for your next night in or sober soiree.

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