(WASHINGTON) — The Trump administration announced on Tuesday it is rescinding Biden-era guidance that uses a federal law to require hospitals to stabilize patients in need of emergency care — including by providing an abortion.
In July 2022, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) issued guidance that, under the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA), doctors must perform abortions in emergency departments — even in states where the procedure is illegal — particularly if it serves as a “stabilizing medical treatment” for an emergency medical condition.
Emergency medical conditions included, but were not limited to, “ectopic pregnancy, complications of pregnancy loss, or emergent hypertensive disorders, such as preeclampsia with severe features.”
EMTALA, which was passed in 1986, ensures that emergency patients receive services and treatment regardless of ability to pay. Hospitals that refuse to provide “necessary stabilizing care” or “an appropriate transfer” can face civil monetary penalties.
The HHS guidance was one of the attempts of the Biden administration to preserve abortion access after the U.S. Supreme Court overruled Roe v. Wade, ending federal protections for abortion rights.
However, HHS and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) rescinded the guidance, as well as an accompanying letter from former HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra, saying they “do not reflect the policy of this Administration.”
“CMS will continue to enforce EMTALA, which protects all individuals who present to a hospital emergency department seeking examination or treatment, including for identified emergency medical conditions that place the health of a pregnant woman or her unborn child in serious jeopardy,” a press release from the agency read.
“CMS will work to rectify any perceived legal confusion and instability created by the former administration’s actions,” the press release continued.
Abortion rights groups, such as the American Civil Liberties Union, criticized the administration and accused President Donald Trump of walking back on a campaign promise not to interfere with abortion access.
“By rescinding this guidance, the Trump administration has sent a clear signal that it is siding not with the majority, but with its anti-abortion allies — and that will come at the expense of women’s lives,” Alexa Kolbi-Molinas, deputy director of the ACLU’s Reproductive Freedom Project, said in a statement. “The ACLU will use every lever we have to keep President Trump and his administration from endangering our health and lives.”
The Biden administration’s guidance has faced legal challenges in the past. In January 2024, a federal appeals court ruled that Texas hospitals and doctors are not required to perform emergency abortions despite the guidance.
Meanwhile, earlier this year, the Department of Justice dismissed a lawsuit brought by the Biden administration against the state of Idaho, claiming its near-total abortion ban violated EMTALA.
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(NEW YORK) — Temperatures are beginning to warm up, indicating the arrival of spring — and of allergy season for millions of Americans.
Research shows that allergy seasons may be hitting people harder by starting earlier, lasting longer and creating more pollen.
Growing seasons — the time of year that conditions allow plants to grow — start earlier and last longer than they did 30 years ago, according to a report from the Allergy and Asthma Foundation of America.
Additionally, pollen concentrations have increased up to 21% across North America over the last three decades, data from the USA National Phenology Network shows.
Allergists told ABC News a mix of climate change and more carbon emissions has led to plants in many areas having longer growing seasons and higher pollen counts.
“Research has definitely shown that the seasons are indeed expanding,” Dr. William Reisacher, an otolaryngic allergist at Weill Cornell Medicine and New York-Presbyterian Hospital, told ABC News. “We’re seeing longer pollinating seasons. We’re seeing higher levels of pollen.”
What causes seasonal allergies?
Allergies occur when the immune system views food, medicine, plants or something else as a harmful substance and overreacts.
Some seasonal allergies, also known as allergic rhinitis or hay fever, occur due to pollen, which are tiny grains that are dispersed from certain flowering plants.
“Allergies are essentially your immune system overreacting to things that you’re exposed to in your environment,” Dr. Thanai Pongdee, a consultant allergist-immunologist at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, told ABC News. “So, for example, if you have hay fever and are allergic to tree pollen or grass pollen this time of year, when you breathe that pollen in, your immune system recognizes it and causes a cascade of events where various chemicals get released — one of the main ones being histamine, and these chemicals cause the symptoms that many experience.”
This leads to symptoms including runny nose, sneezing, congestion and itchy, watery eyes, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Reactions can range from mildly annoying symptoms to life-threatening reactions including anaphylactic shock, which can cause multiple organs to fail.
As of 2021, an estimated 25.7% of U.S. adults and 18.9% of U.S. children have seasonal allergies, according to the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics.
Why are allergy seasons getting longer?
Allergy season typically begins in the spring, around March, and typically ends in the fall, lasting as late as November.
“When we refer to seasonal allergic rhinitis, we are usually referring to allergic symptoms that occupy a certain time of the year,” Reisacher said.
“So, springtime, at least in the northeast, is typically when the trees are pollinating whereas in the summertime, we see the grass is pollinating, and then in the fall, it’s all about the weeds,” he continued. “Ragweed is the most common pollen present at that time of the year.”
However, research has suggested that allergy seasons are getting longer and worse.
“Allergy season is getting longer — in fact it is an average of 13 days longer compared with 20 years ago,” Dr. Purvi Parikh, an allergist and immunologist at NYU Langone Health, told ABC News.
A 2022 study from the University of Michigan found that, by the end of the century, pollen emissions could begin 40 days earlier in the spring than occurred between 1995 and 2014, meaning there could be an additional 19 days of high pollen counts.
Allergists say climate change is one of the biggest reasons why allergy seasons are getting longer.
A 2021 study found human-caused climate change is worsening North American pollen season, causing them to lengthen by 20 days on average between 1990 and 2018.
Reisacher said that as the globe experiences warmer temperatures each year, more storms are occurring, which kicks up more pollen.
“It travels for many more miles on the wind, and it makes it more allergenic, so it gets deeper into our body, into our lungs and even through the tissues that protect our body,” he said.
The warming planet also means that it’s taking longer to see the first frost, which usually occurs in the fall and hold pollen underground, he said. A longer time to get to the first frost means pollen has a longer time to stay in the air.
Reisacher said greenhouse gases are another reason for the longer allergy season. He said more carbon dioxide has been released into the air due to fossil fuels. Plants feed off carbon dioxide, and this has released more pollen into the air.
“There has been a direct correlation between the levels of [carbon dioxide] in the atmosphere and the amount of pollen that plants, including ragweed, are producing,” he said. “So, it’s hard to deny that that is a factor.”
Reisacher and Parikh say this means there will likely be more people who experience seasonal allergies over the next several years.
How to treat seasonal allergies Allergists said there are a number of over-the-counter medications that people can try as well as nasal sprays and rinses.
Some are tailored to relieve symptoms while others are used to prevent symptoms. Additionally, only certain medications work for certain symptoms.
“Start with 24-hour antihistamines. They last longer with fewer side effects,” Parikh said. “[You] can also add nasal steroid or antihistamine sprays as well as eye drops. However, if you aren’t improving, please see an allergist.”
Pongdee said allergy shots may be effective for those who are looking for long-term solutions and are not relief from daily medication.
Reisacher recommends starting medications a few weeks before allergy season starts because they need time to take effect.
He said there are also steps people can take to at home to prevent pollen from coming indoors including keeping windows closed in the early morning when pollination is higher, using air conditioner filters. separating indoor and outdoor clothing and showeing to get pollen off skin and out of hair.
“You want to create a safe haven, and that’s your bedroom,” Reisacher said. “You want to create a pollen-free environment in your bedroom so that at least you have seven or eight hours that your immune system can rest without having to react to pollen.”
(WASHINGTON) — Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is set to testify before two congressional committees on Wednesday to discuss, among many topics, the Trump administration’s proposed budget and its impact on HHS.
Kennedy will appear before the House Appropriations Committee Wednesday morning and the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee in the afternoon.
Last month, the HELP Committee called Kennedy to testify on the restructuring of the department.
In April, HHS began laying off about 10,000 workers and consolidating 28 institutes and centers into 15 new divisions.
Including the roughly 10,000 people who have left over the last few months through early retirement or deferred resignation programs, the overall staff at HHS is expected to fall from 82,000 to around 62,000 — or about a quarter of its workforce.
In a video statement posted on X prior to the layoffs, Kennedy said that he plans to bring to the agency a “clear sense of mission to radically improve the health of Americans and to improve agency morale.”
Kennedy has defended the cuts as necessary to weed out wasteful spending at one of America’s largest departments, but he has drawn criticism for laying off people who are responsible for regulating tobacco usage, monitoring lead exposure in children and diagnosing black lung disease in miners.
The secretary himself has appeared not to know about some of the cuts, telling CBS News last month he was “not familiar” with several cuts cited by the outlet.
Wednesday will mark the first time Kennedy has testified before Congress since his confirmation hearings in late January, and he may be forced to confront statements he made that critics say are evidence of promises broken.
Kennedy said several times during his hearing in January that he supports vaccines, although he refused to unequivocally say that vaccines don’t cause autism, despite numerous existing studies already showing there is no link.
“I support the measles vaccine. I support the polio vaccine. I will do nothing as HHS secretary that makes it difficult or discourages people from taking either of those vaccines,” Kennedy said.
However, in March, the HHS confirmed that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will study whether vaccines cause autism.
Additionally, in the wake of several ongoing measles outbreaks across the U.S. and over 1,000 cases so far this year, Kennedy has shared contradicting views about vaccines.
In a post on X on April 6, Kennedy said that the “most effective way to prevent the spread of measles” is to receive the measles, mumps, rubella (MMR) vaccine. However, in a post later that evening, he said more than 300 children have been treated with an antibiotic and a steroid, neither of which are recognized treatments or cures for measles.
Kennedy’s embrace of anti-vaccine ideas nearly put his confirmation in jeopardy, as he faced resistance from Louisiana Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy, a physician who heads the HELP committee. Cassidy expressed concerns about Kennedy’s views on vaccines before ultimately voting to move him through the confirmation process in February.
Cassidy said, at the time, that Kennedy assured him he would not alter vaccine policy without “ironclad” scientific evidence. The senator added that Kennedy and Trump officials promised him an “unprecedentedly close collaborate working relationship” with the secretary.
Currently, Cassidy does not believe Kennedy has violated the commitments he made to him, a person familiar with the senator’s thinking told ABC News.
The men speak multiple times per week and have maintained a productive relationship, three people with knowledge of their dynamic said.
An HHS spokesperson said Kennedy “maintains a professional and respectful relationship with Senator Cassidy, grounded in a shared commitment to public health and evidence-based policymaking.”
Cassidy plans to tell Kennedy on Wednesday that the secretary can “set the record straight” about how HHS will “maintain its critical duties and implement change important to Americans’ health,” according to an excerpt of Cassidy’s remarks, which were obtained by ABC News.
ABC News’ Cheyenne Haslett and Anne Flaherty contributed to this report.
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(NEW YORK) — The U.S. has recorded the highest number of measles cases since 2019, according to new Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data published Friday.
There are now 712 confirmed measles cases across 24 states, an increase of 105 cases from the prior week, the CDC said.
There were 1,274 reported cases in all of 2019.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
