KFF Health News

There's a new bulletin from Florida's surgeon general. Vaccine experts and historians interviewed for this article can’t remember another state health leader urging residents to avoid an FDA-approved vaccine.

Johns Dental Laboratories stopped making the appliance last year after a KFF Health News-CBS News investigation into allegations of patient harm. The company had “never” reported any complaints about its products to the FDA, according to the agency.

Commissioner Martin O’Malley testifies to two Senate panels that his agency will stop the “injustices” of suspending people’s monthly benefits to recover alleged overpayments.

Kilolo Kijakazi sent the letter days after KFF Health News and Cox Media Group reported the agency has been demanding money back from more than twice as many people as she’d disclosed in October.

Sen. Ron Wyden, chair of the Senate Finance Committee, vowed to meet monthly with Social Security officials until the problems surrounding overpayment demands are fixed.

The FDA and the manufacturer were alerted to Profemur titanium hips breaking inside patients as of 2005. It took 15 years to recall the devices. Many fractures could have been avoided.

More than 2 million people a year have been sent notices that Social Security overpaid them and demanding they repay the money. That’s twice as many as the head of Social Security disclosed at a hearing in October.

Roughly 8 million people 65 and older have dementia or need help with two or more activities of basic daily life, like getting out of bed. Facing a severe shortage of aides and high costs, caregivers often cobble together a patchwork of relatives and friends to help.

Lawmakers are asking what Social Security will do about its demands on their constituents to repay money distributed — and sometimes in error. Florida Sen. Rick Scott called the actions “unacceptable.”

The governors square off in a first-of-its-kind debate Thursday. Let's compare the political rivals’ health care positions, showing how their policies helped — or hinder— the health of their states’ residents.