Chiropractic Breakthrough

A single senator — Christopher Bond, Republican of Missouri — is blocking a bill that would ensure a reliable supply of medical isotopes while reducing the risk of nuclear terrorism. There are no reactors in this country that make the isotope, so supplies have to be imported, primarily from aging reactors in Canada and Europe. The Senate leadership needs to pry it loose.

Faced with the need to review insurance rates and enforce a panoply of new rights granted to consumers, states are scrambling to make sure they have the necessary legal authority to carry out the responsibilities being placed on them by the new health care law. Insurance commissioners in about half the states say they do not have clear authority to enforce consumer protection standards that take effect next month.

Doctors at three health centers in Massachusetts have begun advising patients to eat “prescription produce” from local farmers’ markets, in an effort to fight obesity in children of low-income families. Now they will give coupons amounting to $1 a day for each member of a patient’s family to promote healthy meals.

The most anticipated health care event of the week is a vote in the House of Representatives on a bill to send aid to states to prevent cuts to Medicaid and teacher layoffs. The Senate approved the $26b measure last Thursday. Now House members are returning briefly to Washington from their August breaks to vote on the bill, which includes $16 b for Medicaid.

The Obama administration is investigating pay practices throughout the health care industry after finding that many hospitals and nursing homes do not pay proper overtime to nurses and other employees who work more than 40 hours a week. Hospitals around the country have paid millions of dollars in back wages to settle claims by the government and their employees.

The Senate on Thursday approved a long-awaited child nutrition act that intends to feed more hungry kids and make school food more nutritious, and it provides for $4.5 billion over the next decade to make that happen. Called the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act, it passed the Senate unanimously and now moves on to the House, where passage is also expected.

Americans are continuing to get fatter and fatter, with obesity rates reaching 30% or more in nine states last year, as opposed to only three states in 2007, health officials reported on Tuesday. The increases mean that 2.4 million more people became obese from 2007 to 2009, bringing the total to 72.5 million, or 26.7% of the population.

A federal judge has refused to block a challenge to the Obama administration’s health care law brought by the Commonwealth of Virginia. Virginia is arguing that Congress, in passing a measure that requires people to buy insurance or face a penalty, exceeded its limits under the Constitution’s Commerce Clause and tax powers.

The federal Health and Human Services agency is celebrating the 45th anniversary of Medicare with a host of features, including a television advertisement featuring none other than Andy Griffith. Mr. Griffith promises that better protections for Medicare beneficiaries are coming, under the new health care law.