More than 1,600 people across five states have been infected with Cyclospora linked to shredded iceberg lettuce served at Taco Bell locations, prompting a multistate food safety investigation. CDC reports 1,644 lab-confirmed illnesses and 94 hospitalizations in Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio, and West Virginia, with no deaths reported. The outbreak has been traced to a single lettuce suppl…

The Public Health Communication Collaborative (PHCC) is offering new Spanish-language resources to help public health professionals share trusted information with their communities.   The newly translated materials cover topics including measles, the Dietary Guidelines for Americans, and healthy summer habits, which have been among PHCC’s most viewed resources this season. Available as p…

Smoking cessation support may become more accessible if proposed Medicare payment changes encourage more clinicians to provide evidence-based tobacco counseling during patient visits. The proposed physician fee schedule would increase reimbursement for tobacco cessation counseling by 19%, alongside similar services for alcohol and substance misuse interventions. Most people who attempt to qui…

Join NPHIC and CDC for our next CDC/NPHIC Monthly Communication Call on Wednesday, July 29, from 2:00–3:00 p.m. ET, featuring practical guidance on website and digital accessibility for public health communicators. The session will cover evolving federal accessibility requirements and implementation timelines, along with strategies for creating accessible web pages, PDFs, graphics, videos, an…

Health care affordability continues to shape public concern as rising costs affect coverage, access, and household finances across the U.S. KFF’s new three-part video series examines key drivers of health care spending, highlighting that the nation spends more on health care than other large, wealthy countries while costs continue to increase. The series explores the full cost of employer-spo…

Cancer cases are projected to rise from 20.6 million annually to nearly 35 million by 2050, according to the World Health Organization (WHO) without stronger action, while persistent inequities continue to limit access to prevention, diagnosis, treatment and supportive care. Cancer currently causes nearly 10 million deaths each year, and five-year breast cancer survival reaches 87% in high-in…

Refusals of the routine vitamin K shot for newborns are increasing, raising concern about preventable cases of severe bleeding that can lead to brain injury or death.   Infants who do not receive the injection are 81 times more likely to develop late vitamin K deficiency bleeding, and the CDC reports that one in five affected babies dies; refusal rates also surpassed 5% of U.S. births in…

COVID-19 vaccine injury compensation policies may change under a proposed federal rule that would establish a list of injuries presumed to be caused by covered COVID-19 countermeasures, allowing eligible individuals to receive compensation without proving causation. The proposal, expected to be published in November, would apply only to injuries supported by “compelling, reliable, valid, medi…

Uncertainty about common vaccine myths remains widespread despite relatively few U.S. adults fully believing false claims, highlighting continued vulnerability to health misinformation. KFF found that at least half of adults classified each false claim as "probably true" or "probably false," while fewer than one in ten expressed firm belief in any individual myth. Belief in misinformation was…