U.S. President Donald Trump attends a House Republican members conference meeting in Trump National Doral resort, in Miami, Florida, U.S. Jan. 27, 2025.Â
Elizabeth Frantz | Reuters
A version of this text first appeared in CNBC’s Healthy Returns newsletter, which brings the newest health-care news straight to your inbox. Subscribe here to receive future editions.
President Donald Trump kicked off the primary week of his second term with sweeping changes to U.S. health care and federal health agencies.Â
Listed below are just a few of the largest changes we saw last week:
U.S. exit from the WHO
Trump signed an executive order to begin to withdraw the U.S. from the World Health Organization, citing what he described as a “mishandling” of the Covid-19 pandemic and other international health crises. In 2021, the Biden administration halted Trump’s first formal attempt at a U.S. exit from the WHO.Â
The implications for the U.S. might be significant: the WHO serves as a primary alert system when a latest disease outbreak occurs, which helps member countries quickly obtain the essential information to assist their residents. The U.S. can also be expected to lose access to the WHO’s global network that sets the flu vaccine’s composition every year. However the WHO will feel the consequences of Trump’s decision much more, because the U.S. is its largest donor and offers extensive technical expertise to the agency.Â
On Saturday, nevertheless, Trump said he may reconsider joining the WHO.Â
“Possibly we might consider doing it again, I do not know. Possibly we might. They’d should clean it up,” Trump said at a rally in Las Vegas, based on several outlets.Â
Anti-abortion policies reinstated
Trump on Friday issued an executive order that reinstated a long-standing Republican anti-abortion proposal often called the “Mexico City Policy,” which bars federal fundi
ng from going to any overseas nongovernmental organization that performs or promotes abortions.
The rule was first put in place by President Ronald Reagan and has been rescinded by every Democratic president — and reimplemented by every Republican one — since then.
Also on Friday, Trump revoked two Biden administration executive orders that sought to expand access to abortions within the U.S.
HHS stop all communicationsÂ
The Trump administration told federal health agencies to pause external communications for now, several outlets reported last week. This includes the agencies that fall under the Department of Health and Human Services, akin to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Food and Drug Administration and the National Institutes of Health.
A memo sent to leadership at federal health agencies noted the communication hiatus will extend through Feb. 1, ABC News reported, citing an internal CDC audio recording.Â
Resources from the department, akin to the CDC’s decades-old weekly public health publication, have been placed on hold.Â
Some staffers at health agencies are also temporarily banned from traveling and have been told to stop work with the WHO, ABC reported.Â
Drug pricing models rescindedÂ
Trump rescinded an executive order from the Biden administration that created three drug pricing models geared toward lowering the price of prescribed drugs for people on Medicare and Medicaid.Â
The Biden administration announced the proposals in February 2023, but that they had not been implemented. They included a $2 monthly out-of-pocket cap on certain generic drugs and lower costs for cell and gene therapies.Â
Biden’s major health-care initiatives under the Inflation Reduction Act, including the $2,000 annual out-of-pocket cap on prescribed drugs and the Medicare drug price negotiation program, weren’t affected by Trump’s executive actions.
DEI, discrimination protections scrapped
Trump issued an executive order on his first day to finish all federal government initiatives related to diversity, equity and inclusion. He also moved to finish a spread of policies that aimed to guard rights for LGBTQ+ people.
Trump specifically signed an executive order proclaiming that the U.S. government will recognize only two sexes, female and male. It essentially attempts to finish legal recognition of transgender and nonbinary people under federal law.
It requires that the federal government use the term “sex” as a substitute of “gender,” and directs the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security to “require that government-issued identification documents, including passports, visas, and Global Entry cards, accurately reflect the holder’s sex.”
In a statement, the American Civil Liberties Union said the gender order requires federal agencies to “discriminate against transgender people by denying who they’re and threatening the liberty of self-determination and self-expression for all.”Â
Be happy to send any suggestions, suggestions, story ideas and data to Annika at annikakim.constantino@nbcuni.com.
Latest in health-care tech: Change Healthcare cyberattack affected greater than half of the U.S. population
UnitedHealth Group said the cyberattack on its subsidiary Change Healthcare affected around 190 million Americans, nearly double the previous estimate released by federal regulators in October.Â
The figure cements the Change Healthcare leak as the biggest reported health-care data breach in U.S. history, and there is not a detailed second. The previous record was set by Anthem in 2015 when hackers compromised data from 78.8 million patients.Â
UnitedHealth said the “overwhelming majority” of affected individuals have been notified. An official final number will probably be submitted to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office for Civil Rights “at a later date.”
“Change Healthcare isn’t aware of any misuse of people’ information because of this of this incident and has not seen electronic medical record databases appear in the info through the evaluation,” the corporate said in an announcement to CNBC.
In February, a ransomware group called Blackcat breached a part of Change Healthcare’s information technology network. Change Healthcare offers revenue cycle management tools and other services for medical providers and payers, and it processes billions of transactions every 12 months.Â
UnitedHealth disconnected the compromised systems when it detected the cyberattack, and the disruption caused serious fallout across the U.S. health-care sector. Many doctors were temporarily left with no solution to fill prescriptions or receives a commission for his or her services, and a few providers took 1000’s of dollars out of savings to maintain their doors open.Â
In a congressional hearing in regards to the breach in May, UnitedHealth CEO Andrew Witty estimated that around one-third of Americans might have been compromised– a guess that has now proved to be too low. Witty also confirmed that UnitedHealth paid a ransom of $22 million to the cybercriminals within the months following the attack.
The updated breach total likely won’t help UnitedHealth foster much goodwill with the American public, which unleashed a barrage of shock toward the corporate following the fatal shooting of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in December.Â
UnitedHealth announced last week that Tim Noel, an organization veteran, will function the brand new head of the insurance arm.
Be happy to send any suggestions, suggestions, story ideas and data to Ashley at ashley.capoot@nbcuni.com.
The health care sector is outperforming in 2025
Food-as-medicine programs are hoping the Trump administration focuses on nutrition
While Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s nomination to be secretary of Health and Human Services faces opposition over his stance on vaccines, his approach to food and nutrition is fueling cautious optimism amongst startups focused on nutrition counseling for patients in government plans. Nutrition counseling has begun to realize traction in Medicaid programs to assist combat obesity and diabetes through weight loss program reasonably than costly GLP-1 drugs. If he’s confirmed, Kennedy could give the programs a lift.Â
Be happy to send any suggestions, suggestions, story ideas and data to Bertha at bertha.coombs@nbcuni.com.