Health

The South Dakota House of Representatives chamber at the Capitol in Pierre. (Joshua Haiar/South Dakota Searchlight)

Legislature will tackle county funding and long term care in summer studies

BY: - March 27, 2023

The 2023 legislative session ended Monday, but legislators are already preparing and researching issues ahead of the 2024 session. The Legislature will conduct two summer studies this year focusing on long term care sustainability as well as county funding and mandated services, the Executive Board decided Monday. The summer studies allow legislators to learn about […]

(South Dakota Searchlight/Datawrapper)

Whiteclay area substance abuse center closes, leaving few alternatives

BY: - March 27, 2023

LINCOLN, Neb. – The only inpatient substance-abuse treatment center serving the Whiteclay, Nebraska, area has closed, making help for Native Americans battling alcohol or drug problems even less accessible. The Northeast Panhandle Substance Abuse Treatment Center (NEPSAC) in Gordon, 37 miles from Whiteclay, closed Jan. 31. The center, which had operated since the 1990s, was […]

COMMENTARY
Gov. Kristi Noem speaks at a January 2022 event in the state Capitol at Pierre. (Twitter/Governor Kristi Noem)

A state that’s ‘pro-birth’ should also be truly ‘pro-life’

BY: - March 26, 2023

No matter where you fit on the political spectrum, the news on June 24, 2022, was staggering: The Supreme Court had overturned Roe v. Wade, the landmark decision that guaranteed women the right to an abortion. Polls indicate that two-thirds of the country saw this as a crippling blow to the rights of women. For […]

Dave Lacknauth, director of Pharmacy Services, Broward Health Medical Center, shows a bottle of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine during a press conference on Dec. 23, 2020, in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. (Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

Moderna plan to hike COVID vaccine price to $130 a dose rebuked at U.S. Senate hearing

BY: - March 22, 2023

WASHINGTON — The CEO of Moderna on Wednesday defended the company’s decision to drastically increase the price of its COVID-19 vaccine later this year, arguing that an expected drop in demand, changes to its distribution process and the overall benefit of the vaccine warrant the higher cost.  That decision was met with bipartisan condemnation from […]

Abortion rights activist Rachel Bailey, center, chants during an International Women's Day abortion rights demonstration at the Texas State Capitol on March 8, 2023, in Austin, Texas. (Photo by Brandon Bell/Getty Images)

What plaintiffs targeting abortion pill want might not even be possible

BY: - March 21, 2023

At the center of the federal anti-abortion lawsuit against the U.S. Food and Drug Administration is the abortion drug mifepristone and the regimen that reportedly accounts for the majority of abortions in post-Roe America. That’s why the whole country is bracing itself for a ruling from a notoriously anti-abortion judge in Amarillo, Texas.  The attention […]

President Joe Biden delivers remarks in the East Room of the White House on Feb. 24, 2022, in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

Biden signs bill declassifying information on the origin of COVID-19

BY: - March 20, 2023

WASHINGTON — The U.S. director of national intelligence has three months to declassify information on potential links between China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology and the origin of COVID-19, after President Joe Biden signed legislation Monday. The bill was one of the first Biden has signed since a 118th Congress split between the two parties began […]

Doctor Rebecca Gomperts addresses supporters as the abortion rights campaign group ROSA, Reproductive Rights Against Oppression, Sexism and Austerity, holds a rally at Guildhall square on May 31, 2018, in Londonderry, Northern Ireland. (Photo by Charles McQuillan/Getty Images)

Ending a pregnancy in 14 states leaves few options. Some are looking to Europe and India for help.

BY: - March 20, 2023

The pills came in a dark salmon-colored envelope sealed with a plastic covering that traveled more than 7,000 miles, over a dozen time zones from Nagpur, India, in almost exactly one week. They were placed partially under the doormat of a home in a state with one of the most restrictive abortion bans in the […]

Close-up of someone holding naloxone nasal spray. (Courtesy of NIH/NIDA)

‘Why wait?’ SD businesses can purchase opioid overdose medication under new law

BY: - March 20, 2023

Bystanders who witness an opioid overdose in a public space, restaurant or workplace only have one option under existing state law: call 911 and wait for help to arrive. But waiting puts lives at risk, said Rep. Brian Mulder, R-Sioux Falls. Under current law, medications used to treat opioid overdoses in emergency situations — such […]

(Darwin Brandis/iStock Getty Images Plus)

As opioids overdose deaths keep rising, report urges lawmakers to develop new approaches

BY: - March 16, 2023

WASHINGTON — Lawmakers should view America’s staggering opioid crisis, including the rise of illicit fentanyl, through an “ecosystems” approach, argues a massive RAND Corporation report published Thursday. That means they should examine the gaps and interconnections among emergency response, data collection, education, treatment, housing and law enforcement, the report advises. The 600-page volume — which […]

Contractors conduct groundwater sampling in March 2022 as part of an effort to provide alternative water supplies for areas affected by PFAS contamination near Ellsworth Air Force Base. (U.S. Air Force Civil Engineer Center)

Pentagon to halt use of firefighting foam that contains PFAS as cleanup costs mount

BY: and - March 16, 2023

WASHINGTON — Battered by years of criticism from U.S. lawmakers and environmental advocates, the Department of Defense will stop purchasing PFAS-containing firefighting foam later this year and phase it out entirely in 2024.  The replacement for Aqueous Film Forming Foam has yet to be determined, and advocates are frustrated it’s taken so long to halt […]

Atlantic Council Senior Fellow Dr. Jamie Metzl, left, testifies before the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic with former New York Times editor and author Nicholas Wade, Dr. Paul Auwaerter of Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and Dr. Robert Redfield, former director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention under former President Donald Trump, in the Rayburn House Office Building on Capitol Hill on March 8, 2023, in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

Congress unanimously votes to require declassified information on COVID-19 origins

BY: - March 10, 2023

WASHINGTON — The divided 118th Congress approved its first bill Friday, after lawmakers in both the House and Senate voted unanimously to send President Joe Biden legislation that would require declassification of intelligence on the origins of COVID-19. The four-page bill, which the House voted 419-0 to clear, would require the Director of National Intelligence […]

The U.S. Capitol building is seen on Oct. 22, 2021, in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

National ban on transgender athletes in girls’ sports passed by U.S. House panel

BY: - March 9, 2023

WASHINGTON – The U.S. House Education and Workforce Committee early Thursday passed a bill on a party-line vote that would block transgender girls from competing in school sports consistent with their gender identity, a reflection of a broader push in multiple states to curb the rights of transgender student athletes. The bill, H.R. 734, introduced […]