How one state’s medical meal program lowered health care costs

NewsletterMorning Rounds How one state’s medical meal program lowered health care costs Medicaid work requirements, fast-tracked funding for experimental Ebola vaccines, and more health news from Morning Rounds Manage alerts for this article Email this article Share this article By Theresa GaffneyJune 2, 2026 Morning Rounds Writer and Reporter Theresa Gaffney[email protected]Theresa is the lead Morning Rounds writer, and her stories focus on gender-affirming care, reproductive health, and mental health. You can reach Theresa on Signal at theresagaff.97. Get your daily dose of health and medicine every weekday with STAT’s free newsletter Morning Rounds. Sign up here. Good morning. It’s officially Ice Cream Every Day Season. I hope you partake. Advertisement New rules for the Medicaid work requirements The Trump administration published a highly anticipated document yesterday laying out the rules for new Medicaid work requirements. The policy, created as part of President Trump’s tax bill last summer, requires adults who enrolled through the program’s expansion and those with lower incomes who are not also enrolled in Medicare to spend at least 80 hours per month either working, doing community service, or, at least half the time, engaging in education. There are a variety of exemptions, including people who are “medically frail,” but questions remain about which medical conditions might put people into that category. States will rush to understand all the rules by the time they go into effect at the start of 2027. Read more on the details from STAT’s John Wilkerson and Tara Bannow. 1 in 5 That’s the number of adolescents aged 12 to 21 who reported going to an AI chatbot for mental health advice, according to a RAND survey of more than 1,000 young people published yesterday in JAMA Pediatrics. The survey, conducted in November 2025, showed an increase from the 13% who reported AI use in a similar RAND study from earlier in the year.Advertisement Among those who used AI, nearly 43% did so monthly, and about 92% rated the advice as at least somewhat helpful. Chatbots like Gemini and ChatGPT are becoming more common, but growing in parallel are major concerns about how these tools respond to mental health problems. Fast-tracked funding for experimental Ebola vaccines The Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations announced yesterday that it will provide three entities with about $62 million in funding to help manufacture and test a vaccine for the rare Bundibugyo Ebola virus. Most of the funding is going to Moderna — about $50 million. But even with the cash infusion, it is likely to be months before clinical trials for specific vaccines can start, STAT’s Helen Branswell writes. Read more from Helen on the challenges ahead, and why one CEPI executive says the world is actually better prepared to respond to this outbreak than previous, larger epidemics. The brewing legal fight threatening DTC telehealth In more than 30 states, it’s illegal for corporations to practice medicine. This may come as a surprise in a time when telehealth companies are advertising on the subway platform and downloading an app might be the first step patients take to get a drug prescription. The way many telehealth companies get around these laws is by working with “friendly” physician-owned medical groups, who are, theoretically, in control of the care. The telehealth company itself is, in legalese, only a management service organization. But as STAT’s Katie Palmer explains in the latest installment of The Virtual Rx Boom, the relationship between these two groups has defined the rapid growth of virtual-only telehealth businesses. Some experts argue that physician groups are more “captive” than “friendly.” Over the past two years, several states have moved to strengthen their corporate practice of medicine laws based on these concerns. Read more from Katie on how these agreements currently work, what states are trying to make changes, and how a telehealth lobbying group keeps popping up to challenge proposed laws. Advertisement Testing one state’s medical meal program The idea of food as medicine has gained a lot of attention lately, especially with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. leading federal health initiatives. We’re still waiting on his proposed MAHA box initiative to send healthy groceries to SNAP participants. In the meantime, states like Massachusetts have piloted programs to send medically-tailored meals to Medicaid recipients with diet-sensitive conditions such as diabetes, heart failure, and chronic kidney disease. A study of the program’s first few years, published today in Nature Medicine, found that participation was associated with 31% fewer hospitalizations, 20% fewer emergency department visits, and $3,433 lower total health care costs. Researchers matched data on more than 1,800 participants with nearly 1,400 similar, eligible individuals. Everybody who participated in the program received meals for at least three months, and for an average of six. The program cost about $3,500 per person, which meant that reductions in health care costs largely offset the price. Thirteen states have taken steps toward implementing food as medicine programs, including meal programs. The findings support the need to test these interventions in more contexts, the authors write. Why hasn’t the FDA banned this ‘punishing’ ‘torture’? The use of electrical shock devices to manage dangerous behavior in people with intellectual disabilities and autism has been called “punishing” by the American Academy of Pediatrics and a form of “torture” by United Nations officials. Although the FDA has attempted to ban the practice before, it’s never stuck. In its latest attempt, the agency gave itself a deadline, two years in advance, pegged to the end of May. It’s now June, but there’s been no movement. “We’ve come so close, so many times,” nonprofit director Robyn Linscott told STAT’s O. Rose Broderick. If the FDA were to not ban the practice, “it would almost feel like salt in the wound.” Read more from Rose on the latest, and revisit her 2024 story for a rundown of the whole Sisyphean saga.Advertisement What we’re reading The painful truth about long Covid, Wired Baffling. Frustrating. Frightening. What it’s like to be sued over medical debt, KFF Health News At the world’s largest cancer research meeting, data briefly took a backseat to grief, STAT Jeffrey Epstein’s sperm may have survived him, New York Times No Surprises Act arbitration rule could worsen flood of provider disputes, STAT health care Submit a correction requestReprints Theresa Gaffney Morning Rounds Writer and Reporter Theresa is the lead Morning Rounds writer, and her stories focus on gender-affirming care, reproductive health, and mental health. You can reach Theresa on Signal at theresagaff.97. Newsletter Understand how science, health policy, and medicine shape the world every day Recommended Morning Rounds June 1, 2026 CDC says containing the spread of Ebola is top priority Morning Rounds May 29, 2026 Which vaccines will curb the Ebola outbreak? 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