Policy & Compliance

  • April 24, 2026

    Tenn. Abortion Ban Trial Taken Off Calendar Following Appeal

    A Tennessee state court has canceled a trial scheduled to begin Monday over a suit challenging the state's abortion ban and seeking clarification on when a physician can legally terminate a high-risk pregnancy.

  • April 24, 2026

    Cigna Plan Members Say HIPAA Notice Backs Privacy Claims

    A group of Cigna health plan participants who claimed the company failed to protect their private health information when it tracked their website activities told a Pennsylvania federal judge that the insurance giant should not be allowed to dodge new allegations that their HIPAA rights were violated.

  • April 24, 2026

    2nd Circ. Nixes Cigna Retirees' Bid For Added Discovery

    The Second Circuit refused to restart proceedings in a class action from Cigna retirees who challenged changes to their pensions, ruling Friday that a lower court was correct to hold that the ex-workers hadn't shown the insurer was disregarding orders to reform their retirement plan. 

  • April 23, 2026

    FTC Cuts Deal To End Anesthesia Group Rollup Case

    The Federal Trade Commission reached an agreement Thursday to settle its case accusing U.S. Anesthesia Partners Inc. of monopolizing the Texas anesthesia services market by purchasing most of the competing anesthesia practices in the state.

  • April 23, 2026

    Pa. County Joins Insulin-Pricing Suit Blitz Against CVS, PBMs

    Chester County, Pennsylvania, filed its own suit in a sprawling multidistrict litigation against CVS and multiple pharmacy benefit managers and drug companies, claiming the entities worked together to inflate the price of insulin.

  • April 23, 2026

    Kirkland To Add Tenn. SG Behind Skrmetti Supreme Court Win

    The Tennessee solicitor general, who successfully defended the state's ban on some gender-affirming care for minors before the U.S. Supreme Court, will join the Nashville office of Kirkland & Ellis, the firm announced Thursday. 

  • April 22, 2026

    Feds Must Give Records On Trans Military Ban, Judge Says

    A Washington federal court has ordered the Trump administration to produce records underlying its decision to bar transgender individuals from serving in the U.S. military, rejecting a distinction the administration carved between trans individuals and individuals with gender dysphoria.

  • April 22, 2026

    Ex-Conn. Prosecutor Fights Drug Co. Bid To Appeal DQ Denial

    Insurers Humana Inc. and Molina Healthcare Inc. urged a federal judge to turn down a group of generic-drug makers' request for an immediate trip to the Third Circuit, arguing the drugmakers' bid for a second chance to disqualify Connecticut's former assistant attorney general from an antitrust case was not qualified for an interlocutory appeal.

  • April 21, 2026

    Courts Rule On J&J Investor Class, Abortion Rights And More

    Law360 Healthcare Authority looks at the U.S. Supreme Court's rejection of a petition by Johnson & Johnson challenging the certification of an investor class, a Pennsylvania state court's recognition of a constitutional right to "reproductive autonomy" and other court rulings affecting the industry this week.

  • April 21, 2026

    Congress Rallies More For Bills On Copyrights Than Patents

    There have been more intellectual property bills floated in Congress that are supportive of copyright rights than patent rights, according to a new report looking at how lawmakers treat the IP system.

  • April 21, 2026

    Amgen Faces ERISA Suit Over Health Plan Tobacco Surcharge

    A former Amgen Inc. employee filed a proposed class action in California federal court Tuesday alleging the biotech company discriminatorily imposes an "egregiously high" $150-a-month surcharge on employees who use tobacco products, while failing to adequately notify them of reasonable pathways to avoid the fees, in violation of federal benefits law.

  • April 21, 2026

    ProMedica Wins Bid To Unseal Gov't Probe Briefs In FCA Suit

    Nursing home operator ProMedica Health Systems Inc. has succeeded in its bid to unseal government briefs in a whistleblower case over alleged problems caused by understaffing at its facilities, with a Pennsylvania federal judge ruling that a presumption of openness with court records trumped the government's concerns about disclosure of its investigative methods.

  • April 21, 2026

    Woman Pleads Guilty In $51M Medicare Fraud Scheme

    A San Diego woman has pled guilty in California federal court to billing Medicare for nearly $51 million in fake prescriptions and trying to hide the scheme through money laundering and kickbacks to doctors.

  • April 21, 2026

    Medical Ethics Researchers Talk Doc Misconduct Trends

    Law360 Healthcare Authority talks to Western Michigan University researchers about misconduct trends in healthcare professions and what state data doesn't hold.

  • April 21, 2026

    White House Insider Says New CDC Pick Aligned With MAHA

    White House senior adviser Calley Means said Tuesday that the new nominee for CDC director, Dr. Erica Schwartz, was in "lockstep" with the Make America Healthy Again movement and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

  • April 21, 2026

    2nd Circ. Chilly To Additional Discovery In Cigna Pension Suit

    The Second Circuit on Tuesday seemed reluctant to restart proceedings in a long-running suit against Cigna from retirees who challenged changes to their pensions, appearing unwilling to upend a decision to turn down post-judgment discovery in the class action.

  • April 21, 2026

    Novo Nordisk Unit Can't Slip Former Exec's Sex, Age Bias Suit

    A Novo Nordisk unit must face a former finance director's lawsuit claiming she was fired because she was an older woman who complained about a male co-worker's behavior, with a North Carolina federal judge ruling her allegations were detailed enough to stay in court.

  • April 20, 2026

    Pa. Court Strikes Down Ban On Medicaid-Paid Abortions

    A divided Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court struck down a ban on Medicaid funding for abortions, declaring Monday that the ban violates a fundamental right to reproductive autonomy under the state's constitution and illegally discriminates on the basis of sex.

  • April 20, 2026

    No High Court Review In NY Nursing Home COVID Death Case

    The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to review the dismissal of a civil suit against former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo and other former state officials over COVID-19-related deaths in nursing homes that allegedly stemmed from the state's controversial early pandemic policies.

  • April 20, 2026

    ImmunityBio Stock Fell After FDA Letter, Derivative Suit Says

    Biotechnology company ImmunityBio Inc.'s stock slipped by 21% after misleading statements on a podcast by the company's founder about its lead cancer drug prompted the issuance of a warning letter from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, according to a shareholder derivative suit in California federal court.

  • April 20, 2026

    PBMs Fail To Freeze Discovery In Mich.'s Drug-Pricing Case

    A pending motion to dismiss the Michigan attorney general's drug-pricing case against multiple pharmacy benefit managers does not preclude the PBMs from handing over agreements between PBMs and pharmacies to the state, a federal judge said in a motion hearing Monday.

  • April 20, 2026

    Doctors Fueled Man's Fatal Opioid Addiction, Philly Jury Told

    Counsel for the family of a man who died of an opioid overdose at age 26 told a Philadelphia jury that his doctors were responsible for pushing treatment plans that allowed him to develop an opioid addiction, leading to his untimely death, pointing to both physicians being paid speakers for the pharmaceutical companies whose medications they prescribed.

  • April 20, 2026

    Justices Mull Limits On Federal Review Of State Cases

    The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday wrestled with the potential impact of reining in — or even scrapping altogether — a 100-year-old doctrine that curbs litigants' ability to go to federal court to try to overturn a state court loss.

  • April 20, 2026

    'Unserious Leaders Are Unsafe': RFK Jr.'s Trans Edict Voided

    An Oregon federal judge struck down Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s efforts to enforce the agency's restrictions on gender-affirming care for minors, finding the restrictions unlawful and criticizing Kennedy's leadership and the policy declaration that introduced the changes. 

  • April 20, 2026

    Justices Won't Block Multimillion-Dollar Health Fraud Retrial

    A man accused of pocketing $12 million as a part of a larger $140 million scheme to defraud public and private healthcare programs can't get out of a second trial, as the U.S. Supreme Court declined to review his case on Monday.

Expert Analysis

  • Steps To Consider As DOJ Launches Fraud Division

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    The establishment this month of the National Fraud Enforcement Division within the U.S. Department of Justice is a significant reorganization that suggests an increase in enforcement activity involving federally funded programs but leaves a number of important questions unanswered, say attorneys at Crowell & Moring.

  • Court's HRSA Policy Reversal Leaves 340B Rules Murky

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    A D.C. federal court's recent decision in Premier v. U.S. Department of Health limits the Health Resources and Services Administration's ability to enforce long-standing Section 340B interpretations through subregulatory guidance, leaving open core statutory questions about purchasing models, inventory classification and program oversight, says Martha Cramer at Hooper Lundy.

  • Fresenius Ruling May Shift Anti-Kickback Enforcement

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    The Ninth Circuit's recent decision in Fresenius v. Bonta suggests that businesses have a First Amendment right to donate to certain charities, even if those donations are motivated by economic self-interest, potentially calling into question years of Anti-Kickback Statute proceedings against pharmaceutical manufacturers for making similar donations, says Jonah Knobler at Patterson Belknap.

  • The Challenge Of Stabilizing Rural Hospitals On The Brink

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    The outlook for rural hospitals has grown more concerning, as recent policy and regulatory developments are decreasing hospital revenues and increasing the cost of uncompensated care, which may result in additional hospital closures, service reductions, or mergers and acquisitions, say Omur Celmanbet, Kristy Piccinini and Sabiha Quddus at FTI Consulting.

  • Fraud Enforcement, Sentencing Face Unusual Convergence

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    The Trump administration’s newly created task force to eliminate fraud and the U.S. Sentencing Commission’s recent proposals to scale back certain elements of the federal sentencing framework seem to point in opposite directions, creating a collision of policy priorities that may reshape how fraud cases are charged, negotiated and sentenced for years to come, says David Tarras at Tarras Defense.

  • Peptide Policy Is Shifting Toward Sanctioned Compounding

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    The policy landscape for peptides is undergoing a significant shift under the Trump administration, moving toward a complex system of verified compounding and complementary enforcement that will likely bring peptides firmly back into the sphere of legitimate consumer products, say attorneys at Sheppard.

  • Trump Order Signals Tougher Benefits Fraud Probes

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    A recent order from President Donald Trump establishing a federal taskforce for addressing fraud in federally funded benefit programs emphasizes interagency information sharing, potentially affecting a broad range of areas including government contracts, administrative law considerations and False Claims Act cases, say attorneys at Morgan Lewis.

  • The Evolution Of States' Workplace Violence Prevention Laws

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    Utah's new law requiring hospitals to implement comprehensive workplace violence reporting systems continues a broader trend of state efforts to expand workplace protections in the absence of sufficient federal regulations, say attorneys at Ogletree.

  • FDA Guidance May Move Goalposts For Form 483 Responses

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    New draft guidance from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration provides formal insight on how drug manufacturers are expected to respond to Form 483s, raising some concerns about the agency's timelines and expectations, say attorneys at Cooley.

  • 2 Strands Of Patent Law In High Court's 'Skinny Label' Case

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    Amarin v. Hikma, which is set for oral argument in the U.S. Supreme Court this month, highlights the distinction between two different strands of intellectual property law — analogizing a patent to either a property deed or a home, says Jonas McDavit at Spencer West.

  • A Check-Up On HHS' Push To Implement AI Infrastructure

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    The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has made some headway in its efforts to implement artificial intelligence across its agencies, but will have to overcome a number of near-term tests in order to be successful, says Theodore Thompson at Stinson.

  • Mich. Banking Brief: All The Notable Legal Updates In Q1

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    Michigan's financial services sector saw several significant developments in 2026's first quarter, including the state Department of Insurance and Financial Services' issuance of a bulletin on the use of artificial intelligence and the Michigan House's introduction of a bill based on the Model Money Transmission Modernization Act, say attorneys at Dykema.

  • The Road Ahead For Drug Development In The US

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    Against the backdrop of drug manufacturers potentially looking to move development efforts overseas, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's latest guidance on new approach methodologies signals the FDA is likely to be receptive to industry innovation that makes U.S.-based drug development faster or less expensive, creating opportunities and compliance risks for tech companies, say attorneys at Morgan Lewis.