Health & Medicine

City library janitor Sean Bloom cleans a bathroom where many homeless regularly take advantage of the public area on Friday, May 19, 2017 in Sacramento, Calif.

Lack of bathroom access linked to hepatitis A outbreak among the homeless

An outbreak of hepatitis A among primarily homeless people in Southern California and Santa Cruz has prompted Sacramento County health officials to ramp up prevention efforts and talk about bathroom access for the homeless

Capitol Alert

Time for California to get moving on universal health care bill, Gavin Newsom says

Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom challenged California’s Democratic-run Legislature to pass sweeping universal, government-run health care next year.

Capitol Alert

‘John McCain has a conscience,’ Bernie Sanders says in San Francisco

Bernie Sanders thanks John McCain for coming out against the the GOP’s Graham-Cassidy proposal to overhaul Obamacare.

Capitol Alert

Bernie Sanders thanks John McCain on health care in San Francisco

Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders thanked Arizona Sen. John McCain for his decision to oppose the latest Republican attempt to repeal Obamacare.

Capitol Alert

Gavin Newsom: 'No reason to wait around' on universal health care in California

Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom, gave a full-throated endorsement of Senate Bill 562, a proposed universal health care bill that stalled in the Legislature because Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon said it lacked a financing plan. Newsom, running for governor in 2018, was speaking to the annual convention of the California Nurses Association Union in San Francisco on Sept. 22, 2017. The group has endorsed him.

Business & Real Estate

How national drugstore plans to help in fight against opioid abuse

CVS Health is putting new limits on opioid prescriptions and looking to educate patients in a bid to decrease abuse and overdoses of the medication.

Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., center, joined by Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., center left, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., center right, and supporters, speaks at a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington.

Politics & Government

Liberal group ups the pressure on candidates to back single-payer

The Progressive Change Campaign Committee is endorsing a Democratic Iowa gubernatorial candidate, singling out the labor leader for her full-throated support for a “Medicare for all” program.

Health & Medicine

She took DNA test to get health information. She found 3 half siblings

A Placerville mother of two uncovers a complicated family history, thanks to a DNA testing kit.

Health & Medicine

'I felt invaded': Woman finds out her biological father was a sperm donor

Jaclyn Baxter discusses the emotional pain brought on by the discovery that the father who raised her is not her biological father.

A discarded syringe lies near the railroad tracks between 19th and 20th streets in Sacramento. Nationally, opioid and heroin overdose deaths are way up since 1999.

Capitol Alert

No supervised heroin use in California after ‘safe injection sites’ bill fails

Counties with heavy intravenous drug use could create sites for addicts to inject under supervision if Gov. Jerry Brown signs Assembly Bill 186.

Health & Medicine

Cal Expo will become a gigantic, free medical clinic for 3 days

Patients must show up at 4 p.m. one day in advance to register to see doctors, dentists and eye doctors at a free medical clinic at Cal Expo.

Gavin Newsom holds a town hall meeting at the Maidu Community Center in Roseville on Aug. 1.

Capitol Alert

Jobs and health care on voters’ minds heading into California governor’s race

Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom continues to lead the 2018 race for California governor. The economy, health care and crime rank as top issues.

Health & Medicine

Vaccines by the Numbers: A public health achievement

Between 2001 and 2010, the United States saw big declines in the number of cases of vaccine-preventable diseases. Because of this, vaccines are one of the top public health achievements of the decade.

Capitol Alert

Bernie Sanders, Kamala Harris embrace details of ‘Medicare-for-all’ – including tax hikes

Sen. Kamala Harris joined Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders in announcing support for a universal “Medicare-for-all” health care bill.

Health & Medicine

Born 4 months early - and weighing 1 pound, 4.5 ounces - Leni beats odds, survives in Sacramento

Mom Chastity and Sutter Medical Center doctors tell the amazing story about tiny Sacramento preemie Leni.

Health & Medicine

Preemie’s mom held him in palm of her hand and willed him to live: ‘Don’t die on me’

Doctors at Sutter Medical Center prepared Baby Leni’s mom for the worst when he arrived on May 9, four months early at her Sacramento home and weighing just 1 pound and 4.5 ounces.

The traditional pacemaker, bottom, dwarfs the new Micra Transcatheter Pacing System and a nickel.

Health & Medicine

One inch long and as slender as a pencil, this device helps prevent heart attacks

Sacramento hospitals start implanting a tiny pacemaker that stimulates the heart through tines that attach to the lower right ventricle wall.

Planned Parenthood supporters rally on “National Pink Out Day'” at Los Angeles City Hall in 2015.

Capitol Alert

Abortion would be first-degree murder under California proposal

The proposed 2018 ballot initiative by Daniel Ehinger would treat abortion and some forms of birth control as first-degree murder.

Capitol Alert

More opioid prescriptions than people in some California counties

More than half of Californians used prescription opioids in 2016, Department of Public Health data show. Some parts of the state have much higher usage and overdose rates.