My #1 story from 2021 to 2025 is expanding Medicaid eligibility in North Carolina

 

RALEIGH, NC – March 4, 2025 – More than one year ago, on December 1, 2023, North Carolina officially became the 40^th state to expand Medicaid, the federal program for health insurance for low-resource individuals. A state Medicaid expansion (ME) bill was passed by the General Assembly and signed by Governor Roy Cooper in March_. ME was in the Affordable Care Act of 2010 and left to each state to decide in a subsequent Supreme Court ruling. ME increases health care access to eligible North Carolinians ages 19-64 and their families by relaxing the program’s strict eligibility requirements.

The latest update of the NC Medicaid Expansion Enrollment Dashboard was on March 4^th. There have been almost 640 thousand people in North Carolina who have been enrolled since the law took effect including more than 15.5 thousand residents of Buncombe County. It was estimated that 600 thousand North Carolinians were eligible for ME, with 15.5 thousand from Buncombe County. The state had predicted that it would take 2 years (24 months) to achieve their enrollment. After only 15 months of accepting applications, the state and Buncombe County have already exceeded their estimates to enrolling eligible persons.

North Carolina has been thrust into the national spotlight through the passing and implementation of Medicaid expansion. Its success was due to the strong grassroots support by many organizations and the efforts of Governor Cooper and both houses of the General Assembly.

It has been estimated that expanding Medicaid will bring the state 8 billion federal dollars annually, almost 2 billion dollars to support behavioral health, public safety, and rural health care, and 2 billion dollars for starting the program in 2023.

In an interview with North Carolina Health News, Governor Cooper, who spearheaded expanding Medicaid in North Carolina, said, “When I ran for governor, one of my top priorities was creating a North Carolina where people were healthier and could get the care that they need to have lives of purpose and abundance.” He added, “We knew that Medicaid expansion was an important way of making that happen, because there were a lot of hardworking people in North Carolina who were making too much money to qualify for Medicaid, but not enough money to qualify for subsidies under the Affordable Care Act.”

There are many ways to apply for NC Medicaid for eligible persons. Those who have not yet applied should visit Medicaid.nc.gov to see if they qualify. Buncombe County residents can apply for Medicaid online and at any time at ePASS.NC.gov. Applications can be done in-person at the HHS Building on 40 Coxe Avenue, by calling 828-250-5500, or by mail.

 

Listen to the full report below:

 

 

Contact: Dr. Dick Needleman, Health reporter, 103.3 AshevilleFM, [email protected]

More Posts for Show: Asheville FM News Hour

 

ASHEVILLE, NC – March 12, 2025 – The CDC’s COVID Dashboard for the week ending on March 1^st shows:  

• Less than 2% of the deaths in North Carolina were due to COVID, the 2^nd lowest level of 6 groups.
• Emergency department visits for COVID-19 are minimal in North Carolina, representing 1% of all visits, a moderate decrease since last week.

Wastewater monitoring can be used to provide early warning for COVID, flu and RSV outbreaks. For the week ending on March 1^st, the COVID-19 wastewater viral activity level for the state is moderate. The Buncombe & Henderson counties COVID wastewater data for the week ending on February 26^th shows:

• The number of viral gene copies in each water sample is at a yellow level representing the 3^rd highest level of 5 groups, currently between the 40^th and 60^th percentile relative to the past peak level measured at the same site.
• The 15-day rate of change of the number of viral gene copies in each water sample has increased from the previous week, at 10% to 99%, the 2^nd highest level of 3 groups for a positive rate of change.

During the week ending on March 1^st, viral activity levels in the North Carolina wastewater were moderate for influenza A and very low for RSV, and viral activity levels in the Buncombe County wastewater were moderate for influenza A, and low for RSV.

The CDC’s weekly flu surveillance report for the week ending on February 22^nd (16 days ago) indicates that levels are either high or very high in 40 of 47 continental states (with Vermont not reporting). The Mountain West and northern plains states have moderate levels. North Carolina is at a high level.

The CDC reports that the weekly percent of positive tests for RSV for the week ending on March 1^st is below 5% for Region 4 (which are the states in the southeast U.S. including North Carolina).

The weekly North Carolina Respiratory Virus Summary Dashboard for the week ending on March 1^st shows:

• Less than 12% of all emergency room patients had symptoms of a respiratory viral illness, about a 20% decrease from last week.
• Influenza-like symptoms represented about 40% of these patients
• There were about 2 thousand hospital admissions from the emergency department in North Carolina for people who had a diagnosis, or symptoms, of respiratory viral infection, a 7% decrease since last week. More patients were admitted with the flu than any other respiratory disease.

 

Listen to the full report below:

 

 

Contact: Dr. Dick Needleman, Health reporter, 103.3 AshevilleFM, [email protected]

More Posts for Show: Asheville FM News Hour

 

UNITED STATES – February 19, 2025 – A vaccine for pancreatic cancer! What a breakthrough for the treatment one of the most devastating cancers where fewer than 13% of people live more than five years after diagnosis. The cancer is very advanced by the time someone has any symptoms. It has spread much earlier than most cancers by the time the diagnosis is made. There are very few effective treatments. Surgery is indicated only about 20% of the time due to the quick spread of this cancer. There is no routine screening test for cancer of the pancreas.

In a recent article published in Nature, researchers from the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City performed a phase 1 trial on 16 patients with pancreatic cancer that was treatable with surgery. A novel approach to treatment included the standard regimen of surgery, chemotherapy and an immunotherapy drug with the addition of a personalized mRNA vaccine based on the genetic make-up specific to the person’s tumor. Patients were followed for an average of 4 years. One-half of the patients had a longer recurrence-free survival time compared to patients who did not respond. These responders produced specialized white blood cells to fight the cancer. The median increase in survival time was more than 1 year. The study showed that the addition of the vaccine was safe and effective.

The vaccine teaches the body’s immune system to produce large numbers of specialized white blood cells to recognize, destroy and prevent the spread of cancer cells. These ‘killer’ white blood cells were not present before administration of the vaccine and were found to be present for up to 3 years after vaccination.

Precision medicine is a new non-traditional health care approach that uses a person’s unique genetic, lifestyle and environmental factors for a personalized prevention, diagnosis and treatment of disease. It is also known as “personalized medicine”. The U.S. Food & Drug Administration says that “the goal of precision medicine is to target the right treatments to the right patients at the right time.” Knowing a tumor’s genetic make-up may allow physicians to choose specific treatments that may extend a person’s life, improve their chances of survival and reduce the risk of side-effects from treatment.

The results of this study are encouraging, although it is an early trial. Larger trials are planned. Similar vaccines are being tested for treating people with melanoma, a deadly skin cancer, and the increasingly prevalent colorectal cancer.

 

Listen to the full report below:

 

 

Contact: Dr. Dick Needleman, Health reporter, 103.3 AshevilleFM, [email protected]

More Posts for Show: Asheville FM News Hour

 

ASHEVILLE, NC – February 26, 2025 – The CDC’s COVID Dashboard for the week ending on February 15^th shows:  

• Less than 2% of the deaths in North Carolina were due to COVID, the 2^nd lowest level of 6 groups, unchanged from last week.
• Emergency department visits for COVID-19 are minimal in North Carolina, representing a little more than 1% of all visits, a moderate decrease since last week.

Wastewater monitoring can be used to provide early warning for COVID, flu and RSV outbreaks. For the week ending on February 15^th, the COVID-19 wastewater viral activity level for the state is high. The Buncombe & Henderson counties COVID wastewater data for the week ending on February 12^th shows:

• The number of viral gene copies in each water sample is at an orange level representing the 4^th highest level of 5 groups, currently between the 60^th and 80^th percentile relative to the past peak level measured at the same site.
• The 15-day rate of change of the number of viral gene copies in each water sample has decreased from the previous week, at -99% to -10%, the largest level of 2 groups for a negative rate of change.

During the week ending on February 15^th, viral activity levels in the North Carolina wastewater were high for influenza A and low for RSV, and viral activity levels in the Buncombe County wastewater were moderate for influenza A, and very low for RSV.

The CDC’s weekly flu surveillance report for the week ending on February 15^th indicates that levels are either high or very high in 42 of 47 continental states (with Vermont not reporting). The Mountain West region has moderate levels. North Carolina is at a very high level.

The CDC reports that the weekly percent of positive tests for RSV for the week ending on February 15^th is below 5% for Region 4 (which are the states in the southeast U.S. including North Carolina). It had peaked to more than 15% around Christmas.

The weekly North Carolina Respiratory Virus Summary Dashboard for the week ending on February 15^th shows:

• 17% of all emergency room patients had symptoms of a respiratory viral illness, a 20% decrease from last week.
• Influenza-like symptoms represented more than one-half of these patients
• There were more than 25 hundred hospital admissions from the emergency department in North Carolina for people who had a diagnosis, or symptoms, of respiratory viral infection, a 24% decrease since last week. More patients were admitted with the flu than other respiratory disease.

 

Listen to the full report below:

 

 

Contact: Dr. Dick Needleman, Health reporter, 103.3 AshevilleFM, [email protected]

More Posts for Show: Asheville FM News Hour