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The problem isn’t whether Physician Orders for Life-Sustaining Treatment orders exist. It is whether clinicians and first responders can find them when decisions have to be made.

When budgets tighten, public health agencies often break complex problems into smaller contracts. Max Entman argues that this instinct now works against them. AI can help small teams move faster, but better outcomes depend on connecting data, implementation, communications, and subject-matter expertise around the results agencies need to achieve. The opportunity is not to automate more tasks or buy the same pieces more cheaply; it is to ask partners for integrated solutions that identify what works sooner and scale it when it delivers.

As AI takes over the routine delivery layer of government health work, agencies should rethink what they’re paying for. 

The latest briefs note that the growth rate of GDP continues to exceed health spending growth, but the two have begun to converge, economy-wide inflation exceeds health care prices for the ninth month, and health care job growth has partially offset the overall decline in the labor market.

The latest briefs note that the growth rate of health care spending has declined in recent months, prescription drug prices in June declined for the sixth straight month, health care job growth has declined in the past four months, and inflation is outpacing health care wage growth.

Altarum has relaunched publication of the monthly Health Sector Economic Indicators (HSEI) briefs, providing a resource to the public health community that first began in 2011.

Kansas, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI), Indiana, Washington, Illinois, and Nevada were selected to participate in the second State Technical Assistance Cohort (STAC) convened through the Center for Maternal and Child Health and Medicaid Partnerships (CMMP).

Congress reignited the Safe to Sleep® campaign with $1.3 million in National Institutes of Health (NIH) funding to help reduce sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) and sudden unexpected infant death (SUID). For more than 30 years, Safe to Sleep® has translated complex NIH research and science-backed clinical guidelines into clear, credible information for families, health and child care providers, and other caregivers.

The latest briefs note that utilization growth rather than price increases is driving personal health care spending growth, prescription drug prices continue to decline as overall price growth has slowed, and job growth has slowed for the past five months.