Tag: health care

From trips to treatments: how psychedelics could revolutionise anti-inflammatory medicine

Once synonymous with hippies and hallucinatory experiences, psychedelic drugs are now being explored for their medical potential. The stigma of that era resulted in research being suppressed by drug laws, yet with mental health treatments hitting limits, scientists have returned to this controversial corner of medicine.

Substances like psilocybin (found in magic mushrooms) and ayahuasca are now being taken seriously by scientists and doctors, not for the visions they induce, but for the healing potential they possess.

Initially, this focused on treating mental health conditions like depression, where currently prescribed drugs only help a minority of patients. But these investigations have now expanded to include diseases driven by inflammation, which psychedelic drugs may help reduce by calming down the immune system.

In both human cells grown in laboratory dishes and animal studies, psychedelic drugs like DMT, LSD, and a compound called (R)-DOI can block the release of inflammatory molecules called cytokines. These protein molecules fuel conditions like rheumatoid arthritis, asthma and even depression, as well as increasing brain damage following traumatic brain injury.

Advantage over steroids

But these drugs have a considerable advantage over typical anti-inflammatory medications like steroid drugs because psychedelics appear to work without suppressing healthy immune function, which is a major problem with steroids.

Significantly, these laboratory findings are beginning to be confirmed in studies in humans. Evidence is growing that psychedelics could hold the key to managing inflammation, one of the body’s central drivers of many chronic diseases, including depression, arthritis and heart conditions.

Take psilocybin, the active ingredient in magic mushrooms. In a study involving 60 healthy participants, just one dose was enough to significantly lower levels of two key inflammatory molecules – TNF-alpha and IL-6 – over the following week.

However, not all studies have shown the same clear results. Some only had a few participants and others were complicated by the fact that some participants had previous drug experience, which could affect the results.

One big challenge with studying psychedelics in medical research is that it’s very hard to hide who got the real drug and who got a placebo. When someone has a strong psychedelic experience, it’s obvious they didn’t just take a sugar pill.

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White House Releases New Memo Exposing Democrats’ Demand for Nearly $200 BILLION in Taxpayer-Funded Healthcare for Illegal Immigrants — All While Gutting Reforms That Protect American Citizens

A newly released White House memorandum just blew the lid off Democrats’ latest betrayal of the American people.

Buried inside their continuing resolution (CR) is a demand to repeal President Trump’s historic America First healthcare reforms, the very safeguards that protect U.S. citizens from footing the bill for illegal aliens’ medical care.

According to the memo, if Democrats succeed, taxpayers will be on the hook for nearly $200 BILLION in healthcare benefits for illegal immigrants and non-citizens over the next decade, almost enough to fund the entire Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) for the same period.

The Working Families Tax Cut Act (WFTCA), signed into law by President Trump, was designed to end taxpayer subsidies for illegal immigrant healthcare and redirect resources to the most vulnerable Americans. It:

  • Ended Medicaid & Medicare funding for most non-citizens.
  • Shut down the California loophole that allowed liberal states to siphon federal dollars for illegal alien healthcare.
  • Blocked emergency Medicaid expansions that reimbursed hospitals more for treating illegals than for caring for American children and seniors.
  • Repealed the Obamacare “special rule” that gave subsidies to immigrants earning below the poverty line while denying them to poor American citizens

According to the memo, the Democrat proposal would:

  • Spend $193 billion over 10 years on healthcare for illegal immigrants.
  • Repeal safeguards against fraud, improper payments, and abuse of federal programs.
  • Cancel Trump’s $50 billion rural healthcare investment.
  • Eliminate expanded Health Savings Accounts for 10 million Americans.
  • Gut work requirements for able-bodied adults, reviving failed welfare policies

The memo breaks down just how much repealing Trump’s reforms would cost taxpayers:

  • $91.4B – Restoring Obamacare funding for non-citizens
  • $34.6B – Reopening California’s Medicaid scam
  • $28.2B – Emergency care reimbursements for illegals
  • $27.3B – Obamacare “special rule” subsidies for non-citizens
  • $6.2B – Medicaid for non-citizens
  • $5.1B – Medicare for non-citizens
  • TOTAL: $192.8 BILLION

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Illegal Immigrants and Federal Health Benefits: What to Know

Republicans and Democrats offer competing claims about whether people who entered the country unlawfully are benefiting from Medicaid.

“The law prohibits undocumented immigrants from getting payments from Medicare, Medicaid, or the ACA. There’s no money, not a penny of federal dollars that are going there,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said on Sept. 30.

Yet Republicans say millions of people who entered the country illegally do receive federal health benefits.

“By some estimates, 20 million illegal aliens came [here] from every country, all around the world,” House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) told reporters on Oct. 2, referring to the years of the Biden administration.

“[Democrats] gave them all this parole status so that they could get enrolled onto taxpayer benefits.”

The war of words has erupted during a government shutdown because of Democrats’ demand that all health-related portions of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBB) be repealed as part of a continuing funding resolution.

The dispute is over competing visions for the scope of government-funded health. Democrats favor a more expansive list of noncitizens who can apply for federal benefits. Republicans, through the OBBB, have shortened the list considerably.

Here’s a look at which immigrants can now apply for Medicaid, and how that’s set to change in 2026.

Qualified Aliens

Under current federal law, “qualified aliens” can apply for federal benefits. This category includes people lawfully admitted for permanent residence.

Generally, there is a five-year waiting period before eligibility begins, though most states waive that for immigrant children and pregnant women.

Parolees are also qualified aliens. Federal law gives the director of Homeland Security the discretion to release them into the United States temporarily, “only on a case-by-case basis for urgent humanitarian reasons or significant public benefit.”

More than 2.8 million people were paroled into the country between February 2021 and January 2025, according to the Department of Homeland Security. Parolees are eligible for Medicare, Medicaid, or the ACA Marketplace after one year.

Immigrants who are granted asylum or refugee status are also qualified aliens. They have no waiting period.

Qualified aliens also include people who are under an order of deportation that has been withheld, come from certain designated countries, are victims of domestic violence, are victims of sex trafficking, are members of certain Indian tribes, or certain others.

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Elizabeth Warren Loses Her Mind When Journalist Notes That Democrats Actually Do Want Healthcare for Illegals on the Taxpayers’ Dime 

Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts lost her cool on CBS News this week, when reporter Tony Dokoupil noted that Democrats actually do kinda want to provide healthcare to illegals, funded by taxpayers.

She got really angry but then pretty much confirmed what Tony Dokoupil was saying, while giving a long, confusing explanation.

You know what’s very telling in this ongoing debate? The anger and frustration of Democrats. It’s a tell that indicates that they are losing this argument and they know it. You see the same thing with Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries.

Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts lost her cool on CBS News this week, when reporter Tony Dokoupil noted that Democrats actually do kinda want to provide healthcare to illegals, funded by taxpayers.

She got really angry but then pretty much confirmed what Tony Dokoupil was saying, while giving a long, confusing explanation.

You know what’s very telling in this ongoing debate? The anger and frustration of Democrats. It’s a tell that indicates that they are losing this argument and they know it. You see the same thing with Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries.

Transcript via Curtis Houck on Twitter/X:

Dokoupil: “So, senator, you know, Republicans say what you’re really fighting for is taxpayer dollars for, as they put it, illegal aliens. I know that’s not strictly true but there is a provision –”

Warren: “Oh, excuse me not strictly true.”

Dokoupil: “It’s not directly true, but –”

Warren: “It is a flat-out lie. It is a flat-out lie.”

Dokoupil: “– the way that they frame it –”

Warren: “There is nothing in Medicaid, nothing in Medicare, that permits one undocumented immigrant to get one dollar of assistance. None.”

Dokoupil: “– Senator –”

Warren: “Zero.”

Dokoupil: “– if you let me finish the question –”

Warren: “Of course. I’m sorry.”

Dokoupil: “– sorry, in the Democratic counter offer the proposal for funding, there is a restoration of Medicaid benefits for certain noncitizens that had been taken away in the Big, Beautiful Bill as Republicans put it.”

Warren: “No!”

Dokoupil: “Republicans don’t think those people should be getting health care on the taxpayer dime. I’m not asking on the merits. Politically, putting that in there, exposes you to this talking point, this lie as you put it. Why put it in there? Why is it worth it?”

Warren: “No. What’s happened is that what we’re saying is that whenever hospitals give care, what is going to be the level of reimbursement? And the Republicans said it’s going to be a low level. The Democrats said we just want go back to the level it was before because you’re going to bankrupt hospitals. You’re going to put rural hospitals out of business. The Republicans and the Democrats’ plan, nothing changes the number of undocumented immigrants who still get care if they show up bleeding and unconscious at an emergency room. There is absolutely zero difference. The difference is whether or not hospitals who, under laws that date back to Ronald Reagan, may provide emergency care to anyone who’s unconscious, will actually get reimbursed at a very low level that will put the hospital ultimately out of business potentially or at a higher level. The Republicans – there is no change, no change in the number of undocumented migrants who get any help under what the Democrats want. Look, what we’re looking for is help for people who are going to get pushed out of nursing homes, help for people who are at home and relying on home health aides.”

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Emails show evidence gender transition providers for kids hid what they do, misled journalists

The University of California San Francisco scrubbed its website of details on its provision of puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and surgical removals of healthy breasts and genitals for minors, following a query from then-Fox News host Tucker Carlson’s show, according to a massive production to Judicial Watch in a California Public Records Act lawsuit.

The UC system’s designated campus for health sciences and University of Southern California-affiliated Children’s Health Los Angeles also hid the fact that a 9-year-old was part of their blocker study through the National Institutes of Health, when they corrected New York Times reporters who asked about an 8-year-old in the study.

The evidence of obfuscation, misleading and threatening the media – one official suggested suing Carlson before he reported anything – is sprinkled throughout nearly 2,500 pages of three-year-old internal conversations among so-called gender-affirming care leaders of UCSF and CHLA and both conservative and mainstream media. 

It suggests a pattern of withholding information that could cut the taxpayer and insurance spigot to the lucrative world of medicalized gender transitions for minors and set back gender ideology in U.S. medical institutions, which have resisted their European counterparts’ dramatic pullback on medicalized pediatric transitions.

CHLA researcher Johanna Olson-Kennedy admitted hiding the results of her NIH-funded study, that gender-confused children don’t see mental-health benefits from blockers, because “I do not want our work to be weaponized” by opponents. She also falsely characterized the study population to the Times to explain away her findings.

Much of the damage to the industry’s reputation and cash flow is self-inflicted, through its own public recordings of practitioners candidly discussing the gruesome and lucrative nature of surgeries, hormone therapy and the lifelong medical management they require, and how to overcome parental opposition to child transitions.

The American Academy of Pediatrics, which hid research on the importance of children seeing faces when it endorsed COVID-19 mask mandates, then claimed it was an accident, also banned a critic of gender ideology the morning of its conference last fall.

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Dems Want Medicaid For Millions Of Biden-Era Migrants But Use Sneaky Wordplay To Pretend They Don’t

The federal government shut down on Wednesday after Democrats refused to vote on a clean continuing resolution to keep the government funded for the next seven weeks. When Republicans pointed out that Democrats were unwilling to vote to fund the government without restoring health care eligibility for illegal aliens, the media and other Democrats jumped into action, “fact-checking” Republicans and claiming that wasn’t true.

These “fact checks” rely on the ludicrous claim that foreign citizens who were dumped into the United States by the millions by the Biden administration via blanket parole grants are not really “illegal” aliens.

Democrats refused to fund the government without a funding proposal that would, in part, rescind Subtitle B in Title VII of the One Big Beautiful Bill. That section had narrowed the eligibility requirements for government health care benefits (like Medicaid), restricting eligibility for certain foreign nationals, such as the 2.8 million otherwise inadmissible aliens who received blanket parole into the United States from the Biden administration.

But rather than acknowledge that Democrats’ proposal would extend federal health care to parolees, leftist mouthpieces insist that those millions of parolees don’t count as “illegal aliens” and therefore that no illegal aliens are getting Medicaid benefits.

That’s what Neera Tanden is doing when she insists the Affordable Care Act “bans care for illegal aliens.”

Or Minnesota Sen. Tina Smith, who claimed: “Undocumented immigrants aren’t even *allowed* to access Medicare, Medicaid or ACA credits.”

Rhode Island Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse said in an X post: “‘Health care for illegal aliens’ is the new ‘immigrants are eating cats and dogs in Springfield.’ The Republican playbook is simple: make up a baseless lie, repeat it every chance you get, hope and pray that everyone blames Democrats for the crises you created.”

Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand said: “To be clear, undocumented immigrants aren’t even allowed to enroll in federally funded health coverage.”

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries told CNBC it is an “outright lie” and that “federal law prohibits the use of taxpayer dollars to provide medical coverage to undocumented individuals.”

New York Rep. Jerry Nadler said on X that “undocumented immigrants are not eligible for the ACA. Period.”

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CNN’s Jake Tapper Corners Hakeem Jeffries on LIVE TV — Confronts Him on Hidden Provision That Gives Illegal Aliens Healthcare Through Emergency Medicaid and Asylum Loopholes

CNN’s Jake Tapper grills House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries on live television about hidden provisions in the Democrats’ spending bill that fund emergency Medicaid for noncitizens, exposing the healthcare-for-illegals loophole Democrats don’t want Americans to see.

The confrontation came amid the ongoing government shutdown, where Democrats are blocking a clean continuing resolution unless Republicans cave to their demands for bloated spending, including the extension of Obamacare subsidies set to expire at the end of 2025.

But Tapper wasn’t letting Jeffries off the hook with the usual Democrat talking points about protecting Americans.

Tapper was forced to read aloud Subtitle E of the bill to Jeffries, a section Republicans have rightly exposed as a Trojan horse for open-borders healthcare handouts.

Jake Tapper:
Donald Trump blessed it as well. Let me ask you about a provision that the Republicans are talking about quite a bit. I know you want to talk about, and Democrats want to talk about, extending the Obamacare subsidies which expire at the end of 2025. But they talk about the provisions, and it’s right here—Subtitle E.

This has to do with the repeal of health care subtitle changes, and specifically what it is. How they characterize it is: you want to give health insurance to undocumented immigrants. I understand that’s not really an accurate depiction, but what it does do is—

Hakeem Jeffries:
It’s a lie.

Jake Tapper:
It’s a lie. But what you support does bring back funding for emergency Medicaid to hospitals, some of which does pay for undocumented immigrants and people who don’t have health insurance.

Also, there is this provision, and it’s not about undocumented immigrants. It’s about people with asylum seekers and people with temporary protected status, et cetera, et cetera, but about their ability to get Medicaid.

They’re non-citizens. They’re not undocumented, they’re not illegal. Why even include that in a bill, knowing that they’re going to seize right upon that and use that as a message?

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Govt Shutdown: Ro Khanna Admits Democrats Are Fighting to Get Free Health Care for Illegal Aliens

Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) admitted that the government shutdown fight is over Democrats seeking to provide free health care to illegal aliens — paid for by American taxpayers.

In an interview with Fox Business this week, Khanna said the government has shut down in part because Democrats are looking to make it easier for illegal aliens to secure taxpayer-funded healthcare benefits.

Khanna, though, tried to downplay the issue by claiming only a small amount of taxpayer funding is going toward subsidizing healthcare benefits for illegal aliens.

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Scots patients forced to have electric shock treatment more than 1000 times.

Patients in Scotland were forced to receive electric shock treatment against their will almost 1,100 times last year – prompting calls for the NHS to stop using the ‘ethically unacceptable’ procedure.

In each case, people suffering from mental illness were compelled to undergo electro-convulsive therapy (ECT) even though they objected to the treatment or actively struggled to resist it.

The World Health Organisation and United Nations recently warned that involuntary or forced ECT risked breaching patients’ human rights – and could be regarded as a form of torture.

The procedure, which sees electric currents passed through the brain to induce a brief seizure, has been used since the 1930s but remains deeply controversial.

A new report shows that ECT was carried out in the Scottish NHS more than 4,000 times last year.

Women in their 60s were most likely to receive the treatment – while the most commonly treated condition was severe depression.

In around 2,000 cases, ECT was performed on people who, because of their mental state, were deemed incapable of giving consent.

In 1,081 cases, treatment was given to patients who said they didn’t want it or fought against it – but who were over-ruled by doctors.

While health chiefs in Scotland acknowledge ECT can produce ‘adverse’ side-effects, they insist it is safe and effective.

First developed in the 1930s, the procedure was infamously portrayed in the 1975 film One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest, in which Jack Nicholson plays a convicted criminal who feigns mental illness.

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Waste Of The Day: Veterans’ Hospital Equipment Is Missing

Topline: The Veterans Health Administration has lost an estimated 5% of its reusable medical equipment worth at least $211 million — including exam tables, computers and microscopes — and “will continue to do so if processes are not improved,” according to a new audit from the Veterans Affairs inspector general.

Key facts: VA hospitals own over 2 million pieces of nonexpendable equipment that is meant to be used for two years or more, valued at $12 billion. Federal auditors recently visited hospitals to see if the VA was properly tracking the equipment and found that thousands of items had disappeared.

The auditors estimated that a third of the equipment — 537,000 items — is in a different location than inventory records claim, and an additional 75,500 items are missing entirely.

It’s possible there is even more missing equipment, because the VA is only required to keep track of inventory worth more than $5,000.

Some of the nonexpendable equipment is tracked using electronic tags, but some of the tags have dead batteries or only show what building the item is in and not what room.

The VA also uses an “inventory by exception” system in which items that have their location recorded during routine maintenance do not need to be included in annual inventory reports for up to 24 months, even though most items are required to be logged every 12 months. Auditors wrote that “a lot can go wrong, including losing equipment,” because of the inventory-by-exception system.

There are also staffing issues contributing to the missing equipment. Some VA employees working on inventory could not search for items because they did not have the keys to all the rooms in the hospital. Some hospitals have staffing levels below 40%, which employees said made it harder to fill out inventory reports on time.

Search all federal, state and local salaries and vendor spending with the world’s largest government spending database at OpenTheBooks.com. 

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