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As COVID spikes again in Florida, seasonal flu rising with it

As COVID spikes again in Florida, seasonal flu rising with it

As COVID-19 keeps sending more Floridians to the hospital, the seasonal flu is catching up to it. While the number of COVID-positive patients statewide has ballooned by almost 50% over the past month, influenza hospitalizations have more than doubled. Medical staff across Florida tended to 1,504 COVID patients Friday, the U.S. Health and Human Services Department reported. That’s up from 1,020 on Nov. 9. Hospital patients with the flu, meanwhile, numbered 469 statewide, an exponential growth from 219 a month ago. [Source: Gainesville Sun]

Most migrant workers in Florida don't have health insurance

Migrant workers are essential in getting us the produce we find in our local supermarkets. Though they are essential workers, most of them are either underinsured or don’t have health insurance at all. The job of a migrant farmer can be daunting. They work long hours, oftentimes from sun up to sun down, all in an effort to feed their families and put Florida’s produce on our tables. [Source: WFTS]

Florida medical marijuana operator Trulieve faces lawsuit over employee layoffs

Workers laid off by Trulieve, Inc., the state’s largest medical-marijuana operator, have filed a potential class-action lawsuit alleging the Tallahassee-based company failed to give adequate notice before letting them go. Trulieve, which operates in nine states including Florida, laid off an unspecified number of workers over the past few weeks at facilities in North Florida, where its grow operations are based. The lawsuit alleges Trulieve failed to comply with the federal Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act, which requires advance notice before plant closings or mass layoffs. [Source: News Service of Florida]

Hospital financial decisions play a role in the shortage of pediatric beds for RSV patients

The dire shortage of pediatric hospital beds plaguing the nation this fall is a byproduct of financial decisions made by hospitals over the past decade, as they shuttered children’s wards, which often operate in the red, and expanded the number of beds available for more profitable endeavors like joint replacements and cancer care. [Source: WUSF]

Advocates prepare for legal challenge to ban on transgender medical care for kids

The DeSantis administration’s drive to deny gender-affirming care to young people in Florida has been hitting snags, including a split between two key oversight boards and publication of the wrong email address to file public comments by one of those boards. At the same time, Southern Legal Counsel, which provides legal representation in civil rights issues, along with other LGBTQ+ advocates are gearing up for a court challenge to the ban on such care if it takes effect, according to Simone Chriss, an attorney and director of the organization’s Transgender Rights Initiative. [Source: Florida Phoenix]

See also:
» Board of Osteopathic Medicine extends the comment period for a proposed trans care ban

ALSO AROUND FLORIDA:

› Orlando Health adds new hospital in Puerto Rico, helps improve health care
Orlando Health has built a brand-new hospital in Puerto Rico, which is still trying to rebuild after recent hurricanes. Doctors’ Center Hospital Orlando Health in Dorado, Puerto Rico has started a new chapter for health care in Puerto Rico. “We’re committed to making health care better in Puerto Rico,” said Dr. Luis Herrera of Orlando Health.

› Filling out medical forms can be difficult. A Tallahassee startup has an app to help.
A Tallahassee startup wants to make visits to the doctor a little easier. WellConnector is an app that replaces the paperwork patients have to fill out before visits with new doctors. Over the past year, Allison Aubuchon found herself visiting new doctor after new doctor while trying to find solutions for an ongoing health concern.

› A proton therapy center will provide advanced cancer treatment in Lee County
The land’s been scraped bare, the brick and mortar will come soon. By the start of 2025, Southwest Florida will have its first proton therapy center to fight cancer. Dr. Ari Dosoretz is the force behind Southwest Florida Proton. He started planning the project three years ago. Ali Onuralp, vice president of sales in North America for IBA, the Belgium-based company that sells the proton machines, said he was at the gym when received an unsolicited call from Dosoretz. "He had existing knowledge,” Onuralp said. “He always had this vision.”

› Distressed Boca drug firm lays off more than 200 workers
A Boca Raton pharmaceutical company that since 2008 has developed drugs for women is laying off 212 employees or almost all of its work force after reaching a licensing deal with another firm to sell its products. Financially troubled TherapeuticsMD at one point cut a deal this past summer to be acquired by another firm, but it was voted down by its shareholders. The rejection placed the company on a path that led to a management change, the raising of $7 million in funding from a private firm, and even consideration of a bankruptcy filing.