Supremes Decline State’s Appeal In Benton Harbor Drinking Water Lawsuits
Lawsuits against the Department of Environment, Great Lakes & Energy (EGLE) arising out of elevated lead levels in Benton Harbor water stand after the Michigan Supreme Court declined to hear the state’s appeal.
Justice Brian Zahra would have granted the appeal, but he didn’t explain why in the court’s order.
In a January per curiam opinion, the Michigan Court of Appeals panel held the Court of Claims “properly concluded” that the state’s evidence didn’t eliminate factual questions arising from residents’ claims.
Separate lawsuits – led by Jennifer Janssen-Rogers, Daretha Braziel and Oliver Kavanaugh – argued, in part, that the city violated residents’ rights to bodily integrity by not doing enough to protect residents and failed to warn them about the toxicity of the drinking water.
The state has argued that area residents were aware of lead in the drinking water in October 2018 when the city distributed a public advisory letter with information, including advising users to “reduce your risk of lead exposure” by running the water to stable, cold temperatures and using bottled water to prepare baby formula.
“How can it be that the government deliberately hid lead contamination from the people of Benton Harbor if it spent three years repeatedly notifying the city’s residents about the lead contamination?” the state’s opening appeal brief reads.
The plaintiffs encouraged the state’s high court to deny EGLE’s application to appeal “because it is based on nothing more than the defendants’ dissatisfaction at being denied an early exit.”
Meanwhile, a federal court granted preliminary approval in January to a proposed $25 million settlement in Braziel’s class-action lawsuit. A hearing to determine if final approval will be given is set for June 17.
Firefighters Have Low Levels PFAS In Their Systems
More than 1,000 Michigan firefighters who participated in a statewide study were found to have widespread exposure to so-called “forever chemicals,” although many of the chemical concentrations detected in their blood were similar to or lower than levels found in the general U.S. population, according to a new report from the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services (MDHHS).
The report, released this month through the department’s PFAS in Firefighters of Michigan Surveillance (PFOMS) project, examined blood samples from 1,023 firefighters from 64 municipal and airport fire departments between 2021 and 2023. Researchers tested for 39 types of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), chemicals commonly linked to firefighting foam, waterproof protective gear and other industrial products.
Researchers found PFAS compounds such as PFOS, PFOA and PFHxS in more than 95% of firefighters tested. Some compounds, including PFOS and a branched version of PFOS, were found at slightly higher average concentrations than in the broader U.S. population measured through the federal National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey.
At the same time, the study found Michigan firefighters generally had lower overall PFAS blood concentrations than firefighters examined in similar studies conducted elsewhere in the United States and internationally.
“Historically, firefighters have been at an increased risk of PFAS exposure due to the nature of their work,” Michigan Chief Medical Executive Dr. Natasha Bagdasarian said in a statement accompanying the report. “The findings of this report provide valuable insights into PFAS exposure among Michigan firefighters and will help us better understand firefighters’ exposure to PFAS.”
The report noted airport firefighters had significantly higher concentrations of many PFAS compounds than firefighters working at non-airport departments, likely due to more frequent exposure to firefighting foams used in fuel fires. Urban firefighters also showed somewhat higher concentrations of certain PFAS chemicals than non-urban firefighters.
Researchers also collected drinking water samples from selected fire stations, but concluded station water supplies were not a significant source of PFAS exposure for participants. Instead, the report pointed toward firefighting foam, turnout gear and station dust as more likely contributors.
The PFOMS project was launched by MDHHS to better understand occupational exposure risks among firefighters and help guide future safety recommendations. Firefighters participating in the study completed surveys about workplace habits and provided blood samples for testing.
The report emphasized that the study was not designed to determine whether firefighters would develop health problems tied to PFAS exposure. However, the findings will be used to help departments reduce future exposure risks, including recommendations involving the use of PFAS-containing firefighting foam, cleaning protective equipment and following decontamination procedures after fire responses.
Planned Parenthood Asks Governor For $5M
Planned Parenthood of Michigan (PPMI) asked Gov. Gretchen WHITMER for a one-time $5 million allocation they describe as “stabilization to preserve existing patient care infrastructure.”
Whitmer’s office has said the response to PPMI’s request has to come from the Legislature, not her.
“We urge the governor to pursue every pathway,” Paula Thornton Greear, president and CEO of PPMI and Planned Parenthood Advocates of Michigan, said today during a media call. “Michigan patients are not a football to be tossed around from branch to branch. These are real people. …
“Gov. Whitmer needs to take responsibility and to drive a solution forward,” Greear added.
In an open letter to the governor, PPMI said it is “facing a critical funding gap that we cannot bridge alone” because of an influx of changes to Medicaid and Title X dollars.
Greear said that if the funding isn’t received, it will mean operational changes, including closing health centers and stopping programs and services.
PPMI’s letter blames the situation on the Trump administration, his conservative allies in Congress and “anti-abortion judges.”
Legislative efforts for an appropriation, the letter noted, are nearly impossible because the Republican-led House is “loyal to the president and his politics,” and any cooperation with PPMI’s requests is unlikely.
PPMI’s letter also noted that other states have faced a similar situation.
In Maine, Gov. Janet Mills committed more than $13 million to sustain reproductive health providers, and Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker directed existing state resources to fill the gap, according to PPMI’s letter.
House Says Medicaid Should Go Generic First
Medicaid may be prohibited from covering brand-name drugs or biological drug products if an equivalent generic drug or interchangeable biological drug product is available, under legislation the House passed, 63-43, today.
HB 4839 , sponsored by Rep. Sarah Lightner (R-Springport), would amend the Social Welfare Act to require Medicaid coverage to default to the lower-cost generic or interchangeable biological option. The exception would apply when the prescriber writes “dispense as written,” “d.a.w.” or “to be dispensed as communicated” on the prescription, under existing Public Health Code language.
The House Fiscal Agency (HFA) estimated the proposal could generate “moderate to significant” state Medicaid savings, ranging from $50 million to $100 million gross, or $12.5 million to $25 million in General Fund savings. HFA noted, however, that pharmaceutical costs and rebates are volatile and can lag, making an exact savings estimate difficult.
The analysis said Michigan’s Medicaid pharmaceutical benefit totals more than $4.1 billion gross in payments, while receiving more than $2.4 billion in pharmacy rebates, leaving net Medicaid pharmaceutical costs above $1.5 billion gross.
Supporters framed the bill as a cost-saving measure for the Medicaid program, while still leaving room for physicians to request a brand-name drug when they believe it is medically necessary.
Rep. Alabas Farhat (D-Dearborn) was among the members who opposed the bill.
“Families across our state are struggling with the crippling costs of health care,” Farhat said. “And right now, 25% rely on Medicaid as their primary insurance. Complicating their coverage and interfering between the patient and doctor relationship is not the place of state government. We should be looking at ways to let doctors continue practicing medicine and delivering the best outcome for their patients.”
As far as the budgetary savings, he said that “we cannot compromise on ensuring our residents get the health care they deserve.”
The legislation now heads to the Senate.
Senate Panel Picks Up Ongoing Debate Around Copay Coupons For Drugs
A Senate committee is revisiting legislation that would ban insurers from using “copay adjustment programs,” a practice critics say prevents drug discount assistance from lowering patients’ actual health care costs.
Reform to prohibit “copay adjustment programs” was spearheaded last term by Rep. Carrie Rheingans (D-Ann Arbor), who spent more than eight years working at a health policy center that conducted research and surveys for consumers, physicians and hospitals in Washtenaw County.
But Rheingans’ legislation was left behind in the final days of the Democratic trifecta in 2024. Now a new bill, SB 914 , sponsored by term-limited Sen. Stephanie Chang (D-Detroit), received more than 40 minutes of testimony today in front of the Senate Finance, Insurance and Consumer Protection Committee..
Chang told the committee that when an insurer uses copay accumulators, financial assistance from a drug manufacturer is no longer applied to a patient’s deductible or out-of-pocket expense maximum. Some of the discounts are provided in the form of “copay cards” from a drugmaker.
“When the value of the card runs out, you become fully responsible for the deductible and maximum out-of-pocket cost. In other words, rather than the discount for the drug that the manufacturer intended, the copay assistance becomes simply a delay on a full payment,” Chang said. “Which, in the long run, is not the help that cancer patients and others need.”
One of the testifiers was Ken Martin of the Hemophilia Foundation of Michigan, representing residents with bleeding disorders.
Martin described representing individuals whose blood is unable to clot properly, experiencing internal bleeding caused by trauma, activity or sometimes happening spontaneously. He said a hemorrhage in an elbow or a knee can lead to arthritis and eventually a permanent disability.
Although treatment and care had advanced significantly over time, Martin said the newer treatments come at an enormous cost.
“When I fill my first of the year 30-day prescription, I owe my entire out-of-pocket maximum,” Martin said. “I have worked over the past 40 years, and I have lost jobs, not taken jobs and have been discriminated (against) by employers because of insurance costs.”
He described asking his last employer if their sponsored insurance plan had accumulators. When he asked them if he’d be responsible for all out-of-pocket costs, when they confirmed there were accumulators, “they said ‘Yes, that’s only fair.'”
Opposed to the legislation, however, were groups like Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan, the Detroit Regional Chamber, Meridian Health Plan, the Upper Peninsula Health Plan and the Michigan Association of Health Plans (MAHP).
Christine Shearer, the MAHP’s deputy director of legislation and advocacy, said that the coupons later come with higher costs, hidden trade-offs and “the system working against them and instead of for them” as part of a bigger scheme.
“Prescription drug costs are exploding today. They account for over 24% of the total health care spend, up from 6% in 2006,” Shearer said. “That’s not sustainable, and it’s not an accident. Copay coupons are a classic bait-and-switch. They are designed to steer a patient towards higher-cost, brand-name drugs even when there are equally effective, lower-cost alternatives available.”
She added that the coupons don’t last, with the programs often being time-limited, “sometimes for just one fill,” and target specific types of patients.
Meanwhile, the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network brought up Stacey Goins, a Metro Detroit resident who was diagnosed with cancer in December 2022. Her high-deductible health plan featured an $8,150 out-of-pocket maximum – the most she would have to pay annually ahead of insurance coverage kicking in for certain services – which she continues to pay medical bills on through 2023.
She said there were no generic drug options for the aggressive cancer she was diagnosed with. Wanting to make her out-of-pocket maximum as small as possible, she removed her son from her coverage in 2024 as he was graduating from college.
“I made the difficult decision to put my entire two paychecks from January into my health savings account because that was my insurance. This caused me to fall behind on other bills. When I refilled my prescription, they stated, ‘hey, there’s a copay assistance card to cover my out-of-pocket share of it.’ Initially it did,” Goins said.
At first, Goins was beginning to feel capable of catching up on her bills, with the assistance’s $2,500 applied to her deductible. However, as she felt the weight coming off of her, Goins said her insurer said an error occurred, and that the $8,353 the assistance paid out would not touch her out-of-pocket costs.
In January 2025, Goins cashed out 80 hours of vacation time at work, and went half a month without a paycheck in order to put the most she could into a health savings account.
“Most cancer patients will eliminate most savings they have within three years. This is how it happens,” Goins said.
El-Sayed Wants To ‘Ban The Middleman’ In Drug Pricing
U.S. Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed unveiled a new policy proposal today aimed at eliminating pharmacy benefit managers (PBM), the prescription drug middlemen he argues are driving up costs for patients.
El-Sayed’s “Ban the Middleman Act” would end the PBM industry and replace it with a public, nonprofit pharmacy benefit administrator designed to make prescription drug pricing more transparent and patient-centered.
“For too long, PBMs have inserted themselves between patients and the medications they need to survive, operating behind the scenes in an already complicated system to drive up costs,” El-Sayed said.
His campaign pointed to a 2025 Federal Trade Commission report that found markups on generic drugs generated more than $7.3 billion in excess revenue between 2017 and 2022, while patient and employer drug payments continued to increase.
The proposal includes seven reforms, including expanding federal drug price negotiations, guaranteeing access to affordable generics, putting medical experts in charge of drug decisions, protecting pharmacies and supporting pharmacies harmed by PBM practices.
Drugmakers Ask Supreme Court To Restore Mail Access To Abortion Pill
Drugmakers asked the U.S. Supreme Court on Saturday to temporarily allow patients to continue to access mifepristone, a commonly used abortion pill, through the mail.
Justice Samuel Alito Jr. granted that stay until 5 p.m. May 11, and he ordered a response to Danco Laboratories and GenBioPro‘s emergency appeals be filed by 5 p.m. Thursday.
The drug manufacturers’ appeals came after a three-judge panel of the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals blocked a ruling Friday allowing mailing of mifepristone.
“This decision is another dangerous, partisan attempt to erode reproductive freedom,” said Gov. Gretchen Whitmer in a statement late Friday.
“Mifepristone has been approved by the FDA and safely used for decades. Banning it in this way is based on politics, not science,” she added. “It’s clear that extremists have no intention of stopping at Roe (v. Wade).”
The U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe in 2022, holding the U.S. Constitution did not “confer a right to abortion.”.
Twenty-one states, including Michigan as well as the District of Columbia and Pennsylvania’s governor, submitted a brief supporting the drug manufacturers’ requests to stay the lower court’s ruling.
The Fifth Circuit panel acknowledged that the stay of the rule “would, as a practical matter, have a nationwide effect.”
On Friday, the three-judge appeals panel, all Republican appointees, blocked a Louisiana rule allowing mailing of mifepristone, holding the 2023 rule “injures Louisiana by undermining its laws protecting unborn human life and also by causing it to spend Medicaid funds on emergency care for women harmed by mifepristone.”
Research as of 2017 showed that medication abortion is the preferred method for terminating a pregnancy.
Attorney General Dana Nessel said that mifepristone has been prescribed more than 5.5 million times and has been used by women for more than 20 years “with exceedingly low rates of any adverse effects and zero documented deaths.”
She added: “As hospitals and doctors’ offices continue to close across the state, especially in our rural counties, access to health care is becoming more and more difficult for Michigan residents, which is why Michigan enacted laws in 2020 that increased access to telehealth and Gov. Whitmer, in 2022, issued an executive order ensuring maternity care was protected through telehealth appointments.”
In 2021, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, the FDA stopped requiring in-person medical appointments prior to a doctor prescribing mifepristone.
The state of Louisiana filed its lawsuit against the FDA in 2025, seeking reinstatement of the in-person dispensing requirement. The state argued, in part, that allowing its residents to receive the abortion drug via mail violated the state’s abortion laws, which essentially bar all abortions, with very narrow exceptions including saving the mother’s life.
The states, including Michigan, argue that medication abortion is a safe and effective method to terminate a pregnancy, and the Fifth Circuit’s ruling interferes with states’ sovereign authority to promote access to reproductive health care for their residents.
Tick, Mosquito Diseases A Risk After Floods
As the insects start to emerge in spring, the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) and the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development (MDARD) are asking people to watch out for diseases from ticks and mosquitoes, especially during flood cleanup.
Diseases like Lyme disease, West Nile Virus, Eastern Equine Encephalitis and Jamestown Canyon virus have been found in various places around the state; flooding and excess rain make for fertile breeding grounds for mosquitoes and brush piles can harbor ticks.
“Use insect repellent and wear long-sleeved shirts and long pants when outdoors to help prevent bites. If you find a tick attached to your body, promptly remove it, monitor your health and consult with a medical provider if you become ill,” said DHHS Chief Medical Executive Dr. Natasha Bagdasarian.
Viruses carried by mosquitoes are transmitted by the bite after feeding on an infected animal. Symptoms can happen between two to 14 days after the bite, and vary depending on the disease, but can include high fever, confusion and severe headache. Some can lead to meningitis and encephalitis.
Diseases carried by ticks typically start one to two weeks after the bite and can include fever, rash, headache, fatigue or muscle ache.
MDARD State Veterinarian Dr. Nora Wineland said both humans and animals can be affected.
“Livestock and pet owners should check their properties for pooled water and take action to empty those pools, use veterinarian-recommended preventatives like insect repellents and monitor animals for any signs of illness,” Wineland said.
She said elimination of insect habitat is the best defense against both mosquitoes and ticks, making sure to keep lawns and pastures mowed and trimming tall grasses and brush around homes and barns or sheds.
Wineland said to check for ticks after coming inside from outdoors and make sure to talk to a veterinarian about tick prevention on animals.
“Taking a few simple steps now can go a long way in keeping Michigan’s animals healthy and protected,” she said.