The Western Divisions of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services present an event highlighting the importance of collaboration among clinicians & community members to address the opioid crisis.

During National Suicide Prevention month and week, the U.S. Health and Human Services in collaboration with the National Action Alliance for Suicide Prevention – the nation’s public-private partnership for suicide prevention – is hosting an educational media session about suicide prevention and the media.

Joe Grogan, associate director of health programs at the Office of Management and Budget, will speak at the reporter breakfast.

Americans pay more money – sometimes much more money – for prescriptions than consumers in many other wealthy countries. Why? The drivers are many and complicated. Pharmaceutical companies, employers, health care providers, patients, lawmakers, and pharmacy benefit managers all play a role. Calls to make prescriptions more affordable have prompted new efforts, including at the federal level.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases hold the annual media briefing on the upcoming flu season.

From duplicate blood tests to unnecessary knee replacements, millions of Americans – especially older adults – undergo screenings, scans and treatments that offer little or no benefit every year. Researchers have estimated that 21 percent of medical care is unnecessary – a problem that costs the health care system at least $210 billion a year. Such “overtreatment” isn’t just expensive. It often harms patients.

Hear from authors of a new report about using law and policy interventions to increase fruit and vegetable intake and learn how a large city used regulation to improve availability of staple foods, including fruits and vegetables in retail settings.