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HealthPlatform.News(letter)
January 12, 2026
In this week’s edition of health news across the states: Arizona lawmaker calls TDS a threat to stability, States to receive an average of $200M for rural healthcare, States move to restrict food assistance for sugary processed food and drink
Plus: Seth J. Karp, M.D., Vanderbilt University: Examining the future of the U.S. organ procurement and transplantation network
An Arizona lawmaker wants her state’s public health department to study Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS) and its long-term impacts. She’s bringing forth a new bill that would result in recommendations for further research or public health actions to mitigate what she calls a “public health crisis.”
Beginning this year, all 50 states will receive an average of $200 million in grants through the Rural Health Transformation Program, a $50 billion initiative established under President Donald Trump’s Working Families Tax Cuts legislation. Grants will be available to expand the rural health care workforce through recruitment training, modernize medical facilities, equipment, security, and technology, expand preventative, primary, behavioral, emergency and maternal health services, and introduce innovations such as telehealth, new partnerships, and regional collaborations.
Six states, Hawaii, Missouri, North Dakota, South Carolina, Virginia, and Tennessee, received approval from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) to ban the purchase soft drinks, candy, energy drinks and other processed food with Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits beginning in 2026.
In the system’s current state, too many people are still unnecessarily dying. As I previously testified before Congress, an efficient and accountable system can provide enough organs for every person removed from a heart, liver or lung transplant waiting list because they died or became too sick for a transplant. Such a system will dramatically decrease the time on the waiting list for a kidney transplant, eliminating suffering and saving lives. Essential and urgent reforms fit into three categories.
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