COVID-19

On Dec. 10, the first COVID-19 vaccine will be evaluated by a Food and Drug Administration advisory group, made of external vaccine experts. They'll say - in a public meeting - whether they think the FDA should give emergency use authorization for the vaccine developed by Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech, and why.

While advocating against “government handouts” during the coronavirus pandemic, the Idaho Freedom Foundation and a majority of its board members received more than $2 million of forgivable, government-backed loans.

The Affordable Care Act is back in the news. As the Supreme Court once again considers the Obama-era healthcare law, we wanted to check in with one of the people who helped shape the policy. Dr. Ted Epperly traveled back and forth between Boise and Washington D.C. ahead of the 2010 passage of “Obamacare.” 

Now, as the country staggers through a global pandemic, Epperly serves on the board of the Central District Health Department, which covers Ada, Elmore, Boise and Valley Counties.

Some anti-mask protestors who showed up at multiple downtown businesses this past weekend will get trespassing citations from the Boise Police Department.

States only have a few weeks left to spend federal COVID-19 relief funds, which is spurring lawmakers around the Mountain West to pass major aid deals now.

In April, Governor Brad Little authorized a 16-member coronavirus financial advisory committee to oversee $1.25 billion in federal pandemic aid provided to Idaho through the CARES Act.

By the end of the year, more people in Idaho will have access to broadband, thanks to the state’s nearly $50 million investment during the pandemic.

Our region is facing a hospitalization crisis. COVID-19 patients are flooding ICUs, adding to an already busy time of year. To tackle it effectively, hospitals and states need to work as a team. But as the Mountain West News Bureau’s Madelyn Beck explains, it’s not that simple. Madelyn joins Idaho Matters to talk more about this.

A move to partially defund Panhandle District Health by a Bonner County Commissioner fell flat Tuesday morning.

Despite a drop in confirmed COVID-19 cases across the Mountain West last week, public health officials are warning folks not to breathe a sigh of relief.

"Here [in Utah] a lot of the facilities that were doing testing were closed completely on Thanksgiving," said Utah Department of Health spokesperson Charla Haley. "I think that had a big impact on the smaller numbers of people testing positive as well as people just being tested in general."

Bonner County Commissioners will consider retaliating against the region’s public health district Tuesday morning after it implemented a five-county mask mandate last month.

Dr. Ted Epperly, President and CEO of the Family Medicine Residency of Idaho, knows quite a bit about the Affordable Care Act. In fact, he was very much a part of its foundation in 2009, when he served as President of the American Academy of Family Physicians. More than a decade later, Epperly says the ACA is more important than ever, considering the nation is grip of a pandemic.

Bogus Basin opened all 10 of its lifts this past weekend, the start of what’s sure to be a very different ski season. Conditions on the mountain will be unusual this year and it has nothing to do with snow.