Erin Brodwin
@erinbrodwin.bsky.social
Health tech reporter @Axios. Send tips on Signal: @erin.14 or via email at erinbecca@proton.me. She/they
interesting. it was reported today that Neuralink raised $600m, a tad over the $500m is was rumored to be raising back in April, but the story doesn't name the investors. anyone know who's involved here? www.semafor.com/article/05/2...
Elon Musk’s Neuralink raises fresh cash at $9B valuation
The company, which implants experimental brain chips to help paralyzed patients, raised $600 million from private investors, people familiar with the matter said.
semafor.com
excited to announce I'll officially be spending more time diving deep into the stories shaping the future of healthtech. tldr: my purview's no longer limited to stories w/ a deal element. (but keep deal news coming!) if you're building, investing in, analyzing, or advising in this space, let's talk!
scoop: Next Life Sciences is looking to raise $20M to further develop male contraceptive product Plan A. the San Luis Obispo company is courting investors and hopes to close the round by this June to power early feasibility trials in Australia and Canada and to prep for a 2027 U.S. FDA submission.
Exclusive: Male birth control maker raising $20M to develop "Plan A"
Next Life Sciences is based in San Luis Obispo, California.
axios.com
this headline appears to suggest the other VC firms aren't *already* in Washington... www.politico.com/newsletters/...
General Catalyst goes to Washington
politico.com
Exclusive: Navajo Code Talkers disappear from military websites after Trump DEI order
Navajo Code Talkers get "DEI" label as military info disappears under Trump order
Also vanishing: The Civil War regiment from "Glory," women pilots from WWII and a Medal of Honor winner.
axios.com
I've gotten a lot of good feedback about this story — if there's more to share, pls contact me on Signal at @erin.14 or via email at erinbecca@proton.me.
Erin Brodwin@erinbrodwin.bsky.social · last yr.calling all San Diegans: Join me this Friday at 9am for an event about the challenges in today’s pain treatment landscape and the current state of pain, featuring Stanford University’s Beth Darnall. what smart Qs should I ask her? theprognosisforamericaspainmanagement.splashthat.com/newsletters
Axios' The Prognosis for America’s Pain Management
Join Axios for an event in San Diego, convening thought leaders and medical experts for conversations about the challenges in today’s treatment landscape and the current state of pain.
theprognosisforamericaspainmanagement.splashthat.com
Board member of Meta hugs it out with Andrew Tate, well known heinous person www.washingtonpost.com/entertainmen...
Andrew Tate receives warm welcome from UFC’s Dana White at weekend events
The Tate brothers — who are under criminal investigation in Florida and charged with human trafficking in Romania — attended UFC 313 and Power Slap 12 events.
washingtonpost.com
Francis Collins, the NIH Director for 12 years, led the Human Genome Project and other NIH efforts for 32 years, resigned today. Key words from his resignation letter www.nytimes.com/2025/03/01/u...
Yesterday I caught Pfizer making some telling changes to their DEI page. @elaineywchen.bsky.social tried to get the company to explain, but they only gave her a generic statement. Judge for yourself, we’ve got all the edits here, annotated: www.statnews.com/2025/02/27/p...
The first measles death in the US in a decade -- the tragic, preventable death of a child whose parents chose not to protect them with vaccination -- should spark an immediate nation-wide campaign to ensure all children are protected against preventable diseases. Anything less is unconscionable.
Breaking: FDA's March meeting to select flu shot strains for 2025-2026 season has been canceled per email sent to committee members, a VRBPAC member told me. drug companies need about 6 months leeway to make shots in time for fall vax campaigns. #healthpolicy
My colleagues and I have been working to break news + write stories holding powerful people accountable. These are the top stories on our homepage right now, one of which I worked on. Our newsroom work is continuing. No one has ever told me what to write. If that changes, I’d speak out and leave.
Important! Fantastic story by @claudia-lopez.bsky.social www.thetransmitter.org/policy/exclu...
Exclusive: NIH appears to archive policy requiring female animals in studies
Such a shift would “put us back in the dark ages in terms of our science,” says neuroscientist Anne Murphy, who helped to formulate the original policy.
thetransmitter.org
I heard a ski instructor tell a little kid on a ski lift recently "it's not win-lose. it's win-learn." and I think I'm just going to have to accept that as my slogan for 2025
Talkspace, which NYC paid $26M to provide free online therapy to teens, was leaking data about who visited the website to TikTok, Meta, Snap, and other social media companies that the city is currently suing for harming teen mental health. gizmodo.com/teen-mental-...
Teen Mental Health App Sent Kids' Data Straight to TikTok
The company removed tracking tools from its teen-focused websites in New York, Seattle, and Baltimore after parents complained.
gizmodo.com
Excellent piece from PLOS co-founder and Nobel laureate, Harold Varmus: "If the attacks on our scientists and their institutions are allowed to continue, our envisioned future of longer, healthier lives will happen more slowly, in other countries, or not at all." www.nytimes.com/2025/02/14/o...
Opinion | American Science is Under Attack (Gift Article)
The Trump administration hobbles research and endangers the public health.
nytimes.com
important note for anyone interested in healthcare: FDA cleared *does not* mean FDA approved. FDA clearance can simply mean the agency is allowing you to advertise and sell your product. in many cases, it simply means a product is "substantially equivalent" to other cleared products.
“This is a parallel overlaying of authority over the entire structure of the U.S. government.“
ryan cooper@ryanlcooper.com · 2y agofeels similar to how the Soviet dictatorship was set up. the nominal presidency is quickly becoming meaningless, while dictatorial power accumulates at DOGE by planting commissars in every agency talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/not-h...
Scoop: With its unprecedented hospital deal officially closed, General Catalyst is setting up shop in Ohio. www.axios.com/pro/health-t...
Scoop: General Catalyst, now a hospital owner, is setting up shop in Ohio
The moves mark the beginning of the firm's work using Summa Health as a test bed for its tech tools.
axios.com
new: racing to combat burnout, health systems are flocking to technology at an unprecedented pace as they test and trial AI medical scribes. with investors flooding the zone, the landscape is primed for a massive shakeout. www.axios.com/pro/health-t...
Health systems see scribes as the real AI revolution
Notoriously technophobic hospitals are jumping to adopt tools from Big Tech companies and Silicon Valley startups alike.
axios.com
DATA! 📊 Health care policy analyst @charlesgaba.com has downloaded the entire CDC site. Access it below.
Charles Gaba ✡️@charlesgaba.com · 2y ago📣 UPDATE: OK, still working with some others to figure out the best way to present it all, but in the meantime here's the first batch of links to the most-recent archived versions of every page at the CDC prior to the Trump/Musk Purge: acasignups.net/25/02/02/whi...
figure this is as good a time as any to say: I write investigations and deep dives focused on businesses in the digital health sector. please send tips to erinbecca@proton.me or send me a direct message and I'll give you my Signal number. both platforms are encrypted for privacy purposes.
You know how the Trump admin blocked publication of the CDC's weekly morbidity and mortality report, which until now had been released every single week since 1952? Turns out last week's report would have included 2 important new studies on bird flu transmission. kffhealthnews.org/news/article...
Trump Administration’s Halt of CDC’s Weekly Scientific Report Stalls Bird Flu Studies - KFF Health News
An unprecedented freeze on the agency’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report sparks new concerns about political meddling in science.
kffhealthnews.org
New: RFK Jr says he’ll amend his ethics form after questions about his financial stake in HPV vaccine litigation RFK Jr had denied a possible conflict of interest when pressed by @warren.senate.gov at confirmation hearing this week Warren now says it’s grounds to delay the nomination
From a journalist friend: Just spreading the word. The CDC is purging data, so people should archive their favorite CDC datasets today, namely ones around race/ethnic diversity, LGBTQ, and reproductive health. Also health data involving climate. The youth risk behavior survey has already gone down.
The CDC has shuttered its webpages for supporting LGBTQ+ youth in schools, Health Disparities Among LGBTQ Youth, and Creating Safe Schools for LGBTQ+ Youth www.cdc.gov/healthy-yout... www.cdc.gov/healthy-yout... www.cdc.gov/youth-safe-e...
Nsikan Akpan@monscience.bsky.social · 2y agoThis CDC webpage for the youth risk behavior survey remains down. Its corresponding data repository shows that last night its "gender field was changed to "sex" ... h/t @akrugman.bsky.social data.cdc.gov/Survey-Data/...
