The AP (2/2, Swenson) reports HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced Monday that the agency “will devote $100 million toward a pilot program addressing homelessness and substance abuse in eight cities, building on an executive order” the President “signed last week related to addiction.” The agency “will also make faith-based organizations eligible for addiction-related grants and expand states’ ability to use federal health funding for substance abuse treatment in certain situations involving children, Kennedy said.” Kennedy also “said SAMHSA’s new pilot program will be called STREETS, or Safety Through Recovery, Engagement and Evidence-Based Treatment and Supports.” The initiatives “represent some quick momentum for” the President’s “executive order signed last Thursday launching what [he] calls the ‘Great American Recovery Initiative’ to better align federal resources on the addiction crisis.”

Related Links:

— “HHS unveils program to address homelessness and addiction, part of a set of new initiatives,”Ali Swenson , AP, February 2, 2026

USA Today (2/2, Peter) reports, “About half of the U.S. Olympians and U.S. Paralympians set to compete at the Milano Cortina Games will not be at their best mentally, according to Jonathan Finnoff, chief medical officer of the United States Olympic & Paralympic Committee (USOPC).” To support these athletes, Finnoff “said the USOPC has built ‘an incredibly robust program.’ He noted the hiring of 16 dually certified mental health and mental performance [professionals], virtual consultation services with more than 500 psychological services professionals and several ways to assess athletes for mental health needs.” The increased emphasis comes after the “Borders Commission, created by the USOPC in 2018, concluded in a 2019 report that mental health care can and must be expanded.” The USOPC “said that between the Tokyo Olympics in 2021 and the Paris Olympics in 2024, it increased the number of licensed psychologists on its staff to 15 from six.

Related Links:

— “How Team USA has evolved mental health services for Olympians,”Josh Peter, USA TODAY, February 2, 2026

Healio (1/30, Gawel) reported, “Hearing aids did not lead to any significant differences in cognitive testing among older patients with moderate hearing loss, but these devices may reduce risks for dementia, according to” research. The study “cohort included a median of 664 patients (mean age, 75.1 years; 49% women; 98% white) who received a prescription for a new hearing aid in the previous 3 years, including 402 who always or often used their hearing aid and 188 who sometimes or rarely used it, and a median of 2,113 (mean age, 74.2 years; 48% women; 99% white) who did not.” The findings were published in Neurology.

Related Links:

— “Hearing aid prescriptions yield no significant difference in cognitive test scores,”Richard Gawel, Healio, January 30, 2026

The New York Times Magazine (1/30, Jones) interviewed “more than two dozen people who have been diagnosed with dissociative identity disorder along with nearly 20 experts.” DID has been “included in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders” since 1994. It is considered “one of the most controversial diagnoses in psychiatry. For decades, some critics have argued that it is extremely rare, or that it doesn’t exist at all.” Despite skepticism, “the field of psychiatry has never had more robust scientific and clinical data about the disorder – including the ways it defies decades-old stereotypes. There are now multiple validated assessment tools for dissociative disorders, including D.I.D., as well as neuroimaging studies that show how severe dissociation manifests in the brain.” In contrast to the 1980s and 1990s, “neuroscientists now have more clues about how severe dissociation appears in the brain.”

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— The New York Times (requires login and subscription)

Reuters (1/29, Roy) reports, “More than a million fewer Americans have signed up for [ACA] plans for 2026, with enrollment dropping to about 23 million as monthly premiums for many soared due to the expiration of extra COVID-19 pandemic health insurance subsidies.” In 2025, about 24.2 million people signed up for the plans. According to data released Wednesday on CMS’ website, “nearly 3.4 million new consumers signed up for policies, while less than 19.6 million people were returning consumers.” According to KFF, the “total premium costs for subsidized [ACA] enrollees are expected to increase to an average $1,904 for 2026 from $888 in 2025.” Analysts also “said they expect the total enrollment to fall in coming months as Americans who were auto-enrolled fail to pay their premiums and are removed from coverage after three months.”

Related Links:

— “Obamacare enrollment drops to about 23 million people for 2026,”Sriparna Roy, Reuters, January 29, 2026