• California: Teledyne Technologies has agreed to purchase Varex Imaging for roughly $1.1 billion. Varex designs and manufactures X-ray imaging components, and the acquisition will help expand Teledyne's position in the healthcare market, the companies said. According to Teledyne CEO Robert Mehrabian, both companies serve similar customers with related technologies, but their products are also uniquely complementary and have minimal overlap. "For example, while Teledyne produces X-ray detectors, we do not provide detectors suited for high-radiation environments such as oncology, as does Varex." The deal was unanimously approved by the boards of both companies and is expected to be finalized early next year, pending regulatory approval. (Hart, Wall Street Journal, 8/10)
• District of Columbia: Last month, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) released a report outlining expert-sourced suggestions on how to improve U.S. surveillance of emerging infectious diseases. The report was based on a roundtable GAO convened with the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. The roundtable included 18 experts in public health, animal health, infectious diseases, and academia, who met over three sessions in April and May 2025. The experts' suggestions focused on four categories: collaboration, data quality and infrastructure, surveillance methods, and communication. The experts called for a multisectoral, multidisciplinary leadership group to help coordinate surveillance across different agencies, the implementation of common data standards, and a coordinated communication strategy to help build public trust. According to GAO, these suggested actions provide HHS and other agencies an opportunity to evaluate potential tradeoffs and feasibility as they consider new ways to approach infectious disease surveillance. (Bean, Becker's Clinical Leadership, 8/5)
• Indiana: Eli Lilly is suing six companies for allegedly selling black market versions of its experimental GLP-1 drug retatrutide. The drug is currently in late-phase clinical trials, and no medicine containing retatrutide has been approved for human use by any regulatory agency, including FDA, Lilly said. The companies involved in the lawsuit are Aesthetic Envy, Astra Peptides, Legendary Peptides, Striker Pharmacy, Texas Peptides, and Lone Star Peptide.  According to Lilly, these companies are selling retatrutide as a weight-loss "hack" and falsely claim that the drugs are for "research-use only" when they are actually intended for human use. FDA has also said retatrutide cannot be legally compounded or sold and that selling unapproved drugs can have significant risks for patients. "Retatrutide is being rigorously studied as part of a comprehensive clinical trial development program," said David Hyman, Lilly's CMO. "We take the responsibility of evaluating the safety and efficacy of our investigational medicines seriously. What is being sold on the black market is not a medicine — it is entirely unverified, unapproved and not worth the risk." (Weixel, The Hill, 8/12)

GLP-1s have quickly become a cornerstone of obesity and metabolic care — but the real challenge isn’t whether they work, it's how the healthcare system uses them. Leaders are grappling with tough questions around hype, access, safety, cost, and long-term sustainability. In this episode, Rae Woods moderates a candid conversation with physician leaders  and explores why medication only approaches fall short, how wraparound care improves outcomes and adherence, and what it will take for GLP-1s to deliver true value for patients, employers, and payers.