With help from Darius Tahir (@dariustahir), John Hendel (@JohnHendel) and Tim Starks (@TimStarks)

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Quick Fix

— Azar says HHS will work with Congress to keep telehealth around: The HHS secretary gave a strong indication Thursday that the department supports making telehealth a bigger part of Medicare and Medicaid.

— Senate Dems slam Trump administration testing efforts: Among other suggestions, they recommended designating a public health official whose whole job is leading diagnostic testing.

— House appropriators approve FDA spending boost: Committee members agreed on a small funding increase for the 2021 fiscal year.

eHealth tweet of the day: Adam C Lake [email protected] "I find telemedicine hard with time management. Some visits seem to take 5-10 minutes, the next I have to cut off after 40 minutes. I have trouble knowing how to schedule people given this."

It’s FRIDAY at Morning eHealth. What health and tech topics are flying under the radar? Let us know at [email protected]. Give us a shout at @ravindranize, @dariustahir, @POLITICOPro and @Morning_eHealth.

THE VACCINE RACE: The world is waiting on a coronavirus vaccine. We're tracking the global competition, the research and development, the rollout plan and how effective the vaccine will be. Check out our full coverage here.

Driving the Day

NO GOING BACK? — HHS plans to work with Congress on legislation allowing for greater telehealth coverage, Azar said during a Hill event Thursday. Authorities tied to the national and public health emergencies have allowed federal and state governments to temporarily waive payment restrictions, but those changes aren't likely to last without regulatory and statute changes.

Azar put some of the blame on Congress for the lack of broader coverage. "Telehealth is one we've wanted to do for so long, but Congress has been unable to actually change the Social Security Act to make Medicare and Medicaid amenable to telehealth," he said. "Now that's available."

... "I think we'd have a revolution if anyone tried to go backwards on this," he added. "This is now I think an embedded part of our health care system." HHS plans to "do everything we can by regulation to keep the gains that we've had to put the patient, that doctor relationship, the hospital relationship in the center."

Azar's comments follow CMS chief Seema Verma's telehealth endorsement last month. “I just can’t imagine going back because people recognize the value of this,” she said at a Stat News event. She said CMS was examining what allowances could be made permanent.

BROADBAND LAND: FCC AWARDS ALL STIMULUS TELEHEALTH CASH — FCC Chairman Ajit Pai on Wednesday announced the agency has committed all $200 million that Congress awarded as part of the March stimulus package known as the CARES Act, putting the money to use in the Covid-19 Telehealth Program aimed at helping health care providers secure internet connectivity. Final tally of grant recipients: 539.

... But some states have been left out, FCC Democratic Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel tweeted Thursday. "Three states with a rising number of cases: Alaska, Hawaii, Montana. These are also the only three states the FCC did not provide a grant to through this pandemic telehealth program. Why?" she asked.

Lobbying groups such as the American Telemedicine Association have pressed Congress to dole out more funding for the program; in April the group asked for an additional $300 million.

— What’s next: Pai told lawmakers in a letter late last month that once the program is over, the agency wants to review how the funding was spent and explore takeaways that might improve the FCC’s Connected Care Pilot Program. He added that participants are expected to report on the program’s effectiveness.

— Caveats? Democratic lawmakers had questioned how fast money was actually able to reach health care providers and noted what seemed to be a big lag time as the commission vetted grant recipients’ information. And during a Senate hearing last month, Sen. Brian Schatz(D-Hawaii) questioned the way Pai favored giving out grants to areas deemed hardest hit by the virus at the time staff considered applications.

Still, Pai told Schatz at the time “we can’t just give it out on a whim” and on Wednesday touted a victory, saying, “We have already seen the program’s positive impact on expanding access to telehealth services and promoting the well-being of patients and healthcare providers across the country.”

— Meanwhile: Democratic Commissioner Geoffrey Starks has a new event planned for July 13, titled, “Thriving While Black: The Role of the Media and Communications Technology in Addressing Black Mental Health.”

AI, 5G FEATURE IN BIDEN PROPOSAL — Democratic presidential frontrunner Joe Biden said he plans to invest in 5G wireless technology and artificial intelligence as part of a $300 billion research and development fund to stimulate the economy, John reports. Telehealth advocates have said 5G could support more virtual care.

“Credible estimates indicate that this level of investment could help create 3 million jobs or more," the campaign said in a statement. That investment would span four years and focus on “breakthrough technologies” including 5G, AI, electric vehicles and lightweight materials, according to the campaign.

NEW PRO ANALYSIS: TELEHEALTH — Pro Analysis is here to help you get up-to-speed quickly on emerging issues, understand the power dynamics of who’s involved and how the process may unfold. If you're a DataPoint subscriber, Pro Analyses are sent directly to your inbox. You can also find them on our newly improved Pro Experience.

SENATE HELP DEMS KEEP UP DATA MODERNIZATION CALL—Democrats on the Senate HELP Committee are out with a dissection of the Trump administration’s testing efforts: As you might expect, given the political environment, it’s negative. The administration, they claim, was not sufficiently attentive to coordinate efforts between various links of the supply chain.

Turning to the future, the report has a bevy of policy recommendations — among which is a familiar call for data modernization. As we’ve previously noted, a moldered data infrastructure has made it difficult to communicate test results back to patients, or keep policymakers apprised about the progress of the disease.

HOUSE APPROPRIATORS CLEAR $41 MILLION DISCRETIONARY FUNDING BOOST — The Agriculture-FDA spending bill would provide FDA $3.2 billion in discretionary funds, an increase of $41 million from current levels, our colleague Sarah Owermohle reports. Including user fees, FDA's overall funding would bump up to $5.99 billion from $5.77 billion, which is slightly smaller than the Trump administration's $6.2 billion overall request from earlier this year.

... The FDA bill will be slated for a full House vote, likely later this month. The Senate has not yet released its own version.

SHOTS FIRED OVER STALLED PRIVACY TALKS — Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, a House Republican leader in bipartisan efforts to craft new online privacy standards, said this week that her Democratic counterparts were doing “serious harm” to negotiations by stepping away from talks and introducing separate legislation, our colleague Cristiano Lima writes. The E&C ranking member took issue with Democrats' introducing a narrower online privacy bill targeting consumer data collection during the coronavirus pandemic without Republican buy-in.

... “I'm open to a targeted proposal, but the partisan process and the product has done serious harm to our bipartisan talks on a broader bill,” McMorris Rodgers said at a hearing by the Consumer Protection Subcommittee. “Frankly," she added, "partisan proposals have no chance of being signed into law. If the majority chooses to come back to the negotiation table, I know we can still pass a comprehensive bipartisan bill in the House.”

THE WRONG DIRECTION — Ransomware attacks on public sector entities like governments, schools and hospitals went a bit crazy in 2019, and were on the decline in 2020 until recently, Emsisoft said in a report out Wednesday. The company wrote that, after an early dip, “we are seeing a reversal in that trend with the number of incidents now starting to increase.” The potential cause? “This may be due to the lifting of restrictions and employees returning to the workplace or simply a normal season spike.”

NAMES IN THE NEWS — DirectTrust appointed two new members to its board of directors this week: Vince Albanese, co-founder and CEO of Haven Technologies, and Christopher Mack, executive director of strategy and business development at Sutter Health.

What We're Reading

—Walgreens Boots Alliance's $1 billion investment includes telehealth expansion, Laura Dyrda reports for Becker's.
—Mike Miliard breaks down CMS' new guidance for electronic clinical quality measurements in HealthcareITNews.