CBS News
Suspect dead after shooting at Northern California school; 2 students hurt, sheriff’s office says
PALERMO – Authorities say a suspect is dead and two students are hurt after a shooting at a school in the Northern California community of Palermo on Wednesday.
The Butte County Sheriff’s Office says the incident happened around 1 p.m. at the Feather River School of Seventh-Day Adventists.
One person was found by deputies with a self-inflicted gunshot wound, with the sheriff’s office confirming that the suspected shooter had died. Two students were also found shot; their conditions were not known at this time, the sheriff’s office says, but both have been taken to local hospitals.
The suspect has not been identified at this time. It’s also unclear if the shooting was random, the sheriff’s office says, but it doesn’t appear that the suspect had a connection to the campus.
Parents are being told to meet their children at the Oroville Church of the Nazarene at 2238 Monte Vista Avenue.
Due to the investigation, California Highway Patrol is diverting northbound traffic on Highway 70 at E. Gridley Road west to Highway 99. Southbound Highway 70 is also closed at Power House Hill Road, with traffic being diverted to Lone Tree Road.
The school serves about 35 students from kindergarten to eighth grade.
Palermo is a town about 25 miles north of Marysville and 65 miles north of Sacramento.
CBS News
Americans are paying more than ever for health insurance. Denials add to their pain.
Health insurance costs are far outpacing inflation, leaving more consumers on the hook each year for thousands of dollars in out-of-pocket expenses. At the same time, some insurers are rejecting nearly 1 in 5 claims. That double whammy is leaving Americans paying more for coverage yet sometimes feeling like they’re getting less in return, experts say.
Frustration over denials and medical costs has fueled an outpouring of vitriol against health insurance companies in the wake of the murder of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson. Also last week, a similar outcry led Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield to reverse a decision to limit anesthesia coverage during surgeries.
The anger may be rooted in fears that unexpected medical costs could prove financially ruinous, as well as concerns that essential care could be denied by an insurance company, putting health and well-being at risk even for those who have health insurance.
Some of those anxieties are well-founded: The top cause of bankruptcy in the U.S. is health care-related debt, underscoring the financial stresses that can stem from high medical costs.
In fact, most adults say they worry about their ability to pay for health care services or unexpected medical bills, a sentiment shared by people regardless of whether they’re financially comfortable or struggling, a KFF survey found earlier this year.
In 2024, the average health insurance premium for families carried a price tag of $25,572 per year, while single workers paid an average of $8,951, representing a 6% and 7% increase from the year earlier, KFF data shows. Since 2000, the rise in health insurance premiums has outpaced inflation for all but a handful of years, the health policy research firm found.
“Unhappiness with insurers stems from two things: ‘I’m sick and I’m getting hassled,’ and the second is very much cost — ‘I’m paying more than I used to, and I’m paying more than my wages went up’,” said Rob Andrews, CEO of the Health Transformation Alliance, a cooperative representing major companies such as American Express and Coca-Cola that works on improving health insurance for their employees. “A lot of people think they are getting less” from their insurers, Andrews said.
And while Americans have unhappily encountered other types of inflation in recent years — sky-high grocery prices have been credited with helping President-elect Donald Trump claim victory last month — health insurance can take on an even more personal edge, Thomas pointed out.
“It’s not like, ‘How much do I have to pay for a lawn chair or a steak,'” Andrews noted. “People are sick or having some sort of health problem they are worried about.”
To be sure, people with employer-sponsored health insurance typically don’t pay the full premium, as their employers pick up much of the tab.
Yet KFF data shows that employees’ share of their premiums are also on the rise, with a worker with family coverage typically paying premiums of $5,700 per year in 2017, the most recent year for that data, up from about $1,600 in 2000, KFF data shows. The average family deductible — the amount paid out-of-pocket before insurance kicks in — has increased from $2,500 in 2013 to $3,700 in 2023, according to KFF.
About 81% of Americans last year said they were dissatisfied with the cost of health care in the U.S, a 16-year high, Gallup polling found.
“We’ve gotten to a point where health care is so inaccessible and unaffordable, people are justified in their frustrations,” Dr. Céline Gounder, CBS News medical contributor and editor-at-large for public health at KFF Health News, told CBS Mornings on Friday.
Health insurance denials
Aside from rising health insurance costs, Americans are also expressing anger at coverage denials, which a KFF analysis of nongroup qualified health plans in 2021 found impacted almost 1 in 5 claims. However, their study found denial rates varied considerably by insurer, with some as low as 2% while others were as high as 49%.
“When you are paying for something, and then they don’t give it to you and they keep raising prices, of course you will be frustrated by that,” noted Holden Karau, a software engineer who created a free service called Fight Health Insurance to help people appeal their denials.
Karau says she came up with the app, which uses AI to craft appeal letters, after her own and her dog’s experience with insurance. Her pet insurer initially refused to pay for anesthesia for her dog’s root canal, while Karau, who is transgender, said she dealt with many appeals to get her own procedures and surgeries covered by her insurance.
More insurance companies are using AI to review claims and issue denials, which isn’t always obvious to consumers. The shift to AI-based reviews has sparked lawsuits against insurers, with UnitedHealthcare sued last year by the families of two now-deceased customers who alleged the insurer knowingly used a faulty algorithm to deny elderly patients coverage for extended care deemed necessary by their doctors.
“With AI tools on the insurance side, they have very little negative consequences for denying procedures,” Karau added. “We are seeing really high denial rates triggered by AI. And on the patient and provider side, they don’t have the tools to fight back.”
Most people may not be aware that they have the right to appeal a denial, Karau noted. The majority of people who are hit with a denial or billing errors don’t contest, a study found earlier this year. For those that do, a first appeal will be dealt with by the insurer, but if that in-house appeal is also denied, you have the right to ask for an independent reviewer to look at your claim, according to the National Association of Insurance Commissioners.
“There are multiple levels of appeal, and in my experience, I would say it’s important to appeal until you at least get to an independent reviewer,” Karau said. “If you don’t appeal, you won’t get the care you need.”
CBS News
dStill need to buy a Christmas tree? Here’s the good news.
If you have yet to buy a Christmas tree this year, take cheer — prices are roughly the same as in 2023.
Growers weren’t expecting to raise wholesale prices, according to an annual survey by the Real Christmas Tree Board, based in Howell, Michigan, and sponsored by annual fees paid by growers and importers.
“It’s similar to last year. From what we’re hearing, wholesalers are holding their prices,” Jill Sidebottom, a spokesperson for the National Christmas Tree Association, a trade group that advocates for the tree industry, told CBS MoneyWatch.
The median price of a Christmas tree came to $75 in 2023, down from $80 in 2022.
“Since COVID, demand thankfully has been very high, and we appreciate that families are still putting up a real tree. The alternative is plastic, and that’s not good for the environment,” Lisa Angevine-Bergs, owner of the Angevine Farm in Warren, Connecticut, and executive director of the Connecticut Christmas Tree Growers told CBS MoneyWatch.
“It’s more expensive the closer to the city you get,” she said.
Christmas tree prices have risen over the last 15 years as supplies fell.
“The original tight supply goes back to 2008, when there was an oversupply and growers stopped planting as many,” said Sidebottom, noting that it takes up to a decade to grow a tree. Extreme weather, including a 2021 heat dome, also killed a lot of trees in the Pacific Northwest, she added.
Christmas trees are grown in every U.S. state, with Oregon, North Carolina and Michigan producing the most. Trees are also imported from Canada, with tree types including the Douglas fir imported from British Columbia.
Drought conditions hit parts of the country in recent months, resulting in wildfires in parts of the East Coast and potentially sleepless nights for tree farmers, given roots that were not properly hydrated in the fall may not make it.
“We were very worried that it would impact the trees for this year. Thankfully we have not seen any issues,” Angevine-Bergs said. “We started cutting some trees early just to see, and in November we began realizing this year’s trees are not going to be affected — taller trees have deeper roots.”
The roughly 8-foot tree now standard for the Christmas holiday typically takes about eight years to grow, with a white pine, for instance, growing quickly and white fir and spruce trees taking longer.
“There’s about a foot of growth a year, so you’re sitting on your money a long time,” Sidebottom said of the investment made by growers as they wait for their seedlings to sprout and flourish into mature trees.
Just like the holiday shopping season, Americans have moved up the timing as to when they purchase Christmas trees. Last year, a third of Americans bought their Christmas trees during the week after Thanksgiving and another 33% made the purchase during the first week of December, according to a poll of 1,499 adults taken in August and September last year.
Another 16% bought their tree in the second week of December; 14% claimed a tree before Thanksgiving; 3% in the third week of December and only 1% on Christmas Eve, the survey found.
“The trend now is earlier, even before Thanksgiving,” Angevine-Bergs said.
In decades past, “We never sold trees before Thanksgiving,” said Angevine-Berg of her roughly 50 acre farm, in the family for 156 years and selling Christmas trees since 1960. “As a child, we were always busy on Christmas Eve, and now you wouldn’t necessarily be open. A lot of farms are selling out earlier, and there are a lot of farms that are already sold out and closed.”
CBS News
Pete Hegseth returns to Capitol Hill to build support as Trump’s defense secretary
Washington — Pete Hegseth, President-elect Donald Trump’s choice to lead the Defense Department, returned to Capitol Hill on Monday as he tries to solidify support among Senate Republicans as he faces allegations of sexual misconduct, financial mismanagement of veterans’ charities and excessive drinking.
Hegseth met with at least two Republican senators on Monday who had expressed concern about the allegations. In statements after the meetings, both Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa and Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina appeared more comfortable with Trump’s pick.
“As I support Pete through this process, I look forward to a fair hearing based on truth, not anonymous sources,” Ernst said.
Graham shared a similar sentiment about those anonymously making accusations involving the former Fox News personality’s conduct.
“The accusations being made regarding financial management of veterans service organizations and personal misconduct should only be considered by the committee if they are supported by testimony before Congress — not anonymous sources,” he said.
Hegseth has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing.
Amid the reports on his alleged conduct, several Republican senators said they found the allegations “disturbing,” including Graham.
Before meeting with Hegseth on Monday, Ernst said she needed to hear more from him on his stance about women in combat and sexual assault in the military before she decided whether to back him. Ernst is a survivor of sexual assault and a military veteran.
She said Monday she had received assurances from Hegseth about how both will be handled if he leads the Pentagon.
“I appreciate Pete Hegseth’s responsiveness and respect for the process. Following our encouraging conversations, Pete committed to completing a full audit of the Pentagon and selecting a senior official who will uphold the roles and value of our servicemen and women — based on quality and standards, not quotas — and who will prioritize and strengthen my work to prevent sexual assault within the ranks,” her statement said.