This Sunday’s Super Bowl will be punctuated by dozens of ads featuring everything from adorable puppies to kids in Star Wars outfits. But one commercial you won’t see is a provocative ad by the carbonated beverage company SodaStream — an Israeli company that is no stranger to controversy — that takes on soda giants Coca Cola and Pepsi.

That’s because the ad has been pulled after pressure from the mammoth corporations led Super Bowl host CBS to take it down from its programming. Reportedly, Coke and Pepsi were upset with the commercials’ implied criticism of the soda industry’s use of plastic bottles and the subsequent harmful effects on the environment:

CBS rejected the ad, reportedly because of its direct assault on the big two carbonated-beverage makers (CBS didn’t return calls for comment). As the music from the movie Deliverance trills, deliverymen from Coke and Pepsi show up at a supermarket and rush to deliver their products. But the bottles pop and disappear, creating a mess. The ad then pans to a shot of a guy using SodaStream. The implication is that SodaStream will make bottled sodas irrelevant. [...]

Like many upstarts, SodaStream has taken an in-your-face, hyperbolic approach to marketing. The company doesn’t just suggest that SodaStream is a money-saving artisanal device. Rather, it suggests that some of the world’s popular brands (and biggest advertisers) are effectively evil forces. Why? They promote the production of polluting bottles and cans.

“SodaStream empowers consumers to make their own fresh soda at home in seconds, without the devastating environmental impact of plastic soda bottles and cans, which litter our parks and oceans,” said Daniel Birnbaum, the chief executive officer of SodaStream International, in a statement. “Our ad confronts the beverage industry and its arguably out-dated business model by showing people that there exists a smarter way to enjoy soft drinks. One day we will look back on plastic soda bottles the way we now view cigarettes; as a dangerous vice, not as an easily-accepted feature of everyday life.”

Watch the ad here:

Americans throw away enough trash every year to cover the state of Texas — twice. And this isn’t the first time that beverage giants have found themselves in hot water over public health issues. Just last month, Coca Cola launched a deceptive new ad campaign attempting to mask the harmful effects of calorie-laden sodas on America’s obesity and diabetes epidemics.

The U.S. Agriculture Department proposed the first broad standards for healthier school snacks on Friday. Under the rule, required by the Healthy Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010, most candy, sugar-filled sports drinks, and greasy foods would not be sold in school vending machines. Instead, they can offer snacks under 200 calories and low-calorie drinks.

Data supports a ban on unhealthy snacks in vending machines, showing that state regulations may have helped slow childhood obesity rates. However, the ban will not apply to food sold at after-school events or affect what kids bring in for lunch.

If passed, the proposal could go into effect as soon as 2014. First, it faces a 60 day comment period from proponents and critics. Taking backlash from Republican critics over its healthy school lunch rule, USDA modified standards in December to allow unlimited calories from meats and grains.

Texas officials were so insistent on defunding Planned Parenthood, they dismantled the state’s federally-funded Women’s Health Program — a network of doctors that provide care for low-income women — so they could relaunch a new program excluding the national organization. But targeting Planned Parenthood comes at a steep price for the women seeking preventative care in Texas. Even though the state initially claimed their new program would have 3,500 participating providers for women to choose from, that list has now shrunk by nearly 1,000, leaving women in the state with even fewer options for their doctors.

Texas relaunched its state-run Women’s Health Program at the beginning of January. Even though the state has always maintained its new program will be able to meet the same demand as the old one did, that hasn’t proven to be the case so far. The first list of providers the state provided was inaccurate and confusing. And now that the state has released a revised list, the Texas Tribune reports it’s significantly smaller than promised:

The Texas WHP replaced the federal Medicaid WHP on Jan. 1. The program’s Affiliate Ban Rule, which prohibits providers associated with abortion clinics from participation, forced the exclusion of 50 Planned Parenthood clinics that participated in the former Medicaid program. Without Planned Parenthood, women’s health advocates have argued that the state will not be able to adequately serve low-income women enrolled in the program.

The HHSC had previously stated that the Texas WHP had 3,500 participating providers, roughly 1,000 more than the number of providers that participated in the former Medicaid WHP. That list has shrunk to 2,448 doctors and clinics, as 965 providers said they would not accept WHP patients, despite being certified for the program. The contact information for 700 other providers has also been updated on the state’s website.

From the beginning of Texas’ crusade against Planned Parenthood, there have been questions about the state’s ability to effectively relaunch its health program without federal funding. Last year, Gov. Rick Perry (R) convened a smoke-and-mirrors press conference to announce that the new Women’s Health Program was ready to go — even though it wasn’t.

Up to 50,000 women are being forced to search for new doctors this year now that they can no longer get their care at Planned Parenthood. To keep up with the increased demand from new patients, other providers in the Women’s Health Program may be forced to take up to five times the number of their usual Medicaid patients.

According to a just-released study by the Commonwealth Fund and Georgetown University, most states are woefully behind in implementing even the most basic Obamacare consumer protections.

The report finds that “only 11 states and the District of Columbia have passed rules needed to implement the law.” That means the other 39 states — which constitute an overwhelming majority of the American population — find themselves playing catch-up when it comes to enacting Obamacare’s core regulations, including provisions that prevent insurance companies from denying coverage to Americans with pre-existing conditions and charging outsized premiums to elderly Americans.

It isn’t all bad news, as the study focuses on individual state efforts to change their insurance regulation rules — the federal government can still step in to enforce the measures in lieu of state action. And state insurance regulators that notice “problems in those areas – either through a review of insurer filings or through complaints from consumers – could contact insurers directly and ask that they fix the problems, or could notify the federal government, which can seek penalties against insurers that violate the health law.”

Still, the report’s findings illustrate the complexity of implementing the massive health care overhaul, which leaves a considerable amount of deference to unpredictable state governments. So far, as many as 30 GOP-led states have refused to implement Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion to help low-income Americans, and about half of U.S. states have refused to establish their own insurance marketplaces. And with 2014 fast approaching — and with it, full Obamacare implementation — many Americans may find their states unprepared for the impending changes.

The Obama administration has released new regulations that help clarify which religious groups and organizations can opt out of providing birth control, as required under the Affordable Care Act, exempting most religiously affiliated groups from the requirement while ensuring that women will continue to receive birth control at no cost.

The law specifies that employers and insurers must provide a wide array of women’s health benefits, including contraception without additional co-pays. Houses of worship are exempt from the requirement. Nonprofit religiously affiliated organizations can also refuse to offer birth control coverage, though their employees may obtain contraception coverage that is part of their insurance plans directly from the insurer without additional cost to them or the companies.

The new rules make small changes to this agreement.

First, the federal government will apply the Internal Revenue Services’ definition for religious organization, which is slightly broader than how the term had been defined. Here is a comparison:

This change also clarifies that “a house of worship would not be excluded from the exemption because, for example, it provides charitable social services to persons of different religious faiths or employs persons of different religious faiths.” Significantly, the rule draws a line at non-profit organizations and would not permit for-profit entities (companies like Hobby Lobby, for instance) to take advantage of the religious exemption.

Women who work for the exempt organizations will still have access to birth control through their insurance companies at no additional cost. But whereas before these insurers added birth control to their existing policies, the new regulations state the insurers (or third-party entities, if the employer is self-insured) will provide separate, individual birth control coverage. The objecting employer will not “have to contract, arrange, pay or refer for any contraceptive coverage to which they object on religious grounds.” Under these terms, women may have separate policies — one for general health care and another for birth control.

Ultimately, the rule is not expected to significantly change existing policy or “expand the universe of employer plans that would qualify for the exemption beyond that which was intended in the 2012 final rules. However, it could help dispel the more than 40 lawsuits that have been filed by employers arguing that the religious exclusion was too narrow and simply an accounting gimmick.

According to a new study released by the Journal of General Internal Medicine, out-of-pocket medical spending in the last five years of life left one in four American seniors bankrupt.

The study found that average “out-of-pocket expenditures in the 5 years prior to death were $38,688 for individuals, and $51,030 for couples in which one spouse dies.” That average was skewed upwards by staggeringly high out-of-pocket medical spending by seniors who had particularly expensive medical needs. All told, a full “25 percent of subjects’ expenditures exceeded baseline total household assets, and 43 percent of subjects’ spending surpassed their non-housing assets,” according to the report.

The study’s findings underscore the fact that, despite Medicare coverage — which is more efficient and cost-effective compared to private insurance — health care consumption by seniors suffering from costly diseases such as cancer and Alzheimer’s can often drive up prices to an unsustainable rate.

That represents the simple reality of the costs of treating diseases for which there are still no cures. Seventy percent of national health care expenses derive from just 10 percent of the population, usually by terminally ill Americans.

But when conservative politicians use that figure to justify radical cuts to social safety net programs, their logic simply doesn’t add up. Shifting ailing patients away from publicly financed insurance programs and into the private market only drives up health care costs and uncompensated care rates by forcing people to pursue treatment that they cannot afford — and those policies would simply force even more seniors to exceed their non-housing assets to pay for their medical costs. The solution to this issue lies in finding more cost-effective treatments for costly diseases, not leaving seniors to their own devices to figure out how to pay for their health care.

Abortion opponents in Arkansas are hailing this week as important progress toward their goal of restricting women’s reproductive rights after several anti-choice measures advanced in the legislature. An unconstitutional “fetal heartbeat” ban to outlaw abortion as early as six weeks passed the Senate by a 26-8 vote, and two other restrictions — one to block health insurance coverage for abortion services, and one to ban late-term abortions without even the narrowest exceptions in the cases of rape and incest — also passed a House health committee.

The fetal heartbeat bill’s sponsor, Sen. Jason Rapert (R), says he feels it’s his “moral obligation” to ban abortion as soon as a fetal heartbeat can be detected — even though the only way to detect a heartbeat at such an early stage of pregnancy is to use a vaginal probe. “Can you imagine what kind of feeling that would cause when inserted into a woman?” State Sen. Stephanie Flowers (D), an opponent of the measure, asked Rapert on the Senate floor. Rapert admitted that he did not.

If Arkansas’ heartbeat ban passes, it will represent the most stringent abortion restriction in the nation. It will also stand in direct opposition to women’s constitutional right to abortion under Roe v. Wade. An attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union has already informed Arkansas’ senators that the group will sue if the state enacts such a restriction.

Now that Republicans control Arkansas’ General Assembly, anti-abortion groups believe these new measures actually have a chance of becoming law — especially because, since the Democratic governor has signed several abortion restrictions before, there’s no guarantee that Beebe will veto these bills. In fact, the governor has indicated that he’s at least considering the merits of the proposed fetal heartbeat ban. Beebe told reporters on Thursday that he will look into the constitutionality of measure. “I’m waiting on lawyers. I think that’s the big concern right now — does it run afoul of the Supreme Court or constitutional restrictions?” Beebe said. “That’s the first thing we’re looking at.”

And despite what Beebe ends up deciding, anti-abortion groups are already celebrating a victory in Arkansas, since the votes on Thursday represent their biggest gains in years. “I think a lot of people are beginning to understand that the people of Arkansas by and large are pro-life and you’re seeing that reflected in how people vote here,” said Jerry Cox, president of the Arkansas Family Council, told the Associated Press.