Healthcare is simultaneously propping up the US economy and facing one of its most uncertain moments in years. This month, Halle and Steve unpack the growing contradictions shaping digital health right now: healthcare jobs are driving nearly half of US job growth while provider bankruptcies surge, AI is flooding into healthcare faster than regulators can keep up, and Washington continues to send mixed signals on the future of healthcare policy and innovation. We cover: Why healthcare jobs are now carrying the US labor market and what Medicaid cuts could mean for the economy The surprising comeback of wearables and how companies like Whoop, Oura, and Google are building massive subscription businesses CMS’s new ACCESS model and the debate over whether AI-driven care can actually lower costs without sacrificing quality The lawsuit against Character.AI and what it reveals about the growing demand for AI mental health tools Why investors are pouring billions into AI drug discovery despite huge unanswered questions about clinical development Marty Makary’s resignation from the FDA and what ongoing instability means for biotech, pharma, and healthcare innovation — Show notes: Forget Tech and Hollywood. California Is Powered by Healthcare Jobs. (WSJ) Oura Debuts Ring 5, Ahead of Potential IPO (WWD) Whoop Raises $575 Million at $10.1 Billion Valuation (Whoop) Fitbit Ditches the Screen With Its New $99 Whoop Rival (PC Mag) Why big digital health players are missing from Medicare’s chronic care experiment (STAT) Character.AI Lawsuit (PA.gov) Marty Makary out as FDA chief (Axios) — 🙏 Do you like this podcast? An easy and free way to help keep the show going is to leave us a review on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you&#x27;re listening. — 📍 Connect with us: Heart of Healthcare website LinkedIn YouTube See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

📣 Digital Health Download: June 2026

The Heart of Healthcare | A Digital Health Podcast

# Full Transcript

**Podcast:** The Heart of Healthcare | A Digital Health Podcast

## Participants

- **Hallie Tecco** (Heart of Healthcare)
- **Michael Esquivel** (Massively Better Healthcare)
- **Steve Krause** (Heart of Healthcare)

## Transcript

Welcome to The Heart of Healthcare Podcast. I'm Hallie Tecco. I'm Michael Esquivel. And I'm Steve Krause. And every Monday, we bring you the latest in healthcare innovation as we sit down with entrepreneurs and industry experts. So buckle up and join us as we figure out how to improve healthcare for all.

Hello, listeners, and welcome back to the show. I'm your co-host, Hallie Tecco. I'm here with Steve Krause. And this is our monthly Digital Health Download where we share the stories that we think were most interesting or most important for our industry. Steve, hi. Happy June. Happy last month of H1. I know. I haven't seen you. I haven't seen you in forever because you did your very successful book tour. Congratulations on that. Thank you. It's great to spend at least an hour with you, my friend.

Yeah. Yeah. And like, as always, there were more stories than we can actually share in the next hour. But we will note for our listeners that this month, we actually have a little bit more diversity in the stories that we're sharing. So we're bouncing around a lot, but I think that they're all super important. So Steve, do you want to take the first story? I will. I will. I read two stories this month, which were interesting, what I'd call kind of

canaries in the coal mine for our industry. The first story was a Wall Street Journal article that noted, it was titled, Forget Tech and Forget Hollywood. California is powered by healthcare jobs. And the fact that healthcare jobs are basically not just for California, but for the US economy propping up the market, the labor market. And that without healthcare hiring, the state of California would have actually net lost jobs over the past four years. But there was a study

by the economic innovation group that analyzed labor data from March 22 to March 2026, and found that health and social assistance jobs in California grew 25% over that period. And if you strip those out, even in the home state of Silicon Valley in Hollywood, what you'd find would be a net job decline, the widest gap of any major state in the country. So that plus the fact that across the country,

healthcare accounted for roughly 47% of April's better than expected jobs report. And our economy that we live and operate in and invest in and build companies every day is driving the US economy. I thought that was really interesting, Hallie. And then- And Steve, just to like dive in a little bit there, what kind of roles are these? Because we know that they're not all clinicians. There are a million physicians in the US. So these are nurses, these are- Yeah, good question. Health aides, yeah.

The interesting thing, most of these jobs are actually low wage. So these are what's considered lower wa...

📣 Digital Health Download: June 2026

Transcript

Built for investment professionals

Every day you wait, your competitors are finding
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📣 Digital Health Download: June 2026

Transcript

Built for investment professionals

Every day you wait, your competitors are findingedge in conversations you're not hearing.

Every day you wait, your competitors are finding
edge in conversations you're not hearing.