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OpenAI launches ChatGPT Health in a push to become a hub for personal health data

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Millions of people already use ChatGPT to ask questions about their health. In fact, OpenAI has previously said it is one of the most common use cases for its popular chatbot. Some upload blood test results, medical scans, and other deeply personal data.

Now OpenAI is leaning into this trend as it seeks to build out more products to keep users engaged and establish itself as the new digital interface that will mediate interactions between different industry sectors—from e-commerce to finance to, yes, wellness and healthcare—and their customers.

Today OpenAI announced the debut of ChatGPT Health — a dedicated experience inside ChatGPT where it says users can securely connect medical records and wellness apps such as Apple Health, Function, and MyFitnessPal to further personalize conversations. OpenAI said it would not train its models on personal medical data.

During a press preview, Fidji Simo, OpenAI’s CEO of applications, introduced ChatGPT Health by sharing a personal story about how ChatGPT helped her after she was hospitalized for a kidney stone last year and developed an infection. A resident had prescribed a standard antibiotic, but she checked it against her medical history in ChatGPT, which flagged that the medication could reactivate a serious life-threatening infection she had suffered years before.

“The resident was relieved I spoke up, she told me she only has a few minutes per patient during rounds, and that health records aren’t organized in a way that makes it easy to see,” she said. “I’ve heard many stories like this from people who are using AI to help connect the dots in their healthcare system that really wasn’t built to see the full picture.”

Five months ago, OpenAI signalled its push into healthcare with two high-profile hires: Nate Gross, the cofounder and former chief strategy officer of Doximity, a leading digital platform for medical professionals, leads OpenAI’s healthcare strategy. Ashley Alexander, former co-head of product at Instagram, leads healthcare product. But Karan Singhal, who leads health AI at OpenAI, said during the press preview that the company had been laying the groundwork for ChatGPT Health for about two years.

According to an OpenAI blog post, the company analyzed deidentified ChatGPT conversations and found that more than 230 million people globally ask health- and wellness-related questions on ChatGPT every week. Even with that massive user base, however, that doesn’t mean the company has an easy road ahead: They are joining a fast-moving race among Big Tech and startups to become the AI front door for consumer healthcare. 

For example, for ChatGPT Health OpenAI has partnered with b.well, a health management platform which combines patients’ health records, financial information, and wearable and other healthcare data. But Google also announced a partnership with b.well in October 2025 – potentially setting the stage for future AI-driven consumer health tools, though the internet giant has not yet announced a health-specific feature set for its AI chatbot product Gemini. 

ChatGPT Health will not be widely available immediately. There is a waitlist for access to a small group of early users, but the company said it will make Health available to all users on web and iOS in the coming weeks. Electronic Health Records (EHR) integrations and some apps are available in the U.S. only. 

OpenAI does not describe ChatGPT Health as HIPAA compliant (consumer health apps are not covered by HIPAA) but says it adds layered protections for sensitive health data and excludes health conversations from model training by default. It also says users can enable multi-factor authentication (MFA) to add an extra layer of protection to help prevent unauthorized access, and that access to medical records can be removed at any time in the “Apps” section of Settings.”

ChatGPT Health also fits a broader pattern at OpenAI: building vertical-specific experiences on top of its core models, rather than relying solely on general-purpose chat. In education, the company launched Study Mode, a ChatGPT spinoff for students, in July to compete with Google’s Gemini for Education. It has also rolled out agentic shopping and shopping research features. There are also reports that a finance-specific experience is also in the works.

OpenAI also clarified that ChatGPT Health was not part of the company’s eight-week long “code red,” announced in early December by Sam Altman in an internal memo. “[ChatGPT Health is] actually sitting outside of Code Red,” said Simo. “We have been working on health for a very long time…we know this is a core use case of ChatGPT, we’ve known that we wanted to make that use case even better and serve even more of people’s needs with the changes that we’ve made.”



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Wife of Renee Good, the Minnesota woman killed in ICE shooting: ‘We had whistles. They had guns’

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The wife of Renee Good, the woman shot and killed in her car by a federal immigration agent in Minneapolis, says the couple had stopped to support their neighbors on the day of the shooting and described the mother of three as leaving a legacy of kindness.

“We had whistles. They had guns,” Becca Good said in a written statement Friday that was provided to Minnesota Public Radio.

The statement was her first public comment about the death of Renee Good, 37, who was killed Wednesday after three Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers surrounded her Honda Pilot SUV on a snowy street a few blocks from the couple’s home. Video taken by bystanders show an officer approaching the SUV stopped across the middle of the road, demanding the driver open the door and grabbing the handle.

The vehicle begins to pull forward and a different ICE officer standing in front of it pulls his weapon and immediately fires at least two shots at close range, jumping back as the vehicle moves toward him.

Trump administration officials have painted Renee Good as a domestic terrorist who tried to run over an officer with her vehicle. State and local officials in Minneapolis, as well as protesters, have rejected that characterization.

Becca Good has not responded to calls and messages from The Associated Press. Her statement provided no further detail about the day of the shooting and instead focused on memorializing her wife.

The couple had only recently moved to Minneapolis and were raising Renee Good’s 6-year-old son from a previous marriage.

Becca said Renee was a Christian who “knew that all religions teach the same essential truth: we are here to love each other, care for each other, and keep each other safe and whole.”

She thanked the people all across America and the world who had reached out in support of their family.

“Renee sparkled. She literally sparkled,” Becca Good wrote. “I mean, she didn’t wear glitter but I swear she had sparkles coming out of her pores. All the time. You might think it was just my love talking but her family said the same thing. Renee was made of sunshine.”

Far from the worst-of-the-worst criminals President Donald Trump said his immigration crackdown would target, Good was a U.S. citizen born in Colorado who apparently was never charged with anything beyond a single traffic ticket.

In social media accounts, she described herself as a “poet and writer and wife and mom.” She said she was currently “experiencing Minneapolis,” displaying a pride emoji on her Instagram account. A profile picture posted to Pinterest shows her smiling and holding a young child against her cheek, along with posts about tattoos, hairstyles and home decorating.

Her ex-husband, who asked not to be named out of concern for the safety of the two now-teenage children he had with Renee Good while they were married, told the AP on Wednesday that he had never known her to participate in a protest of any kind.

Becca Good said the couple, who had previously lived in Kansas City, Missouri, had settled in Minneapolis after an “extended road trip.” She said people they encountered in the Twin Cities had provided a strong sense that “they were looking out for each other.”

“We were raising our son to believe that no matter where you come from or what you look like, all of us deserve compassion and kindness,” Becca wrote. “I am now left to raise our son and to continue teaching him, as Renee believed, that there are people building a better world for him. That the people who did this had fear and anger in their hearts, and we need to show them a better way.”



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Bessent’s visit to Minnesota comes with more vows to crack down on fraud as tensions flare with state, Somalia government

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The Treasury Department is taking a closer look at financial transactions between Minnesotan residents and businesses and Somalia as the federal government ramps up its immigration crackdown in the state, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told reporters on Friday during a visit to the state.

Bessent said his agency has launched a series of actions to combat fraud in the state and has launched investigations into four businesses that people use to wire money to family members abroad to do more to scrutinize transactions. He did not name the businesses.

His visit to the state coincides with protests in Minneapolis after an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer fatally shot a woman in a residential neighborhood south of downtown on Wednesday, leading to a clash between federal and local leaders.

President Donald Trump has targeted the Somali diaspora in the Democratic-led state with immigration enforcement actions and has made a series of disparaging comments about the community, directing Bessent to uncover more fraud. The Treasury first announced last month that it would begin targeting money service businesses, focusing on remittances to Somalia.

The department’s actions have been prompted in part by a series of fraud cases, including a nonprofit called Feeding Our Future accused of stealing coronavirus pandemic aid meant for school meals. Prosecutors have put the losses from that case at $300 million.

Gov. Tim Walz, before he ended his bid to serve a third term this week, said that fraud will not be tolerated in Minnesota and that his administration “will continue to work with federal partners to ensure fraud is stopped and fraudsters are caught.” Walz, who came under heavy criticism from Republicans who said his administration should have caught the Feeding Our Future fraud earlier, said he was “furious” with “criminals that preyed on the system that was meant to feed children.”

The founder of Feeding our Future, Aimee Bock, was charged with multiple counts involving conspiracy, wire fraud and bribery and was convicted in March while maintaining her innocence.

Bessent declined to comment on specific investigations but said he had met with several financial institutions on Friday to ask them to do more to prevent fraud. The department has not disclosed which institutions Bessent spoke with.

Key Treasury actions include Financial Crimes Enforcement Network investigations into Minnesota-based money services businesses, enhanced transaction reporting requirements for international transfers from Hennepin and Ramsey counties, and alerts to financial institutions on identifying fraud tied to child nutrition programs.

“Treasury will deploy all tools to bring an end to this egregious unchecked fraud and hold perpetrators to account,” Bessent told reporters on Friday.

Bessent’s announcement was met with some criticism. Nicholas Anthony, a policy analyst at the libertarian Cato Institute, said Bessent is “building a legacy of financial surveillance and control.”

“The announcement that he is stopping Americans from sending their money abroad and increasing surveillance under the Bank Secrecy Act should be condemned,” Anthony said.

Some Somali leaders said last month they had received anecdotal reports about community members being detained by federal agents but had no details. Those leaders and allies including Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey have vowed to protect the community.

During a speech on Thursday about the Republican Trump administration’s economic agenda at the Economic Club of Minnesota, Bessent referred to the alleged fraud, without mentioning the Somali community that his department is targeting.

“I am here this week to signal the U.S. Treasury’s unwavering commitment to recovering stolen funds, prosecuting fraudulent criminals, preventing scandals like this from ever happening again, and investigating similar schemes state by state,” Bessent said.



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Telluride Ski Resort begins to reopen after striking ski patrollers accept a contract

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Telluride Ski Resort in southwestern Colorado began to reopen Friday after a vote by striking ski patrollers to accept a contract and return to work.

The resort shut down Dec. 27 after the Telluride Professional Ski Patrol Association rejected a company pay proposal. The resort remained closed except for beginner carpets and a lift serving two beginner runs that were staffed this week by managers and temporary ski patrollers.

With help from artificial snowmaking and a foot (30 centimeters) of recent snowfall, more lifts and runs will open starting this weekend, resort officials said in a statement.

“We are confident that this last offer represented a fair compromise,” resort representative Steve Swenson said in the statement.

Neither the resort nor the ski patrol union divulged details of the deal endorsed by the union with a Thursday vote. Negotiations had been ongoing since June.

The union sought pay increases from $21 to $28 an hour for new patrollers and from as little as $30 to almost $50 for the most experienced ones.

“While we are ultimately very disappointed to not address our broken wage structure, we are immensely proud of our efforts that have led to this financial movement. We are even prouder of the recognition and implementation of our supervisors into the unit,” read a union statement on social media Thursday.

Ski patrollers elsewhere in the Rocky Mountain region have been unionizing. Some argue for more pay on the grounds that the cost of living in ski towns is high and that they are responsible for safety.

Patroller duties include attending to injured skiers and the controlled release of avalanches with explosives when nobody is in range.

An almost two-week ski patrol strike a year ago closed many runs and caused long lift lines at Utah’s Park City Mountain Resort. That strike ended when Colorado-based Vail Resorts acceded to demands including a $2-an-hour base pay increase and raises for senior ski patrollers.

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