Month: August 2025

The first 39 weeks and two days of Anyssa Zancanella’s pregnancy were “so beautiful,” she remembers.

Zancanella sang to her unborn child every night, she said in an interview, and rejoiced in milestones like hearing her daughter’s heartbeat, seeing her in ultrasound images and decorating her nursery. As her due date approached in October 2019, the family’s attorneys later wrote, Zancanella’s first pregnancy had been ”normal and routine.”

Then her water broke while she was on a short vacation to Salt Lake County — hours away from her home and obstetrician in Wyoming. Relatives who had traveled with her searched online for the nearest hospital and hurried her to Jordan Valley Medical Center in West Valley City, then owned by Steward Health Care.

There, inexperienced nurses failed to react to signs that Zancanella’s baby was in distress, giving the mother “excessive” doses of the labor-inducing hormone Pitocin, over hours, while the on-call doctor was asleep in a room approximately 30 seconds away, the family contended in subsequent lawsuit.

Hospital staff didn’t intervene and perform a cesarean section delivery until Zancanella had been in the hospital for more than a day — care that deprived the baby of oxygen and damaged her brain so severely that doctors believe, according to court documents, that she will be disabled for life.

Third District Judge Patrick Corum, who found Steward liable in the medical malpractice case earlier this month, reached a blunt conclusion as he announced his decision on damages.

Zancanella “would have been better off delivering this baby at the bathroom of a gas station, or in a hut somewhere in Africa, than in this hospital,” he said. “Literally, this was the most dangerous place on the planet for her to have given birth.”

He awarded $951 million from Steward to Zancanella, her partner and their daughter, Azaylee.

The near-$1 billion award is one of the largest judgments in Utah history, according to Claggett & Sykes, the Las Vegas law firm that represented the family along with Barbara Gallagher of Kidwell & Gallagher, also in Nevada.

The award may have been even higher, the judge added, had Steward not stopped communicating with its attorneys and withdrawn from participating in court proceedings. Corum ultimately proceeded without the hospital chain’s input, hearing evidence and entering judgment against Steward by default.

“Had the defendant been here,” he said, “I think the testimony would have been lengthier and even more compelling, if that’s possible.”

Now the question is how and whether the family will be able to collect any damages from the beleaguered former hospital chain, which is in bankruptcy. It owes billions to creditors, with millions owed in Utah alone. Steward has 90 days from the judge’s Aug. 8 ruling on damages to appeal.

At 5, Azaylee loves to play and appears to be like any other child, but she doesn’t have the cognitive or executive function others do at her age, said Claggett & Sykes attorney David Creasy.

She struggles with seizures and takes medications daily to stave them off. Azaylee is generally nonverbal, saying only short words or phrases, and wears diapers. Zancanella said Wednesday that doctors believe Azaylee will never be able to work, drive a car or go to college, and will require constant care.

While making his ruling about damages, Corum quoted from Zancanella’s testimony. Azaylee, she said, “had her life stolen. We all did. We had her taken from us. She is trapped. I know that my daughter is in there, but she can’t come out and I think of that every day.”

Dallas-based attorney Eugene Sullivan, identified in court documents as deputy general counsel for Steward Health Care system, did not respond to multiple requests for comment. Steward had denied the lawsuit’s allegations in a May 2024 filing, saying that it did not hire the staffers who provided Zancanella’s care and that it was not liable for the family’s malpractice claims.

CommonSpirit Health acquired the hospital two years ago, transitioning it and four other formerly Steward-owned Utah medical centers from for-profit institutions to faith-based facilities. It’s now named Holy Cross Hospital–West Valley.

Laura Malaise, its chief nursing officer, declined to comment on the lawsuit. She said in a written statement that current staff are trained on best practices and are “regularly assessed to ensure they meet all national clinical standards.” CommonSpirit “is fully committed to providing excellent and safe care to all of our patients,” she said.

Cascading ‘failures’

The care provided by Steward culminated in an outcome “so egregious, and so easily preventable,” Zancanella’s attorneys wrote in a pre-trial filing, that medical experts call similar instances “‘never events’ — a kind of event that should never occur in a safe, well-functioning hospital.”

Never events “signal a systemic breakdown in patient care,” they wrote, “not an unfortunate lapse in judgment or a close call.”

Zancanella was admitted around 10:30 p.m. on Oct. 12, 2019. About five hours later, the suit said, her nurses consulted with the on-call obstetrician and began pushing Pitocin through an IV.

Pitocin, the synthetic form of the naturally occurring hormone oxytocin, is used to start contractions and speed up labor, but it can also be used to control postpartum bleeding because these contractions can clamp blood flow to the uterus. If a mother has not yet given birth, this drug can restrict blood flow — and oxygen — to the baby.

That’s why health care staff are instructed to give limited amounts of the drug and to taper off, or stop the dose completely, if there’s no progress, according to a report Zancanella’s attorneys submitted from Michelle L. Murray, a registered nurse and nursing instructor from New Mexico.

Yet Zancanella’s nurses continued the hormone at an “excessive” dose for hours, Murray wrote, even as they should have seen the mounting troubling signs, like the baby’s blood pressure rising and no signs the injection was increasing dilation.

The lawsuit pointed out that both nurses assigned to care for Zancanella were novices — finishing their orientation on or around the day she was admitted to the hospital — and argued they were undertrained. An on-call charge nurse, who would ordinarily provide guidance to newer employees, was also not fully trained and never intervened, according to the suit.

“This was the very first, or one of the very first times, that either of the assigned bedside nurses had individually been assigned a laboring patient,” it said. One of the nurses later said the charge nurse “basically left her on her own” and “preferred not to help take care of the patient or communicate with the family,” according to the suit.

Fetal heart monitoring strips, Creasy said, recorded that the baby was in distress for hours. At one point, one of the nurses told the on-call doctor about the readings and that Zancanella had a fever, the suit said. But that doctor “abandoned” Zancanella and went back to sleep, it said.

Throughout, Zancanella said she was “terrified” and just “wanted her [daughter] to come out.” She said she trusted hospital staff were doing their jobs.

She ultimately gave birth via cesarean section just before 6 a.m. on Oct. 14, 2019. A nurse noted the baby had a “misshapened head,” with the front of her scalp “severely bruised and bulging” and her face “swollen.”

She was soon flown by helicopter to Primary Children’s Hospital in Salt Lake City for more intensive care. There, staffers noted she had “metabolic acidosis,” or too much acid in her blood, which can be a sign of asphyxia before or during birth. They also wrote that she possibly had been hurt by a lack of oxygen and blood flow before she was born — a complication called a hypoxic ischemic injury, which could harm her brain.

It wasn’t until days later, Zancanella said, that she and her partner Danniel McMicheal understood what this would mean for the rest of their daughter’s life.

The family filed the lawsuit, alleging multiple “failures” in care from Steward, in 2021.

‘An attempt to thwart justice’

Corum decided Zancanella, McMicheal and Azaylee should receive nearly $1 billion for the hospital’s flawed care and the lifelong impacts it will bring.

“The person she was to be, the person she deserved to be, is trapped inside a brain-damaged child,” Corum said. “I cannot think of anything more profound, total or complete than that loss.”

Steward’s participation in the case began to dwindle in 2024, Corum said. In May, three months before scheduled trial date, Steward’s attorneys asked for permission to withdraw from the case. They wrote that Steward had stopped communicating and was not paying their fees — and had given “no indication” that it “will pay for work done from now through trial.”

Corum approved their withdrawal and urged Steward to appoint new counsel, but that never happened. In his Aug. 3 ruling finding Steward liable, Corum wrote: “Indeed, since at least the early Spring of 2024, Defendants’ entire strategy seems to have been nothing other than an attempt to thwart justice and the judicial process.”

He added that the family was “admittedly reluctant” to ask for more money, because Steward didn’t show up for the subsequent three days of testimony before his verbal ruling on damages.

“The court is still, in a very, very odd way, reluctant to give what I think this case is actually worth,” he said, “because [the defendants are] not here, because I do not want to create issues that don’t need to be there.”

Regardless of Steward’s bankruptcy, the family should be able to collect at least half of the award, which represents punitive damages, said Jennifer Morales, another Claggett & Sykes attorney. Steward filed documents in its bankruptcy case on Wednesday establishing a trust to manage its assets and repay its debts.

‘How she should have been’

On Wednesday, Azaylee sat in her father’s lap during a visit to Salt Lake City, playing with credit cards she’d pulled from a purse. Zancanella said sometimes Azaylee will say a phrase, like “I told mom,” so clearly.

“And it’s like that’s her voice, that’s her, that’s how she should have been,” Zancanella said, “but she can’t be that person because she’s just locked up. She’s trapped.”

The nursery Zancanella worked so hard to decorate “did not get to stay that way,” she said, as she faced the need to provide her daughter with 24/7 care. With so many seizures, it’s impossible for Azaylee to sleep by herself.

Now, the whole family — including Zancanella’s youngest daughter, born 16 months after Azaylee — sleeps in one bedroom in a modified super bed, a king plus a twin. Zancanella’s grandmother sewed custom linens that stretch across them.

Azaylee’s family keeps extra oxygen available wherever they go, in case she has a seizure and needs it. They’ve retrofitted every door in their home with locks “way up high,” Zancanella said, where Azaylee can’t reach, because she has a tendency to bolt.

They watch their younger daughter grow, learning to crawl and talk and walk exactly when developmental milestones say she should, Zancanella said. That didn’t happen for Azaylee.

Their younger daughter, Zancanella said, is learning to swim under water, while Azaylee tries but can’t grasp that she needs to plug her nose and mouth. Her parents think Azaylee is aware of these differences and understands that others are communicating, often even knows what people are saying, but that she can’t talk back. They said it’s frustrating for her.

Azaylee receives physical and occupational therapy. Her family works with her at home and has garnered a support system of others whose children experienced similar trauma. Azaylee has started kindergarten for a few hours each day. Soon, Zancanella said, she’s going to get her own service dog to help detect seizures and be her “little partner in crime.”

As they spoke in an interview, Zancanella and McMicheal were occasionally interrupted by Azaylee, who was taking photos of herself on a tablet and exclaiming or giggling every so often as she scrolled through silly filters.

Zancanella and McMicheal said they try to focus on the reality in front of them and adjust to it accordingly. “Another thing,” Zancanella said, “is just patience.”

Note to readers •This story is available to Salt Lake Tribune subscribers only. Thank you for supporting local journalism.

Correction • 11:25 a.m., Aug. 28, 2025: This story has been updated to add a photo of Jordan Valley Medical Center in West Valley City when it was owned by Steward Health Care. An earlier version included a photo of Jordan Valley Medical Center in West Jordan, also owned at the time by Steward.

As a pediatric nurse, I’ve witnessed the devastating and extensive impact of tobacco on patients and their families. I’ve cared for children with respiratory conditions worsened by secondhand smoke, and I’ve been alarmed by the rise of e-cigarette use among teens and how quickly it can lead to nicotine addiction.

I am alarmed by the recent cuts to federal anti-tobacco programs. The elimination of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Office on Smoking and Health will have a destructive impact across the nation and right here in Utah. Programs funded by the agency are critical to helping state and local health departments and community organizations prevent youth e-cigarette use and support kids struggling with nicotine addiction.

Reps. Celeste Maloy, Mike Kennedy, Burgess Owens and Blake Moore have spoken about the importance of protecting children and supporting families. Our lawmakers in D.C. must continue to stand up for Utah kids and reject these reckless cuts. We need them to restore funding for proven anti-tobacco programs that save lives, reduce health care costs and secure a brighter future for our kids.

Last month, the Senate took a small but positive first step forward when its Appropriations Committee, on a bipartisan basis, advanced a Fiscal Year 2026 funding bill that preserves funding for CDC’s Office on Smoking and Health. But the work in restoring funding is far from over. Next month, the House Appropriations Committee, of which Rep. Maloy is a member, will consider its version of the funding bill. It is critical that Rep. Maloy and other members of this important committee ensure that the House funds CDC’s vital anti-tobacco efforts.

While tobacco use has dropped over the past several decades, it’s far too early to declare victory in this public health fight. Tobacco use remains the leading cause of preventable death both nationwide and in Utah. Each year, it claims the lives of nearly 500,000 Americans, leaves millions more suffering from tobacco-related illnesses and drives up health care spending by more than $241 billion, much of it paid by taxpayers through programs like Medicare and Medicaid. In Utah alone, tobacco-related health care expenses total $630 million annually, including $135.4 million through Medicaid.

What’s especially disconcerting is how the tobacco industry continues to target our kids with e-cigarettes. More than 1.6 million kids nationwide use these devices, including 5.7% of high school students in Utah. These products, which come in a variety of sweet, kid-friendly flavors, are readily available online and in retail stores. Many are designed to look like school supplies such as highlighters or pens, making them easy to conceal. Some even come with built-in video games and other smartphone-like features, which are even more appealing to kids.

Within those slick packages are high levels of nicotine — some e-cigarettes contain as much as 20 packs of cigarettes or more. Youth use of nicotine in any form is unsafe and can harm brain development, particularly attention, memory and learning. Plus, these devices can also expose kids to harmful chemicals like formaldehyde and lead.

Tackling youth tobacco use is essential to protecting our children’s health today and preventing a lifetime of chronic illness tomorrow. That’s why federal programs are so important. In fiscal year 2024, Utah received $1.26 million in federal tobacco prevention and cessation funding for initiatives like the state Quit Line, which provides free counseling and nicotine replacement therapy to help smokers quit. It also supports programs that partner with schools, parents, health providers and communities to prevent youth use of tobacco products.

In addition to losing funding for such programs, the elimination of the CDC office also likely means the end of its successful national public education campaign, “Tips from Former Smokers,” which has helped one million smokers quit, prevented more than 129,000 smoking-related deaths and saved over $7 billion in health care costs. Without “Tips,” hundreds of thousands of Americans won’t successfully quit smoking.

Congress must not turn its back on programs that have saved lives and prevented chronic disease for so many Americans. If these cuts are allowed to stand, more kids will be left deprived of resources, more families will suffer and more lives will be lost. Protecting our children from a lifetime of tobacco and nicotine addiction isn’t just a public health priority; it’s a moral obligation, one I take personally. Policymakers must act now to safeguard our nation’s most important asset: the next generation.

Data Skrive

The UTEP Miners (0-0) are 6-point underdogs heading into their matchup on Saturday, August 30, 2025 against the Utah State Aggies (0-0). The total for this game has been set at 60.5 points.

Last year the Aggies fell short of a bowl appearance after finishing 4-8 during the regular season. On offense, they averaged 31.9 points per game (35th in college football), and they conceded 37.8 per game (128th in college football) defensively. The Miners failed to make a bowl appearance last year after going 3-9 during the regular season. They scored 19.5 points per game (122nd in college football) and conceded 32.3 (113th).

Keep up with college football all season on FOX Sports.

Utah State vs. UTEP Game Information & Odds

• When: Saturday, August 30, 2025 at 7:30 p.m. ET
• Location: Merlin Olsen Field at Maverik Stadium in Logan, Utah
• TV: CBS Sports Network
• Live Box Score on FOX Sports

Utah State vs. UTEP Prediction

• Pick ATS: Utah State (-6)
  
• Pick OU: Over (60.5)
  
• Prediction: Utah State 37, UTEP 24

Predictions are made by the Data Skrive betting model.

Learn more about the Utah State Aggies vs. the UTEP Miners game on FOX Sports!

Utah State vs. UTEP Betting Insights

• Per the spread and over/under, the implied score for the matchup is Aggies 33, Miners 27.
• The Aggies have a 69.4% chance to win this meeting based on the moneyline’s implied probability. The Miners hold a 35.0% implied probability.
• Utah State compiled a 5-6-0 record against the spread last season.
• UTEP compiled a 5-7-0 ATS record last season.

Utah State vs. UTEP: 2024 Stats Comparison

Utah State 2024 Key Players

UTEP 2024 Key Players

FOX Sports created this story using technology provided by Data Skrive and data from Sportradar.

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Utah Gov. Spencer Cox speaks at the launch of the Nucleus Institute on Aug. 27, 2025 (Alixel Cabrera/Utah News Dispatch)

State officials and higher education leaders have launched the Nucleus Institute, an organization they hope to see become a crucial tool for Utah innovators to compete at a global level, finding solutions for emerging energy needs and developing technologies like artificial intelligence.

The organization stems from a law passed in the 2025 legislative session that restructured the Utah Innovation Lab and created the institute as “an independent, nonprofit, quasi-public corporation.” The goal is to connect higher education, industry and government to make ideas become reality. 

With the institute, researchers and entrepreneurs can search for solutions to early-stage funding challenges, moving forward from concept to market, or finding spaces to collaborate.

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Utah Gov. Spencer Cox said during the launch on Wednesday the institute will help make Utahns’ lives easier by finding solutions to keep energy prices low, decarbonizing the atmosphere and other challenges the country faces.

“We are never going to regulate our way out of the most difficult problems that we’re facing as a country,” Cox said. “We can only innovate, and the state does play a role in that, and so does higher ed, but especially the private sector.”

The institute is expected to collaborate with different innovation campuses across the state, including those in authorities like the Point of the Mountain and the Inland Port, but also other innovation labs in public universities.

And with the help of those partnerships, Cox said, this and future generations of Utahns will be able to build their innovation skills in a thriving environment.

“It is all about passing that knowledge of innovation, those skills that are so necessary to compete on a global scale, and passing them on to the next generation,” Cox said. “It’s about investing in companies that are going to solve those wicked problems that we’re facing right now as a country. We know that the solutions are out there. We just need to discover them.” 

In a way, the new organization is a response to the unprecedented speed of change in different technologies, said Jefferson Moss, director of the Utah Governor’s Office of Economic Opportunity, and now, also leader of the Nucleus Institute.

“We led the nation on AI. We led the nation on data privacy. We’re leading the nation on energy. We can do that because we have people in the government that actually get along and want to get stuff done,” Moss said. “And then you take that and combine it with both the great things we’re doing in education.”

President of the University of Utah, Taylor Randall said he was excited to be part of the initiative since the state’s flagship university dedicates almost $800 million a year in research, including important medical advancements like the first artificial heart implant for a human. 

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“But that research is no good if it stays in the lab,” Randall said. Nucleus, he added, is a way to step on the gas to incorporate those types of discoveries into people’s lives.

The Legislature allocated $555,400 from the Income Tax Fund for compensation and benefits for the institute board’s executive director, for the compensation of the chair of the innovation fund, and an annual contracted audit during years 2026 and 2027, according to the bill’s fiscal note. 

Senate Majority Leader, Kirk Cullimore, R-Sandy, who sponsored the legislation in the Senate, said that while the institute is expected to collaborate with for-profit industries, it’s still a nonprofit structure.

“The goal is to boost the economy in Utah, to boost the workforce in Utah, to boost innovation and commercialization of that innovation here,” Cullimore said. “So it’s not really a business idea, and it’s government-esque, but playing in that more innovation and entrepreneurial space to kind of help facilitate all these things.”

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SALT LAKE CITY — Utah is being thrust into a national battle over redistricting because of a court order to redraw its congressional map for the 2026 midterm elections, while President Donald Trump is pushing other Republican-led states to add winnable U.S. House seats for the GOP.

The new district boundaries could make one of Utah’s four congressional seats competitive for Democrats as the party fights to topple the GOP’s slim majority in the House. Nationally, Democrats need to net three seats next year to take control of the chamber.

The current map divides heavily populated Salt Lake County — an island of Democratic support in an otherwise red state — among all four congressional districts. Before the map was adopted in 2021, one district had traded hands between Democrats and Republicans. All have since elected Republicans by wide margins.

Here’s what to know about Utah’s place in the redistricting fight.

A judge on Monday ordered Utah’s Republican-controlled Legislature to toss its congressional map and quickly adopt a new one. District Court Judge Dianna Gibson declared the map unlawful because the Legislature had circumvented an independent redistricting commission established by voters to ensure districts don’t deliberately favor a party, a practice known as gerrymandering.

Voters in 2018 narrowly approved a ballot initiative that created the commission to draw boundaries for Utah’s legislative and congressional districts, which the Legislature was required to consider. Lawmakers repealed the initiative in 2020 and replaced it with a law that transformed the commission into an advisory board that they could choose to ignore. The following year, lawmakers disregarded a congressional map proposal from the commission and drew one of their own.

The Utah Supreme Court said the Legislature is extremely limited in changing laws passed by voters and sent the case back to Gibson to decide the map’s fate.

“How district lines are drawn can either safeguard representation and ensure accountability by elected representatives or erode public trust, silence voices and weaken the rule of law,” she wrote in the ruling.

Gibson has given lawmakers until Sept. 24 to adopt a map that complies with voter-approved standards. Voting rights advocates who were involved in the legal challenge can submit alternate proposals. But Republican officials could use appeals to try to run out the clock before a candidate filing deadline in early January to possibly delay adopting new maps until 2028.

The U.S. Supreme Court is unlikely to intervene, and the state Supreme Court may be hesitant to entertain an appeal after it already asked Gibson to decide.

Utah’s four congressional districts currently converge within a couple blocks in the Salt Lake City suburb of Millcreek. A voter could grab a milkshake at the beloved Iceberg Drive Inn and cross into all four districts before it melts.

Lawmakers presented the map as a way for each representative to serve both urban and rural areas. One district spans the entire eastern border of the state and groups vastly different communities, from the winter resort town of Park City, to the urban center of Provo, down to the red rock recreation hub of Moab. Voting rights groups who challenged the map argued it intentionally dilutes the Democratic vote and produces congresspeople who aren’t suited to represent all of their constituents.

The tight deadline for lawmakers to draw new maps could push them to reconsider proposals from the independent redistricting commission that they had ignored after the 2020 census. Those plans create a compact district combining the Democrat-heavy cities of Salt Lake City and Park City, while grouping other cities geographically.

GOP leaders could cut their losses by creating a single left-leaning block, or gamble on creating competitive districts that Republicans will fight to keep.

Registered Republicans overwhelmingly outnumber registered Democrats in the state. But voter registration data doesn’t paint the full picture.

Only about 12.3% of Utah voters are registered Democrats, but more than triple that amount voted for Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential election. About 29% are unaffiliated, and many voters in the state who hold liberal beliefs choose to register as Republicans to vote in the primaries and have a say in intraparty matters.

That uncertainty may create complications for Republicans as they navigate rapidly redrawing boundaries that shield their seats while complying with stricter standards.

The ruling throws Republicans a curveball in a state where they expected a clean sweep while they’re working to add winnable seats elsewhere. Trump has urged governors to take up mid-decade redistricting ahead of the midterms, when the sitting president’s party tends to lose seats.

In Texas, a plan awaiting Gov. Greg Abbott’s approval includes five new districts that would favor Republicans. Ohio Republicans already were scheduled to revise their maps to make them more partisan, and Indiana, Florida and Missouri may choose to make changes. Some Democrat-led states say they may enter the redistricting arms race, but so far only California has taken action to offset GOP gains in Texas.

The Supreme Court in 2019 ruled that claims of partisan gerrymandering for congressional and legislative districts are outside the purview of federal courts and should be decided by states.

Redistricting typically occurs once a decade after a census. There are no federal restrictions to redrawing districts mid-decade, but some states — more led by Democrats than Republicans — set their own limitations. The Utah redraw may benefit Democrats who have fewer opportunities to gain seats through redistricting.

EL PASO, Texas (KTSM) — The countdown to kickoff continues — we’re just four days away from UTEP opening its 2025 season.

The Miners are packing their bags and heading to Logan, Utah, to take on the Utah State Aggies.

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On Tuesday, UTEP held its first weekly press conference of the season — giving us a game-week update on how the Miners are preparing for their opener.