Medicare Maneuvers, Part 3: The Insurer Showdown
July 16, 2008
It seems that Harry Reid gambled and won. In our previous two posts we described the battle being waged in Congress over the proposed 11% paycuts to Medicare physicians. After the Independence Day recess, the Senate Majority Leader and advocacy groups working on behalf of doctors and seniors - as well as informed and angry constituents - were able to put enough pressure on Senate Republicans to finally cross the aisle.
But party lines weren’t the real issue. The two sides squaring off in this debate were private insurers versus the average American. Why? Two words: Medicare Advantage.
As discussed in our July 2 post, Medicare Advantage came about when insurers convinced government that they were getting good at cutting spending on health care, and that maybe the government should learn from some of their tactics. Heck, they said, let’s just let insurers do the job themselves!
DNA, Disease, and Discrimination
June 10, 2008
Can you imagine being faced with the difficult decision of having your breasts removed - not because you have breast cancer, but because you’ve determined that you carry the genes for it? Women at risk for the disease can now find out whether they have the same DNA that killed their mothers and grandmothers.
In recent years, advances in genetic research have helped push medicine into realms once reserved for science fiction.
In the 1850s there were only 140 categories of disease, differentiated by their symptoms. By 1993, genetic mapping had allowed scientists to distinguish 12,000 categories of disease, to determine that some diseases were linked genetically despite having widely different symptoms, and to find better drugs and measures to treat or prevent these diseases.
When Insurers Take Their Toys and Go Home
May 10, 2008
For the past few years there has been work in cities and states across the country to improve our citizens’ access to health care. From San Francisco to Vermont, 39 states and a number of cities are in the process of creating legislation that would help address their numbers of uninsured.
Washington, D.C. is one of these. A look at the trouble our nation’s capital is facing on this issue may shed a light on why the words “health care reform” are often greeted with less than a smile.
Blame the Boomers?
March 18, 2008
It’s long been the assumption that what’s driving the rise in health care costs is our aging population and in particular, the baby boomers. As folks get older, they get sicker and more fragile – need more health care treatment and medicines. As the baby-boomers hit their sixties, people are assuming that our nation’s health care spending is going up accordingly.
But experts now say shifting demographics isn’t the main cause of our costs problem. The Congressional Budget Office has issued a new report finding that unnecessary tests and treatments are to blame. CBO Director Peter Orzsag has stated that if nothing is done these costs will consume half the U.S. economy before the end of this century.
Health Care: The Joke Is On You
March 7, 2008
It seemed to be health care night over at Comedy Central’s nighttime “news” shows last night. First, John Stewart interviewed former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle about his new book Critical: What We Can Do About the Health-Care Crisis.
According to the Publishers Weekly summary of the book:
Congress Ready to Promote Mental Health
March 5, 2008
Originally posted November 17, 2007: Metal Health Discrimination? The AP reports that the Senate has passed a bill that would require group health insurance to cover mental health services and substance abuse treatment at the same levels as typical medical coverage. From this little article one gets a glimpse at the way the US has treated mental health. There is a more expansive House version of the mental health parity bill that would also require insurance changes to begin in January 2008 - almost a year earlier than the Senate bill, which has the support of insurance companies. The House bill has made it through three committees.
Beware Drug Reps Bearing Gifts
February 21, 2008
Only 1 in 3 medical schools have policies to prevent conflicts of interest between their academic departments and the drug or medical device companies that may fund individual researchers. Only 6 U.S. medical schools are completely free from the “influence” of pharmaceutical kickbacks. While universities as private institutions set their own rules on ethics and proprieties, government can regulate medical professionals and health care.
Now Minnesota is leading the way in banning drug company gifts to doctors. In 2005, a state official decided that current law allowed the state to forbid drug makers from giving doctors more than $50 worth of food or other gifts per year. Since then, this kind of direct-to-doctor marketing has decreased, with the number of visits from drug reps declining twice as fast as the rate nationwide.
Next President Faces Obesity
February 18, 2008
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| Clinton | Gravel | Huckabee | Keyes |
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| McCain | Obama | Paul |
As the race to determine the next President of the United States begins to pick up steam and public attention, the issue of health reform is also gaining traction. But on top of figuring out how best to revise our health coverage system, many are concerned with how to improve our actual health. A recent 2007 conference convened a host of Democratic and Republican presidential candidate advisors to discuss what the next president needs to do about obesity.
The Return of the Cavity Creeps
February 1, 2008
Dental care seems to be experiencing the same cost increases that medical care is. Which may be why one in four children and adults - who aren’t necessarily low-income - have untreated cavities. At least twice in 2007, a child died from an infection caused by decayed teeth.
Unlike medical doctors, however, dentists’ salaries are actually rising, in part because their numbers aren’t increasing while the nation’s population is. Limited supply leads to high demand leads to the ability of dentists to charge higher prices, which they’re doing.
Cancer Society Promotes Health Reform
November 16, 2007
Heath care reform causes the American Cancer Society to make a major jump into the world of politics. “In a stark departure from past practice, the American Cancer Society plans to devote its entire $15 million advertising budget this year not to smoking cessation or colorectal screening but to the consequences of inadequate health coverage.” While one in every 10 cancer patients is uninsured, one in every four families afflicted by cancer is bankrupted by the fight, including one in every five with insurance. Though over half a million Americans are expected to die from cancer this year, ACS is targeting the US health care insurance system as the real enemy. Cancer rates won’t go down, ACS thinks, until people get the health care coverage they need to screen for, diagnose, and treat the disease.
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