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"The White House is mounting a stinging, sustained broadside against health insurance rate increases," The Washington Post reports, adding that President Obama "and his health secretary staged a two-pronged attack Monday in a stern letter to health insurance chief executives and a speech in which the president castigated insurance companies 22 times... Read more..
News outlets report on health care remarks from GOP leaders. "National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman John Cornyn said Monday that if some type of health care legislation is able to limp its way out of Congress, GOP candidates across the country are poised to make it the premiere issue of the fall campaign," Politico reports... Read more..
The Emotion of Reform The New York Times For the Democrats, expanding health care coverage is an emotional hot spot. Over the past year, Democrats have fought passionately for universal coverage (and) there is something morally impressive in the Democrats' passion on this issue... Read more..
As Democratic leaders attempt to resolve differences between the House (HR 3962) and Senate (HR 3590) health reform bills, President Obama on Monday held a rally in Pennsylvania to urge members of his party not to waver in their fight to enact the overhaul, the New York Times reports... Read more..
The following summarizes selected women's health-related blog entries. ~ "Stupak's Abortion Argument: Still More About Class Than Choice": Washington Post's "Ezra Klein": The "practical effect" of Rep. Bart Stupak's (D-Mich... Read more..
Politico: Process is principle in Washington right now, as parliamentary procedure attorneys "clash" over the legal designations and wording of various bills and provisions in the lead up to an attempt to pass health legislation under filibuster-avoiding reconciliation rules... Read more..
The Dallas Morning News: "Lawmakers have been thinking ahead to a massive shortfall, topping $10 billion, that's probably coming when they write the next budget in 2011. But state officials told them Monday that they'll have to fix a hole in the current budget, too. Rising health care costs have dug a hole of about $1.7 billion, the officials said... Read more..
The Associated Press: President Barack Obama will travel to Philadelphia today to "try to persuade the public to back his plan to remake the nation's health care system, while also urging uneasy lawmakers to cast a 'final vote' for a massive reform bill in an election year." Obama will then travel to St. Louis Wednesday... Read more..
A bill in the Virginia state legislature could upend a critical provision of the Democrats' health overhaul and open the door for a fresh battle over the federal government's power over states, The Boston Globe reports. "The Virginia Legislature this week is poised to become the first state to pass legislation that says citizens cannot be required to have medical insurance... Read more..
A split among Democrats on abortion is threatening to derail efforts to overhaul the nation's health care system. The Hill reports that "lawmakers took sides over whether the final health care bill contains language that would allow people receiving government subsidized health care to obtain an abortion and a White House official accused abortion opponent Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich... Read more..
If Reform Fails The New York Times Any change as big as this is bound to cause anxiety. Republicans have happily fanned those fears with talk of "dangerous experiments" on the "best health care system in the world." The fact is that the health care system is broken for far too many Americans. And the country cannot afford the status quo (3/6)... Read more..
In appearances on several Sunday talk shows, Democratic officials continued to put pressure on Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) over his claims that the abortion-coverage provisions in the Senate health care reform bill (HR 3590) would allow federal funding to pay for the procedure, The Hill reports... Read more..
The Los Angeles Times: "Obama's signature ability to inspire fellow Democrats and Pelosi's well-honed ability to read their parochial needs will be tested as they tackle the job of finding the last stubborn votes for the healthcare bill. ... "Under the Democrats' strategy, the House would pass the Senate's version of the bill... Read more..
The Los Angeles Times analyzes how insurance costs became a focal point: "The Democrats' bill was in serious trouble when news broke of planned rate hikes by the California insurer. ... Anthem Blue Cross was seeking double-digit rate increases for many of its 800,000 individual policyholders. Company executives had little reason to worry... Read more..
States are having to make budgetary decisions about their health care systems as federal legislation and funding continue to be tied up in Congress. Minnesota Daily: Lawmakers in Minnesota have revealed a plan to temporarily extend the General Assistance Medical Care plan before replacing it "with a trimmed-down delivery system managed largely by hospitals. ... Read more..
In a letter to the CEOs of UnitedHealth Group Inc., WellPoint Inc., Aetna Inc., Health Care Service Corporation and CIGNA HealthCare Inc., U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius called on the executives to publicly justify proposed health insurance premium increases. Sebelius' letter comes after a meeting last week with these executives at the White House... Read more..
Rep. Bart Stupak's (D-Mich.) claim that the Senate health reform bill (HR 3590) would allow taxpayer dollars to be used to cover abortion services "concerns (or at least pretends to concern) matters of fact, not belief," Slate columnist Timothy Noah writes... Read more..
The following summarizes select women's health-related blog entries. ~ "Nelson Restrictions Most Likely Outcome of Reconciliation Process," Jodi Jacobson, RH Reality Check: While antiabortion-rights advocates "are ratcheting up pressure to completely eliminate" abortion coverage, "discriminatory restrictions contained in the Senate bill (HR 3590) ... are likely to become law," Jacobson writes... Read more..
"Democratic leaders in Congress are embarking on a delicate strategy to win over abortion opponents, a gambit that could determine whether the legislation becomes law." The Washington Post reports. "The effort depends on convincing as many as a dozen anti-abortion Democrats in the House that abortion language in the Senate bill is more stringent than initially portrayed... Read more..
Several news organization have "fact checks" on the reconciliation procedure and health reform provisions. The Associated Press examined then-candidate Barack Obama's Oct. 2007 statement of "We're not going to pass universal health care with a 50-plus-one strategy... Read more..
President Barack Obama intensified his push for health care reform by lobbying small groups of Democratic lawmakers Thursday... Read more..
"As President Obama pushes for a prompt up or down vote on his health initiative, lobbyists and activist groups on both sides of the issue have launched grass-roots and high-dollar advertising campaigns on the roughly two dozen members of Congress who may be the final swing votes on the controversial issue," The Los Angeles Times reports... Read more..
As health reform negotiations continue, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Democratic leaders are working to gain the support of antiabortion-rights House members without compromising the votes of members who support abortion rights, the Washington Post reports... Read more..
The following summarizes select women's health-related videos. Stupak, Sebelius Discuss Reform Vote: On Thursday's "Good Morning America," Sebelius countered Rep. Bart Stupak's (D-Mich.) claims that the Senate health reform bill would lessen restrictions on federal funding of abortion... Read more..
The Hill: "Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) is seeking bipartisan support to block Senate Democrats from using special parliamentary tactics to pass healthcare reform. The Democratic strategy of using reconciliation to pass changes to the healthcare bill is reminiscent of Republican attempts to force President George W. Bush's judicial nominees through with a simple majority vote, McCain said Thursday... Read more..
"Aggressive negotiations are under way" over funding for health insurance coverage of abortion services in the various health reform proposals in Congress, Americans United for Life President and CEO Charmaine Yoest writes in a Wall Street Journal opinion piece.
A "triple-barreled" insurance industry attack on the Senate Finance Committee's health legislation - including separate reports sponsored by America's Health Insurance Plans and the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association, as well as television advertisements in six states - is "a reminder that the insurance industry has enormous financial stakes in a health care overhaul and will not sit by while its interests are threatened," the Read more..
Roll Call reports that after the Senate canceled the Columbus Day recess in October, it "will not be in session Nov. 11-13 and will take off the entire week of Thanksgiving, even though the chamber could be in session until Christmas to deal with health care reform. ... Read more..
As the recession grinds on, more and more people are relying on taxpayer-supported health centers that offer care on a sliding fee scale," The Associated Press reports. "If Congress passes a law giving more Americans access to health insurance, the clinics will also be a critical element to ramping up capacity to care for millions of new patients. Read more..
News outlets report on a variety of state health stories including insurance in Minnesota, premiums and out-of-pocket costs in Massachusetts and high premiums for Blue Sheild in California. In Minnesota, Gov. Tim Pawlenty has proposed letting Minnesotans purchase out-of-state health insurance policies and letting for-profit insurers into Minnesota to drive down health costs, the Read more..
Approximately 184,700 people in North Carolina lost health insurance coverage in 2009 due to a rise in unemployment, according to a report issued today by the health consumer organization Families USA. According to the report, the state's average unemployment rate in 2008 was 6.3 percent, while the average rate this year was 10.7 percent, thereby resulting in losses of health coverage. Read more..
Public Option Re-Emerges In Senate Discussions; Continues To Play Role In House
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's efforts to merge the two Senate health care reform bills is being complicated by question of whether to include a public plan and how it might fit with vote counting, the president's agenda and the more liberal version sure to come out of the House. Read more..
The political center remains elusive in the health care debate, despite Democrats' glee after one version of the bill received a GOP vote, Politico reports. "If Democratic leadership hoped Republican Olympia Snowe's decision to cross party lines Tuesday would inspire her fellow middle-of-the-roaders, they were mistaken." Rather than echoing her show of support, moderates like Sens. Ben Nelson, D-Neb., and Mark Pryor, D-Ark. Read more..
As the House Democratic leadership continues to work toward moving a health overhaul measure to the floor, members continue to stake out positions - sometimes because of their personal histories or where they are from. In a few cases, the positions they have taken lead to increased attention. Democrats in the House represent the poorest and richest parts of the country, according to an analysis from USA Today and reported in Read more..
An insurer in Utah is encouraging consumers to use less medical care, but a study of California hospitals suggests that sometimes spending more really does improve patient outcomes. "As the battle over health care reform rages in Congress, Regence BlueCross BlueShield is using a slick Internet site, social media and billboards to say that consumers bear much of the blame for high premiums," Read more..
Reform And Your Premiums The New York Times "After months of seeming mostly supportive of health care reform - and just before the Senate Finance Committee was set to vote on its bill - the leading industry trade group issued an inflammatory and utterly self-serving report alleging that the committee's bill would drive up premium costs for Americans by thousands of additional dollars a year. Read more..
AFP Examines 'Street Pharmacies' In Benin Agence France-Presse examines Adjegounle, the "drugs" district in Benin. Read more..
Approximately 95,500 people in Virginia lost health insurance coverage in 2009 due to a rise in unemployment, according to a report issued today by the health consumer organization Families USA. According to the report, the state's average unemployment rate in 2008 was 4.0 percent, while the average rate this year was 6.7 percent, thereby resulting in losses of health coverage. Read more..
On Wednesday, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) convened the first of several meetings with top Democrats to combine the chamber's two health reform bills, The Hill reports (Young, The Hill, 10/14). Senate Finance Committee Chair Max Baucus (D-Mont. Read more..
Before voting with the Democrats on the Senate Finance Committee, Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, had been involved in negotiations for months that led to the shape of the measure's key elements, USA Today reports. "The Maine senator refused to support a government-run insurance option to compete with private insurers - and the bill didn't have one. Read more..
Bloomberg: "Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid now has to meld the $829 billion legislation with a measure passed by the Senate health committee in July. While both proposals aim to curb medical costs and cover tens of millions of uninsured Americans, their different paths to the goal have divided Democrats and unsettled some of the party's main supporters. Read more..
Kaiser Health News staff writer Phil Galewitz reports on the position generic drug makers have taken regarding how the costs of health reform should be paid. "Generic drug makers - which have saved Americans hundreds of billions of dollars in the past decade with their low-cost, copycat medicines - don't think they should join other health industries to finance a health care overhaul" (10/15). Read more..
Democrats are seeking momentum and votes -- from both Democrats and Republicans -- as leaders work to combine the two versions of reform approved by Senate committees. The Hill reports that Democrats are preaching unity as their leaders merge the bills: Baucus, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and "Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn. Read more..
Approximately 28,300 people in Arkansas lost health insurance coverage in 2009 due to a rise in unemployment, according to a report issued today by the health consumer organization Families USA. According to the report, the state's average unemployment rate in 2008 was 5.1 percent, while the average rate this year was 6.8 percent, thereby resulting in losses of health coverage. Read more..
For the more than four million uninsured adults in the United States nearing retirement age, a serious illness often spells financial disaster, according to a recent study. "We found that for a typical household this costs - in lost savings - between one-third and one-half of their total accumulated financial assets relative to households with similar, but insured individuals," said lead author Keziah Cook, a Ph.D. candidate in economics at Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill. Read more..
Health experts and officials from around America are weighing in on the health care reform efforts in Congress. The Grand Junction (Colo. Read more..
Senate Finance Committee Bill's Soft Spot: Health Care Insurance Mandate The Christian Science Monitor "Americans must be aware of how mandates might impinge on their choices - and how vulnerable Obama's plan might be to court challenge" (10/13). Read more..
Kaiser Kaiser Health News staff writers Eric Pianin and Mary Agnes Carey report on yesterday's developments in the Senate Finance Committee. Read more..
The Senate Finance Committee yesterday became the fifth and final committee in Congress to pass a health care overhaul bill. The committee voted 14-9 in favor of the bill with Sen. Olympia Snowe, of Maine, joining all of the panel's Democrats to cast the sole Republican "yea" vote. Read more..
The BBC offers a trans-Atlantic primer on American health reform: "Unlike other developed countries, the US does not have a universal system of healthcare coverage," the report explains. Though Obama made health reform his "top priority," members of Congress are "finding it difficult to agree on a bill." The lawmakers must address the plights of 46. Read more..
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