Unbiased Analysis of Today's Healthcare Issues
That is the title of a new paper with Shanshan Wang, Jaehong Kim, and Slaven Sikirica that has the subtitle “Budget impact analysis from the US payer perspective.” That abstract is below: BACKGROUND:Heart failure (HF) is a leading cause of mortality in the United States, often complicated by comorbidities like diabetes mellitus. These patients face…
Measles outbreak expands to 19 states. Commercial health plan coverage of accelerated approval drugs…and a recent case study. Extending IRA drug price negotiation to commercial plans? ‘Kennedy Turns to a Discredited Vaccine Skeptic for Autism Study’ Why are LLMs so good at economics? Most expensive states to start a business.
This is a new organization that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. aims to create, consolidating the functions of many federal health organizations and cutting significant staff. The Guardian reports: Robert F Kennedy Jr said the nation’s health agencies will cut 10,000 jobs from their 82,000-person workforce – an enormous reduction the US health secretary characterized as…
That is the title of a new USC white paper by Darren Filson, Karen Van Nuys, Darius Lakdawalla and Dana Goldman with the subtitle “How Much Does Revenue Drive New Drug Development?” What is the elasticity of innovation? It measures the percentage change in innovation—using the flow of new drugs approvals, or Phase 1, 2,…
That is according to a paper by Wolff et al. (2025). They use 2011-2022 data from the National Health and Aging Trends Study (NHATS) linked to data from the National Study of Caregiving (NSOC). Using these data, they find. …the numbers of family caregivers providing help to older adults increased by nearly six million between…
As reported by the BBC: NHS England will be abolished and brought under “democratic control” in an attempt to cut bureaucracy and duplication, Sir Keir Starmer has announced. The organisation, which oversees the country’s health service, will be brought into the Department of Health, and the PM said the move would free up money for…
On Tuesday (11 March 2025) the European Commission presented the draft of its new Critical Medicines Act (CMA). The Science Media Centre España writes that the CMA’s objective is: …to address the serious shortage of medicines and healthcare products, reduce external dependence on critical medicines and ingredients — especially from Asia — and guarantee the…
The Incidental Economist website has a helpful explainer video. The truth is that higher cost is due to both higher prices and more utilization of healthcare goods and services. It is not caused by any one stakeholder within the healthcare ecosystem. Reducing health care costs would require significant–and often painful–tradeoffs.
That is the question asked in a new paper by Enright, et al. (2025). The authors use the Tufts Medical Center Specialty Drug Evidence and Coverage (SPEC) database current as of August 2023. This database contains publicly available specialty pharmacy coverage decisions as issued by 18 large US commercial health plans, which—collectively—cover 200m people (i.e.,…
Can LLM experience anxiety? Impact of economic shocks on infant health. The advent of managed long-term services and home care. “Nothing would will have more impact on workers’ comp than significant cuts to Medicaid.” Impact of work from home.