Unbiased Analysis of Today's Healthcare Issues
Today, I will review the Republican Response to President Obama’s health care reform speech. To sum up, Republicans propse: malpractice reform (likely damage caps) allowing individuals to buy health insurance across state lines, allowing small businesses and individuals to pool together (not the same as creating a health insurance exchange), refundable tax credits for low-…
Today, President Obama made a speech calling for healthcare reform. To sum up, Obama is proposing: creating a health insurance exchange, an individual mandate, guaranteed renewability of health insurance, subsidies for individuals and small businesses to purchase insurance, and public option/co-op. Below are some highlights from the speech [with my comments in brackets]. So tonight,…
The N.Y. Times reports that President Obama will not insist that a public option be part of any health reform package. You can watch the full speech tonight at 8pm ET live online here. Or for those of you (like me) who prefer the written word, you can always read the speech transcripts available later…
Is Obamacare going down in flames? Is Sarah Palin’s “Death Panel” comment the culprit? Is the government going to start killing its own citizens? In Sarah Palin’s Facebook post, she explains her concerns by quoting from section 1223 of HR 3200: Section 1233 authorizes advanced care planning consultations for senior citizens on Medicare every five…
Waiting: 70 days to see an ob-gyn in Massachusetts. Why Obama’s health reform efforts will succeed where the Clinton’s failed. Government auto inspections do not affect car accident rates. Wellcare’s Bill: $80 million for Medicare/Medicaid fraud, $10 million for SEC violations. McKinsey: Regulation drives complexity. Using prices to ration water. On the table: Removing the tax exemption on…
Bank of America shareholders approved the purchase of Merrill Lynch on December 5, 2008. Last year in the fourth quarter, Merrill Lynch lost $15.84 billion. Bank of America President Ken Lewis knew that Merrill was at risk of huge 4th quarter losses. Ken Lewis did not tell shareholders about Merrill’s impending large losses. Why? Under oath,…
Nevada is contemplating ‘slapping’ a $5 tax on sex acts in brothels.
SURGEON GENERAL’S WARNING: Reading this edition of the Cavalcade of Risk puts you at risk of certain side effects such as: a sudden increase in intelligence; gaining a basic understanding of how health care and health insurance works in the UK and at General Mills; nausea from recent economic news. This news includes investigating the parallels…
Regarding my post on Monday, Obama’s stimulus package–a.k.a. the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA)–includes 1.1 billion dollars for clinical comparative effectiveness research. According to the American Academy of Family Physicians (AAFP), ARRA “allocates $1.1 billion for comparative clinical effectiveness research, including $300 million for the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality and $400 million each…
The Kaiser Family Foundation that says 59% of people think health reform would make the country better off and only 12% thought health reform would make the country worse off. This seems like overwhelming support. However, how only 38% of people thought health reform would make themselves and their family better off compared to 11%…