Unbiased Analysis of Today's Healthcare Issues
A paper by Lurie et al. (2021) provides the answer. They reach four conclusions from their analysis: First, the actual penalty paid per uninsured month is less than half the statutory amount. Second, nonetheless, we find visually clear and statistically significant responses to both extensive margin exposure to the mandate and to marginal increases in…
The answer to this question likely will be shaped in part by a new multilateral working group that will include not only representatives from the U.S. (U.S. Department of Justice Antitrust Division, and Offices of State Attorneys General), but also Canada (Canadian Competition Bureau), Europe (the European Commission Directorate General for Competition) and the United…
To get people vaccinated for COVID-19, a lot of things have to go right. First, you have to have purchased the vaccine. Second, you need a supply chain to be able to deliver the vaccine. Third (or perhaps first) you need people who actually are interested in receiving the vaccine. As you can see from…
A number of different federal agencies buy prescription drugs. However, the price at which these pharmaceuticals are purchased varies dramatically. To quantify this variation, a 2021 report from the Congressional Budget Office examines the following prices: Medicare Part D: the prescription drug program for Medicare beneficiaries. Prices are set when private insurers (or pharmacy benefit…
Conventional wisdom holds that the U.S. has become more and more partisan and the views of both Democrats and Republicans have become less moderate over time. Is that the case with respect to views on health policy? A paper in JAMA last week by Blendon et al. (2021) conducted probability-based national surveys on four topics…
That is the title of an article by Angela Maas in Radar on Specialty pharmacy (reprinted here). A few excerpts: “Although state governments frequently pay for health care through programs such as Medicaid, in the past, state governments have not manufactured drugs,” says Jason Shafrin, vice president of health economics at PRECISIONheor. “Thus, this is a…
Last week I reviewed an article on some of the potential positives and negatives of large, integrated health systems. A recent 60 Minutes episode talks about some of the perils by examining how Sutter health system has become a near monopoly provider in Northern California. Consider the following interaction between Leslie Stahl of 60 minutes…
Integrated delivery networks. IDNs. Accountable Care Organizations. ACOs. Systems of care. Health systems. Whatever you call them, many health policy experts claim that they are the best way for the U.S. health care system to deliver high quality care in a cost-effective manner. But is that really the case? A commentary by UCSD professor and…
How do you incentivize pharmaceutical companies and researchers to develop new drugs for rare diseases? Drug development is expensive and–by definition–rare diseases have a small market. One solution to this problem is that governments have used orphan drug policies to provide monetary incentives for innovators to research drugs for rare diseases. But which countries have…
This is the question that a recent paper by Chorniy et al. (2020) attempt to answer. This issue is clearly very relevant as the UK recently has approved the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine for COVID-19 before the US. Unlike most studies that attempt to examine the relationship between FDA review time and R&D investment dollars, the authors…