The Association of Health Care Journalists, the Society of Professional Journalists and 9 other scribbler groups have asked the Food and Drug Administration to lift its requirement that agency officials first get permission from the public relations office before speaking with reporters. The demand came in a letter sent to Principal Deputy Commissioner Joshua Sharfstein, who is running the FDA's Transparency Task Force.
Good idea. In fact, it should be extended to every government agency.
I was struck during President Obama’s health care speech before Congress several months ago that the reforms he advocates would not go into effect for four years, until 2014. This timetable, too, is written into both the House and Senate versions.
Why the delay? It is hard for me to imagine, even given the federal rulemaking process, that it should take four years to establish an insurance exchange from which people can buy coverage. This is the exchange that would eliminate the nasty practices of insurance companies: Denying coverage because of pre-existing conditions; limiting annual or lifetime payments; and rescission of policies. It is hard for me to imagine, too, why it should take four years to fully deliver targeted subsidies to lower income people so they can afford insurance.
As noted by Princeton Professor Paul Starr in an article in the New York Times earlier this week: “By comparison, when Medicare was enacted in 1965, it went into effect the next year.”
This leaves me with a bad feeling. It looks like the Obama team does not want implementation of the health care bill to take place during their first term. Why? Perhaps they know that the cost of the plan is higher than they are saying. Or maybe they know that the options available to consumers will be less attractive than currently portrayed.
On December 1, 1999, the Institute of Medicine released a report entitled To Err is Human: Building a Safer Health System. Although its authors hoped to spark a national movement, they had little cause for optimism. After all, early efforts by advocates like Berwick and Leape and organizations like the National Patient Safety Foundation had barely moved the needle of public and professional attention.
The IOM Report succeeded beyond its framers’ wildest dreams, and the movement they spawned turns ten today. Please indulge me while I spend a nostalgic moment recalling the remarkable spin that launched the patient safety field. I’ll then segue to a summary of my assessment of what we’ve accomplished over the past decade (I outline this more fully in an article in this week’s web version of Health Affairs, which I hope you’ll take a look at).Continue reading…
By JEFF GOLDSMITH
President Obama has promised not to sign any health reform legislation that increases the federal deficit. This promise recognized rising public concern about an Argentinean fiscal trend that, unchecked, could leave us with $19 trillion in federal debt in a decade.
Without that pledge, given the current economic climate, health reform would be one dead mackerel.
Some clarifications are essential here. I’m a Democrat and fervent Obama supporter. I voted for him twice (and that was just in the Virginia primary). I’m proud of our President. He has first class economic and healthcare teams. He deserves credit for not postponing health reform. He’s right: it’s simply not tolerable, morally or economically, for a wealthy nation to continue having close to 50 million uninsured people.
The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) issued a report today saying that if the Reid bill becomes law, the price of non group policies would be about 10 percent to 13 percent higher in 2016 than it would be under current law. The CBO projects that small group and large group premiums would be about the same in 2016 as they would have been anyway as the benefits of the bill would offset some of its new costs.
But what is likely to happen to health insurance rates in 2010, 2011, 2012, and 2013 before any of the bill’s benefits occur for both the insurance markets and consumers?
I would suggest Democrats not overlook the potential for political fallout in those years.
By delaying the start of most health insurance reform benefits—including insurance subsidies and underwriting reforms—until January 1, 2014 the Reid health care bill creates a real risk of unintended political consequences for the Democrats.
Or, maybe I should have said almost certain consequences that Reid may not have thought of.
Every week we bring you a video from the world of Health 2.0. This week we're featuring a video from our latest conference in San Francisco on October 6-7, 2009. Hear the latest from WebMD, Google Health and Microsoft.
To see more videos from past Health 2.0 conferences, or to purchase the entire conference DVD sets from '07 & '08 click here. 2009 DVD sets will be available shortly, please check back for updates.
Hey Folks,
This is Ian Kibbe, Associate Editor at THCB, with a request for your help.
This
month, I've become involved in a global charity that is bringing much
needed attention to cancers that affect men, namely prostate and
testicular cancer. Movember, is an international
organization that raises funds and awareness in support of men's health
by encouraging men to grow mustaches or "Mos," as they say in Australia, in the month of November.
I'm currently growing my Mo while raising funds and awareness for prostate and testicular cancer
research. It's like I'm running a marathon, but I've replaced the
running with the awkwardness of trying to grow facial hair, which if
you saw me you'd think was just as painful. (There's a mustache in that picture of me, I swear!)
This is the final week to collect donations before the Movember Gala, and I'm reaching out to all those who are able to contribute. Please take a minute to donate if you can.
I realize that this all sounds pretty silly, but to date, Movember has raised $47
million globally making it the world’s largest charity event for men.
The
funds raised go to the Prostate Cancer Foundation and the Lance
Armstrong Foundation (LIVESTRONG).
By MICHAEL PAINTER, MD
Last week a new article from The American Journal of Medicine entitled, “Hospital Computing and the Costs and Quality of Care: A National Study” by Himmelstein, et al. appeared in my Twitter stream. In fact, Brian Ahier (@ahier), whom I and about 3300 other tweeps like me follow, sent me a DM asking for thoughts. In that article the authors sort of breathlessly conclude that current hospital computing has minimal impact on quality and no impact on cost. Shocking. Actually, it’s the kind of gotcha article that really grates—the kind that isn’t particularly helpful to anyone as the authors seem intent on drawing sweeping conclusions from pretty limited data.
For starters, how can we draw any conclusions about the impact of widely adopted, meaningfully used electronic records until they’re, well, widely adopted? As research by Ashish Jha et al. highlighted in Chapter One of the recently released 2009 RWJF HIT Adoption report (results from that research also published in April NEJM) show that only 1.5% of hospitals have a comprehensive EHR system—and only another 8% have a so-called basic system. I’m not sure how one can draw important conclusions about national hospital computing given such an unbelievably low national rate of adoption.Continue reading…
By KATHLEEN BOOZANG
Seton Hall University School of Law’s Center for Health & Pharmaceutical Law & Policy has called for major substantive reforms in the financing and oversight of clinical research. In a White Paper entitled “ Conflicts of Interest in Clinical Trial Recruitment & Enrollment: A Call for Increased Oversight,” the Center proposes legal and policy changes to address conflicts of interest in the relationships between industry and doctors that can create unwarranted risks to trial participants and to the scientific integrity of research.
Over 60% of testing of experimental drugs and medical devices now occurs in physicians’ private offices; unlike years past, industry funds a much higher percent of clinical trials than government, frequently paying researchers significantly more than government does. For some physician practices, conducting clinical trials represents a significant portion of their income.Continue reading…
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