Tag: Uncategorized

Is Massachusetts a model for national reform?

Dec 30, 2008• 18

By Charlie Baker Charlie_baker

I get asked this question a lot these days, which shouldn’t be that surprising. Harvard Pilgrim is headquartered in Massachusetts, and the Massachusetts health care reform plan is already a couple of years old. More importantly, it has added about 440,000 people to the insured ranks (185,000 through unsubsidized private plans and another 255,000 through subsidized, Medicaid-like coverage), has maintained high employer participation (over 70%) and doesn’t appear to be crowding out private coverage as public coverage expands.

But my answer to this question remains “it depends.” There were profound differences between Massachusetts and the rest of the country before health care reform took center stage here that make relying on our experience somewhat challenging for the nation as a whole. For example, Massachusetts already had guaranteed-issue requirements for individual health insurance coverage even before reform. Today, most states don’t. So in Massachusetts, individual coverage was available to anyone who wanted to buy it, but it was really, really expensive.

That’s because most of the people who buy individual coverage — absent a mandate to purchase — usually plan to use health care services once they purchase the insurance. Insurance works through risk pooling – a small number of people who get sick spend the premiums paid by a much larger group of people who don’t. If most of the people who buy the product plan to use it, there’s not enough healthy people to keep the overall price down.Continue reading…

My Health Care Reform House Party

Dec 29, 2008• 6

By Michael L. Millenson

The Obama-Biden Transition Team has encouraged individuals across the country to gather in small groups with friends and neighbors to discuss their ideas for health care reform. The team provided a background paper, discussion guide and a specific list of questions as a framework within which citizens could provide feedback to health reform czar-designate Tom Daschle. More than a thousand would-be hosts have officially registered on the change.gov website, and my wife and I were recently invited to one such gathering in a small village (yes, that’s the official designation) north of Chicago. My report below is not the official one.

‘Twas three nights before Christmas, and despite cold and stormWe’d gathered together to talk health care reform.Clutching Team Obama’s brief questionnaireWe went over each item with scrupulous care.Middle-class, middle-aged and in the MidwestWith our host’s college kids for reality test.O’er the country many thousands had signed up for the sameDespite fear “special interests” would come rig the game.But as we plain folk gathered by the living room fireWe closely read instructions, then vented our ire.

“Get Well Soon” Wishes for Health Policy Pioneer Paul Ellwood

Dec 28, 2008• 1

By Michael L. Millenson

Here’s a greeting card conundrum. What exactly do you say to an 82-year old man who, emailing you about a joint project you were working on, notes that he has just survived “a 12-foot backward fall into a jagged confined space. Result at least 6 smashed cervical and thoracic vertebrae. [But] no paralysis! In a halo and off full duty for a while, but eager to rejoin the hunt.”

“Get well soon” seems so pallid a reply.

Paul Ellwood, who survived this most recent harrowing accident, is best known as the man who originated the term health maintenance organization and then got the federal government to support the concept. He was also one of the first policy thinkers to push vigorously for patient-centered measures of care quality, through his Jackson Hole Group and, since the mid-1990s, on his own.

He’s also one tough hombre.

JSK on Health IT in 2009

Dec 23, 2008

By Matthew Holt

Savvy stuff, of course. Go read.

Prop 8 still reverberates, and bigotry is still with us

Dec 21, 2008• 20

By Matthew Holt

There’s a pretense from the ~~anti~~ (whoops!) pro-Prop 8 diehards that somehow this is not about them hating gay people. Rick Warren says that, as did Mike Huckerbee said when he ended his (clearly losing) conversation with John Stewart on The Daily Show. Frankly I’d be happier if they just came out and admitted it.

In a portrayal of one of the most unpleasant sounding families I’ve heard about in some time, the LA Times has a couple of juicy quotes. And the unpleasant family and their equally unpleasant pastors essentially come out and say it.

The Bible is very, very clear . . . that that kind of perversion will not get people into heaven," Abel said. "They’re fallen people, broken people, hurting people."

SNIP

Brooklyn and her family believe that gay activists have unfairly painted Proposition 8 supporters as "hate-mongers and bigots."

Hmm…who’s painting who?

But I’m always amazed that while caring so much about what happens in the afterlife, the fundamentalists among us are so determined to ruin other people’s lives in this space-time continuum.

CODA: The ridiculousness of the “resting on what the Bible says” position is of course best revealed in this classic, which ended up being used in a memorable scene in The West Wing.

Conservatives Need to be Part of Health Care Reform

Dec 20, 2008• 3

By Robert Laszewski

Stuart Butler, Vice President of Domestic Policy at the conservative Heritage Foundation has an op-ed in Thursday’s Washington Times, “Four Steps Can Heal Health Care.”He makes some very valuable points and proposes four steps toward reforming the health care system most people—liberals and conservatives —could agree on:

Making sure every working family has access to an affordable private health plan
that could include state-based default plans with agreed upon minimum
benefits and premiums subsidized through reinsurance pools that spread
any adverse risk over the broad private market.
Encouraging insurance exchanges not unlike those envisioned by Democrats but at the state level where Stuart sees these exchanges avoiding “endless Congressional micromanagement.”
Reforming the existing federal tax preferences for health insurance by capping the value of these tax breaks as a means to encourage more efficient plans and raise revenue to help pay for premium subsidies
Redesigning the Medicaid and SCHIP programs
by giving states the ability to streamline these programs and free-up
funds to expand the help the low-income people get for health
insurance—including vouchers to purchase private coverage.

California transplant surgeon acquitted

Dec 19, 2008• 1

By Sarah Arnquist Roozrokh

A jury acquitted a San Francisco transplant surgeon Thursday of criminal charges
related to his alleged actions during an attempted organ harvest nearly three years ago in a small town on California’s central coast.

In what’s thought to be the first case of its kind in the United States, prosecutors accused surgeon Hootan Roozrokh of ordering excessive amounts of painkillers to hasten the death of a potential organ donor.

The not-guilty verdict relieved the
transplant community, which feared the case would have chilling effects
on the public’s willingness to donate organs and surgeons’ willingness
to participate in the rarer type of donation done in this case, called
donation after cardiac death or DCD.

The Medicare Ponzi Scheme

Dec 19, 2008• 21

By Eric Novack

Just today, our next President spoke out against the largest investment swindle in US history. The alleged behavior of Bernard Madoff may have cost investors up to $50 billion.

“In the last few days, the alleged scandal at Madoff Investment Securities has reminded us yet again of how badly reform is needed when it comes to the rules and regulations that govern our markets. … And if the financial crisis has taught us anything, it’s that this failure of oversight and accountability doesn’t just harm the individuals involved, it has the potential to devastate our entire economy. That’s a failure we cannot afford.” — Barack Obama Dec. 18, 2008

What did Madoff do? He lured investors with big returns, and used the “profits” as a means to encourage additional investment by investors, while luring new ones.

Health 2.0 Conference is hiring

Dec 18, 2008• 4

By Matthew Holt

As the conference grows up and does more, Matthew & Indu are looking to get some help!

We are looking for a Conference Project and Production Manager and also a Registration, Customer Service & Sales Manager. These are great opportunities to dive into a small team that’s trying to make a big difference in health care — and have fun and an interesting time while we doing it. These are full time roles based in the Health 2.0 offices in San Francisco and/or Los Angeles.

If you’re interested or know some bright sparks who might be interested, please click or forward the links above!

The Inevitability of Health Care Reform: This Time, the Politics Have Changed

Dec 17, 2008• 8

By Michael Millenson

Rummaging through my extensive files (i.e., drawers of paper), I came across this
January/February 2001 issue of Healthplan, the magazine of the old American Association of Health Plans before it gobbled up the Health Insurance Association of America and became AHIP. It heralds the results of the 2000 election as an opportunity for Republicans and Democrats to work together on health care reform.