Was The Budget a Good Balance?
President Obama's budget proposal Monday was tough on the health care sector, which enjoyed none of the big-bucks proposals he offered in energy and infrastructure. The president repeated calls for...
View ArticleWhat Will Exchanges Look Like?
HHS is due out with its rules for insurance exchanges any time now. But states and private enterprises aren't necessarily waiting for the details. What interesting solutions do you see coming from the...
View ArticleDoes Congress Need IPAB?
Two House committees meet this week to mark up a bill repealing the Independent Payment Advisory Board, an executive-branch board with control over Medicare prices that even Democrats don't like. A...
View ArticleHas Rep. Ryan Changed Medicare and Medicaid Dialogue?
House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan is getting ready to release his second budget blueprint, and he isn't expected to pull any punches on Medicare. Ryan told National Journal's Nancy Cook that...
View ArticleTwo Years of Health Reform: What Would You Change?
Friday marks the second anniversary of the health reform law. Just three days later, what Republicans like to deride as "Obamacare" will face the biggest challenge it has ever seen: oral arguments at...
View ArticleMissing Ways To Salvage Health Reform?
After tougher-than-expected questioning for the Obama administration at last week's historic Supreme Court arguments on the health reform law, figuring out how to make the law work if the court strikes...
View ArticleAre ACOs Already Over?
Last week the federal government announced it had signed up 27 hospital and doctor groups to participate as accountable care organizations, one of the health reform law's great cost-saving hopes. The...
View ArticleShould Americans Get Insurance From Their Employers?
What role should employer-sponsored health insurance plans play in U.S. health care? House Republicans have bashed the health reform law as the beginning of the end of the employer-sponsored health...
View ArticleWhat Can Congress Learn from the FDA User Fee Bills?
Unlike so much else in the 112th Congress, the package of legislation to authorize Food and Drug Administration user fee agreements is humming along. At a House markup last week, Rep. Henry Waxman,...
View ArticleIf "Obamacare" falls, what's next for Congress?
A rumor that the Supreme Court might rule on the health care case last week turned out to be just that. But, with the Court's decision drawing near, members of Congress have begun thinking about how...
View ArticleAre insurance reforms here to stay?
On Monday, the health insurer UnitedHealthCare announced that it will be preserving several consumer protections now required by the Affordable Care Act, regardless of what the Supreme Court opts to do...
View ArticleWhat Changes Will Survive the Supreme Court?
The countdown to the Supreme Court's decision in the health care case is on. Chief Justice John Roberts said Monday that the justices would be issuing rulings in the remaining cases on Thursday, which...
View ArticleThe Court Has Spoken. What Now?
So the Court has spoken. We can now end all the speculating and vague worrying about what the Supreme Court might or might not do to the health reform law. A majority of the Court said that the...
View ArticleAIDS: Where Are We Now?
The International Aids Conference is back in the United States for the first time in more than 20 years, with a star-studded cast that includes top U.S. health officials, former presidents,...
View ArticleWill We Have a Serious Discussion About Premium Support?
Mitt Romney's selection of Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., as his running mate has brought his Medicare reform proposal to the front of the presidential campaign. Polling in February suggested that while...
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