Health Care
Not All Bad
Daily Treatment, With a Healthy Smile
Most under-appreciated feature of health reform: Better dental care for kids. (Jessica Marcy, Kaiser Health News) Liberal groups are mounting a campaign to improve the affordability protections in health reform. (Chris Frates, Politico) READ MORE >>
Sorry, Prevention Not a Priority
Last week, I received a form letter from my internist's office, spotlighting one of the more peculiar characteristics of our health care system. It began: Dear Patients: As many of you know, Medicare does not cover preventive medical care or annual physical examinations. Comprehensive annual examinations are a very important part of your health care, allowing us to focus on prevention of illness and patient education. READ MORE >>
How to Get Around Bad CBO Scores
How Baucus Would Make Health Care More Affordable
How can Obamacare make insurance more affordable for Americans, given the current state of the reform bill? One approach--supported by many progressives--is to raise the insurance subsidies provided to lower-income families. The other is to shrink the benefits package that insurance companies are required to provide. In a conference call organized this afternoon by Families USA, Senate Finance Committee chair Max Baucus explained exactly what the latter might look like. READ MORE >>
Give 'Em HELP Harry
The Senate Finance Committee has been the focus of so much attention, for so long a time, that it's easy to forget another committee in the Senate passed its own version of reform several months ago. READ MORE >>
Daily Treatment, Full of Irony and Contradiction
The Congressional Budget Office tells us what legislation will cost, but can't always answer that question accurately. Lori Montgomery explains. Some legislators representing rural states are very keen to keep down the cost of health care reform, except when it means paying their home-state hospitals less. Eric Pianin and Mary Agnes Carey have the story. READ MORE >>
The Penalty Box
Peter Harbage is a Washington DC-based health policy analyst who worked with both Senator John Edwards and Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger on their individual mandate proposals. He has also worked at both the Center for American Progress and the New America Foundation. READ MORE >>
Hold the Mayo
Harold Pollack is a professor at the University of Chicago School of Social Service Administration and Special Correspondent for The Treatment. READ MORE >>
Help for the Docs. What About the Patients?
Congress is about to write a very big check to America's doctors, apparently without blinking. It may or may not be the right thing to do--more on that in a second. But it does make you wonder why they find it so hard to write a very big check to make sure everybody can get affordable health insurance. READ MORE >>
