HealthCareForAmericaNow

Budget Office Sees Hurdles in Financing Health Plans - NYTimes

The Congressional Budget Office said Thursday that many of the health care proposals championed by President-elect Barack Obama and other Democrats would carry a high price tag and would generate only modest savings.

Matthew Herper On Health Care - Forbes

Drug companies, health insurers and hospitals have all been talking about changing the way they do business. Now they actually have to or else.

Rebecca Ruiz On Health Care - Forbes

There's a large corner of Capitol Hill that's obsessed with pushing health care reform through Congress in 2009.

How Healthcare Fares During A Recession - NPR

It's hard enough being a doctor, let alone running your own practice. As patients face ever tightening budgets, some people skip important screenings and tests over insurance worries.

ABC News’ Teddy Davis Reports: Advocates of a government alternative to private health insurance fired the first shot of the new battle to reform the nation’s health-care system on Wednesday.

Read more…

Liberals Call Govt. Health Option Non-Negotiable - ABC The Note

Advocates of a government alternative to private health insurance fired the first shot of the new battle to reform the nation’s health-care system on Wednesday, saying that efforts to water down this key component of Barack Obama’s health-care plan should be rejected by members of Congress.

Obama's health-care calculations - Market Watch

Dangerously crowded emergency rooms. High and rising costs. Eroding standards of care. Disjointed health care that buries patients and doctors in paperwork. Declining employer-sponsored insurance coverage.

The Institute for America’s Future and renowned health care and economics expert, Jacob Hacker, released a report today called: “The Case for Public Plan Choice in National Health Reform.” The report explains how the public plan option levels the playing field to allow for access and affordability by reducing costs, without reducing the innovation that can come from the private market. The Key Findings (pdf) of the report state:

A health care system that contains costs and drives value must include a good public plan if the broad goals of reform—universal insurance and improved value—are to be achieved. Private insurance and public insurance have distinct strengths and weaknesses, and thus should be encouraged to compete side by side to attract enrollees on a level playing field that rewards plans that deliver better value and health to their enrollees. Public insurance has a better track record at reining in costs, while preserving access; it has pioneered key quality and payment innovations that have often set the standard for private plans; it is essential to set a standard against which private plans must compete to drive value and can be a source of stability for people. Private plans are a source of new benefit options, and continuing pressure for innovation in benefit design and care management strategies.

HCAN Campaign Director, Richard Kirsch, voiced his support for the report’s conclusion: “Creating a high quality, affordable public plan alternative to private insurance is absolutely essential to achieving comprehensive health care reform solutions that will work for all of us in 2009.” Rep. Pete Stark stated his strong support for the choice of a public plan and HCAN agrees that a health care solution that does not include a public plan would be a non-starter. President-elect Obama also talks about the choice of a public option as a critical part of his plan, saying again and again in his speeches that every American should have a choice of a public plan similar to the health care that every Member of Congress gets.

However, we have seen signs that there will be debate on this issue. Advocates of real health care reform need to make sure that this critical part of the solution is not bargained away in a misguided attempt to placate those who see health care reform as a business opportunity, not a matter of the health of our families and our neighbors. This would be a tragic mistake.

Many of you who have been following Congressional politics for some time now will remember that in recent years, “Mr. Hastert was an advocate of governing the House by a ‘majority of the majority’ – a standard he thought best served the interests of his Republican members and, by extension, the nation.” By that standard on the list of Congressional supporters for the HCAN Statement of Common Purpose, we have a ‘majority of the majority’ supporting the public plan choice. We hope this will allay the fears of anyone who believes that real change can’t happen, because, in fact, this train is already pulling out the station.

Obama faces a crush of demands from interest groups - USA Today

Al Gore wants quick action on climate change. Sen. Edward Kennedy says health care reform can't wait. Labor unions want a bill making it easier to organize.

Insurers Seek Presence at Health Care Sessions - NYTimes

When supporters of President-elect Barack Obama hold house parties to discuss ways of fixing the health care system over the next two weeks, they may find some unexpected guests.

Cancer Doctors Fear Chemo Drug Shortage - Forbes.com

The inability of two drug makers to produce a generic cancer medicine endangers both patients and research.

Alarming Numbers For Black Men And Colorectal Cancer - NPR

Dr. Ottis Brawley, chief medical officer at the American Cancer Society, sponsored the research and discusses the findings disparity.

GAO Report Finds That Medicare Advantage Plans Can Cost Beneficiaries More Than Traditional Medicare - Kaiser Daily Reports

Medicare Advantage private fee-for-service plans can cost beneficiaries more out-of-pocket than the traditional fee-for-service program, according to a recent Government Accountability Office report, CQ HealthBeat reports.

Geography Has Role in Medicare Cancer Coverage - NYTimes

The medical tool’s catchy name, CyberKnife, evokes digital accuracy. But the way the federal Medicare system treats CyberKnife seems anything but precise.

Here is a little sampling of all the great work that is going on in the field with the HCAN campaign.

First, Representative-elect Himes in Connecticut made a public commitment to the principles for health care reform from the HCAN Statement of Common Purpose. You can watch his moving statement on video here from Connecticut Citizen Action Group:

Then, I got these photos from Progress Ohio where they are gathering forces from the around the state to fight for health care in 2009.

Progress Ohio Meeting

And finally, from Denver, Colorado our partners at SEIU are organizing health care workers from around the country to participate in health care community discussions with the transition team. Watch the video from Dr. L. Toni Lewis, President CIR/SIEU:

Keep up the great work guys! This is how will achieve change that works.

Tom Daschle has his own health plan: Learning from Clinton's mistakes, the nominee for Health and Human Services secretary favors going on the political offensive to bring about reform. - LA Times

Noam N. Levey - By choosing former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle to head his healthcare reform effort, President-elect Barack Obama got more than an old congressional hand with a policy book on his resume.

Primary Care's Primary Advocate - Forbes.com

David Whelan - Forbes talks with Dr. Kevin Pho of KevinMD.com about health policy matters as President Obama takes office.Kevin Pho, an internal medicine doctor in Nashua, N.H., has a busy medical practice. But he's also become an influential voice as the country embarks on another round of health reform under President Obama and "health czar" Thomas Daschle. Pho runs KevinMD.com, the most popular doctor blog.

Pushing more docs to ditch prescription pad: Medicare to offer e-prescription bonus incentives to help cut medical errors - MSNBC

The push for paperless prescriptions is about to get a boost: Starting in January, doctors who e-prescribe can get bonus pay from Medicare.

Necessary Medicine? – The New York Times

President-elect Barack Obama placed a heavy bet last week that the recession-wracked country he is about to inherit has finally reached its tipping point on health care.

Drug Maker Said to Pay Ghostwriters for Journal Articles – The New York Times

Wyeth, the pharmaceutical company, paid ghostwriters to produce medical journal articles favorable to its female hormone replacement therapy Prempro, according to Congressional letters seeking more information about the company’s involvement in medical ghostwriting. At least one article was published even after a federal study found the drug raised the risk of breast cancer.

Healthcare IT spending is not dead in Hospitals (yet) – The Health Care IT Guy

The nice folks at NAHIT sent out a note about their new survey of about 144 CIOs that captured technology executive’s views on healthcare IT spending. The report’s key findings include (these are direct quotes from the report):

Many doctors use bare-bones records system : Survey indicates many physicians rely on outdated paper records - MSNBC

Just under 40 percent of U.S. doctors use electronic medical records and many say the system they use is only minimally functional, according to federal survey results released on Thursday.

Many of you signed up to be hosts at the community health care discussions sponsored by the Obama transition team and Sen. Daschle on Change.gov. Thanks for that. We are happy that the transition team is making this a priority and going to great lengths to get input from people like you who are most affected by the health care crisis in America.

I have been getting a lot of emails and phone calls asking for more information on these discussions. If you would like to know more, or if you want to host a discussion, please sign up at Change. gov. They will send you a Discussion Moderator Guide and let you know how to send your notes back to the transition team.

Here is a link we set up to get you on your way.

Thanks for participating!

NEWS

Health Care Policy Is in Hands of an Ex-Senator - New York Times

In selecting Tom Daschle to be his health and human services secretary, President-elect Barack Obama said Thursday that he wanted Mr. Daschle, a former South Dakota senator, to pursue something that had eluded federal officials for decades: securing “affordable, accessible health care for every single American.”

Medicare insurers' profits exceed expectations - Associated Press

Health insurance companies that serve the elderly and disabled in Medicare are realizing significantly higher profits than they anticipated, resulting in the companies getting $1.3 billion more than projected, congressional auditors say.

Baucus, Harkin Outline Plans for Health Care Overhaul - Kaiser Family Foundation

Senate Finance Committee Chair Max Baucus (D-Mont.) on Wednesday said when the next Congress begins he will have a health care overhaul bill ready to bring to the floor, CQ Today reports. He said, "I'm guessing the first of the year, near the first of the year, we'll have a bill" (Armstrong, CQ Today, 12/10). Baucus added, "I want to get started, and there are going to be certain upfront costs related to health care reform, no question about that" (Cohn, CongressDaily, 12/10).

Obama won't delay push on healthcare - Boston Globe

President-elect Barack Obama said yesterday his administration would press ahead quickly on national healthcare reform despite the deep recession and soaring federal budget deficit.

Economist: Health Care Key To Stimulus - NPR

Uwe Reinhardt, professor of economics and public affairs at Princeton University, calls the health care sector the "strongest economic locomotive working for us." He estimates that by 2015, health care will be one-fifth the size of the U.S. economy and says this is a good time to expand health insurance coverage for the uninsured.