March 22nd, 2010 by BobDoherty in Better Health Network, Health Policy
Tags: Health Policy, Healthcare reform, Senate Healthcare Bill
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As part of their closing argument against health reform, Republicans argue that Democrats who vote for the bill will be ignoring the will of the American people, at their own political peril. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell accuses Democrats of wanting “to plow ahead on a partisan bill Americans don’t want.” McConnell is correct that just about every recent poll shows that majorities of Americans dislike the current legislation. But supporters of the legislation counter that it really has more public support than a simple “for it or against it” poll would yield.
The Kaiser Family Foundation tracking poll finds that the country is evenly divided on the legislation, but large majorities support many of the major provisions in the bill. And when asked about the next steps for health reform:
32% said that Congress should “Move soon to pass the comprehensive legislation that has already been approved by the House and Senate.”
22% want to “Put healthcare on hold, so Congress can work on other priorities and try to deal with it later in the year.”
20% want to “Pull out a few key provisions where there is broad agreement and pass those, even though this won’t be comprehensive reform.”
19% want them to “stop working on healthcare” this year. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at The ACP Advocate Blog by Bob Doherty*
March 22nd, 2010 by Stanley Feld, M.D. in Better Health Network, Health Policy, Opinion
Tags: Congressman Paul Ryan, Healthcare Costs, Healthcare reform, Obamacare, Senate Healthcare Bill, Traditional Media
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By Stanley Feld MD, FACP, MACE
The traditional media is not discussing the economic consequences of President Obama’s healthcare reform program.
In these final days, traditional media is describing the horse race to the finish line for a deemed vote (“Slaughter rule”) vs. a partisan up and down vote on the Senate bill. The horse race is a distraction to avoid discussing the unintended consequences of the bill.
Congressman Paul Ryan is the Ranking Member of the House Budget Committee and senior member of the House Ways and Means Committee. His focus has been to bring fiscal discipline to federal spending. The House Ways and Means committee’s jurisdiction is tax policy, social security and healthcare. He has been addressing America’s long-term fiscal crisis and the dangers of explosive entitlement spending. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Repairing the Healthcare System*
March 22nd, 2010 by DrWes in Better Health Network, Health Policy, Opinion, True Stories
Tags: Cardiology, Health Insurance, Healthcare Systems, Heart, uninsured
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Being at the American College of Cardiology Scientific Sessions in Atlanta, Georgia, USA, I had a unique opportunity to meet with an interventional cardiologist from “across the pond” in England: Sarah Clarke, MD.
Sarah is a Consultant Interventional Cardiologist at Papworth Hospital, Cambridge UK. Her undergraduate years were spent at the University of Cambridge, UK and postgraduate training was undertaken in the region. She attained an MD from the Univeristy of Cambridge. She was awarded a Fellowship in Interventional Cardiology at the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, and returned to take up her Consultant post in the UK in 2002. In 2006 Dr Clarke was appointed the Clinical Director of Cardiac Services at Papworth. Papworth Hospital is a 240ish-bed hospital that performs about 2,000 interventional cardiology procedures per year.
We thought it would be interesting to compare and contrast two heart patients — one with insurance and one without insurance — from our two health care systems, to illustrate how these patients obtain health coverage, might be managed, and how things look from the patient’s perspective. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Dr. Wes*
March 22nd, 2010 by EvanFalchukJD in Better Health Network, Health Policy, Opinion
Tags: Healthcare Policy, Healthcare reform, Senate Healthcare Bill
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Since the 2000 Presidential election, and most especially since the world-changing events of October 17, 2004, I’ve known this: Don’t assume anything is over until it’s over. Still, I’m going to bed so I’m going to give you my six quick reactions to the healthcare reform plan, based on the assumption it’s about to get voted in:
UPDATE: I stayed up and it passed.
1. It’s Historic. It is, but mostly because people keep saying that it is. I mean the President of the United States has gambled most of what he’s got on this, so it’s one for the history books in that sense. Still, a health care program that was truly historic would be something like taking all of the uninsured and just enrolling them immediately in Medicare. This plan doesn’t come anywhere close to doing that. Much of what is meant to deal with the serious problem of the uninsured doesn’t start for years, and is going to be handled through a complicated mechanism that may not even work. I suspect the history-making part of this will have to do more with the political fortunes of the Democrats and President than American health care. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at See First Blog*
March 22nd, 2010 by Debra Gordon in Better Health Network, Health Policy, Opinion
Tags: Government-run Healthcare, Health Insurance, Healthcare Costs, Healthcare reform, Medicare
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My alarm clock is set to “radio” and my radio is set to the local NPR station. Now, I’m not one of those people who leaps out of bed when the alarm goes off. Instead, I lie in bed slowly waking up to about 15 or 20 minutes of the morning news.
This morning however, the news just made me want to pull the covers over my head and never get out of bed. That’s because the focus was healthcare reform, and the amount of misinformation — and, yes, I have to say it: stupidity — out there about what the current proposals will or won’t do is making me literally sick to my stomach. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at A Medical Writer's Musings on Medicine and Health Care*
