Sally C. Pipes
Commentary
Obamacare counts insurance cards, not access to care
The latest federal report on Obamacare’s insurance exchanges has prompted an outcry from Democrats and Republicans alike. Released this summer by the Department of Health and Human Services, the study found that marketplace enrollment fell by roughly 3 million this year. It attributed as much as half of that decline ...
Commentary
The sneaky, unregulated dangers of copycat GLP-1 drugs
Federal regulators are turning up the heat on sellers of copycat weight-loss drugs. Earlier this summer, the Food and Drug Administration sent warning letters to dozens of companies marketing compounded GLP-1s over misleading advertising. That action is more than welcome. The growing trade in compounded GLP-1s continues to expose patients ...
Commentary
Why Hospital Prices Keep Rising—And How Competition Can Help
Prescription drug prices fell 3.1% over the past year, the sharpest annual decline in more than six decades, according to new data from the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics. Hospital prices, meanwhile, rose 5.2%. Yet the vast majority of Washington policymakers focus their time and attention on reducing drug prices, ...
Commentary
Senate Democrats Eyeing Public Option
Senate Democrats are once again laying the groundwork for a federal public option. Last week, Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and his fellow Democrats on the Senate Finance Committee released a request for information seeking ideas to expand health coverage — including creation of a government-run “public option” insurance plan. Its ...
Commentary
Why the DSA’s Medicare-for-All dream threatens us with a real-life nightmare
Single-payer health care is back on the political agenda, pushed by Democratic Socialists and their leftist allies as the answer to Americans’ frustrations with private medical insurers. But while excoriating insurance companies may be good politics, forcing everyone into a government insurance monopoly would be disastrous policy. Today’s insurance market ...
Commentary
The high cost of finding breast cancer too late
Using Medicare data on cancer patients aged 66 and older, researchers calculated that cancer-attributable medical costs averaged nearly $122,000 during the final year before a cancer death. Patients diagnosed after their cancers had already spread generally incurred the highest costs, while costs tended to be lower for earlier-stage disease. Breast ...
Commentary
Medicare’s Drug Price Controls Could Actually Raise Prices In The Long Run
Four years ago, on August 16, President Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act into law. Lawmakers promised that letting Medicare set drug prices would save taxpayers more than $100 billion over a decade. New research suggests the IRA may accomplish the opposite in the long run. A study by University ...
Commentary
CMS Undermining Next Generation of Medicines
Some of the biggest advances in medicine don’t come from discovering entirely new drugs. They come from making existing ones easier to take, faster to administer, safer, and more effective. A new proposal from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services could make those improvements far less common. The agency ...
Commentary
Medicare’s Drug-Pricing Proposal Carries A Hidden Cost
The Trump administration says it wants to accelerate medical innovation. Yet one new proposal from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services could do just the opposite. The agency has proposed a seemingly technical expansion of Medicare’s prescription drug price control scheme, which was created by the Inflation Reduction Act ...
Commentary
Before embracing Medicare for All, the U.S should look at Britain
American doctors already know how government payment works. Private insurers pay roughly twice what Medicare does. After inflation, Medicare physician payments have fallen 33% since 2001. Medicare for All would spread that underpayment across the entire healthcare system. Every physician would have to accept whatever Washington chose to pay. Patients ...
Obamacare counts insurance cards, not access to care
The latest federal report on Obamacare’s insurance exchanges has prompted an outcry from Democrats and Republicans alike. Released this summer by the Department of Health and Human Services, the study found that marketplace enrollment fell by roughly 3 million this year. It attributed as much as half of that decline ...
The sneaky, unregulated dangers of copycat GLP-1 drugs
Federal regulators are turning up the heat on sellers of copycat weight-loss drugs. Earlier this summer, the Food and Drug Administration sent warning letters to dozens of companies marketing compounded GLP-1s over misleading advertising. That action is more than welcome. The growing trade in compounded GLP-1s continues to expose patients ...
Why Hospital Prices Keep Rising—And How Competition Can Help
Prescription drug prices fell 3.1% over the past year, the sharpest annual decline in more than six decades, according to new data from the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics. Hospital prices, meanwhile, rose 5.2%. Yet the vast majority of Washington policymakers focus their time and attention on reducing drug prices, ...
Senate Democrats Eyeing Public Option
Senate Democrats are once again laying the groundwork for a federal public option. Last week, Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and his fellow Democrats on the Senate Finance Committee released a request for information seeking ideas to expand health coverage — including creation of a government-run “public option” insurance plan. Its ...
Why the DSA’s Medicare-for-All dream threatens us with a real-life nightmare
Single-payer health care is back on the political agenda, pushed by Democratic Socialists and their leftist allies as the answer to Americans’ frustrations with private medical insurers. But while excoriating insurance companies may be good politics, forcing everyone into a government insurance monopoly would be disastrous policy. Today’s insurance market ...
The high cost of finding breast cancer too late
Using Medicare data on cancer patients aged 66 and older, researchers calculated that cancer-attributable medical costs averaged nearly $122,000 during the final year before a cancer death. Patients diagnosed after their cancers had already spread generally incurred the highest costs, while costs tended to be lower for earlier-stage disease. Breast ...
Medicare’s Drug Price Controls Could Actually Raise Prices In The Long Run
Four years ago, on August 16, President Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act into law. Lawmakers promised that letting Medicare set drug prices would save taxpayers more than $100 billion over a decade. New research suggests the IRA may accomplish the opposite in the long run. A study by University ...
CMS Undermining Next Generation of Medicines
Some of the biggest advances in medicine don’t come from discovering entirely new drugs. They come from making existing ones easier to take, faster to administer, safer, and more effective. A new proposal from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services could make those improvements far less common. The agency ...
Medicare’s Drug-Pricing Proposal Carries A Hidden Cost
The Trump administration says it wants to accelerate medical innovation. Yet one new proposal from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services could do just the opposite. The agency has proposed a seemingly technical expansion of Medicare’s prescription drug price control scheme, which was created by the Inflation Reduction Act ...
Before embracing Medicare for All, the U.S should look at Britain
American doctors already know how government payment works. Private insurers pay roughly twice what Medicare does. After inflation, Medicare physician payments have fallen 33% since 2001. Medicare for All would spread that underpayment across the entire healthcare system. Every physician would have to accept whatever Washington chose to pay. Patients ...