Health Care
Commentary
How government policy is killing independent medicine
Independent physicians are disappearing from American healthcare. Increasingly, the doctors patients see are employees of hospital systems or insurance conglomerates. Government policy is the reason for this wave of consolidation. Medicare’s reimbursement rules, payment advantages for hospitals, and distortions embedded in the federal 340B drug discount program have systematically weakened ...
Commentary
El-Sayed Promises Medicare for All, His Wife Opted Out
Abdul El-Sayed is riding high after his victory in Michigan’s Democratic Senate primary earlier this month. If victorious on Nov. 3, the Medicare for All champion could soon take his far-left health agenda to Washington. Before he does, he’ll need to reckon with an awkward contradiction in his pitch for ...
Commentary
Socialism polls better than it performs
Nearly 6 in 10 Democrats view socialism positively while less than a third say the same of capitalism, according to a new CBS News/YouGov poll. That’s an ominous sign for this fall’s midterm elections, as socialist ideas increasingly vie for mainstream prominence. Socialist health policies may promise universal access, but ...
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 ...
How government policy is killing independent medicine
Independent physicians are disappearing from American healthcare. Increasingly, the doctors patients see are employees of hospital systems or insurance conglomerates. Government policy is the reason for this wave of consolidation. Medicare’s reimbursement rules, payment advantages for hospitals, and distortions embedded in the federal 340B drug discount program have systematically weakened ...
El-Sayed Promises Medicare for All, His Wife Opted Out
Abdul El-Sayed is riding high after his victory in Michigan’s Democratic Senate primary earlier this month. If victorious on Nov. 3, the Medicare for All champion could soon take his far-left health agenda to Washington. Before he does, he’ll need to reckon with an awkward contradiction in his pitch for ...
Socialism polls better than it performs
Nearly 6 in 10 Democrats view socialism positively while less than a third say the same of capitalism, according to a new CBS News/YouGov poll. That’s an ominous sign for this fall’s midterm elections, as socialist ideas increasingly vie for mainstream prominence. Socialist health policies may promise universal access, but ...
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 ...