Medicaid
Commentary
Hillary Won the Nomination, But Bernie Won On Healthcare
Many pundits speculated that Hillary Clinton would devote a significant portion of her Democratic Convention speech to health care. But she dedicated just one sentence to the topic. The reason? Earlier in the week, Bernie Sanders had already laid out her campaign’s position. In exchange for her formal rival’s endorsement, ...
Sally C. Pipes
August 8, 2016
Commentary
A Better Way to Affordable, Quality Health Care
President Obama recently took to the Journal of the American Medical Association to defend his health-care law and recommend additional reforms. Among them? A government-run “public option” designed to compete against insurers on the exchanges. Instead of looking to increase the federal government’s role in health care yet again, he ...
Sally C. Pipes
August 1, 2016
Commentary
Don’t buy the ColoradoCare single payer snake oil
The good people of Colorado must be smoking something these days. That’s the only explanation for the decision by 156,000 of the state’s more than 3 million registered voters to endorse a November ballot initiative that would create a statewide single-payer health care system. Patients in single-payer systems elsewhere must ...
Sally C. Pipes
July 11, 2016
Commentary
Pulling The Plug On ObamaCare’s Life Support
Health insurance premiums have risen rapidly in the three years since the launch of ObamaCare’s exchanges, despite the law’s multibillion-dollar efforts to keep a lid on them. ObamaCare created three mechanisms for bailing out insurers if they lost too much money through the exchanges — the so-called risk corridor, risk ...
Sally C. Pipes
July 5, 2016
Commentary
High-risk pools: the life jacket U.S. health care needs
Obamacare guarantees all Americans health insurance. But it doesn’t guarantee that coverage will be affordable. That’s becoming a bit of a problem. This year, premiums were up an average of 8 percent. In many states, double-digit premium hikes were the norm. Next year, they’re likely to be even bigger, according ...
Sally C. Pipes
June 30, 2016
Commentary
The GOP’s Obamacare Replacement: Better Than Good
Last week, the GOP kept a promise to the American people by delivering a replacement plan for Obamacare. The plan — part of the party’s “A Better Way” campaign — was unveiled by House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wisc. “What we are laying out today is a first-time-in-six-years consensus by the ...
Sally C. Pipes
June 27, 2016
Commentary
Medicare Drug Reimbursement Cuts Are Backdoor Rationing
Imagine being denied treatment for cancer because Washington bureaucrats decided that a cutting-edge new therapy that could cure you just wasn’t “cost effective.” That’s already happening in Britain under its government-run health care system, the National Health Service. And Medicare officials are poised to bring similar policies here. The NHS’s ...
Sally C. Pipes
June 6, 2016
Commentary
Obamacare is Failing–On Purpose?
Obamacare’s exchanges could soon be out of health insurers. This month, UnitedHealth – the largest U.S. insurer — announced that it would no longer sell exchange plans in New Jersey in 2017. It has now withdrawn from 27 states. Last year, UnitedHealth lost about $475 million on the exchanges; this ...
Sally C. Pipes
May 31, 2016
Commentary
Bundled payments bad medicine for Medicare seniors
Medicare is changing the way it pays for seniors’ knee and hip replacements. That change could be awfully painful for patients. The new payment scheme pits doctors and patients against one another by punishing providers for excess costs — and rewarding them for denying access to more expensive, potentially better ...
Sally C. Pipes
May 18, 2016
California
No end in sight for higher Obamacare premiums
Weren’t health insurance premiums supposed to go down under Obamacare and its California exchange, Covered California? During his 2008 campaign for president, Barack Obama predicted that, in his administration, “we’ll lower premiums by up to $2,500 for a typical family per year.” Covered California premium increases the past two years ...
Sally C. Pipes
May 18, 2016
Hillary Won the Nomination, But Bernie Won On Healthcare
Many pundits speculated that Hillary Clinton would devote a significant portion of her Democratic Convention speech to health care. But she dedicated just one sentence to the topic. The reason? Earlier in the week, Bernie Sanders had already laid out her campaign’s position. In exchange for her formal rival’s endorsement, ...
A Better Way to Affordable, Quality Health Care
President Obama recently took to the Journal of the American Medical Association to defend his health-care law and recommend additional reforms. Among them? A government-run “public option” designed to compete against insurers on the exchanges. Instead of looking to increase the federal government’s role in health care yet again, he ...
Don’t buy the ColoradoCare single payer snake oil
The good people of Colorado must be smoking something these days. That’s the only explanation for the decision by 156,000 of the state’s more than 3 million registered voters to endorse a November ballot initiative that would create a statewide single-payer health care system. Patients in single-payer systems elsewhere must ...
Pulling The Plug On ObamaCare’s Life Support
Health insurance premiums have risen rapidly in the three years since the launch of ObamaCare’s exchanges, despite the law’s multibillion-dollar efforts to keep a lid on them. ObamaCare created three mechanisms for bailing out insurers if they lost too much money through the exchanges — the so-called risk corridor, risk ...
High-risk pools: the life jacket U.S. health care needs
Obamacare guarantees all Americans health insurance. But it doesn’t guarantee that coverage will be affordable. That’s becoming a bit of a problem. This year, premiums were up an average of 8 percent. In many states, double-digit premium hikes were the norm. Next year, they’re likely to be even bigger, according ...
The GOP’s Obamacare Replacement: Better Than Good
Last week, the GOP kept a promise to the American people by delivering a replacement plan for Obamacare. The plan — part of the party’s “A Better Way” campaign — was unveiled by House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wisc. “What we are laying out today is a first-time-in-six-years consensus by the ...
Medicare Drug Reimbursement Cuts Are Backdoor Rationing
Imagine being denied treatment for cancer because Washington bureaucrats decided that a cutting-edge new therapy that could cure you just wasn’t “cost effective.” That’s already happening in Britain under its government-run health care system, the National Health Service. And Medicare officials are poised to bring similar policies here. The NHS’s ...
Obamacare is Failing–On Purpose?
Obamacare’s exchanges could soon be out of health insurers. This month, UnitedHealth – the largest U.S. insurer — announced that it would no longer sell exchange plans in New Jersey in 2017. It has now withdrawn from 27 states. Last year, UnitedHealth lost about $475 million on the exchanges; this ...
Bundled payments bad medicine for Medicare seniors
Medicare is changing the way it pays for seniors’ knee and hip replacements. That change could be awfully painful for patients. The new payment scheme pits doctors and patients against one another by punishing providers for excess costs — and rewarding them for denying access to more expensive, potentially better ...
No end in sight for higher Obamacare premiums
Weren’t health insurance premiums supposed to go down under Obamacare and its California exchange, Covered California? During his 2008 campaign for president, Barack Obama predicted that, in his administration, “we’ll lower premiums by up to $2,500 for a typical family per year.” Covered California premium increases the past two years ...