In his latest weekly address to the Nation, U.S. President Barack Obama reaffirmed his commitment to passing health care reform this year. “It would be irresponsible to not act,” the President said. “We can’t keep shifting a growing burden to future generations.” He also announced that his administration is proposing an additional $313 billion in [...]
Senator Kennedy’s draft health plan has been released and it is much as expected: Individual’s would be required to buy health insurance, insurers would be required to cover everyone (even those with pre-existing conditions), people who are even nominally poor would get subsidies to help them pay their policies. It sounds like heaven until you [...]
Should the U.S. government create a new public health plan that competes with independent insurance companies? That’s probably the most hotly debated issue in the current health care reform negotiations on Capital Hill, and last week both President Obama and Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said “yes.” According to a Wall Street Journal [...]
Health care costs keep going up. More Americans with insurance will be expected to pay a bigger share of their healthcare costs this year and going forward. The number of uninsured has also been rising over the years, but recent blog posts by health care industry insiders suggest this problem is much worse than the official numbers suggest. Patients need to take steps such as budgeting for anticipated costs and talking about prices with doctors and hospitals.
Obama’s 2010 budget proposes more than $630 billion for reforming the health care system. $20 billion or so has been pledged for health information technology. Health IT firms are scrambling for that money. Consumers would gain if this pushes doctors and hospitals to adopt online medical records and e-prescribing.
